“You…You…” The man searched for the word from Arabic to English in his head, “…America”. The word more of an accusation than a question from suspicious eyes. I was startled in place. Why the question?
 The encounter surreal. as I was rushing out of my suite from a Bahrain resort located near the fringes of the island, an area still under construction so any interaction is seldom and brief. I was in a hurry to beat the traffic to Manama City for the night’s dinner, some cocktails, maybe a bout of Cricket on the telly at an undisclosed restaurant sports bar. The discovery of which only comes from exploration of the area. The only reason I was even here was to wash the weathered sweat and salt from a long day’s work in the hull of a ship. The 100-degrees of the day augmented by the sun beaten ship’s hull and its confined quarters. Refreshed and change of clothes, I rush out to the man’s path.
 The Arab was unkempt, the sight pitiful. Tousled hair caked with clumps of dandruff and with straggly beard festooned with foodstuff trapped in their curls and dried spit. A stained t-shirt and acrid body odor betrays any consideration of hygiene long abandoned.  And though with an armful of bottled water, his dried and cracked lips evince dehydration, his queries looked painful. He blocks the stairs I intended to use. His shock clearly displayed that he did not expect this encounter either.
 I notice the opened door beside us to the his suite around the corner from mine. Shadows mill around in the dark. I see their silhouettes against a cooking fire in the middle of the great room the only source of light for the drapes are drawn in the darkened apartment. As the questioning is repeated louder, ambulation stops and figures approach the portal. Curious.
 Their presence here incongruous. Obviously longer than mine. The reason I was isolated here, instead of a city hotel by our client, is to prevent such interactions. With tensions between east and west it seemed a good plan. Apparently they had the same idea. A month here and a few more days to go before leaving attests the futility of the plan.
 Before this trip, I have been warned. Attempts to deter this field job decision came from my immediate manager. “You can always back out, no reflection on you or your work.” Clandestine calls received by government representatives, all advising to reconsider the trip. However, the boss and owner of the company, Bill, was adamant on his intent and I agreed to accompany him. He now was gone a few weeks and I was alone now realizing the cause for the concern.
My mind races in that moment, have I discovered a zealous and xenophobic cell in hiding? Worse, they discovered me.
 I have seen the movies, in the book “Den of Lions” correspondent Terry Anderson’s unfortunate encounter in the 1980s lasted in sequestration for seven years. Others not as fortunate as videos appear of their demise at the hacks of dull machetes.  We were assured safety at the beginning of this venture of course. A security detail at the ready to extract us to the safety of Dubai at the moment’s press of a pager phone. A phone I have now kept in my suite for lack of imminent danger these past four weeks here already.
 Frozen in place on this terrace alone, with all of these thoughts racing through my head…my fate depends on my response to probing questions.
 An answer is expected...

  The assignment was that of maintenance repair to a dredge and dock vessel whose generator could not maintain from tripping under heavy load. Something in the regulator selected. No one wanted it, too far and in disputed territory most concerned for safety in the den of Middle Easterners who did not regard Westerners highly. But boss Bill needed a lackey and I jumped at the opportunity.
 I have always wanted to travel to the Middle East and thought that without military service it would not occur. The customer, a longtime relationship with boss Bill, needed technical advice. They have acquired a contract to dredge the northern coast of Bahrain. Sweep for sand from the floor of the Persian Gulf and mix it to make an island. A new hobby for the Arabs, creating land beyond the limits of their shores.
 A few islands already made in countries along the periphery of Saudi Arabia. Some in the shape of palm trees or fishes. Nothing that their imagination and unlimited resources could not derive.
 Another enticement, boss Bill was a genius. No small claim. The man worked at levels beyond the peer engineers. His was the solution to complex problems along the lakefront steel mills, the root of our enterprise. His work has kept our business solvent for years, with patents pending and repeat business, his reputation kept him surrounded with acolytes seeking recognition.
 However, this one time, none wanted to go and I saw an opportunity to flicker my ambitious flame against his roaring pyre.
 Concerns arose. Bahrain has just gone through an attempted revolt. Citizenry wanting to change the regal system a deadly failure. The result known across the world as the Bahrain uprising, the Pearl Roundabout where the incident happened was soon torn down to not inspire martyrs. This fresh in the news as we plan our maintenance execution.
 The flights took a full 24 hours. With a major delay in Kuwait. Boss Bill, Ed S., our customer’s liaison, and myself struggling with jet lag and the language gap kept close quarters the entire way. Moreover, even after arriving on the island we were not far from each other’s company. Traveling with their lead was limiting. We went to the same restaurant for breakfast and dinner for the first few weeks. The only place deemed to have decent American meals was Rick's Kountry Kafe, an establishment in an open lot just outside the city. Book-ending our 16 hour days on the vessels. The dusty fields surrounding it also awaiting building constructions for islands were not the only intended modernization on the burgeoning island. Here the sight of an ancient Mosque and blends with the modern World Trade Center beyond, a dual Sail building with three windmill blades to harness wind to power the building. The ambitious project would never spin all three at once when sighted, rumors stating that resulting vibrations from all three turbines were disturbing and concerning. Nonetheless, Bahrain intent on entering the 21st century as a beacon of progress without sacrificing its Regal hold on ancient fiefdom.
 Local lore has it that a lone denuded tree in the sands a few miles south of the city is the remains of the tree of knowledge, whose transgressed fruit exiled Adam and Eve. In effect the belief is that Bahrain is the desert result of the fallen garden of Eden. Awaiting a triumphant return with the eradication of all non-believers. The deserted area around the tree is littered with debris of human refuse. A Jimala (local McDonalds) wrapper here, empty Wild Stallion (Red Bull) cans there, strips of caught paper flitting around on twig branches dance in hot winds. But the lack of piety for the area does not discourage the locals to believe they are the promised ones.
 This was the extent of our touring. The remaining time was work based in the hull of the vessel. Retiring to the resort the customer suggested as a deterrent for unfortunate encounters. 
The Kingdom of Bahrain is credited as the birthplace of Kings, the great leaders of history are rumored to be from here. And is doing so it has been disputed territory for centuries. Saudi Arabia holds it; Iran covets it, tensions are high, resulting in rumors of an impending invasion for rightful claim is a matter of time. The countries only separated by the narrow strip of the Persian Gulf that if executed it would only be a matter of minutes warning of the transgression. In addition, with recent escalations between the east and west, non believers are scrutinized by all.

 Time came, two weeks hence, that Boss Bill and Ed S. had to return to the states to attend other business. I remained to maintain unforeseen issues. Given the rental car and freedom to explore, I ventured where they did not dare.
 I discovered a city foreign to anything I have ever seen yet somewhat similar. A nearby Shia town named Galilee, just west of the neo-island, had a familiar feel. Narrow muddy streets filled with speed bumps and potholes. Corrugated doors closed on adobe storefronts for either evening prayers or to abate the heat of the afternoon. Walls awash with base colors for differentiation. The few citizens visible lazing in a shade, sharp features on darkened skin and thick black hair that gave them a distinctive Hispanic look. In fact, if not for the Arabic lettering on the store marquees I could have mistook the town to be one like Tarimoro in my native Mexico.
 The island is Sunni dominated, although in the minority of the population, and so both entrance and exit to these towns have Saudi checkpoints. A tight reign and curfew imposed upon the majority accused of enticing the revolt. As a result, the Shia have been disappearing on a daily basis since. They question my reasons for driving through. Accusingly berating me with imagined conspiracies. However, I am let go once I speak feign confusion for the inquiries. I drive away in relief and for the only time in my life, I am glad I am not as dark skinned as my native family who looks to be kin to the people of the desert.
 Galilee no longer shows on modern maps, updated with the new islands created shown I only can speculate that the intended expulsion of the minority has succeeded.
 May 2nd of that year, news of Osama Bin-Laden reaches us. The cause for concern that was looming this entire trip for naught. The streets erupt in celebration. Soldiers on leave from the base, expats who have not been stateside since discharge (complaining of an indolent society they cannot bare to return and stagnate), visiting Saudis with their choice of caffeinated drink, Wild Stallion a Red Bull equivalent. In my weeks there, they were my barfly friends and we all party the night away. I become complacent and no longer worry about retributions.
 My time on the island is near an a month hence and I drive to the city, whose traffic is so slow, with no rush to be anywhere and gas prices at 30 cents a gallon the citizens enjoy their car time. In all that time waiting for the nigh hour crossing of a few miles I have taken up teaching myself Arabic numbers and letters through the miasma of exhausts of stopped cars in front of me. I too, it seemed, was not in a rush either. On this day, a quick shower after brief day of work promised the possibility of a shortened delay in traffic. However, running out distracted and as I turn the corner to the assumed unoccupied section of my hotel I encounter the specter of a man with suspicious eyes.

Am I an American, the question asked twice from the tramp in front of me, eager to hear my answer as we circle each other. I lose count of hidden spectators in the shadows at the door at six. Maybe more.
 “Americano? No. No Señor!” In Spanish. “Mexican!” Throwing in further strings of words to validate my claim, dripping thick in accent. Then to push the narrative home, feigning the throwing down a sombrero and dancing around it with imagined Mariachi music. I must have looked a fool but that was my intent. For in Arab culture, it is to care for the fool. A religious edict around these parts. However, them barely able to care for themselves in seclusion I wagered they could not afford the extra burden. Sure enough, uncomfortable in the situation the scruffy Arab backed slowly into his doorway while others slammed it shut. I ran down the stairs in a rush praising my luck. Never to ascend that particular set of stairs, remaining vigilant for the rest of my stay.

