File Under “Irony”

18 June
0245
On a 2-3am anchor watch. An anchor watch entails sitting around while everyone else sleeps, making sure the boat doesn’t drag its anchor and move on its own into a perilous situation. Sounds dreadfully dull and, if we’re being honest here, it’s all that and more. Except this anchor watch.

Anchored up in a bay called, I believe, Mannbåen, about 13 miles northeast of Bodo. We motored here yesterday after an invasion of nine guests (eight Scots who are members of a kayaking/outdoor group) and made this short jump in order to get out of town. And here in this small bay, at the base of a sheer cliff protecting our northern flank, looking east up a fjord with Yosemite-like peaks and cliffs lining either side, it was the right call.

Especially sitting here in the cockpit alone. The peace and quiet and solitude is exactly why I head into the outdoors, be it in a boat, on foot, on a plane or any other method. And this particular moment might just be the best moment I’ve had since I joined Polar Bear more than a month ago in England.

Just three hours ago I crawled into my bunk and amid the cacophony of 15 other people (especially a bunch of Scots on holiday who’ve been cooped up in planes for many hours) enclosed within the confines of a sailboat, plugged my noise-canceling headphones into my iPad and fired up an application, Ambient. I still have no idea when or why I downloaded the freebie app, but trying to fall asleep in that craziness made the benefits of an app that plays peaceful sounds of birdsong trilling alongside a running river painfully clear. The name of the program? Paradise.

The sounds were indeed peaceful, serene and (thankfully) sleep-inducing, but true paradise had arrived in the form of an hour-long watch, alone, with the midnight sun shining on the snow-dappled peaks and flanks of island mountains all around me and as far as the eye could see. The sound of the ankle-high waves 300 yards distant have replaced the recorded river and real birdsong cascades from the trees just beyond the shoreline. A whisper of breeze flowed past my earlobes, generating a pleasing whistle and a gull splashed in the inky-black water just feet away and looked at me as though expecting a handout. We shared the moment and he went off to more productive locations.

Paradise? No, it’s not on a digital tablet, thanks. I’ve found it in Alaska, in New England, the Rocky Mountains and countless other places. And now it’s all around me here in a Norwegian fjord at two in the morning.

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Dateline: Norway

The Norwegian coastline from several miles offshore. Bodo is vaguely visible on the waterline in the distance

Arrived in Bodo, Norway, (posts written en route are below) yesterday evening right after dinner. And appearances have turned into reality: it truly is stunning here…helped by bright, warm sunshine. Alaska-like mountains cut by fjords, offshore islands rising out of the sea, dolphins and whales bounding around the bay…I could get used to this.

It is, however, incredibly expensive. Eight bucks for a beer; $18 for a rum-and-coke! But the people are friendly and enjoying the northern summer with its 24-hour sunshine. All eight crew members adjourned to a waterfront bar upon arrival (I had a shower in the harbor facilities first: $5 for 10 minutes) where a couple of serious drunks took a liking to our group and provided some serious entertainment: tall tales of the area’s fauna, sparking up a joint on the patio, stumbling to get refills.

Approaching Bodo…a little closer this time

The bartender was a Brazilian guy named Tchiago who came to Bodo a few years ago to play professional soccer a collegiate career at UC-Santa Barbara. Now he tends bar while he starts up a surfing service in the area. You got it: surfing. He gave me the beta on breaks and a place the rents boards and wetsuits out in the Lofoten Islands — where we’re headed on Friday for the first of two, one-week cruises — so I’m cautiously optimistic that I can grab a wave or two while I’m here, though I can only imagine how expensive a rental board will be.

The Bodo harborfront in warm sunshine

One other observation: in addition to being a lot like Alaska — think Seward or Valdez, only Bodo is a MUCH bigger city — it’s also kinda like San Diego: fighter jets take off from the nearby airbase pretty much constantly.

The Bodo Welcoming Committee

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Quickie Adventure

Looking east up Turnagain Arm toward Portage

A friend was chastising me recently, wondering where the blog accounts of my adventures in Alaska were. I had to reply that, sadly, there hadn’t been much in the way of adventure since I returned north. Rather, I’ve mostly been preoccupied with the punch list for my house, playing beer league hockey and the various aspects of my job search.

Well, hockey ended this past weekend (we lost in the championship game, 1-0) and the punch list is in great shape (got most of the insulation up in the basement yesterday). So following the quite-encouraging lunch I had today with some folks regarding a potential job opportunity, I took a drive out the Seward Highway to Girdwood and back.

Looking due south across Turnagain Arm near Girdwood

The drive east-southeast from Anchorage to Girdwood is about 35 miles long or so, and winds alongside Turnagain Arm, the eastern fork of Cook Inlet, which leads up from the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean to form the triangle at the base of the Chugach Mountains that is Anchorage. It is, without question, one of the most beautiful drives in North America, if not the world — especially on a sunny day after fresh snow. Mountains leap up on either side of the arm, which is transited by fierce tidal currents daily. Glaciers wind down toward sea level at the head of Turnagain Arm and winds equal in ferocity to the tides often race the length of the fjord. Dall sheep bound around their craggy cliffs above the roadway.

The south-facing slopes above the Seward Highway with minimal snow for March

And in winter, the scenery is even more impressive. The mountains are swathed in snow, even in this thin-snow winter, and form brilliant-white teeth biting into a sky that is that unique-to-high-latitudes shade of blue. Streams of snowmelt cascade below retreating avalanche deposition. And the mudflats at low tide are gouged by the retreating and advancing current, while the flats are littered as far as the eye can see with huge blocks of iced mud tilted in all sorts of non-right angles.

It was, today, quite exactly what the doctor ordered.

Mt. Spurr and the Tordrillo Range visible through the haze across the mudflats and Cook Inlet

As I ponder various opportunities — both in and out of Alaska — for the next stage of my life, it’s always rewarding to get out into Alaska, even if it’s just for a Sunday drive (on a Thursday). And as much as Anchorage is home and is comfortable, it’s not capital-A Alaska. But all it takes is an hour-long drive along Turnagain Arm to make me wonder: why in the hell would I ever think about leaving Alaska? What a wonderful, special place.

On a bluebird day after an overnight snowfall, it’s THAT good a drive.

(Thanks, Sam, for the kick in the ass to get outta town.)

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