Out of the Northwest Passage
Beechey Island – 16/17 September 2016
Weather: Cloudy, light winds, -2
So, what is the fastest way to get 156 people out of bed and on deck?
With a lifeboat drill?
Nope.
An abandon ship announcement?
Nope.
You tell them there’s a polar bear on an ice floe directly in front of the ship.
Someone on the bridge with an exceptional eye had spotted the bear. The ship altered course and slowed to a stop about 500m short of the floe. We were upwind from the bear and it didn’t seem to notice us.
It wandered about the ice floe and then found some soft snow to make a bed.
If he fits, he sits.
The ship stuck around for about a half hour and then resumed course for Beechey Island. As expected, we didn’t make as much headway as was hoped. The day was spent in presentations and workshops. I attended an interesting talk by Milbry Polk on Women Polar Explorers.
We arrived at Beechey Island but only knew that because of the map.
We couldn’t see the shoreline through the thick fog, and for this reason, the landing was put off until the next morning. The ship moved out of Erebus and Terror Bay to ensure it didn’t get surrounded by ice overnight.
Beechey Island was named after one of the men on Robert Peary’s 1819-20 expedition that went as far west as Melville Island. Franklin and his crews would overwinter here in 1845-46. In 1850, a number of expeditions searched for Franklin including one financed by Lady Franklin and this ship discovered three graves belonging to Franklin’s men on Beechey Island. The graves have been exhumed and the remains examined. While high levels of lead were found in their systems, at least one of the men died from consumption. A fourth grave contained the remains of Thomas Morgan who died while on the Investigator which was searching for Franklin.
When we woke the next morning, the fog had cleared and the ship was moving back into Erebus and Terror Bay.
There is a wreck near the bay that is known and avoided so that the anchor doesn’t tear it apart. The HMS Breadalbane was tasked to leave supplies on Beechey for Franklin’s searchers in 1853. The twenty-one crewmen were awakened one morning by a creaking sound, and once on deck, found the ship was being crushed by the ice. They abandoned ship and it sank in the bay in less than twenty minutes with no loss of life.
Disembarkation for our visit began after breakfast and we had been given three choices. There are two sites of interest on the island – the grave site and Northumberland House where Franklin’s Cenotaph is located.
The first choice allowed passengers to visit both sites and be ferried between them by zodiac. The second, the short hike, visited both sites and hiked just above the beach to the second site where the zodiac would pick them up (red line).
The third option was labelled by some as the Arduous Ordeal. It involved a hike up the steep slope and then across the top of the cliff to the south end of island.
And they can’t descend on that side. They have to return the same way and a great deal of it was in snow up to two feet deep. The total distance was almost seven kilometres.
I knew my limits. That was way beyond it. In the summer, it wouldn’t be a problem. With snowshoes, it wouldn’t be a problem. But not in ankle boots in snow that could be up to my thighs.
So, they got off the ship first and headed up.
I was in the next group and had some time to take pics on the beach as the others arrived.
The first stop was at the graves.
The headstones are replicas as the originals are in a museum in Yellowknife.
We got a short talk on the graves and then made our trek through the snow to the second site more than a kilometre to the south.
Here, we saw what remained of the yacht or tender called the Mary as seen in this photo from 1875.
It was towed to the island in 1850 and left behind for Franklin or anyone else who might need it. It was originally left on the western side of the island and later moved to the eastern shore. Over the years, visitors adopted pieces of the ship for souvenirs. In one case, a sailor is known to have taken some of the mahogany wood to make a picture frame.
Gotta wonder whose attic that is in today.
This is the Mary in 1925.
All that remains today is the mast.
Nearby were the remains of the Northumberland House.
It was used to store food in case Franklin returned, but when checked years later, it was found that the polar bears had helped themselves.
Nearby was Franklin’s Cenotaph which was dedicated to those who died looking for Franklin.
It also contained a post box for notes from those who passed through. The cairn here was constructed by Franklin but contained no directions which was odd given that they went through the trouble of building it.
There was also a memorial to Bellot who died after falling through the ice in 1853 not far from the island.
Once we were done, we had two choices for our return to the ship. One zodiac went straight back to the ship while the other did a short cruise around the growlers in the bay.
That was a nice treat.
We got back to the ship by about 10:30 and the long hikers were back before lunch. From here, we headed towards Caswell Tower in the next bay for our second landing of the day.
I went up on deck after lunch just as someone spotted a polar bear on the shoreline. The ship stopped for about twenty minutes as we watched the bear move east along the shore.
He was headed straight for our landing site about three or four kilometres away. The ship docked next to Caswell Tower and the zodiacs headed out to check the shorelines.
The formation used to be the location of a polar bear observation post but it’s not there anymore. There were others on nearby cliffs.
The zodiacs deemed it safe to land and we headed out. I was in the first group and we pulled up to the beach only to be pushed off. The bear we had seen was making much better time than expected and they considered it much too close for comfort.
So, for the sake of our safety and the safety of the bear, they decided we’d do a cruise along the shoreline so that we could watch the bear as it made its way east.
We followed it along for more than a half hour and it covered much of the distance towards our landing site in that time. The crew and bear monitors were off the shore by then and the bear eventually turned inland and disappeared over the hill.
We returned to the ship and I headed straight to the coffee/tea station to warm my hands on a hot cup of tea.
At the recap, Jason told us that we’d be visiting Arctic Bay, Baffin Island, the next day which was welcomed news to everyone. With the ice hugging the coast around Grise Fjord, there was the possibility that we could sail through the entire Canadian Arctic without visiting a single community. The lack of ice near Baffin meant this landing had a good chance of succeeding.
What little ice there was in the bay meant another treat first thing in the morning.
Go to Arctic Bay
Go to Table of Contents