I was deviated from the main highway hours ago, and since then a hundred miles of back roads have passed. Surprised, because the highway was heading in my general direction but the wise GPS says, "No, this way is quicker." I heed to the suggestion without question. Since then, there has been nothing but fenced off grazing lands to my left and right, with even less grazers in vies and I wonder if those barb's intentions is to keep us out than the livestock in. Snowy-capped mountain ranges surround me at every turn that I never quite cross. Only an undulation of a straight road that runs unperturbed toward the hazed horizon where mountains meet the gold-green-tan sage patchwork of earth that is my world.
My Mini Cooper is low on fuel. With only 350ish-mile capacity in its sparse 10-gallon tank, I found a while ago that my little car is better suited for urban travel, not for the expanse of western deserts where gas stations are sporadic and hundreds of miles in between. I am getting within a hundred miles of capacity now. I kowtow at Google Maps for wisdom, careful not to blank the map in my search for nearby gas stations, I find that Denio Junction, a brief 60 miles away, has the only gas station anywhere near me and , coincidentally, the point where I am to turn westward on route 140 toward the Oregon State line.
I continue on, rolling road undulating as it has now been for forgotten hours. Hypnotic and accompanied by the soft roar of rubber on asphalt. This is my world now, all else forgotten. I lose myself in the tedium of it. My blank glaze only interrupted with the occasional glances to my dashboard, hoping my fuel depletion is not as accurate as my gauges indicate.

The problem with travel these days is that one is more dependent on GPS to get from here to there. You enter the desired location into it, it then gathers current satellite data, does millions of calculations per second (using Einstein's Theory of Relativity formula to compensate for time dilation from your current position on earth and said satellites. Without which, the stated position would be several feet away from accuracy). All this to provide the best route from here to there. It points and you blindly go.
In the old days, where you had to be more conscious of your surroundings, and with the aid of a paper map, you were the master of your driving fate, derive alternate routes if necessary, and detouring to interesting points along the way. GPS in urban settings are ideal. Traffic back up, alternate route calculated...In the vast barren land of northern Nevada not so much.  Worst still, with limited data service out there your map is running off silicon memory stored the moment you put your destination and the route calculated hours ago. Any deviation and the map disappears, the animated thinking wheel gyrates aimlessly looking for signal (three dots dancing on the blank screen as assurance that you are not forgotten) for what seems like hours and, with small prayers to the digital gods, hope that I am not abandoned in the middle of all of this. Futile and lost, I lament the loss of the tracking skills of my Cro-Magnon ancestors. With brief data coverage, I try to imaging which cardinal direction will be my best path. Which will take you further away, and which leads you to imminent danger. The mind wanders in possibilities in the desolation of poor mobile carrier coverage. My only gauge is the bright orb in blue overhead, traveling to my southwest and my base instinct can only guess that I am on a northerly road, not west toward my intended Oregon. Damn my comfort and foregoing getting that paper map!

Halfway through the book 'Here, There, Elsewhere' by William Least Heat-Moon and I am officially freaked out. In what I have read so far, the author and I have traveled individually to most of the same places in our exploits. And the remaining half promising more similarities.
A friend's suggestion for me, his reason being that this travelogue writer's books uncannily displays our story telling style similarities. I find that he was not wrong, but with humility that I am compared to a superior scribe. I find Heat-Moon's tales provoking, engaging, and inspiring. His monologues answering questions as if in anticipation to my queries. He fills my descriptive deficits, inspires my vocabulary to be more considerate, exact. He is now my figurative travel companion where we meet each other in our random travels to remote and unheard of locations. With only a few years, even decades, of separation from meeting. Nevertheless, his presence there is no longer shocking.
Of course Wm H L-M has been here, after all, so am I!
In the book so far we have shared a tour of the Yucatan Peninsula pyramids, ten years before my romp through its jungles (we both experience the isolated indigenous tribes at their full uninterrupted nature, something lost with the advent of global communications). He hunted craft breweries during their beginnings in Oregon and Washington while I seek more established locations in my travels. Wandered the newly established Katy trail in St Charles Missouri when surrounding landowners threatened to shoot all trespassers, I now travel this trail without fear.
He even wrote an homage to his walking stick, inherited from his grandfather. Much like my trusty felled branch I now call 'Xi-Rok' (old man with a broken twig), so named by the Mayan children who chided me as I ambulated with its support through the Guatemalan jungle. Meant in jest, the name sticks. Now my constant travel companion.
This is just the first half of the book. Coming chapters promise further known locations.
The most eerie discovery in this book is the chapter named 'The Old Land of Misfortune', where he has been to the isolated Denio Junction back in 1997. I suspect that nothing much has changed in the intervening 24 years, I suspect not much since 1811 when Wilson Price Hunt's miserable expedition through this area, looking for an overland trail to the Pacific Ocean for John Jacob Astor, gave it the nomenclature of 'Misfortune'.

I 'wake' from a daze when I realize that I have passed the town unnoticed. My Google Maps app is rerouting me a return U-turn while chirping away suggestions to turn around to regain the calculated path. It did not seem like a town, a few structures on one side and fewer shacks on the other. The only sign of life was fenced in dogs and wandering sheep grazing.
With the Oregon state line within 3 miles of here, I find this crossroad with just a few buildings in sight.
This cannot be Denio Junction. The salvation I have been imagining for the last hour and a half. I see no stores, and specifically no gas station. Nothing. I turn around after the intersection and my app seems happy, telling me to turn left at the only stop sign I have seen since leaving the highway. It states that the gas station is to my left but all I see is an unpopulated and closed motel/diner whose lot has a collection of World War II cannons, an old walk in phone booth, and other detritus on an open plot. Under the diner's overhang sit two large potted plants where gas pumps should be. Google Maps tells me this is my gas station.
It cannot be. My heart sinks as I sit there in the middle of the road for minutes, no traffic to obstruct for days it seems.
I look at my gauges; I have a good 40 miles before depletion. Not quite as far to the next town shown on the map. I drive up and down a bit more hoping to find...someone...anyone to give me guidance. But like most of this week, I am truly alone in the world.
I roll back southward, from where I came from, and Maps  to turn around...recalculating...recalculating. I fear turning it off for it might never return with a working map. So remote that the satellites may not even register. Then I see it! in the middle of the 'collectables' stands a single  older gas pump, circa 1980s, the kind you still have to pull a lever for. I drive up to it and sure enough it was active! Wired with an ad hoc credit card reader that would make one pause in the populated world, a note hung notifying the user that if they intended to pay cash they are on their honor and drop the money at the diner's mail slot, envelopes provided. No receipts given return on Monday for one.
I slide my credit card the suspect slot and grab the hose. Though not necessary because the pump was already unlocked and ready to fuel. I start to feed the hungry maw with whatever octane the lone pump offers, Thirsty rats cannot be choosy of whatever they are fed.
As I stand there, no jacket in that cold breeze of the plateau and warm sun on my face, I wait for the slow pump to complete. I inspect my surrounding and see the place for what it is. An American oasis. A place of refuge for weary travelers. Halfway from two distant points. Though I might be here off season or merely because it is a weekend, the motel remains empty.
Then suddenly, out of nowhere, a green jeep station wagon rolls up to take the opposite side of the pump. A family of three, eventually the father steps out to start pumping gas into his vehicle. He was a cowboy, the hat gave it away, with Asiatic features. An odd sight I thought. Unexpected. But considering him seeing a large jacket-less Latino in a small European vehicle in this Nevada vastness, I am sure the sight of me was equally perplexing. Perhaps the reason he was reticent to exit his vehicle at first when he showed up.
The first humans I see in a few days I spark a conversation. How is it going? You live in these here parts? What is there to do? He is a transplant from California, the family keep to themselves but there is a bar up on the state line where truckers can go. Otherwise not much happens in Denio...my pump releases the latch, my car full and I hang the hose up. Waiting there for a bit until I remembered that no receipt will be offered.
I say my goodbyes, the kid already curious from the back seat waves me farewell.
I drive up to the diner to inspect it further. In Heat-Moon's book he stated that he ate at the diner, probably here, where he asked his server to pronounce the name of the town. "De-nye-oh" she states but then proceeded to admit in a hushed tone that those who live here call it "Denial". As I ready myself for a couple hundred more miles of road before dusk I notice that her statement was more prophetic than admission of current perceptions. Above one of the World War II lawn ornament flies a Trump "No More Bullshit" flag. Months after the claim of malfeasance proven wrong and the election conceded Democrat, Denio remains in denial of the decision.

"I will have no man in my boat," said [chief mate of the Pequod] Starbuck, "who is not afraid of a whale."
__the most reliable and useful courage was that which arises from fair estimation of an encountered peril, but that an utterly fearless man is far more dangerous comrade than a coward.__
                                                           The Ship, Moby Dick
 
It is always prudent to remember that, whatever your station, a cautious approach to the unknown with skepticism and fear is necessary. These rapids (of any class), are as unpredictable as Starbuck's whale.
 
