Justine’s Blog

The radio towers and derelict buildings of the former village stood high on the hill in front of us. We’d weaved around football fields of jumbled pack ice for 6 hours and were only 1km away from Killiniq but now a low flat shelf of ice blocked our path. Aborted attempts to go around it brought us back to the same 30 metre wide slab of sea ice with blue sea twinkling tantalizingly beyond. While I was wondering if the thin ice pan could take our weight, Frank jumped out onto it so fast that I didn’t see how he did it. He later told us that 2 inch thick ice will hold a man’s weight and he reckoned the pan was at least 8 inches thick, even on the crumbling edges. The rest of us were less sure. JF went first and paddled at the floe as fast as he could, his bow rising over the ice to about front hatch Level before it started to slide back into the sea. Frank grabbed his kayak and pulled it onto the ice, followed by Larry’s and mine. On the seal launch off the other side, my bow got stuck on another pan and when I tried to reverse off it my rudder jammed into the berg I’d just left. I could feel how thick the ice was as I struggled to free myself.

The ice was moving all the time, blown by the fresh westerly wind, pushed by the currents and jostled by each other. A passage through one minute was gone the next. I was last in our group weaving through a narrow corridor and I watched as 2 ice floes slid together in slow motion and closed the door to clear water right in front of me. I tried to bully my way through but was no match for several tonnes of frozen water. I backed off fearing my kayak might get crushed. Frank lept out onto the ice again and pulled me through. He told us he had walked a lot on similar ice when he rowed the northwest passage.

Safely through, we made our way to the former Inuit community of port burwell on Killiniq island. We’d been told there was an older freezer building that we could camp in and we were delighted to find it close to the water. Claw marks and an almost bashed in door showed us we weren’t the first to try to gain entry and reinforced why we wanted to sleep in there. We pried open the door, swept the floor of broken glass and moved in with our 4 kayaks and 2 tents. Larry and JF fixed the door with some old nails and set up a locking system in case any bears come by.

jF and I went for a walk around the former village, peering into the old generator building with rusty equipment, a workshop containing a rusty bulldozer and lots of rotting houses. Over 100 empty barrels of fuel lie piled on top of each other near a tip of wood and metal A fairly new satellite dish and communication antenna day higher up on the hill. The view from the village is gorgeous, looking towards McLean strait where we hope to find a way through the ice tomorrow. Everyone in the village was relocated in the 1970s and I wonder about their lives. JF and I met someone who grew up here where we paddled from Kuujjuaq to Saluit in 2017. I wonder which crumbling house was his.

It’s a great trip. Full of adventure. The ice today wasn’t really scary, but exciting. No bears yet. Let’s see what tomorrow brings.

Larrys alarm went off at 2.30am as he wanted extra time to get packed and enjoy his coffee. Frank got up too and I dozed on and off through the pzzzz of deflating mattresses, the crunch of dry bags being tightly packed and patter of feet on the floor. All too soon JFs watch buzzed loudly by my ear. Surely that wasn’t 30 minutes already? We leapt into action; Jf packing away the sleeping stuff, me priming the stove for breakfast. The four of us moved the almost empty kayaks 200 metres down a path of sharp rocks and packed them at the waters edge. Mine still seems full to the brim even after eating 5 days worth of food. 90 minutes later, we pushed off close to high water, relieved to see that the semicircle of rapids that guards the bay was almost covered by the sea. We each choose a channel through shallow boulders and practiced our river running skills for 50 metres. Frank got caught up briefly on a boulder but skillfully pushed himself off.

Once in the open bay, a brisk wind whipped up the sea into short choppy waves. My mapcase was flung up into the air. Cats paws raced across the surface in the strongest gusts. Happily it was blowing from behind us and pushed us enthusiastically along our way. We had a maze of hundreds of islands, rocks, reefs and icebergs to find our way through. Navigating was challenging as the maps and charts don’t show accurately how much land dries out at low tide so we don’t know which channels between islands will be dead ends. There are so many rocks that aren’t on the chart that it’s tricky to know where you are. Hundreds of Icebergs caught up on shallow ground blocked our vision and sometimes our path. They were all around us today, some flat low white tables, others sculpted into beautiful glistening blue ornaments. We stopped to take photos of ones that had melted to look like a whale tail or the loch ness monster.

We didnt want to go too far out and around everything but we’re afraid of getting stuck on the inside and having to back track against the wind and current. In the end we skirted most of the islands, spending all day miles from the mainland. We were on the look out for bears amongst the ice. We haven’t seen any yet but we are getting to the area where they like to hang out. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see our first one tomorrow when we hope to get to kiliniq near the northern tip of Labrador.

