HUMBLED BY ICE 1
1 July 2023
Even at the height of summer, the ocean was frozen solid. The static white expanse extended out towards the mountains on the far side of Eclipse Sound. Large patches of turquoise water on the surface of the ice indicated it was slowly melting. In a matter of weeks, this ice would be gone. But we couldn't wait that long. We needed to start the expedition now.
Three teammates and I were about to attempt to kayak the Northwest Passage. If we achieved it, we would be the first people to kayak the passage and the first to complete it using only human power, no motors or sails, in a single year.
But first, we had to get to the open ocean. We were in the Inuit settlement of Pond Inlet, in Nunavut, on the north coast of Baffin Island, high in the Arctic. The Northwest Passage starts in Baffin Bay, 40 miles east of Pond Inlet. Between us and Baffin Bay was a solid platform of frozen ocean.
Our two local contacts agreed to tow us across the ice to the floe edge. Titus, an Inuit (though he fiercely reminded us he was an Eskimo first and foremost and Inuit second), and Steve, from the US, each had a snowmobile. Behind their Ski-Doos they each dragged a large wooden sledge called a qamutiik. Titus would tow the kayaks and gear. We would sit on Steve's qamutiik, which had a high front with a small window to protect us from the frigid wind.
We hauled our gear from the shore edge to the qamutiiks and began to pack. We couldn't forget anything. We would rely on this gear for the next month or two until we reached a village called Cambridge Bay for a resupply. It was nearly a thousand miles away.
We would also rely on each other. I met my three teammates for the first time just five days before. Expedition leader West Hansen and his best friend Jeff Wueste were both in their sixties and from Texas. They'd already attempted to kayak the Northwest Passage the year before with a third paddler named Rebecca. Delays in getting to the start and slower progress than they expected meant they pulled out after a couple of hundred miles.
To solve some of their issues - mainly the need to carry more supplies - they decided to come back in tandem kayaks and therefore needed two more paddlers, as Rebecca elected not to return.
That is where I came in, with just a few months' notice. The fourth paddler, Eileen Visser, in her fifties and from Alaska, had joined at the same time as me. Eileen had the chance to train with West and Jeff, but I couldn't afford to fly from London to the US. So, aside from the odd Zoom call, we were strangers.
Months alone with people I'd never met in the harshest environment on earth was a risk, for them and for me. There were many differences. Most notably, I was the youngest by twenty years and from a different country.
After finally loading our gear, Steve's wife, Heidi, invited us back to their house for one final hot meal before we disappeared into the wilderness. We were incredibly fond of Steve and Heidi. They served chilli con carne with a side of jelly that had fruit floating in it, which my American teammates informed me was a salad - a cultural difference I had never heard before.
With a belly full of delicious homemade chilli and American salad, we walked back down to the frozen ocean and crammed into the tiny qamutiik. Along with us four kayakers was Tom McQuire. He was one of our shore team and would be providing us with weather updates and other critical information throughout the journey. He was joining us to the floe edge to film our departure. Our shore team consisted of just two people, the other being West's sister, Barbara. Barbara would relay Tom's information to us each day via a satphone call to West, and also deal with other less technical admin, such as if we needed kit or food delivered to Cambridge Bay.
Even with the small windbreak, the qamutiik promised to be a cold way to travel. I wrapped up warmly. With a rev of the engine, we lurched forward.
I shut my eyes for a second. I took a deep breath. It was finally happening. I had been dreaming of the Northwest Passage since 2016. From 2020 to 2022, I had been part of a team organising another expedition, planning on rowing the Northwest Passage. But at the end of 2022, that expedition had come crashing down around me and I thought I'd never realise my dream. At the last minute I jumped for this new opportunity to join West, Jeff and Eileen - we called ourselves the Arctic Cowboys for our Texan leaders.
The sky was a clear blue. The shining sun made the ice look pristine. The patches of surface water sparkled and looked like large lakes, rather than inch-deep puddles. The mountains on the far side of Eclipse Sound seemed to grow straight out of the water. They were a mix of dazzling white snow and jet-black cliffs.
