Fort Ross house interior
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If the walls could talk…..Stove still worked!!
Got Some Zodiacs!
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The little Orange one by the ship is us coming back from an exploratory trip to Bellot Straits and particularly Magpie Rock. We did not want to go through a 200m gap between the rocks and the shallows with 8 knots of current under us. We preferred a slight push against us and we waited 4 more hours to get the right time. Good job Captains!
Lots of neighbors!
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These guys literally dropped 90 pax on the beach for an hour with Kayaks and 10 guides and Bear protection folks..Had a quick walk around and left. Eco Tourism at its fastest. Guides were friendly though and Canadians while the ship was Russian. With Russian officers.
Traffic Jam..
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Briefly, neighbors…. Our morning here was marked by the arrival of a former Russian spy ship, converted into a “research” vessel which is currently chartered to a Canadian eco-tourism company. In the background a small container ship lines up on Bellot Strait. More traffic than we had seen in a week.
Ft Ross Depot bay
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We arrive at Fort Ross, Depot Bay, Somerset Island. The trip South was a lot more intense than we thought or hoped it would be. 1st off a band of 5/10 Thick 1st year ice showed up where it was not meant to be.. Every time we tried to get on track we would be forced closer to the shore. However after 4 or 5 hours and Just after sunset we got to clear water and could relax. We were about an hour out from Ft ross at around 0100 when suddenly the depth gauge went from 70 meters to 18 to 16 to 12…Well you get the point. We did a hard U turn and traced our way back We then set off on a 5 mile detour around a shallow bank that was not on either the Chart or the Electronic charts. We possibly could have gone through but we opted to go where there were more soundings. However when we did finally anchor it was one of the best Anchorages we have been in. This abandoned Hudson’s Bay Trading Company post has a fascinating if short-lived history well worth Googling.
Fwd: Starting in.
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Rosehearty picking her way through. Once the ice got thicker no one had time to take any photos!
Watching
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Capts. Toomey and Hutch on ice watch With Ethan on the Radar…Concentration! Where is the way through?
Sunset and Ice Lovely...
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Drift ice off Somerset I When the sun gets low or sets it is quite difficult to spot the small stuff that we also have to avoid. It keeps you focused.!
Time to Move
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Drift ice off Somerset I. Creswell Bay. We were sitting nicely when this lot moved in. as we were too deep drafted to get inside behind the point we had no option but to up anchor and move on These guys were moving at 2 knots and we could not risk a collision. Anchored boats do not manoeuvre well So even though late in the day off South to Ft Ross at the East end of Bellot Straits.
Ice Report
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The most important daily news here…the ice reportLetters in the Chart are represented by an Ice Egg. It is read down and crossed to a code Our ice was H and was further to the west than shown 5/10ths of Thick 1st Year ice (Ice that formed since October last year) the 7 outside the egg shows it has traces of 2nd year or multi year ice. the bottom number 5 shows the floe size..Big floes. Not a place for us to be…Yet there we were..
Beluga Bones Apparently.
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Along the way we ran across this field of bones left by an 18th century English whaling operation in which three boats harvested approximately 8000 Belugas over two years. A haunting and sobering place indeed. The local populations are allowed also to “harvest” and are granted an allowance a year to hunt. Maybe that is why we see no whales here..Except these Ex ones...
Ethan with a find
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As there is not much visible up here that is alive we are now looking for signs of Life!! This is a Caribou Set.
Richie in his Glory
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Got the Photos but…NO fish! :)
On the beach at the camp, char fishing
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Or is it the set of a movie in the Grand Canyon!
Inuit Hunting Camp
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They have all gone home already..