After 40km we came closer to shore and scanned the sharp rocky cliffs for a possible campsite. We thought we saw a beach but as we got closer, it was a sand colored ramp of rock on a reef. Poking our nose into a wide rocky bay, we spotted a beige curve at one end. I tried to stop the excitement building at the sight of a steep sand beach. What if it was just another illusion? JF was less restrained and started yelping with delight at finding an oasis amongst all the rock. “Wow look at that beach. It’s the shortest and easiest portage ever in Ungava bay”. Then the excitement went up a level, “A cabin ! Look! There’s a cabin”.

It was indeed a beach. We pulled the kayaks up and clambered up the sand and gravel and over a berm to a flat plateau behind. The news about the cabin was less favorable. It was once a large building with three separate rooms and two wood burners. Now, one wall is missing, all the windows are empty and the roof is sagging and spewing thick insulation. It would offer no protection from bears. We set up camp at the top of the beach, had a wander up a hill to look down on our red hilleberg tents, and the vast Arctic landscape. I’m about to finish the first night watch shift. It’s 10pm and the sky is alive with the most glorious reeds and blues from the setting Sun. Another good day.

The orange glow in the sky lit up the ice bergs that were beached on the rocks. We can see well enough to paddle at 2am, I noted! I think this is the earliest I’ve ever got up to paddle but it doesn’t make that much difference when it’s barely dark for a couple of hours a night and when we went to bed at 6pm! We rub the sleep from our eyes, cook and shovel down some oatmeal, pack up our sleeping stuff from the cabin and carry the kayaks 100 metres over some smooth rocks to the ocean. We are leaving close to high tide, hence our early morning. During the night, heavy rain drummed on the cabin roof, I woke just long enough to feel glad I wouldn’t have to pack away a wet tent and to hope it had stopped by morning. I was in luck and we launched onto a barely rippled sea under a pink and blue sky dotted with cotton wool clouds. It was one of those mornings where we should have made great progress with a favorable current and a gentle breeze behind us but someone stopped every few minutes to take another photo or video clip. Just when you thought you were done, another sculpted ice berg appeared glinting in the early morning sun.

It was classic Ungava bay geography today. The coast is all fairly even height, an endless low rocky ridge with a few undulations. The bare rock is light tan colored below the high tide mark and stained black with lichen above it. we lost sight of shore for half of the day, forced ever outward by hectare after hectare of reef, skirting a rock wall that guided us several kilometers from the mainland. The winds gradually picked up and joined forces with the current to give us a good push in the right direction. We landed after almost 6 hours as the favorable current faded out and had lunch on a Rocky shore at 9.30am! Scanning the map ahead, Frank noticed another cabin 18km ahead that Felix had told us about. The thought of another full night of sleep was all the motivation we needed to push on, out and around more offshore reefs, almost through a beautiful gully filled with giant ice bergs. We paddled into Bray inlet, scanning for the cabin. Jf spotted it and we happily powered towards it only to find a 400 metre wide, 1.5 metres tall rapid barring our entrance any further into the bay. We found a spot where we could carry the kayaks 50 metres over a low rubbly rock wall and spent an hour getting ourselves and all our gear the last 200 metres to the cabin. But it was worth it. It’s windy enough to keep all but the hardiest bugs away. Frank cooked over a fire, we had a relaxing few hours sorting out gear and we worked out if we leave close to high water tomorrow we should be able to paddle right over the rapids.

We finished paddling at 11.30 this morning which might make us sound lazy. But the alarm went off at 3.30am and we were paddling away before 5am. We set up our tents inside our tiny cabin last night, fly sheets almost touching, to protect ourselves from the many mosquitoes who appeared for the first time yesterday afternoon. They were celebrating the sun which appeared with a flourish and warmed our bones, bronzed our faces, dried our gear and charged our batteries. I flew my drone to see where the nearest water source was ( at least that’s my excuse) and JF and I went for a short hike to fill the water bladders. The msr gravity filter system worked great. We wandered around and enjoyed the rolling grey and green tundra speckled with blue ponds of various shapes and sizes.

Today a fresh wind behind us nudged us on our way, past endless low mounds of rock; long pointy islands, big black domes, and small smooth tan colored rocks that will be hidden by a rising tide. There’s not a tree to be seen and only dwarf plants like juniper, Heather and Labrador tea can get a foot hold. As we head north we see more and more ice. Offshore is a large bank of white, maybe a big chunk of sea ice from the winter that hasn’t broken up yet. We paddle past car size icebergs beached on islands, sparkling in the sun. They are getting bigger and more frequent. We stopped early today after 30km because there’s another cabin here. This time a bright red one, well maintained and mosquito and mice free. It’s on a tiny island with a Stella view of other craggy isles rimmed with glimmering ice. It’s the last cabin we will pass for 4 or 5 days so we’re making the most of feeling secure from the bears and getting a full nights sleep without being on watch. We’ll leave early again tomorrow close to high tide so we don’t have far to walk and we can make the most of the ebb current which flows north.

Morale is good. IT’s been Sunny the last 2 days until about an hour ago when it turned overcast and cold. We all put 2 jackets on! Time to cook dinner and get an early night!