Banner
Islands of the Four Mountains Print E-mail
Written by Jon Bowermaster   
Friday, 27 June 2008 11:31
It's difficult to find more exposed sea kayaking than in the heart of the Aleutian Islands, the chain of 150 rocky atolls strung like a necklace between Kamchatka, Siberia, and Alaska. Last summer, four of us—Barry Tessman, Sean Farrell, Scott McGuire and myself—spent a month on a National Geographic sponsored trip, paddling around and among a small group of Aleutian islands—the poetically named Islands of the Four Mountains-1,000 miles southwest of Anchorage. Five snowcapped, volcanic peaks, rising to 6,000 feet straight out of the sea, they sit astride the junction of the Bering Sea and Pacific Ocean, a spot historically known as "the Birthplace of the Winds," where the war between water and land is never-ending.

This was no leisurely paddle down Baja, no casual seaside crossing. (Alaska is most likely an abbreviation of Unalaska, derived from the original Aleut word "agunalaksh," which means "the shores where the sea breaks its back.") Every second we were on the water, every stroke we took, was purposely targeted toward getting back to land quickly, and safely. Far from rescue, locked in cold, raging seas, this beautiful, stark setting was the last place you wanted to make a mistake. Dropped off on June 13 at the north end of Kagamil, we were greeted by a thick fog. Later that day strong winds and rain blew the fog away but hours later it was back—thicker, wetter and colder than before. Exactly the conditions we expected.

Other than the region's notoriety for bad weather, we knew little about the place. Few do. One-hundred-mile plus winds are common. The channels separating the islands are renowned for unpredictability. Ten-foot standing tide rips concerned us, as did the lurking threat of earthquakes and volcanoes.

Less than a handful have kayaked these waters since the Aleuts disappeared from the islands a couple hundred years ago. (It was the Aleut's sophisticated baidarkas that served as forerunners for the top-of-the-line, 22-foot fiberglass/Kevlar/carbon Necky kayaks we paddled.) Certainly no one for centuries has made the crossings we would be attempting. Difficult to reach, yet incredibly beautiful when the strong, constant winds occasionally blow away the fog and storms, there is little reason other than insatiable curiosity to come this far. We were lured by a secondary mystery: The Aleuts consider these islands—particularly Kagamil—to be the birthplace of the Aleutian people. They buried their dead here, mummified, adding a strong hint of spirituality to the place.

This was expeditionary paddling at its utmost. Simply making the crossings in our heavily loaded boats—on the days we weren't pinned down in our tents by wind and rain—was a major concern. Unlike a big mountaineering trip, with the accompanying Sherpas and tons of gear, we had no base camp. We carried everything we needed—food, paddling and climbing gear, emergency and first aid equipment, mountains of camera gear—each time we paddled. We couldn't risk leaving anything behind in case the violent storms we anticipated came up without notice, separating us from our lifeline.

The middle of the Bering Sea is no place to spend time in the water. In practice, these big tandem boats, weighing between 700 and 800 pounds when loaded, could be rolled back up if we tipped over. But that's more theory than reality. The likelihood was that if we ended up swimming we would need to get out of the water in less than five minutes before hypothermia began to slow our hearts and kill us. We each wore strobe lights on our PFDs and each boat carried an emergency beacon, but we jokingly dubbed them "cadaver locators." The closest rescue would come out of Dutch Harbor, 150 miles away. By the time any distress signal was picked up, the beacon-carrier would most likely be dead. Each morning I measured the temperature of the ocean; it ran between 35 and 38 degrees. Air temps were in the low 40s, with steady winds of at least 10 mph, making the wind chill in the mid-20s. Not the best weather for a swim.

On our second day we attempted our first crossing—2.5 miles between Kagamil and Uliaga islands. As we pushed off the beach I was nervous. We were headed into thick fog. It was the first time I'd worn neoprene gloves while using an ultra-light, carbon-fiber paddle—the result was that I could get no grip on the paddle, nor purchase on the ocean. I realized too that my foot pegs were badly adjusted, my knees crammed high into the fiberglass. Scott and I paddled up alongside Barry and Sean, but they were against any kind of retreat for a refitting. "This is the best test imaginable," shouted Barry, the strong wind whipping water off his paddle.

On our fourth day we were still camped at our drop-off point. We'd hoped to head south this day, along the western edge of Kagamil. But not paddling proved to be the best call. Among everything we carried out there, patience may have been our most valuable asset. The plan had been to leave the black sand beach at 11 a.m. We hoped to round Candlestick Point and then slide down the west side of the island, staying within 150 feet of the shoreline. We expected it would take three to four hours in our heavily loaded boats to reach the southern end of the island, hopefully with the wind at our backs.

Departure was delayed until 1:30, as it took seemingly forever to pack our boats. A major problem was the 50 pounds of extra food, especially the bags of rice, pasta and 16 days worth of freeze-dried. It—and Barry's big mound of camera gear—proved difficult to squeeze into the already heavy boats. As the afternoon ticked by, the winds picked up. Scott and I watched the pass separating Kagamil and Uliaga and we could see the whitecaps growing with the naked eye. What we could not see, and could not predict, was what the seas and winds were doing around Candlestick Point.