                              Gauley Expedition Sept 2020 Journal Entry

Incident at Pillow Rock
Pillow Rock is a Class V rapid. The extreme of extremes of rapids and the highest class encountered in the United States.
Our guide Ara Marine informs us that as we bump onto the huge boulder on river right and we will bump, to reach over and tap our paddles against it. All of us. The eft and right side of the raft. This was not a vanity move; our raft will be slid upon its edge. Precariously balanced. By all of our lean to the rock side, our heft toward it, we will not tip over to the left and dump into the rage of a rapid. This was the plan. As good as any plan goes.
We approach and bounce as she commands our maneuvers toward it over the din of water. “GO GO GO!” We power on, taking on water calve high from splashes all around. Our forward momentum halted as we crash on the rock. The raft crumbles under the pressure as we attempt the reach with our paddles. However, that collision and collection of water have rearranged our raft. The tubing “breathed”, shifting and expanding, and what was a cemented grip of my feet between the rubber tubes was now loosened. I began to slip out.
Worse, as I fell back, I was drawn into the maw. Face under the cover of water and the force of the current was sucking me down. An attempt to sit up to return to form will pry the last grip my feet held on the shifting raft.
At some moment of submersion, my mechanical mind unconsciously ticked the seconds I was holding my breath. A healthy person can hold his breath a good couple of minutes. I think I can go as far as 40 seconds. Maybe. Even less if, water up my nose shocks an exhale from me. The Sama-Bajau people of Southeast Asia can hold their breath for 15 minutes...but let's not get distracted here.
Surprisingly, my left hand still held my oar. One last attempt; I will brace the blade of the oar against the rush of the current may be enough force to push me back up enough. If this did not work, I will relent and let go of my failing grip and hope for the best and to be able to swim past the danger on my own. However, as I went for the handle with my right I met resistance. It was Mike grabbing my wrist to pull me up. He did admit that he debated tapping Pillow Rock with his oar or grabbing the exposed arm over rushing spumes. He pulled and I rose out of the water. With only time to put one foot loosely under a brace cross sectional tubing I immediately resumed rowing at the guide’s command because the run was not yet over. After Pillow Rock, we needed to maneuver around submerged Volkswagen Rock.
This eternity lasted a mere two seconds.
Ara explained afterward that if I did not resume my position my heft overboard would have certainly flipped us all. We were lucky Mike debated correctly in that split second to save my life. Lucky indeed.
Our luck doubly so. As we notice on the sixth frame of the provided pictures afterward, Mike, my one salvation, was in danger of being decapitated as he drew me back into the raft by Al’s wandering oar blade which should have been held with both hands *sigh*.
Come on Al!

The Journal:
Wednesday, September 16, 2020: Indiana-West Virginia
The trip to WV takes us around 8 hours. We stop off at Mike K to pick him up and we have a two-car caravan on the way there. Mike leads in his Jeep and goes just at the speed limit. Fears of being pulled over betrayed by his lag. I travel with Gabe in his Jeep. The first time this vehicle has traveled more than from house to train station and back as part of his morning commutes, before Covid-19.  Pat R and Al Z travel with Mike. We speculate the kind of weird stories Al tells them on the way. A sample of which we hear as we have breakfast on our first stop later.
Out of the group, Al was not our choice for traveling companion yet somehow he is invited (all claim he just invited himself).
Along the way, in a ghetto part of eastern Indy, we stop at a Waffle House. Mike’s traditional stop on trips. He hopes it will be ours as well now. Gabe and I disagree as we force the slop down. The trip continues.
We arrive and start setting up camp in the remaining two hours of day’s light. Travis, Mike’s son, joins us soon from Washington DC and helps to finish. We decide in the darkness to go into town and find something to eat since the reports of a closed resort’s bar due to the pandemic.
The only place available is a small bar called Maggie’s, just west of the New River Gorge Bridge. A bridge so large that, at night, you do not realize you are crossing unless you were aware of it. Maggie’s is a rafting guide’s hangout and we meet people who we will be with later on the rafting trip as a result. No food only pretzels, (after a recollected pause) but hey, we can order a pizza from Domino's. Great idea! We crowd a small three-person table. Hey! You can sit out back on our large patio area. Greater idea!
Out back is an area thrice the size of the small bar that reminds us of someone parent’s basement bar back during our high school days. We spend the evening at a fire pit eating pizza and craft beers. The jokes abound as the buzz increases. It is a good first day for the trip.
We pay our bill and return to camp. Set up a fire and talk through the night. I retire early; I was already sleepy at the bar. Mike and Trevor talk well into 5 am. Father and son reunions are vocal.
 
Thursday, September 17, 2020: Adventures on the Gorge Resort
We woke from the coldest night we will experience. The lower 40s and all joints are stiff. I fell asleep without removing my sleeping bag from its container. I used it as a pillow instead and my Mexican poncho as a blanket. Figuring it was good enough for my father’s peregrinations from our tiny town to Mexico City in his youth yet I failed to consider the difference in night temperatures in these higher latitudes.
Gabe and I, being the first to wake, walked over to the resort for coffee. The place is empty. Activities do not start until Friday. We get our drinks and find a place to sit atop the ridge overlooking a splice of the river below in rolling fog. Rapid trickles below echo into our ears like a far off faucet needing closing, the brisk morning dew chills our fingers. Warming them on the hot brew, we briefly discuss the filial but contemplate the beauty in silence. I like these coffee moments with my brother.
The day continued with mist and rain. Activities rendered untenable in the cold and wet. Before the rain fell steady, in the gray of morning, we did concoct a breakfast of Spam and eggs, chorizo and eggs, just eggs. With spices and metal utensils, (Pat abhors plastic cutlery, though paper plates seem fine for him). It was good. Al Z reneged everything; we suspect he did not want to divvy charged for anything beyond his means. Instead, he cooked a can of beans he brought with him, hunted for wild mushrooms, and a single egg accepted an egg for his breakfast mix. The rest of us ate with reckless abandon.
 We sat under Pat’s Bear’s canopy tent and drank beer for the majority of the downpour. We soon tired of this and decided to try some local breweries. What else to do in rainy days? The nearest were down winding back roads off the typical tracks. We drink a few at Bridge Works Brewery as a first stop and then continued for some more at the Freefolk Brewery. At Freefolk we meet two young ladies, cousins on their own adventure from Pennsylvania. Amanda was the brunette. I do not remember the blonde. Pat, Trevor, and Al enjoyed their company and did all the talking. Al, trying to impress with his Polish language and bizarre tall tales that he may or may not have had. As he freely admitted while dismissing his indecisiveness with a single right-shouldered shrug, as was his habit in any conversation However, he WAS trying hard to woo the blonde whom he mistakenly called Aria, her dog’s name. Pat admits his goal was to talk me up. Obviously misconstruing their expressed interest of the friends who did not attend them.
It is getting dark. Earlier we talked of going down through the Fayette Station Bridge down on the river beside the larger New River Gorge Bridge. During breakfast, I mentioned on how at one point it was the only bridge to cross the river for rafting. What now takes 40 seconds to cross above would take 40 minutes to reach below.
We leave in a rush. “Come on Al! We are on a mission.” Al regrets his missed opportunity of delight with the gorgeous blond named Aria.
Travis drives us all and tries to beat the dark in futility. Making wrong turns, we ended back up at the campsite and we try again. We make it eventually. The view...

In the dark and fog, all is in shadow. We stopped midway on the one-way bridge and step out of the vehicle to view it. The gorge rises on both sides and high above. The flowing river below gray with white spumes where the rapids upstream run eternal. Overhead, about 800 feet up, only a quarter of the New River Gorge Bridge is visible through the rolling mist; the rest is lost in the fog. Like a phantom memory that is there and is not there. The sounds of a semi-trucks on leafs overhead road mingle with the babble of water below. Only a rectangle, book ended with spheres of white and red lights, appear mid-air and glides across the sky onto the visible part bridge that, too, is slowly disappearing from view. And once engulfed by the fog it is like it never was there.
The view beautiful. This experience was surreal. A memory that will last forever.
We return to camp. Watch the remainder of Thursday night football on Travis’ computer. That night it is warmer than last night but I still do not remove the sleeping bag from its bag.

Friday, September 18, 2020: Upper Gauley River
The purpose of getting together before rafting is to get a feel for the crew. On the river, especially The Gauley, we will rely on each other implicitly. I know Gabe and Pat. Mike and Travis are new, and, of course, I know Al from old experience. Not my choice of rafting companion at all, however, as circumstances turned out he now is.
All others were awesome, with varied personalities to be accustomed, we were rough but we are compatible. The bonding of the past couple of days made us an equal unit…all but one.
From the get-go, Al was troublesome. For example, we had six chairs for all yet he insists on sitting on his food bucket (he cleaned out his cupboards and brought all the food he needed for the trip and placed it in a dirty 5-gallon bucket) to not inconvenience us. The first night he refused to sleep in the tent, not wanting to be an imposition. Curled himself up under a Pat’s canopy in a bundle of blankets, refusing a sleeping bag we anticipated for him (we knew he had none). He reneged all offers for comfort and not wanting to inconvenience was a real inconvenience. “It is what it is.” Al was particular.
On the morning of the trip, Al disappeared. We thought he was backing out with all the horror stories of rafting the most treacherous river there is (Al dismisses that by saying “I rafted in Missouri when in the army. How hard is it to doggy paddle to shore if I fell out?”). At the time to check-in and he is not found.
He shows up late at the check-in dressed in jeans and combat boots. I now understand that he did not want to heed our advice against the shoes, it was mentioned previously. Therefore, he went ahead of us. Noticing this, we had to get Mike’s favorite guide, Ray-Ray, to give his opinion. Upon seeing the boots his words were only “Nuh-uh.” Al reluctantly went to put on his only other pair of street shoes. We were assigned a guide and went through orientation.
Mike (our Gauley veteran) requested Ray-Ray to be our guide. Mike had tales to tell of Ray-Ray and hoped we too had the experience, but to Mike’s chagrin, he already had another charge. He was beside himself; Ray-Ray was his only option. “Ray-Ray this…Ray-Ray that…” was all he talked about for days. Instead, we get a young 22 something, Ara Marine. Initially, she admits that this was her second tour of the river but assures us that she knows rafting. She worked in her native Colorado before making the move east. Mike was not sure, and the rest of us had doubts and considered that a seasoned guide might be better suited for this raging river. Even on start of the rafting, there were a few “uh-ohs” or “oh shit” moments where she had to steer us away from unexpected obstacles. However, these calm collected young lass proved her mettle after a few first rapids. She guided us through them with ease and turned out to be the best option for our novice team.
Mike, thinking he was helping, kept mentioning how Ray-Ray handled this, told that story... etc. Whether she was annoyed, she did not betray it. At first opportunity with just us, I pointed out “I am sure Ray-Ray was awesome, it is clear from your bro-mance stories, but each guide has their own tricks. Let’s not confuse her, especially during rapids, with doubts if she should do it as she knows or if she needs to please your remembered experience.”
This seems to have done it as Mike even repeated it often afterward as if it was his original thought.
Ara was home-schooled, became too smart for her peers, and selected a college at an early age. Bored she turned to her love of adventure boating. She tried ski resorts and snowmobiling but the rote would soon lose her interest. She started rafting rivers in her native state of Colorado and found her knack. When she recently came out to West Virginia she took a risk of refusing an only Lower Gauley Rafting guide for fear that she would be pigeon-holed and lose any opportunity at guiding the Upper Gauley. Her gamble paid off and when invited to guide both Upper and Lower, it was the most coveted job on the river. Many have tried, few are considered. Arai is well proven.
During the two-day trip, Al took a shining to her and started his awkward flirtation talk. It was rough to witness. However, understandable. I too may have crushed a bit on this strong and independent young soul. On one let-out, as we disembarked, the long lanky beauty, inches taller than me, offered me her hand to help my ‘jelly knees’ to shore as it was in chivalrous days when gents offered to demure damsels. I accepted freely. I might have even giggled.
We rafted all the Upper Gauley Class Vs this day under her guidance. She complimented our every success. No issues except for one, Pillow Rock early on almost dunked me. That was the lesson learned that got me ready for all the rest.

