Crossing The Gates of Alaska:. Dave Metz
by tomorrow it could be too windy and cloudy to travel, trapping me on this peninsula for days. I’m already geared up and ready to go, so instead of thinking too long and realizing the danger I’m about to face, I shove off with the dogs pulling ahead of me. I have one thing on my mind. I want to get away from the coast where the freezing wind never stops blowing.
The local people have erected tall willow branches to mark the way across, which give me some reassurance that this is a direct and safe route to the other side. The dogs start out strongly but soon they become confused about not being able to see land ahead of them. The dogs look back at me every couple of minutes for reassurance, which I’ve rarely seen them do before. “Good boys,” I say, “hike, hike.” This gives them some encouragement and they forge on. Their pulling power is outstanding and I’m sure I couldn’t make this crossing in one day without them. Without the dogs, I would be able to go only one mile per hour. I know. I tried. With them pulling, we whisk along at an average of about five miles per hour.
The sky is overcast, but the clouds do not sit low enough to obscure my view of the mile just ahead of me. However, any inclement weather worries me. The wind blows into our faces as we trudge forward. I twist my neck around so I can see the outline of the landmass behind me that I’m skiing away from. It seems crazy to leave land for the emptiness of the sea ice. As I get farther from shore, it really does feel like I’m on the ocean, and the outline of the land behind becomes quite distinct from the white, flat arctic ice. Later I will find out that the distance across in the diagonal direction we are taking is twelve grueling miles, not four like I think it is. Soon I begin to wonder about the distance; it seems so far.
Will begins to tire. He always pulls harder than Jimmy in the first half of the day; he always has his shock cord stretched out farther. Now Jimmy becomes the fresher of the two and soon he takes the lead from Will. They each have their own shock cord attached to my waist belt and can pull as hard or as little as they like. I don’t have them attached to the same cord because I don’t want Will to have to pull Jimmy, too. Jimmy is always content to lag back while Will, who is the more aggressive of the two, seems to thrive on the exertion. Sometimes early in the day when Will is fresh, he will hunker down to put his shoulders into the effort as he tries to gain better traction on the snow.
I ski harder when the dogs slack off or tire, and I ski easier when they get excited and pull like mad. Sometimes at the beginning of the day or when they smell or see something interesting up ahead, they pull so hard and fast that I can’t ski with my legs. I have to stand there using my poles to help propel us.
After two hours crossing on the sea ice, the dogs begin slowing. We need to keep moving to avoid camping on the ice where it would be dangerous. We would be exposed to the bitter wind and water would be tough to find. There isn’t that much fresh snow lying on the sea ice to melt. I’m almost too cold, so I consider stopping to add more clothing. But I don’t want to overheat and sweat, either, with this much exertion, so I keep moving instead.
I worry about losing visibility. Discerning the pattern of the ice surface is already difficult. It’s so white, and the clouds conceal the bulk of the sun’s bright rays, and in the dim light the bumps are not well defined. I hit them with my skis, and trying to travel fast causes me to waste a lot of effort trying to correct my balance. I become frantic. “Hike, hike,” I yell to the dogs. They increase their pace, but it’s short-lived. They are strong but can tire like pups; after all they are not even a year old. We’re going as hard as we can and I’m growing fatigued as well. “Come on Jimmy, come on Will,” I shout to them. They keep up the pace, but I know they will stop when they reach their limits, no matter where we are. Then I will be forced to haul the sleds by myself, or camp for the night. I’m sure the dogs are getting thirsty and they appear bewildered about moving off into a sinister, white world without any darkly outlined land in front to give them hope. I know land is over there and I try to convey to them that everything will be fine, but I often wonder. “We’re okay, guys. We’re okay,” I say in a pleasant tone, which is hard for me to do right now because of the desperation I feel. I wonder about the cold seawater beneath the ice. The sea is perilous beneath our feet and in constant swirling motion, with a massive volume and force reaching far down into murky depths. In summertime this sea can become a monster, with waves raging through the inlet at ten feet in height. Only the frozen surface separates us from sinking into the steely darkness. What if it cracks open and swallows us up?
Halfway across we come to a small pressure ridge where the sea-ice has fractured and shifted several feet. I don’t like to think about the fact that I’m miles from land on a frozen ocean, but I am. I slow down when I near the six-inch gap in the ice. The impacting ice around the gap has driven up both edges about a foot. I stop the dogs before I get to the crack by simply stopping my efforts and gliding. The dogs are tired, so when they feel more strain on their lines when I stop working, they ease up. Then I just say, “stop, stop.” I look at the fissure as it snakes its way far down the ice in both directions. I don’t know anything about its length, depth, or the strength of the ice around it. Snowmobiles have come through not too long ago by the looks of the tracks I’m following, so I assume the crack is safe to cross. But still, to see a haggard rift in the ocean ice gives me the creeps. I give a little quick hiss, and Will tightens his shock cord. Jimmy soon follows. Then we inch over the crack and pick up speed again. “Hike, hike,” I say with some gusto in my voice. This gets the dogs trotting faster away from the rip in the ice. There is no weakening of the ice below our feet at all as we move past. There are no creaking sounds, only the freakish silence of the wide, arctic waters and the ruffled breaths from the panting dogs in front of me.
Several Eskimo say the bay ice is several feet thick, but I still don’t like it. They say the bay ice is so thick that people drive trucks across without it cracking under the massive weight. I ski on and the dogs pull as we leave the ice fissure and the mainland behind us. There is no turning back now. We have come too far to get back to the side we started from in a reasonable amount of time to avoid skiing in darkness. And no way am I skiing on a frozen ocean in the dark.
In another hour I notice land in front of us. It’s just a faint, thin line running far up and down the coast at first. Sometimes I think it’s closer slightly to the left of the direction I’m heading, and I get the urge to change course. Several times I veer off our track only to come to my senses. I think the higher coastal banks make it look much closer that way, but it’s not. It’s probably a lot farther. The long, linear row of markers, however, signals that land is straight ahead and it’s hard to convince myself that the marked course is correct. It takes at least another hour before I believe we have gotten any closer to land at all, but soon it becomes clear that this is the best way.
Then another hour goes by and I see a snowmobile up ahead racing along the shore. The dogs see it, too, but it’s too far away for me to hear. The dogs liven up with newfound energy and run for several minutes. They now understand that land is up ahead like I had hoped and told them, not just a dreadful wasteland of wind and ice. I’m grateful that we will soon have solid ground beneath our feet, and relieved that we will be off this oceanic inlet for good.
Night is falling around ten o’clock when we come ashore utterly exhausted. I ski to some willows and pitch the tent behind them to gain at least a little protection from the wind. It has taken me about five strenuous hours of skiing to get across, and now I’m so happy I sit down for a second to pat the snowy earth. One of my most dreadfully anticipated obstacles is now behind me for good. We waste little time getting into the tent, secure from the cold and content with knowing the foundation beneath us is not an unstable mass of ice. I can sleep in peace without having to worry about the ice shifting beneath us during the night.
I begin melting snow to make dinner while the dogs doze in their own corners until their food and water are ready. They don’t move an inch and wait patiently for dinner. I ask so much of them, and they never lose their amicable spirit. It has been the dogs who enabled me to cross this ice sheet, and if all goes according to plan, they will also enable me to ski up the Kobuk River in the coming weeks before it breaks apart with the warming weather.
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