The scale of the landscape was immense. The size of the challenge began to dawn on me. The end, almost 2,000 miles away, did not cross my mind. I wasn't sure if that showed a lack of confidence or an absolute focus on the present moment. In my preparation, I'd worked on letting go of the outcome to enjoy the journey. Staring across the solid sea towards the mountains of Bylot Island, I was packed with positive emotions.
Steve and Titus sped towards Bylot's south-east corner, where we'd find cabins. We planned to spend a night there, pack our kayaks and then start the expedition. It was almost surreal to actually be on our way to the start of the Northwest Passage after so long.
The Northwest Passage is the Arctic route that links the Atlantic to the Pacific. We'd travel through the Canadian archipelago, in the Arctic ocean, from Baffin Bay to the Beaufort Sea, as per the International Hydrographic Organization's definition of the Northwest Passage. Britain in particular was once focused on finding the passage, as it promised a shortcut to Asia. John Cabot, an Italian explorer, was sent by Henry VII to find an Arctic route to Asia as long ago as 1497, and Martin Frobisher tried to find it in the 1570s. Bit by bit, like a huge deadly jigsaw, the region was mapped at the cost of many lives. In the nineteenth century the focus became a national obsession, and countless expeditions hunted for the fabled route. It wasn't until the 1850s that the last section of the passage was found.
By then, it was clear that even once the waterway was located, the route was entirely impractical. It was chock-full of ice for most of the year and the ice never retreated for long enough to make it commercially viable. Even when Roald Amundsen finally became the first person to navigate the entire Northwest Passage, it took years, from 1903 to 1906.
Climate change has changed all of this. The passage is open for longer each year. Some commercial ships are already making their way through and more will in the future.
As the ice retreated at a rate of 13 per cent per decade relative to the 1981-2021 average, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, adventurers began to wonder if it would be possible to traverse the entire Northwest Passage without a motor. The adventure community scrambled to be the first to complete the passage by human power in one season. For about a decade, other rowing and kayaking teams had tried it and failed. One rower did the whole thing over three years, going home for winter and returning for summer (though he finished in Pond Inlet, 40 miles short of Baffin Bay, so by the International Hydrographic Organization's strict definition of the passage, he didn't complete it; I thought this 40 miles a bit arbitrary, so always said we were trying to be the first do it in a single season in an attempt to acknowledge the rower's feat).
We were the latest adventurers to pit ourselves against the challenge. Even as we launched in 2023, two other rowing teams were trying the same human-powered feat. We could still be the first to kayak the route, even if the other rowers finished first, but as far as the overall human-powered feat was concerned, we were in a race.
One team was rowing from the other end - west to east. They were two rowers in two solo boats - Matty and Adam. The other rowing team was starting from the same end as us, though they hadn't arrived yet. It was unclear if they'd even start. This latter team was an eight-man crew led by Leven Brown.
This was my former team, prior to joining the Arctic Cowboys. When I was still part of Leven's team, West had added me on Facebook as a friendly acknowledgment of the opposition. As I exited Leven's team, having bitterly fallen out with him, I messaged West, explaining my predicament and asking for a spot on his team. Another rower from Leven's team initially joined, too, but he had even less kayaking experience than me, and it soon became clear he didn't have time to make up the deficit.
Despite the turmoil of changing teams, I was relieved to be here, rid of Leven, and about to embark on the journey. The five of us laughed at ourselves as each bump sent us flying and crashing back down onto the hard surface of the qamutiik. It wasn't built for this many people. One of my bum cheeks rested on the wooden seat and the other on the top of a gas canister. Jeff and Eileen were crammed up against the windbreak, with their backs to where we were going. West was on the floor between us all and Tom and I sat on the back, with the most space but exposed to the wind as we hurtled forward. Each time Steve turned, our craft swung wildly to the left or right.
We began to drive along next to a crack in the ice about two...