• Initiation
• Insignificant: named not for the type of rapid but for how it makes you feel afterward
• Pillow Rock: and its ensuing incident
• Lost Paddle
• Shipwreck
• Iron Ring
• Sweet’s Falls: Where we pulled over a successful run only to see others not so lucky. I saw my first throw rope incident and many Postage Due jams in the forbidden rocks.

We continued through the Lower Gauley’s Koontz Flume before letting out on the northernmost bend of the river for the overnight. Setting up tents and drying wet clothes in the cold and wet environment (they will not dry, we know).
Joining the other crews by a fire pit, a fat dinner and all the free beers we can. We enjoyed the remains of the day under starry skies and shooting stars.
 
Saturday, September 19, 2020: Lower Gauley River
We wake to a cold morning but the sun is coming out. Overnight Gabe and I placed our tent on a platform that shook with every move. Gabe thought there was an earthquake when I adjusted. I was trying to get comfortable in the sleeping bag that I finally opened.
The river goes down overnight. Maybe to a few hundred cfs (cubic feet per second), so much so that you could walk across where rapids ran before. How it works, at dawn the Summerville Dam some twenty miles upriver lets out water in the mornings to refill the river. It will take a few hours for that release to get to us. Plenty of time to try to dry our wet and now cold clothes for today's run. In the meantime, there is breakfast. We will break down camp to be on our way by noon.
Al disappears again. To Ara’s concern, there are snakes out here but Al insists on hunting his wild mushrooms. Why pay $20 when he can take some from here. He is even more anti-social here. He stomps around in PJ bottoms and the combat boots while his only pair of clothes are hanging wet in the cold air. He is trying to dry them next to the waning campfire to use them on this second day of rafting.
After a good breakfast and a bit of basking in the brief exposure of sun (that dries us enough to be comfortable in our departure) we push off. Days of sleeping on hard surfaces take its toll on me. I am stiff all over and barely ambulatory.
In attempts to woo Ara even more Al broods quite visibly. In addition, he attempts to be the antithesis of everything we say and do. Us: “Finally! The sun comes out.” Al: “I hate the sun.” “Ah, coffee goes good after that cold night.” “Never drink the stuff.” “We like girls!” “I hate…um…coffee.” You get the idea.
A final few rapids are taken, but if I am honest, after the Upper Gauley these were a bit anticlimactic. Maybe that is maybe because we are now accustomed to the rush of the greater rapids.

• Five Boat Hole
• Upper and Lower Marsh
• Pure Screaming Hell

Even a couple of jumping rocks which Travis and Pat took great advantage. Floating freely down the river. I declined. It might be the harrowing experience in Alaska, where I, water logged and exhausted, could not get myself back in the boat I jumped off. A traumatic experience that stops me now. A phobia I must conquer eventually. After that entire incident was now 35 years past.
The final part of the river was a steady run, a few ripples. THIS is what Al readily admits is whet he knew rafting in Missouri. Now he knows the difference and I think appreciates it. He has already expressed interest in returning with us next year.
Yeah. Sure Al.
But all sights are set for rafting the river down the Grand Canyon next year.

Years after the installation of new diesel propulsion controls on a couple of transports the maintenance fell on us. The intent was for these ship crews to maintain their hardware but all engineering mates were mechanical. None was adept in the computer programming required to run the engines. Therefore, with my familiarity, I was constantly called out to maintain the systems. Not that there was a need, of all the thousand components that makes these ships move, the computers were low maintenance.

On one such maintenance call, I arrived on a Saturday for a quick routine. I was assigned another project so volunteered my weekend to comply to the request that Saturday. I had a return flight set for that evening’s red eye.

All was fine until I heard the revving of the engines. I would seek the Chief Engineer (CHENG) asking why so.

We are just sailing out to the edge of the jetty he tells me. Nothing to be concerned about. So, naively, I return to the bowels of the engine room to continue my one-day preventative maintenance procedure on the propulsion computers.
 
It takes me a few hours to notice that the engines still pokity-pockita'd away outside my confined shack. Noisily churning shafts to the aft and the sway of the ship more than that of shallow shores of the dock allowed.
 
Hmm. I looked for the CHENG but he is not found anywhere on the three storied engine. So I climb three more stories of stairs to the deck to find myself in a watery desert, no land in sight!
 
Going to the bridge, I find the Captain and the CHENG in conspiracy.
 
What gives? Where are we?
 
Well...their sheepish reply. The decision made, since I was available, to give the ship a five day shakedown in open waters.
 
... I open my mouth but nothing comes out...
 
But, but. I have another service call on Monday. I protest. They merely shrug. The decision made No turning back now.
 
I’ve been Shanghaied!
 
The prospect excited me more than the concern really. The mere thought that they would go through such a costly endeavor because of my unique and available skill set was humbling.
 
The excitement short lived. Suddenly I realize that here I am stuck at sea, for what seems to be a week now, and I don’t have fresh skivvies for more than this day. Oh dread.
 
The first night.

The sway of the ship interrupted my sleep. Given officers’ quarters (no shared bathroom), I was made comfortable in my Shanghai. I stroll to the bridge where I find a low ranking officer stuck on the night shift.
Conversation was minimal because she was tasked with keeping an eye on the radar and steer us clear from possible schools of whales typically found at these latitudes. Her face bathed in the green glow of sonar monitors I leave the mate with furrowed brow to her concerns.
 
I step out to the salty breeze of the Atlantic. We are running dark (no exterior lights lit) so the sky is ablaze with too many stars and planets in the absence of pollution, enough light to guide my path. I climb to the roof of the radio shack, the highest point of the ship. Only rotating radar antenna equipment there is higher. I avoid them and stay well outside the yellow warning marks in their radius.
 
There is a lighted compass in the middle of that roof. It matches the one in the bridge below. Indicating our bearing of south-southeast. I compare it with the bright point in the sky that is Venus.
 
"Yup! Southeast alright." My statement, to no one, made it official.
 
The air was not silent. I heard the breeze emanating from American shores miles west of us. The gentle splash of ocean against this behemoths hull. In addition, even so far above, the hum of powerful diesel engines pushing us along. Burning, so I am told, thousands of dollars of fuel per hour.
 
However, the one sound that brings me out of my reverie was the whir of motors rotating those antennas.
 
"Wait a minute" I suddenly realize, “…don't these detectors emit radiation?"
 
Whoa! I back off quickly, cupping my junk as if protecting the boys from possible sterilization! A hasty retreat down to the officer’s deck ensues.
 
The concern dissipates as I arrive to my cabin and settle in on my bunk, rocked back to sleep by the gentle sway of the ship on the Atlantic.

Sometime in between

The energy is frenetic, crew coming and going from the engine control room doing their monitoring and maintenance. Each assigned their own individual procedures for the collaborated benefit on one action, keeping the engines running properly. Suddenly everything shuts down and everyone is looking to CHENG for answers as he is on the phone with the Captain.

"Whales."

The sighs and grunts of disdain are the new sound in a silenced engine room. We must now float powerless until the encountered leviathans decide to mosey along their way. Could be an hour, could be a day. We are held hostage until then.

Though now running silent, the echoed hum of the engines still rattle my bones, my ears buzz with the memory of their din like a phantom limb. The sensation is odd.

The last day

The sway of the boat is now imperceptible. The body has acclimated and that fact will be evident days later when on dry, stable land as my equilibrium wobbles in anticipation of an absent swing. I will stumble like a drunk departing after ‘last call’.
 
The days mundane, my propulsion computers dependable and without faults, for the length of this cruise they require little of my attention. I distract myself by reading repair manuals for mechanical parts of the engine room. Enough reading to eventually assist the crew on their maintenance routines. Even once I ‘drove’ the ship at the Captain’s request when his call to the engine room could not yield a crew-mate. I am commanded to put the main engine from ‘Slow Ahead’ to ‘Half Ahead’. With an “Aye Captain.” I shift the telegraph forward in response. A linked alarm will buzz in the bridge to advise the pilot to match their telegraph to my commands. My console buzzer will cease when they have done so. I am briefly giddy with the power.
 
