Hello from the Bering Sea,
Apologies for the group email and if you are offended to hear news of me this way, please hit delete now, and write to me personally and I promise to respond. However, if you are not offended, read on..
Does her bum look big in this? Add your comments!
I have been away from home for just over two months now and life onboard the Spirit of Oceanus is running at the usual 100 mph. Since leaving Seattle in early May and heading north to Alaska, we have had fairly sensational but unseasonal weather. In fact I am in danger of returning home from Alaska with a tan. The hot weather has sent everything off to an early start with flowers blooming and animals active much earlier than usual.
I have had so many wildlife highlights I would bore you to tears describing them all but I guess my close up with bears in Geographic Harbour is a hard day to beat. Geographic Harbour, even without the bears, is an awesome bay with towering columnar basalt and mountain peaks still laden with ash from an eruption almost 100 years ago. We managed our zodiac tours to coincide with the low tide and over a 3 hour period we saw at least 14 bears up close and personal. My favourite was a brown bear that swam in front of my zodiac for about 5 minutes (only 20 m away) and climbed out onto a small island, shook himself, climbed a small rock formation for the perfect photo and then disappeared.
I also witnessed a harbour seal pup being born on a rock somewhere in the Shumigan Islands. It was an unplanned spectacle that became part of my beachcombing walk on Unga Island. Not too long after that I saw my first Gray whales (I have seen so many now, they barely get a mention) and my latest big 'wow' was in a scout boat with just the Staff Captain, Ivan, the Pilot, Mike and myself. We couldn't do our planned landing because of the pack ice still being 3 miles wide off the coast (Russian Far east) so we went exploring. While cruising along the coast of a nearby island that didn't have any ice, we came across 6 humungous walrus lying on the beach. Two of them were spooked immediately and went straight into the water. We backed away quietly and left the rest on the beach. We then continued around the corner and came across a grizzly bear munching on a carcass on the beach. It was also spooked by the engine and went galloping off into the distance at great speed. We guessed from the reaction of these animals that hunting by motor boat was fairly common in this area. Unfortunately by the time we went back to get the passengers the walrus had also gone.
This cruise has taken me to the Far East of Russia, an extremely isolated part of the country that has no roads leading to it. Air and sea are the only options for transport. We cleared into the Port of Providenya, a former military base in the 1950's with a former population of 55,000. It now has 2000 people and looks like a large ghost town or perhaps how some towns looked just after they had been bombed in WWII. Everything is crumbling or has been smashed to rubble. The surrounding mountains are also naturally crumbling into small rocks so it seems hard to realise where the mountains start and the town begins. Despite the bleak appearance, all the people I met seemed very vibrant and I got to visit an excellent museum and see a great cultural dancing show put on by the local children.
We then jumped into giant 4WD trucks and journeyed across a mountain pass to New Chaplino a Siberian U'pik community just 16 miles away. The drive took an hour, as Russian roads are exactly how you would expect them to be. The pack ice was still in the bay on the other side but melting fast. It was extraordinary seeing the reflection of the surrounding snow covered mountains on the pools in the pack ice. Again despite this mainly subsistence village being obviously very poor, they were extremely friendly and dedicated to their culture. We saw summer dog sledding and some great dancing and witnessed a few of the competitive sports of the Eskimo games.
It has been very hard for me to buy a souvenir of my visit as most items for sale are made from endangered marine mammals but I think I found the perfect thing. I bought a set of nestling wooden Russian Dolls painted in the likeness of the past presidents of Russia. I have a tiny little Stalin right in the middle. It was so tacky I couldn't help myself and I am sure it will continue to make me smile for many years to come.
On this cruise I also got to cross the Arctic Circle. I have cruised above it before in Greenland but never sailed across it. I did it in grand style crossing the dateline at the same time. Some foolhardy passengers ran under a fire hose being pumped directly from the ocean before hopping in to the spa to commemorate the occasion but I thought better of it.
Tomorrow we are in Dutch Harbour. America's 4th largest fishing port, having said that there is not a lot else there but an interesting place none the less. I have about one more month to go and then I return home to Cairns (23 July). As much as I love my job I am really looking forward to going home. In my last 7 years of travelling I have always missed home and looked forward to returning, however, I have never felt that anybody missed me terribly even though my friends always seemed pleased to see me back (I think?). However, things have changed for me in the last year or so and I look forward to coming home more than ever.
I haven't officially told everybody yet but I guess this email is a start. Early this year I moved in with Ken. K2 (my cat) and I now have a new residence and share a house with two 16 year old boys (Patrick and Nick), a red heeler (Cassie) and of course Ken. It is a reasonably happy mix, although I would be lying if I said we didn't all have an 'adjustment' period.
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