Dog Sled Races, Shishmaref, Alaska
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Tag Archives: Shishmaref
Pedal Bike
* “Honda” is the Alaskan term for quad or ATV. “Snowmachine” is Alaskan for snowmobile. Out in the bush, bicycles are often called pedal bikes to distinguish them from hondas/ATVs, which are also often called bikes.
Ravenous Sea
This camp along the shore of the Chukchi Sea almost looks like an ocean going vessel, the cabin itself the wheelhouse, a flag marking the vessel’s bow as it faces a fall sea. Snow but no ice, you can see how the ravenous ocean eats at the shoreline of tiny Sarichef Island. All this will be gone one day… perhaps in not so many years. October 31, 2010
Disappearing Island
It is reported that since 1969, the ocean has eaten away 200 feet of land along the coast of already tiny Sarichef Island where Shishmaref is located. In the past, a sheet of ice forming in fall and lasting through spring kept the Chukchi sea blanketed and calm. Warming sea temperatures in the Arctic mean the ocean is freezing later. When fall and winter storms occur, packing winds that have traveled uninterrupted over thousands of miles of open sea, the surf thus generated claws at the barrier island without mercy. Particularly violent storms can rip away massive chunks of land. Entire homes have been washed away, a fate this abandoned house appears to be facing. Photograph: October 10, 2010
Photo of the Day: Main Street, Shishmaref, Alaska
To imagine Shishmaref, begin with Sarichef Island where the village is situated. Sarichef is one of several low-lying barrier islands running for about 70 miles along the northwest shore of Alaska’s Seward Peninsula. If you’ve ever been to North Carolina’s Outer Banks, you have some idea of such islands. Sand is everywhere. The above photo depicts a section of the main thoroughfare traversing this village of about 570 residents. There are no roads connecting Shishmaref with the larger world. Vehicles and building materials arrive primarily by ocean barge. Groceries are freighted in by plane. Because of the added freight costs, everything in the small local store is quite expensive. Pink salmon and Dolly Varden Char which migrate along the beach, seals taken from the nearby sea, and Musk Oxen, Caribou, an occasional Moose and waterfowl along with blueberries and Cloudberries taken from the mainland supplement most diets.
In 2010-2011 when we lived there, virtually the entire community was without the kind of city plumbing considered necessary in most of North America. The white plastic container near the middle of the street is where “honey buckets” are emptied into. These containers are then taken to a settling lagoon. Most houses have large water tanks of up to about 300 gallons which must regularly be refilled. The closest village is Wales, population about 145, over 70 roadless miles down the coast.
Photo of The Day: Shishmaref Aerial
Flying into the village of Shishmaref for the first time was an unforgettable thrill. This wintertime photograph, in which the barrier island upon which Shishmaref is located appears to be connected to land, belies the village’s isolation. That is ice, not terra firma, surrounding Sarichef Island which encompasses only 2.8 square miles and rises no higher than 13 feet above the surrounding sea. The village itself is home to fewer than 600 mostly Inupiat residents. Tucked up against the ever encroaching Chukchi Sea, Shishmaref lies a mere 20 miles below the Arctic Circle, 105 miles from the Siberian coastline across the Bering Strait, 601 miles from Anchorage and 2,939 miles from L.A. The wintertime winds, with a fetch of perhaps thousands of miles across frozen northern seas, blew at times with terrifying ferocity and cold, on one memorable occasion all but burying the village in snow.
In the next few photos to come, I will try to show a bit about life in this remote village which is perhaps best known as being on the vanguard of the impacts of climate warming, but where also there is beautifully crafted artwork and a spirit of resilience. As always, your comments are welcome.
Summer Blueberry Picking on the Arctic Tundra
Friends from Shishmaref after an afternoon of blueberry picking. Gathering a cupful or two of these small, tart berries growing in scattered clumps across the tundra was work… the fun kind. The following morning, we celebrated with a stack of blueberry waffles.
Accustomed to the six and seven-foot tall blueberry bushes of Oregon where Barbra and I had picked berries by the bucketful when I lived in Astoria, we were surprised to learn that blueberries were growing right under our feet on our walks through the tundra near Shishmaref. “There’s lots,” one of my students told us. “We’re going to go tomorrow. You guys can follow.”
“Follow” is the village English way of saying “come along.” And sure enough, once we learned to key in on the unmistakable Autumn-red of the bushes (if ground-hugging plants that top out at six-inches can properly be called bushes), we began finding an abundance of small, perfectly ripe, deliciously tart berries. The comparatively thick, woody stems of some of these bushes suggested that they had weathered quite a few seasons near the Arctic Circle. Growing among the blueberries were crowberries (locally called blackberries) and low bush cranberries. Elsewhere in the far north, including in Europe, there are cloudberries, perhaps the most delicious berry on earth.
We walked along in the late summer sun, finding patches of berries here and there, crouching and kneeling to pick, and then moving on to find another patch of tell-tale red. Birds were out sharing the bounty – or maybe the insects associated wtih the fruit: lapland longspurs, white-crowned sparrows, savanah sparrows, and other small birds.
The pause that refreshes. A berry-picker gazes across the open tundra on Sarichef Island where Shishmaref is located, snacking on a bag of berries that probably aren’t going to make it all the way home. The red leaves near her feet? Yep. Blueberries!
The Birds are Back in Town!
Feathers puffed against the cold, a female McKay’s bunting warms herself in the radiant heat from a rock. Daily highs are reaching the teens and even the twenties now, and today’s sunshine stretched from sunrise at 7:00 AM to sunset at 11:13 PM. The midnight sun is back, and so are the birds!
Gripped in the heart of winter, an Arctic landscape can be one of the quietest places on earth. Save for a few hardy ravens that manage to make a living off dumpsters and the local garbage facility, most birds head for warmer climes. There are no tree branches for the wind to whistle through, no dry grass to rustle, and on the coldest nights, even the village dogs huddle up and stay mum. Dark settles in, and the waiting begins.
For the past couple of weeks, we’ve increasingly been hearing the welcome twitters and chirps of flocks of the snow birds of the north, snow buntings and McKay’s buntings. It’s been weeks since the last windstorm, and these days we can feel the warmth of the sun on our faces. It feels… wonderful.
I’ve always admired passerines – songbirds. These snow buntings have become some of my favorites.
Real Velvet
As the snow melts, interesting things are being uncovered.
Murder Weapons?
I think it was Agatha Christie who stumped me with a story of a body which had been found lying by a puddle of water with no murder weapon to be found. Though I puzzled over this, I couldn’t figure it out.
Today as we walked around our village, we heard a loud crash, almost like thick glass shattering. We turned to see fragments of a large icicle smashed on the ground next to the school. Looking up, we saw clear, sharply pointed, pendant masses hanging menacingly. These icicles were substantial–their girth the size of pop cans. Hung next to each other, they resembled monstrous fangs ready to devastate.
CutterLight 