 I visit the deck often. The view reminds me of a passage I have read once in my youth:
 
"Well, then, just step forward and take a peep over the weather-bow, and then back to me and tell me what ye see there".
Going forward and glancing over the weather-bow, I perceived that the ship swinging on her anchor with the flood-tide was now obliquely pointing toward open ocean. The prospect was unlimited, but exceedingly monotonous and forbidding; not the slightest variety that I could see.
"What did you see?"
"Not much," I replied- "nothing but water; considerable horizon though..."
"Well, what does thou think of seeing the world? Do ye wish to go round Cape Horn to see any more of it, eh? Can't ye see the world where ye stand?"
Conversation between Captain Peleg and Ishmael
Moby Dick - Chapter 16
 
On this vessel, the size of up to three football fields, you feel small. Insignificant against tons and tons of sinkable steel welded and configured so it defies logic with its buoyancy.
 
Now consider that beast in the vast expanse of ocean. So small and insignificant in a sheet of only water and horizon. No matter how fast we travel the same monotonous view meets us for days.
 
This, I assume, is what Captain Peleg tried to point out to Ishmael.

But sailors are an optimistic bunch. The appeal to seeing the world is not what is immediately in front of them but the anticipation of what they will eventually encounter.

I am often asked, as is the case of at least once every hiking trail I have traveled lately, “What is that on your back?”
They are referring to a girth of a branch that hangs over my shoulder, secured in place by the straps of my backpack. “This is my hiking stick.” I would reply. The look on their faces tells me I need to explain further.
I proceed with the story of my finding it some years back in the Guatemalan jungle. Or, as I more aptly believe, it found me.

In the spring of 2014, I participated in a project with Engineers without Borders. The job was to install a solar panel array to power a pump that provided water to an indigenous children’s school in the eastern jungle of Guatemala. The majority of the students were Mayan and the school, called Ak’Tenamit, was ten miles inland from the Caribbean port town of Livingston. Their current use of a petrol pump required the students to carry five gallons of fuel into the jungle to keep the pump going. We intended of relieving them to the labor and cost of keeping the water flowing.
The project was entirely planned from Chicago offices donating space for our monthly meetings, materials donated, and shipped to the site. The local contingent assisted by clearing an area near the cenote site (a water spring in the jungle) of vegetation, brush, and trees. Once all was in place we few volunteers traveled to the site for the week’s activity of building and wiring the panels.
The experience was surreal. Heat and exhausting treks to and from the site was taxing. The children accompanying us mocked us by running circles around us. Back and forth, they teased as they limberly traversed the slick terrain. The final approach was to descent to the clearing along the rocky and muddy path.
One day, exhausted, I sat on the debris of fallen branches that made the clearing. . My lungs barely purchasing the hot humid air robbed of me by the long trek. I sat there observing the other younger volunteers as they busied themselves in construction. I was called for a wiring issue. I tried to stand but fell back onto the branches. More exhausted than I thought. Therefore, I reach down and pull on a thick branch, arched, and about a meter long. This remnant coffee tree branch, gooey marrow still soft, seemed appropriately strong enough to support my heft.
For the remainder of that stay, it became a crutch. I carried it everywhere. Used it to hang wire and other equipment I had to transport to the clearing when I was a beast of burden. A leaning post when I had no other option when resting. And best of all, I would wedge it in the soft part of the ground and hang my backpack on it to keep it away from invasive insects seeking the sweet snacks in it. Learning my lesson once multiple invading fire ants seeking the same sweet treat stung when I reached in an open pocket.
The branch may have saved my life at one point. I slipped on the slick rock on a decent. Reaching out with the stick in hand it wedged in the crook of a tree and I did not fall into the ravine. Of course, I may be romanticizing the experience. I am sure I would have reached out without the stick in hand. But…
The time came when our work was successfully completed and we prepared to depart. Without consideration, I chucked my friend into the brush behind our cabins, did not give it a thought as we traveled the day to Guatemala City, and boarded our flight back to Chicago.
Fall of 2014, asked to return with another group that was building bathrooms connected to an ABR (Anaerobic Baffled Reactor, a combination of septic tanks with a series of baffles that, over time, clean refuse to separate water fit for irrigation and the resulting ‘mud’ used as fertilizer). This time the demand was more for my translation skills than engineering. Happy to assist I took an additional vacation and joined the crew.
To my surprise, I found the branch where I have thrown it. It was light and I expected it to be washed away from the hill in one of the many rainfalls in my absence. Therefore, I carried it again. Instantly recognized with it. The children called me what sounded like ‘Kiarrick” in the native Quiché language. They would plump themselves up and pretend an imaginary cane to walk. Obviously mocking my thick frame. As they ran off laughing, I asked my translator what the word meant.
“Oh, um, it means…a big man with a stick.” He replied hesitantly in Spanish.
I took it to be a Sheriff Buford reference and I carried it proud any time I heard it called by the kids. Of course, later I find that this was a combination of two Quiché words. Jäq (verb) which stands for broken branch (or twig) and Rì’j (noun) the not so honorific ‘old man’. I now understand my translator’s hesitancy.
Still, I carry this name with honor; it is the name of my Mayan walking stick these days.
The time came for our departure. This time I carried the stick further uphill behind the cabins. Planted it upright in the ground for all to see, if they looked. A bit more worn and most of the bark peeled off it was apparent that it was out of place in all that fallen foliage. But I did not want it to wash away this time around.
I believed this would be the last time I would see it.
As luck would have it, I had an opportunity to return the spring of the following year to help finish the ABR project. Kiarrick patiently waited for me in the same place, fallen palm leaves draped over it but still sturdy in that ground.
More useful this time as my services were required in the extent of the campus. Calls for me at the well prompted a thirty-minute hike. Then recalled to the ABR resulted in a longer hike over a nearing hill. Exhausting, I now leaned on my stick as I translated between the EWB crew and the local carpentry talent.
One such occasion was that the mason was frustrated with the EWB engineer demanding that the concrete walls be nonporous. With local materials, this was near impossible and both were yelling at my translator and me to convey their opinions. The Mayan mason started explaining to me the impossibility and his solution, in Quiché. He kept at it, my translator not having the opportunity to translate. I stood there, leaning on my stick, nodding in understanding. The mason pauses, looking at me for a response. I give him an approving nod and he wanders off satisfied that he won this battle. Meanwhile, I tell the EWB member “Let’s see how his solution fares.”
Incredulous, the translator asked me “You understood all of that?”
“No,” I said shaking my head.  “But he sounded so sure of himself I figured he knew what to do.”
It came time to leave this last time. The day came for us to pack and I found my stick missing. Disappointed I considered that someone coveted it thinking I was going to leave it anyway. They must have liked the way I wrapped the nylon cord around it, making it look like a snakeskin sheathe. However, as we said our goodbyes I found that the students took it to the local woodcarver to carve my birthdate in Mayan rune on the hilt.
Touched by the gesture, I hold this treasure near. I carry it on all my travels. It has been with me on trails from Guatemala to Canada. It will be with me when I finally run my planned Pilgrimage on the Road of Santiago de Compostela.
This particular date rune will not repeat in the Mayan calendar for another 3200 years. It is as unique as the felled coffee branch that chose its travel companion.

After our return from Boulder Bay, we settled into an existence of inactivity. With work at the lagoon camp concluded, we decide not to heed the order to continue work at the new site. Our first and only trip was treacherous enough. With the shortening days, it would be difficult to get any progress going at a remote site.
We contemplate an escape. By now, we both have conceded to the idea that Harry Waterfield was not going to return. The matter was in our hands now and so we gauge how long it might take us to achieve this by land or by water.

