Justine’s Blog

A very tired but happy yeah from Amukta island. Today ( or rather yesterday at just before midnight) Sarah and I landed on a boulder beach in the dark after a 47 nautical mile paddle across Amukta pass, the biggest crossing of our Aleutian Adventure. The pass itself was 37 miles with a bit of extra paddling from and to beaches. It’s now 2am and we’ve just finished putting the tent up, cooking dinner etc. We were 16 hours in the kayaks, long enough that it still feels like the ground is swaying under me. We had great conditions for the crossing, light winds that were mostly helpful and currents which didn’t do anything predictable but which were overall more help than hindrance. That was all after breakfast on the Tiglax fish and wildlife ship who came along to say Hi. I’ll write more tomorrow. .. After a long sleep!

Today’s highlight for me was walking up to the snow line on the lava hills behind our camp. Spongy mosses started out underfoot, soon replaced by clumps of mostly dead grass then just sharp black lava fragments, with just a few hardy plants getting a foot hold in the sea of black. At 500 metres, snow joined the party and the view became black and white stripes, with 2 white volcanic cones poking out on top.

Tomorrow’s treat will be a visit from the Tiglax ( which means eagle in Aleut). This US Fish and wildlife service boat is on it’s way to Adak and the captain Billy Pepper has offered to call in on us bright and early and take us on board for a shower and breakfast! After that we’ll make our way 8 miles to the eastern tip of the island and camp, ready for the 37 nautical mile crossing to Amukta island on Saturday. Unless of course the forecast changes and then we might go for the crossing tomorrow after a hearty breakfast!

Follow our progress here

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We are still at our lovely beach at Lava Cove. Our neighbors the white caps were joined today by 2 fat sea lions who spent most of the day plonked on the other end of the beach, stirring only to scratch an ear with a flipper or pick a short fight with each other. At one point an eagle flew over scanning the sea for fish and I got a photo with the eagle and sea lions in the same shot. Since I had to point out the tiny dot that was the eagle to Sarah, I don’t think it’s going to be an award winning photo!

Today we mostly relaxed in the sun, and of course ate. Sarah rustled up some powdered mashed potato into potato cakes for lunch which were particularly yummy. As was the hot chocolate we made by melting a bar of chocolate into some powdered milk. It seems we have more bars of chocolate than we have chocolate powder! All this elaborate camping food might seem excessive to some but why not bring some delicious things along instead of all dehydrated meals? Food is our engine and it’s also a great morale booster and an activity on a day off paddling.

I haven’t seen tonight’s forecast from Karel at kayakweather.com yet but if it’s the same as last nights then Saturday looks good for our next crossing. For now, in curling up with “where the sea breaks it’s back” , an excellent book that Michael Livingston sent to Sarah about the naturalist Georg Steller’s role in the exploration of Alaska.

To see our progress and follow our tracker visit Sarahs page here

No alarms were set this morning as we knew it would be too windy for our next paddle which is a 37 nautical mile crossing. I woke up when the sun warmed the tent and enjoyed laying in my cosy sleeping bag for a bit longer. It was great to come outside and take in the gorgeous expanse of black sand surf beach framed on either end by short, steep lava flows, with the snowy peak of a volcano just visible in the distance.

Last night when we arrived late, I discovered a crucial bit of our excellent optimus nova stove was missing. The top bowl of metal which spreads the heat must have fallen off when I was packing the stove that morning (possibly because I was watching the sea lions at the time?) or if it fell off after that, we can’t find it. I managed to boil enough water for dinner using a square of foil from the heat shield as a replacement. On the list of jobs for tomorrow is to try to make a more permanent replacement from the lid of a tin can but for today we enjoyed making a fire and cooking everything on that. I set myself the challenge of lighting it using just dried grass and driftwood from the beach, and my firestick that makes sparks. Within a few minutes we had a roaring fire and the kettle was on which I was excited about ( Thanks Patrick from Backwoods survival for showing us how). Sarah jubilantly got out her machete and saw and started producing batons to burn. While I woul d have
made do with driftwood of all shapes and sizes, it was easy having the batons there ready to go and I know Sarah really enjoyed playing with her toys!

First use for the fire was pancakes with freeze dried Black currants (yum). Then we heated up hot water and washed body, hair and thermals. Lunch was home made dough made into pizzas. We took a break for a beautiful walk to three impressive 30 metre waterfalls streaming down over a black lava flow, sending spray flying sideways, and forming small rainbows. Lots of little birds tweeted away everywhere we walked and some stood still for photos. The ground is so spongy here, it’s packed with mosses and small wiry plants. It feels very healthy and alive. Sarah even found a Japanese glass fishing float on the beach!

Back to the fire and dinner was a delicious lentil stew with beach greens picked from a few metres away ( Thanks Crystal and Danny for showing us you can eat them). Desert was 3 marshmallows each roasted. .. We don’t have many so we had to ration them! Now I’m laying in the tent about to go to sleep and hoping tomorrow is as sunny. At the moment, the forecast is looking too windy to move to the next island until possibly Saturday so we are in a nice spot to be stuck. Before then, we may move 8 miles to the easternmost point on this island where the pilot says “there is a fair landing North of the neck”. If it is somewhere we could land and camp then we’d be knocking 8 miles off an already long day to Amukta island.