With winds now blowing from several directions at once, and given the lateness of our start, we were concerned that we would get to the point and start heading south, only to find conditions raging, a fierce wind blowing in our face, or out to sea. If we took off in these heavily loaded boats and were forced to turn back, we might not be able to retreat and could end up sleeping on a pile of rocks or be pummeled against cliff walls. Our next possible camp was eight miles away. "I think we've missed our window of opportunity," Scott said, as we watched a williwaw blow a horizontal band of sea spray in a quarter mile line, half a mile offshore.

"The window has actually just been slammed shut," I added a few minutes later when a gust nearly picked up one of the loaded kayaks. Presented with the notion of resetting camp, Barry and Sean agreed. This was our first glimpse of real Aleutian weather, our first real opportunity to make a decision about whether to move or not to move. We chose on the side of caution. None of us were anxious to round that corner and be met by gale-force winds and waves sweeping toward Siberia. With binoculars, the true ominousness of the Bering Sea bore down; it was bleak, wind-whipped and cold out there. On shore, windchill dropped to 20 degrees. This was exactly the kind of clear and dangerous day, turning the Bering Sea into a frosty, smoky cauldron, that the few locals had warned us about.

"Good call," said Barry, as we watched williwaw after williwaw chase one another through the pass. Then it started to rain, cold and blinding. We left Skiff Cove, on the biggest island called Chuginadak, on our 12th day out. Wind and rain had kept us stuck in our tents for 60 hours. Finally the weather gods smiled. A 100-foot waterfall sparkled behind us as we paddled west past greening shores, stopping occasionally to explore deep seaside caves. The most dramatic action of the day was a badly launched puffin. Never the most adroit flyers, it was surprised by our entrance into a cliffside cave, and when it tried to take flight it hit me square in the head.

Our goal was Applegate Cove, a three-mile-long sand beach in the middle of Chuginadak, strung beneath the 5,700-foot-tall, active volcano Mt. Cleveland. From there we would paddle in a triangle to Carlisle Island, then Herbert Island, and back. The long, black sand beach at Applegate was the best landing we'd seen, for its length and its sandiness. Pulling the boats ashore on the more common rocky beaches had grown tiresome and cold, since it meant unloading while standing in frigid, rocking surf, before carrying them high onto the rocks. Here we could just run the boats straight up onto the beach and drag them above the tideline.

The long beach was the repository of a massive, nightmarish pile of driftwood and plastic debris blown in from the Bering Sea fishing fleet. During a long walk, we found an orange box of Japanese rocket flares (empty), a red Sapporo beer case (empty, alas), various booze bottles (all empty), paint brushes, orange buoys, white and blue bumpers from fishing boats, mounds of thick netting, metal gas containers, round metal buoys, plastic milk crates and pails, and a wooden sign painted in Japanese, which said something to the effect of "Be careful out there." We set up elaborate tent sites at the eastern edge of the beach, out of the constant winds. We hauled driftwood to build front and back porches and buried deadmen anchors deep in the sand, just in case. Out here over-preparation is the way of life.

Herbert Island, Day 16. Walking around a series of seven lakes and ponds just over a high ridge south of our camp, it was possible to imagine an Aleut village built right here. Flat, protected from the winds, fresh water all around. Every step and paddle stroke we took, we thought about what it must have been like for the Aleuts, in those days long before Gore-Tex and fiberglass. Along the ridgeline we surmised that a series of moss-covered humps could have been cairns, visible from the sea, markers for the hunting men in their baidarkas. Six, seven feet tall, they were evenly spaced 50 feet apart, seven of them climbing the hill, too calculated to be an accident.

In the 25 days we spent exploring the Islands of the Four Mountains the hints of Aleut life was our strongest connection to mankind. It is rare these days to spend so much time in a place so remote, so untouched. Other than the drift-stuff, we saw little evidence of modern man. In nearly four weeks we glimpsed a solitary tanker on the far horizon, heard a small plane in the clouds and, from Herbert, spotted an oil company helicopter buzzing Mt. Cleveland.

The next day came with another thing we were not used to seeing: sunshine. The sunlight played on the surprisingly calm seas. Looking across the pass at Mt. Cleveland, it could have easily have been Hawaii, or Japan. The wind died and the songs of the birds were clear. Each day brought more flowers, and now the hillsides were steeped in nootka lupine, mountain buttercup and wild parsnips. We spent a long day hiking Herbert and at midnight it was still light. As the sun finally began to set, final rays of the day and the trip blended with a volcanic plume from still-active Mt. Cleveland, creating an orange/pink halo around its peak, as if a higher being was reminding us of the region's sanctity.

Originally Published, Paddler January-February 2000
 

Share This Page!

Add to: Facebook Add to: Digg Add to: Del.icoi.us Add to: StumbleUpon Add to: Yahoo Add to: Google