Our camp was actually at the eastern point of a peninsula, around 150 square miles of rough terrain, surrounded by Ugak Bay to the north and Kiliuda Bay to the south. Each bay with strips of water ten miles inwards from the Pacific and each about three miles wide at its narrowest north to south points. The peninsula had several mountain ranges with 600-foot peaks. Impassable rivers at the valleys. Getting to the base would be an ordeal, just to continue northwesterly toward our destination compounding the navigable land exponentially. All this to achieve a distance of about thirty miles as the crow flies.
Even considering a longer boat ride north than our recent trip to Boulder Bay was questionable. With short days, unpredictable weather, and an unreliable boat motor, the northeast arc around the jutting land north of Ugak made this consideration an impossibility. Even with the destination reduced to an otherwise manageable 50-mile traverse.
Every consideration thought of. Do we take gear? Do we try a light traverse? How do we protect ourselves with coming gales at heights and uncertain paths? Where would we shelter in the certain multi day trip? Our military tent too heavy to carry. To attempt them in the coming winter weather was madness to consider without proper climbing gear. The results daunting. I knew that Jim secretly factored my inexperience in this environment as a liability. He never mentioned it, but I knew it because I considered it as well.
The escape stifled by our hope and depression sets in. We lingered defeated in the tent for an unknown quantity days. Now planning to weather out the coming winter until spring. We start getting on each other’s nerves. With no distractions, Jim and I began to acknowledge each other’s irritable habits. His complaint of my offending sock smell was frequent already, understandably because they too offended me. Without soap, there was so much that could be done washing them in lagoon water and with no option to dry. I reciprocated by complaining of his southern drawl and mispronunciation of certain words. “It’s creek! C-R-E-E-K creek! What the hell is a crik?” My empty complaints petty.
We attempt some space between us but even the spacious military tent became cramped. Storms confined us inside. The blinding darkness of night, already twelve hours long, shuttered us to the extents of our glowing stove. Our only relief was listening to NPR news feeds each day and the obligatory Paul Harvey’s ‘The Rest of the Story’ (…Good Day!)  Nothing more, the need to conserve the radio’s battery life. Re-reading our respective books and newspaper scraps that we have not burned yet. My own Sony Walkman already depleting its battery and my only cassette album of the ‘Cocktail’ movie Soundtrack ran garbled. The Georgia Satellites version of ‘Hippy Hippy Shake’ now a tone deaf drawl at one-third of its original speed.
Our one relief of the mundane was creating a repast from the scraps of leftover food supplies. Powdered potatoes with homemade pizzas (toasted bread with spaghetti sauce) were Jim’s. A Mulligan stew of leftover soups and bits of vegetables was mine. An improvement for me because when I arrived I have never cooked. Now I try different combinations of the available. Some good some not so.
 After some days though, we notice our stores dwindling. Our thoughts then the same, Harry starved us for days before his return with the current supplies the last time. This time, we did not anticipate his return with more supplies. Therefore, we start rationing our meals and minimizing intake to one dinner per day. Without activity, we do not need much to subsist.
Jim decided to hunt for more food. It is a necessity if we are to last the winter.
“How long you gone for?” my concern evident in my voice. Until now, I have never been alone. Family back home always surrounded me. In Kodiak city, I slept on a couch in a two-bedroom apartment with two families and their children. Now Jim anticipates being gone four days. Three minimum.
“What should I do?”
Jim suggests I stock up on firewood. The cold nights gnaws at the bundles of twigs we collect from the seashore. A heft of a bundle would burn out in about two hours and we spend the rest of the night shuddering in our sleeping bags attempting to keep body heat in.
“Right, firewood. I’ll get the bow-saw.”
“No, use the chainsaw. It is faster.” Jim suggested. “You’ll get more done.”
“Sure. Sure.”
The problem, I have never used a chainsaw. The thought of using it brought images of my slipping and cutting off my leg and bleeding to death in the middle of nowhere. However, Jim assigned me the task and I did not want to disappoint. Yet…all that blood. I have seen the movies.
I worry. On the night of our arrival, trying to prove my worth, I foolishly volunteer to go for water from a fresh stream up beach in the dark. In that pitch black, flashlight barely producing a narrow needle of light to pierce the shadows, I get lost. Jim and Harry came to my rescue. A week in and we three attempt sleep at the worksite in a two man tent, hoping to bypass the five mile hike from base to camp. That night a storm deluged us. Water rivulets under the tent, shifting the ground under our weight and soon the nylon seeps.  They leave for the shelter at an unoccupied cabin. However, I remained, with my morals preventing me to be party to breaking and entering. Water sweeping downhill from my head to feet toward a waiting creek; the flow now a few inches deep in the tent I try to sleep on my side as I lay my head on the barrel of Jim’s hunting rifle wedged on damp sleeping bags in attempts to keep my head above rushing water. The torment too great I leave toward where I remember the cabin was. Along the way, I find Jim and Harry returning to collect me along the doused path.
Now, if anything were to happen to me, with Harry gone and Jim in the hills hunting, no one will be coming to my rescue. My fate lies in my being cautious. Never before, I had to consider this. The thought of which was petrifying.
Jim departs at dawn with partial rations in his pack and his prized rifle over his shoulder. I never told him how I violated it that stormy night. I watch him round the lagoon westward and disappear into the misty haze and into the bush. I get to work for I have a task to complete, heading over to the beach I hunt for firewood. Welcoming the change of pace and considering that this brief separation will alleviate the tension between us. I am sure he felt the same.
Among the flotsam and jetsam, the beach fills with burnable branches, logs, and wooden debris thrown overboard by fishing vessels. I drag it all over a sandy ridge and stage them beside the tent to cut them down to a burnable size. The daily tides brings the bounty to our shores.
I decide against the chainsaw after all. The fear of self-mutilation is too great. The bowsaw will have to do. Yet the day’s progress was slow. The sawing tiring and I only get a pittance of a pile that only provided about an hour’s worth of heat from the stove that night. I sleep in the freezing weather and wake to a stalactite of my vaporous exhaust hanging from the tent’s roof over my head. I have determined that the quantity of material is exponentially greater than the produced heat returned. I was going to have to increase productivity this day.
Returning to the task that next day, I sawed away and attempt to produce a larger purchase only to be spent within a few hours. Exhausted, I rest to recover my strength and return to work when breath caught. However, the more attempts with the manual saw the quicker I tried out and the longer the recovering pause. Something not considered when we rationed our intake to one meal of scraps a day this past week. I lacked the calories for continued activity. With no choice and fear of freezing, eyeing the chainsaw, I concede to the possibility of mutilation, in any event, my death should at least be swift and no more suffering Morbidly I resolve that if that were the case there will be no need for heat then. Remembering Jim’s instruction on its operation, I proceed cautiously. Turn the lever, choke, and pull the cord. Repeat. Repeat. Re… The chainsaw roars to life. Surprisingly not drawing itself to my limbs. My fears unfounded. I start with small twigs. Leaning in, they split and fly away effortlessly in response. I like this…larger branches yield to the power of the chain…yes…logs just as easily yield kindling, a four hundred year old tree stump that took me half a day to roll over should burn for days. YES! It surprises me how easily the metal cuts wood; the term ‘hot knife through cold butter’ could not be more apt. I make a chair out of that stump. I clear the beach of all burnable material. The pile is enough to last the night.
On my third day, I rest at dusk. Exhausted from the heft of the machine and excess work. Even in my weakened state, I now have produced more firewood than the manual saw. With a three foot pile I am sure I have enough now for the duration of a night. Sitting on my new chair that we will eventually call ‘The Throne’, I contemplate my surroundings, the sun already below the western mountains and temperatures dropping to freezing. I barely the change, my cheeks do stiffen in the cold breeze. The grass waves and the sound of the surf roars against the cliff walls to the north and reflect back, the echo combining the back and forth soundwaves into a combined roar sounding more like a plane’s propeller. The auditory mirage would later haunt me. Nevertheless, for now I contemplate for the first time I have been alone for days. Interestingly, voices start to whisper whisper in my ear their approval “See, you worried for nothing.” Other voices chime in their opinions, each starting to yell wanting to be acknowledged, “Hey! Did you hear me?” Then a songs start to play, one not heard for a while. Melodies and tune exactly as I remembered hearing it before and we pause our conversation to enjoy the melody. I marvel at the precise recollection when my mind clears. We approve of the selection. I find the gentle madness soothing. The solitude relaxing, the abandonment fear abate. It is now dark and I retire into the tent. That night I slept in the warmth of my labors.
By the time of Jim’s return, I have a sizeable supply of wood. He approves. He shows me his prize, a backpack full of deer and fox. The venison is for consumption, he has plans for the fox pelts. He tells me of a mallard eluded his traps. Nevertheless, the meat was a welcomed site. Jim starts to dress them in the tent. Stripping them of fur and chopping into modest proportions. The remainder stored in a plastic cooler and the skins and unusable remains buried in a shallow grave just outside of the tent.
We ate like kings that night. Being the welcomed guest Jim has the honor of sitting on ‘The Throne’. Dinner conversation consisted of his experience alone on the hill. I admit my fears over the chained contraption, how I overcame them. We were genuinely glad to be in each other’s company again that even repeated jokes welcome a chuckle.
Sleeping that night with bellies full, we do not even notice the fire going out. Sometime in the middle of the night, I wake to the sound of grunting. My eyes open but the darkness so complete it feels like they are still closed. I cannot see my waving hand and I poke at my eye with an ‘ow’.
“Shhh!” Jim berates me to silence.
“Wha...” I hear more grunting and scraping just outside of my side of the tent. “What is…?”
“Shhh!”
Bears generally isolate themselves and stay away from human settlements. A few wander through and if an encounter proves to be confrontational, usually the human not knowing how to react, they do tend to react. At least once a week NPR news reports of such encounters around the Kenai Peninsula where the result is serious injury from the antagonized. One such report announced that a bear, annoyed when the hunter attempted to shoot it in the head “…in self-defense”, its thick skull barely breached from the short-range shot. The report concluded with reporting that the man hiked miles to a hospital with half his face ripped off, gaping slashes on his torso. He staggered in holding his dangling eyeball in the socket the entire time. He lost that eye.
Kodiak brown bears, indigenous to Kodiak Island, reportedly the largest members of their species, grow to a towering eight feet and can weighing as much as 1500 pounds. They are a powerhouse on four paws, and unpredictable when encountered.
When is the time to avoid them? Generally all of the time. But especially when they protect their families or when they are searching for food to last the winter’s hibernation. Our bad luck, a family of bears, about three, caught the scent of our buried carcasses. Hibernation time approaches after this month. As they dug up the remains, I could hear sound of tearing and chewing occurring mere feet from my laid position just outside our canvas walls. I saw nothing, pitch of night that made me think I dared not open my eyes. Nevertheless, they were open so wide with fear that the cold frosted their exposed liquid film. It was all sound, the scraped dirt splashing the tent wall, the mewing of cubs, the snorts of adults. All as if whispered in my ear. If they scented us, these bears looking for hibernation feed, would turn to us. We could not run anywhere, nor protect ourselves from invisible attackers with acute senses. The realization paralyzing. I do not know how long we lay there. It felt like hours. We were frightened in place, laying in darkness anxiously. That fear exhausting us we went back to sleep unaware of their eventual departure.  
When I woke Jim was dressed and putting on his boots. I followed suit. We checked the shallow grave. Empty. Not a scrap remained. We considered ourselves lucky. Even more so that they did not scent the food in the plastic cooler inside the tent. Probably my offending damp socks deterred their advance I joked. We both chuckle nervously.
We still had more meats that needed dressing in the cooler so we resolved that all scrap and refuse from then on would be dropped on the opposite end of our lagoon. Sure enough the next time we did so we rowed our boat across and tossed the materials into the tall grass and noticed as we rowed back a flurry of activity at the drop off site.
The rest of that week went without incident or encounters and we settled to a mundane existence again. I was now the woodworker, the sawdust pile my pigpen. Jim suggested using some of that dust as an insulator between our bags and the ground. The grass collected flattened quickly and needed to replace continuously. Jim, an optimist, continued studying the topography maps contemplating routes of possible return.
Jim departed for another hunt, this time for sport but the yield will provide more food. We had enough meat to last a while but considering that the weather would turn worse, it would be best to stock up. This time he was gone a bit longer. Both of us welcoming another bout of solitude. In my spare time, I started crossing the lagoon to the nearest tree line to grab more wood to drag back. The beach already combed clean, the surf produced minimal amounts of timber. Before I knew it, he was back.
***
One evening, while we sat in the tent, conversations brief with nothing new to say, we re-read our respective books to while the time away. Jim reading Farley Mowat’s ‘The Siberians’ while I attempted Gene Roddenberry’s version of ‘Star Trek: The Motion Picture’. In his absence, I started reading his book, found it enticing and now longed to continue where I left off but refrained asking him for it. Suddenly Jim looks up. “Hey, that’s a plane.”
“No, that is just the echo of the surf off the cliffs.” I retort.
However, the din persisted and we exit the tent to investigate. The sight unexpected, a seaplane was banking in our lagoon. We stood there dumbfounded. Dropping off two men and their kits before taking off again. The men winded up the path, approached us and after introductions asked if they could stay with us until daylight. Their arrival delayed and now have lost the advantage of the brief daylight to set up camp.
“We got beer.”
Sure.
They were hunters on a final leg of an expedition. In our seclusion, we forgot that hunting season was upon us. Kodiak Island is vast, the chances of encounters brief. Yet here these two were. They, engineers working the North Slope, are vacationing these two weeks and taking advantage of hunts across Alaska. Kodiak, specifically our location, their last stop.
We welcomed the chance encounter, talking well into the night. We offered our only whiskey bottle to counter their beer. We talked of our mishap and abandonment and they explained their work experience, two continuous weeks of work in the eternal night of the arctic and two weeks flown home anywhere in Alaska. I was fascinated, that there are extreme jobs like that influenced me that night to study engineer if I returned. Maybe with luck to work on the slope like them. No one slept, talk of our lives back home, sharing jokes and depleting the libations happened until dawn. At which time they excused themselves and retreat into the hills.
Upon their return in a few days to await the returning plane, they visited once more. Plans were made to secure a flight for us upon their return to Kodiak City. The following day a small plane appeared. Small enough for one passenger. Jim offered for me to take the spot. I declined. He knew how to contact Waterfield. He was better equipped to negotiate a pick-up. We both knew that I was not adept to follow the plan through, yet he offered. I ceded the seat to Jim.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” I answered. Confident in my ability to survive in solitude, yet inwardly fearing a renewed abandonment ‘what if he forgets about me’.
We shook hands and they were off. Stifling the nascent fear, I was confident in Jim’s promise to get me out of here. He has not failed me in the past month yet.
Truly alone this time. I lose myself in busy work. Woodpiles the eternal chore, dumping of refuse across the lagoon, digging a new latrine downwind. I have learned a lot in these long weeks. I nearly forget the luxuries of city living. Such luxuries seem pedestrian to me now. At night sitting by the glow of a cherry red furnace (experimenting with the delicate adjustment of the flue pipe), I find a further appreciation in Jim’s book. That night I dream of the ice foundations of Siberian architecture.
In the following days, expecting the return of a rescue plane, I start looking up with every echo of the surf against the mountainous range. It was frustrating. I knew they were mirages but maybe this one time… Finally, one turned out to be an actual plane. Jim returns. I was surprised. He felt bad leaving me alone and came back with more supplies.
“Why? You could have just sent the plane for me”
“Well, when I finally got a hold of Harry he threatened to hold our pay if we did not close up camp and return with our field notes. So I figured I would schedule us a pickup for this Friday. Charged it to Waterfield and associates. I came back to help pack up.”
The news of pay was promising, but Harry’s apology for his delayed return felt contrived. My trust in him lost.
We ate the last of our stores in those final days, packed all of our goods, and locked all of Harry’s away in the igloos, which he was forbidden to use as well by the lease company.
Friday came and we waited. All day we sat on our packs. He tells me tales of what has transpired in our absence back home, trying to distract the lag of time. Hope of our return made us antsy. False echoes picked away at that hope. As the day waned, we resolved that poor weather must have prevented flights that day. Deflated, we started returning to the igloos (our tent packed away) to wait for another day. Suddenly a low flying plane surprised us as it crossed the eastern sandy ridge and landed on the lagoon.
The pilot warned, “Storm’s coming!” He hurried us but had only room for one person at a time again. I insist Jim go first. I will wait for the return flight. The pilot warns that if the storm prevents his return tonight he will attempt again in the morning.
I was not worried. I trusted that my friend Jim would ensure my rescue. Waving them good-bye, I return to the igloo resolved that he would not return that day. Yet, within the hour, to my shocked, he in fact did return and I rushed back to shore, not waiting for him to fully stop, I throw my stuff in the open door and jumped in. Buckled in the back seat and holding the struts he takes off with the pitting sensation, a mix of dizziness and nausea digs into my gut. He looks over his shoulder to asses me. We cannot speak, the propeller roar is too loud, and I indicate an affirmative with thumbs up. As he banked northward toward the only city, I notice a setting sun breaking through darkened clouds off to the west. One of a few times that I saw it in so many weeks. It shined reddish orange on the darkening blue waters of Ugak Bay. The bay extending so far off to the horizon that I barely see the land beyond even at this altitude. I realize how foolish our plans of overland escape would have been. This vastness was unforgiving.
During that flight, I remembered a conversation Jim and I had one night before zipping up in our respective sleeping bag. He asks, “Gil, what do you expect from your life?”
Unsure of what he meant I respond, “I don’t know. I never give it much thought.”
“That is your problem. You are letting others dictate your path. You need to get control and do your thing. Don’t follow someone else’s dream.”
Thinking he was just annoyed with me again, I respond bothered. “I don’t do that, I am here ain’t I.”
“Well, if we returned after our two week contract, you would have returned to your life of others providing for you. Safe in expecting their charity. Probably find yourself a wife soon so you can rely on her to do things for you. Cook, clean. All that stuff.”
I retort. “Nuh-uh!”
“I bet you that you will. Let’s bet you will be married in the next five years”
“YOU will be married before me I bet you.” my clever reply.
“What do you wanna bet?”
The only thing I can remember in my annoyance was a scene in the movie ‘Cocktail’ where Tom Cruise lost a bet and had to buy his mentor a $500 bottle of scotch. Therefore, I suggest that. We agree and go to sleep. Disturbed, that conversation lingered in my head. Eventually though I realized what Jim was trying to say to me.
I will always remember that moment as a liberation of not just a six-week abandonment but also of living in confinement and ignorance. I existed isolated of such possibilities and without confidence to explore beyond the safety of my four walls. Until this experience, I did not know what life I had to live.
 
