CHAPTER XIX
KATAKTOVICK AND I START FOR SIBERIA
With our sledge loaded with supplies, which included forty-eight days’ food for ourselves and thirty for the dogs, we shook hands all round and Kataktovick and I were off on our journey to the Siberian coast. McKinlay accompanied us for a short distance along the way. It was a hundred and nine miles in an air line from the southernmost point of Wrangell Island across to Siberia, but first we must go around the shore of the island, and the journey across the ice, like all ice travel, would not be, to say the least, exactly in a straight line. To have gone along the shore to the northwest and on around the western end of the island would have cut off some distance but Kerdrillo had already covered part of the coast that way and by going east and south I could look for traces of the missing parties in that direction.
Shortly after McKinlay left us, about half a mile from the camp, we were assailed by increasing blasts of the northwest wind, which swirled the drifting snow about us and prevented our seeing more than a hundred yards. We followed thecrest of Icy Spit to the main shore and then continued along the line of the coast. At times we could not see more than a dozen yards ahead of us and the wind kept on increasing in violence. The travelling, however, so far as the going under foot was concerned, was very good, because the snow was hard and windswept. We followed the lagoons down to Bruch Spit and then kept close alongshore, inside of the heavy grounded floes. On our way we passed quantities of stranded drift-wood. At 6.30P. M.we stopped near Skeleton Island and built our igloo for the night.
When we started to use our tea boiler, after we had finished our igloo and crawled inside, we found that in some unaccountable manner a small hole had opened in the bottom, though I had tried out this boiler the last thing before I left the camp. So I made use of a device which I had learned when I was a little boy in Newfoundland. One Saturday, I remember, we went berry-picking and took along a great iron boiler to cook our dinner in. When we came to use the boiler we found there was a crack in it so that it leaked. We had with us some hard Newfoundland biscuit and my Grandmother Bartlett soaked a couple of pounds of these biscuit, plastered them inside the boiler over the crack and made it all tight. Another time I was going up to Labrador in our steam launch. It wasearly in the season and we had to go through a good deal of loose ice; by and by the bow struck a piece of ice and sprang a-leak. I had about sixty-five pounds of these biscuit on board; we built a dam up in the bow and put the biscuit in it; when they got well saturated with the incoming water they made a kind of cement wall that stopped the leak and saved the day. So now when I found that our tea-boiler was leaking, I remembered these boyhood experiences, and chewing up a small piece of the ship’s biscuit which we had with us, I plastered it over the bottom of the boiler and we were able to use it without further difficulty.
At the first crack of dawn the next morning, we broke camp, had our breakfast and started on our way again. The wind was still blowing a gale from the northwest and the snow drifted around us, as it had the day before. We followed along the shore, keeping a sharp lookout for traces of the lost parties. Little or no driftwood was to be seen along here; in fact, high cliffs came down to the water’s edge and left no beach for driftwood to lodge. At 11A. M.we passed Hooper Cairn, which was built by a party from the U. S. Revenue-cutterCorwinin August, 1881. The cairn, as I could see, was still intact, though I did not go up on the edge of the cliff to examine it. The only animal life that we saw all day was a raven anda lemming; we saw no bear tracks, old or new. As we went along under the high cliffs the wind at times would come sweeping down a gorge in terrific squalls that almost lifted us off our feet and whirled the snow down from the mountain-sides in huge drifts. This cloud of snow, constantly enveloping the island, was the thing that had prevented us from seeing it on our way in from Shipwreck Camp, until we were comparatively close to it. With the snow came myriad particles of sand and pieces of soft shale from the face of the cliff that cut like a knife. The dogs were pulling fairly well and we had no difficulty in getting along. At half past five we built our igloo and turned in.
When we started again at dawn on the twentieth the northwest gale and the blinding snowdrift were still with us. We had camped only a few miles from Rodgers Harbor and after crossing the spit which forms the south side of the harbor we went on over the ice in the harbor and followed the shore around to find out definitely whether any one had made a landing there. There were no traces of man to be seen.
It had been my intention to go as directly as possible from Rodgers Harbor across Long Strait to Cape North on the Siberian coast, but when we got out on the ice I found that on account of thefact that the water here was deep near the shore great pieces of ice had been pressed in, with high rafters, between which were masses of soft, deep snow. We spent some time trying to find a way through and to make a road for the sledge to travel over but finally decided that too many hours would thus be consumed and kept on to the westward, still following the shore-line. That night, with the darkness upon us, we built our igloo about a mile to the westward of Hunt Point. We had been on the march since early morning, but had accomplished little, excepting to find out that we should be unable to make a trail out over the ice at this point.
We broke camp the next day at early dawn. The wind was now coming from the east and the drifting snow whirled about us in clouds. Along here it was a toss-up whether it would be better to go along the sea-ice or travel on the land; the ice was piled in on the shore and so badly raftered that we had to use the pickaxe constantly, besides being drifted deep with soft snow, in which the dogs and sledge made heavy going and we ourselves on our snowshoes had much ado to pick our way along, and yet when we tried the land we found that the wind had blown the rocks bare of snow, which made hard going for the sledge. The dogs were not working so well, and when we made our igloo at dark we had finished a day’s hard work that hadhad many discouraging features about it. We had been compelled to go as carefully as possible to conserve our energy and yet, work as we might, we did not seem to be getting any nearer a point of departure for Siberia, and of course the farther west we now went along the southern shore of Wrangell Island the longer would be our eastward journey when once we reached the mainland.
Consequently, after we took up our journey the next morning we made another effort to find a way out through the rafters and the deep snow. About noon we had to abandon the attempt and turn back to the land; on the way back we broke one of the runners of the sledge and had to stop for about two hours to repair it. When we finally reached the land again we found better going, after we had followed the shore-line westward for a little while, and as we approached the mouth of Selfridge Bay we found it improving more and more. We got out on the ice along shore and found the way easier than it had been before, so that we were able to get to Blossom Point before we camped. The sky was overcast all day and the light was very bad. While Kataktovick was building the igloo at night I went on ahead for some distance and found that the going was getting still better.
The next morning we started out over the ice. Shortly after we left our camp we broke our sledgeagain but Kataktovick soon had it repaired. While he was working on it, I went ahead with the pickaxe. We got under way again and worked through the raftered ice all day long, making the road much of the way. Ahead of us, beyond the edge of the raftered ice, we could see that the air was filled with condensation, indicating the presence of open water and showing that the ice outside the raftered ice must be moving under the impetus of the high, westerly wind. Just before dark we almost reached the edge of the still ice, about five miles from land. Here we found a very high rafter which, though not very wide, would nevertheless retard us for two hours while we completed the road. Once we were out on the running ice, as we should be by the next day, we should have much easier going, though we should undoubtedly have a great deal of open water to contend with. We made our igloo on the raftered ice. I was wearing snow-goggles and though I slept in them, so that I could get my eyes well accustomed to them, my left eye was now paining me a good deal. From the time we left Blossom Point I never again in our journey got a sight of Wrangell Island, on account of the overcast sky and the drifting snow.
On March 24 we started at dawn as usual and were not long in working our way through the rough going in the rafter out upon the running ice.The westerly gale kept the ice in constant motion and Kataktovick did not like this, but we had the satisfaction of knowing that the open water meant seal and seal in turn meant bear, either of which would be valuable additions to our food supply. In fact, just before I slid down from the outer rafter on to the running ice, I saw two seal in a lead.