Author: Justine

There’s a bear, JF pointed into the sun in the next valley. I eventually saw the big, squat shape lumbering away from us a few hundred metres distant. But its black, i said. Its definitely a bear, JF reiterated. The binoculars confirmed a blacky brown coloured bear, a massive one, but the low sun and the distance made it impossible to see details. They do get black bears in this area occasionally, maybe it was a black bear, or an unusual coloured polar bear? I guess we’ll never know.

It was a great day for wildlife. We were land bound for the 2nd day in a row but today was sunny and much more exploring friendly. A short lunchtime walk brought us to a fox den, with 2 red colored foxes with big bushy tails scampering around on a lush patch of green grass. We watched a young carribou nervously make its way towards the nutritious feast, his eyes on the tiny red mammal guarding it’s territory. The ungulate made a casual circuitous route to get closer to the grass. He got within a few metres, probably drooling already, before a small movement from the tiny fox had him taking off and settling for the shorter darker grass up the valley.

In an evening walk we saw the foxes again and then our mystery black bear. It’s time for an early night now. The wind has dropped a lot, its still a headwind but probably only around 10 knots. The forecast is for a switch to SE tomorrow so wee well wake up at 3am and if there are no whitecaps against us we’ll launch and hope for a long day covering lots of miles. 2 bad weather days has meant that we have only 4 days to get to Salluit which is about 150km away, and we need to get there on 1st August in time to organise our stuff and get to a postoffice! Fingers crossed for that SE wind tomorrow.

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I didn’t even look out of the tent when the alarm went off this morning. I just went straight back to sleep – or tried to through the sounds of the rain pelting and the wind blasting the thin fabric enclosing us. JF did the same without the need to communicate. It was miserable out there and too windy to make any worthwhile progress.

When our bladders finally demanded we brave the elements, the white caps on the sea against us confirmed our choice. Back to bed until well after noon when it was our stomachs turn to force us out of our warm cocoon. Pizza for lunch, a few jobs and back to the cosy red tent. Total exploration today was as far as the bathroom, kitchen and water supply. It’s nice to have a chilled day off chatting and recuperating. A long trip like this makes you reflect on life and it’s powerful. Despite that, we hope that the bad weather passes sooner than forecast (tomorrow is also due to be windy from an unfavorable direction). The alarm will go off at 3am tomorrow just in case, and it remains to be seen whether it gets the same treatment.

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I was going to be uncomfortably hot in my drysuit this morning. The sun was beating down on a calm day, my watch read 17 degrees C, sheer luxury for the Arctic, and dare I say it, almost too hot for my Kokatat drysuit and onesie. 8 hours later the watch says 5 degrees, it’s raining, and visibility is reduced to about 5 miles distant. Inbetween times we enjoyed a 5 hour stint with a fantastic 10-15 knot wind pushing us along nicely. The conditions are always changing here.

Yesterday we enjoyed a wonderful day off. The first one we’d had for at least 10 days. The weather was beautiful, sunny and calm but we needed a break from paddling all the time. We relaxed, ate well and went for a nice walk on the tundra, seeing lots of carribou. 2 lovely big rackers were grazing right by out tent this morning when we woke up.

We made up for our day off today distancewise, covering 59km in a little under 10 hours. The tidal range in Hudson Strait is much less than Ungava Bay but we still need to pay attention as it’s still up to 5.7 metres. We paddled along one 3km channel between an island and the mainland with baited breath today. Although our maps marked it as not drying, they are not that reliable. We’re now camped in a pretty valley with a beach covered in seaweed. I have my fingers crossed for the rain to stop overnight.

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Our day got most interesting when we stopped paddling! A green canoe with an engine approached the small bay we’d just landed in. Dora, her husband Putulik and their 10 year old daughter Mariam were on a day trip from their home in Wakeham Bay looking for caribou to hunt. They invited us to come with them on their boat a few km up the coast to a good fishing spot. JFs eyes lit up… We quickly pulled the kayaks above the high water mark and jumped into the boat, sitting besides fishing rods, guns, coolers and warm clothes. Dora was really chatty, telling us about the local way of life and asking us questions.

The wind really picked up as we arrived at the river mouth. We all tried casting, and JF very happily landed a nice arctic char. He proudly tried eating it the Inuit way, at least the way that Tommy and Annie ate theirs in Quaqtaq. He but straight into the raw flesh. I had a taste too, it was very tender but I prefer it cooked!

After 30 minutes or so, we we called over to a picnic. The coolers were opened to reveal everything from locally smoked fish to Tim Hortons donuts. We were encouraged to help ourselves to whatever we wanted multiple times. We were even treated to some wine, our first alcohol for 3 weeks. The kindness of the people we are meeting here is very warming and we ares very grateful to Dora and her family for sharing their experience with us.

Prior to that, it was another hot sunny day with very little wind. We treated ourselves to an extra 90 minutes sleep this morning and felt well rested and strong on the water. We covered about 26 nautical miles along another beautiful rocky coastline with lots of outlying islands. But it’s people we met that will stick in our memory of today.

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