Epilogue
I will not deny that I survived because of the benevolence of a good man. Whether intentionally or by accident, Jim’s guidance and patience birthed a confident soul, curious of the beyond, and willing to explore the unknown. As a result, returning home to Indiana, I would venture out for days without notice. Distressing my poor suffering mother. “Where does this come from, mijo? No one in the family does this.”
Our friendship continued as we returned to Kodiak City. I returned to my couch in the crowded apartment, Jim ever the recluse rented a cabin outside of town without running water and electricity. We cliff climbed in our spare time, and he taught me more of natural living. We both so inspired by the engineers that we registered to the University of Alaska in Kodiak to continue our education. Where he met a beautiful co-ed with similar interests. Her name merely P.J. (I joke that their initials were inverted). A quick romance they soon moved in together in the small cabin. Our excursions now deterred to make way for blossoming love. I was not disappointed. My visits varied not wanting to be a fifth wheel.
Harry finally contacted me weeks after our return looking for the logbooks. Jim and I split them to ensure payment. However, the job service recommended we sue him in small claims court. Jim could not because of his salary but I could. I relinquished the books to a lawyer. I notified Harry of that. Angry he threatens to hold a salary that he never intended to pay. That was the last I heard from him.
My lawyer discovered that Harry and a partner have swindled workers from small boroughs across Alaska with the same promise of work and pay. Seven teams on Kodiak alone. Some with less favorable outcomes than ours. One man fell off the cliffs and ended up with broken legs. Each team awaiting their own small claims court to secure payment. Jim and I discuss this and agree that we will not see our payday from this. We move on.
The job service, wracked with guilt in suggesting the surveying job, secure me some choice positions. I still work the cannery but I also become the maintenance man for an elderly home on Erskine road. The job affords me a one-bedroom apartment on the premises for half the price of rent. I move out of the couch and have my own place. That position leads to the night manager and eventually the only manager while the boss leaves for Seattle to tend to frostbit limbs. Peppered with odd jobs of painting homes, tarring roofs, drywall installations, I make a modest living.
Exxon Valdez happens and all business on the island dry up. I cannot afford my existence on just the one management job so I decide to return home temporarily to wait out until fishing resumes after the cleanup. I say goodbye to Jim and PJ and other friends made and return to Indiana.
Life happens and one thing turns into another. I have a nomadic existence for a few years bartending weekend and traveling off tips made during the week. A few odd jobs here and there. However, eventually, that experience runs thin so I return to school and fulfill my aspirations to become an engineer, working days in a mill to make tuition and nights at school. It takes me some time but I achieve the title and even better secure a position where travel is a priority. I am satisfied with one lone regret. I do wish to return to that land in the north.
After departing my contact with Jim diminished. The original off the grid person our only contact was by mail. We have that kind of friendship though that does not require constant validation. I have a few friends like this. We do not need to keep in constant contact. We would gap our calls, meetings, and continue as if our last contact was just the day before. This is Jim and me.
I know that he and P.J. married and had children. I expect them to have a large brood of grandchildren by now, all with good manners influenced by the humble man that I call my friend.
I also know that that S.O.B. owes me a 500-dollar bottle of scotch as well.

We could already hear the breakers as we approached the southern tip of what is marked on the map as Dangerous Cape. Around the tip of this peninsula is our destination, Boulder Bay. We were about to learn that the names for these locations were aptly named.

A note to new readers: This story is a continuation of the book attempt you find in earlier entries to the blog site. It was a job offering that sounded, and was, too good to be true. Two weeks on a survey expedition in the wilds of Kodiak Alaska. Three of us, Harry Waterfield (the contractor), Jim Purdy and myself flew out to the site just south of Ugak Bay. We set up camp on a seasonally dried out lagoon and hiked miles inland to conduct land surveys. Hunters were establishing cabins there and documentation was required. Jim a surveyor from the Carolinas was the expert on site. I was just a mule, dragging equipment back and forth.
However, it was an experience. Within a week, the boss, Harry, intends returning to Anchorage to “take care of some business” and promises to return in a week before our contract concludes. He is pleased with our work and expresses that he would like us to continue the contract on the next site, Boulder Bay.
 He flies out on the only transport we had back to civilization. A week passes and no sign of Harry, our stores depleted by then. We continue our work; surely, he was delayed momentarily. It is three more days without food before we hear his plane overhead and land on the beach miles off.
We drop what we are doing and rush to camp with dreams of replenished stocks and a decent dinner. However, within the hour of or trek back we hear the echo of his plane power up off the mountainsides. Sure enough, we see him fly overhead directed north to Kodiak city.
We arrive to the camp and find a pile of food, two weeks supply, in our storage igloo along with a note scribbled on a paper plate “Business in Anchorage not concluded. Will return in one week”. Additional information scribbled with directions as to how to conclude our work in his absence.
We continued the job to completion even after his being late on return again. Now de decide to lift the lagoon camp and settle at the Boulder Bay camp…

***

By the time of our arrival, the day has waned unexpectedly, after a couple of incidents that delayed our travel we have arrived at our destination. We certainly did not expect that in this late in the autumn to be strapped for time in the mid-afternoon. However, in these latitudes, the days were shortening dramatically as we approached the solstice. Southern Alaska will achieve 4-hours of day and 20 hours of night by December 21. As the days passed and as daylight shortened. Here we were in the first weeks of November and our nightfall was already at dinnertime.
 Our objective was simple, now that our survey work at the lagoon camp done for already a week now; we were instructed to move our camp from the lagoon toward further south Boulder Bay. Four weeks into our current two-week contract, and being done one week already we decide to chance a trip of moving the camps. Our decision was weighed against shortening days and the lack of work and,truth be told, the boredom of having nothing to do. We planned the trip and were about to execute it earlier in the week when severe three-day gale kept us moored in our tent. We rode the storm in safety, only a mere spine of sand separated our depressed dry lagoon from the torrent of winds, preventing us from being blowing us away. The storm abates and we are now execute our escape.
This morning greeted us with some sunlight piercing the gloom of clouds overhead; balmy forty-degree weather proves that today is the day and we decided that it was as good a time as any to move our camp. Our destination was a mere dozen miles south from our current location as the crow flies. What can go wrong? We loaded the skiff with reckless abandon and started on our way.
Our hubris will soon be tested.
The first delay was when we set out from the safety of our lagoon, the calm waters swelled as we passed from the inlet out toward the rage of Pacific waters; a berme created by the recent gale storm halted our progress immediately several feet way from shore. A ridge of seabed pushed toward the island and hidden a mere foot under the wash. We hit it unexpectedly and it lodged our skiff immobile. Sideways against the waves. Jim, worried, screaming the obvious in the deafening wind, “If we do not move those waves will topple us!”
Our short skiff rocked in the surf. Already burdened with survey equipment, a Rokon motorcycle, timber, and a collection of unnecessary miscellany from our camp we sat low in the wash. A mere foot of clearance and we would have missed the obstacle altogether. As it was, the water level was mere inches from the lip of our sides.
I sat at the bow and Jim on the transom at the stern operating the motor. We stared at each other unsure of what to do as we sat immobile.
I yelled back to Jim, “I’m going to try something!” and jump out onto the submerged ridge. I stood ankle-deep in water several feet from the shore. I start pushing the boat. A couple of heaves and rocking started to feel the grit of sand scraping the hull projected through my hands. The vessel was in motion. We started moving asI take one-step…then another. We are finally free but I find that I have walked down the far side of the berne's ridge and I am now chest-deep in water. My rain gear logged with water I cannot bring myself onto the skiff.
“Quit fooling around!” yells Jim.
I flounder as the water in my tripled weight.
“I…CAN’T!” I yell back.
Jim notices my despair and comes across the skiff to draw me in. However, the wet plastic of my rain gear makes gripping me impossible. He cannot pull me in and I cannot pull myself up. I no longer feel the seabed beneath my feet. The skiff is free rocking free out toward sea and I hang for life on its gunwale.
Quick thinking, Jim grabs an oar, wedges it under me, and uses it as a lever to lift me out of the water. We both grunt and with a heave, I flop over the edge onto the bottom of the boat like a prize-winning marlin. Breathing hard we both laugh at our stupid circumstance. We continue our course, confident that we have encountered the one and only hazard of our trip.
He is already directing the motor toward our destination as I balance myself,  standing to drain the water from my gear. I then sit on the bow, leaning on the lifesaving oar, placing it across the gunwale. But not for long. In our burdened state the waves, peaking over our heads, pour into the skiff.. As we dip, all is silent. As we crest the crashing din of wind and surf is almost deafening. All the while, I try to scoop water that pours into the vessel. Our hand siphon pump fails within the first half hour of the trip, the siphon’s hose falls off into the sea, without it, the pump has no suction. I am now scooping the water with an empty coffee can. A Pyrrhic effort. On the positive, that wind had dried me off from the earlier incident.
We travel southwesterly at an obstructed speed. Accelerating and decelerating at the whim of the imposing waves. Along our right is a seven-mile stretch of cliffs. Long enough to choke the strait of Gibraltar at the Pillars of Heracles, that brief divide of the Atlantic that feeds the Mediterranean. In comparison, our lagoon the southern tip  of Spain and our destination is the northern shores of Africa. Yet this is Alaska and the sight is all the more magnificent.
Time passes without notice. We are at it forever and my discharging invading water seems like an eternal task. The effort becomes rote, the sounds of chaos a background melody by now. But all of a sudden I notice a change in cadence as we crest the waves. The howl of the wind is there and the lapping of water across our hull continues its rhythm, yet there is no motor. I look up and notice Jim fussing with it. An apparent stall and now we are floating aimlessly in the water. Our vessel making its way toward shore conducted by currents now. He cannot get it started. I look toward the shores that we are being dragged toward. No beach, all cliff and I see that the force of the waves silently crash against rocks resulting in a tremendous spray of water. The force will surely splinter us against the cliff side.
Our second dilemma.
“JIM?”
“I KNOW I KNOW!” was his look as he fiddles with the motor. Drawing on the cord with no response. Toggling the choke. No response. Slapping its sides. Obviously nothing.
I may be over exaggerating. The cliff is about a mile away. I am sure Jim will get the motor going before impact. I think...I am sure of it. Just to be on the safe side I start rowing with the oars. Yet even with my best efforts, I do not purchase any advantage against the force of the tide. We near the shore at worrying speed.
“JIM!”
He ignores me. He too is concerned but concentrated on starting the motor. I fool myself into thinking that I am buying us time with my flailed rowing. We are close now. I can hear the crash of the surf on the cliff walls. I dare not look to see how close…
Mercifully the familiar sound of machine reaches my ears. Jim got the motor going. We are at full throttle again moving against the force of nature. We head due east to distance us from the dangers of the cliffs. Truthfully, it was foolish of us to travel so near in the first place. After a brief celebratory exchange we continue southeast again.
During my continued scoops of water I notice out toward the eastern horizon that a dolphin is matching our speed and direction. Dipping in and out of the waves as we crest and trough. The vision freezes in my head. Our time together brief as it dips one last time without reappearing. I look back to Jim for a “how about that” but he did not see it. The experience is all mine. He will not believe me when we discuss it later.
We reach the southern tip of the length of cliffs. A place the map calls Dangerous Cape that we need to round before approaching Boulder Bay. Yet on arrival we notice that the lapping sound of water on rock does not seem to be coming from the land mass. As we turn shore-ward, we see the reason for Boulder Bay’s namesake. Over time the tip of the Cape’s peninsula, an overhanging cliff, has deposited debris out to the water. Large boulders now block our path toward the only path discernible toward any beach we can land. maybe deposited by the 1964 tsunami but if it is named on the map the cause may be more ancient. Worse, these islands of rock appear and disappear with the swelling of the tidal water. An obstacle course.
Jim stops the motor. This is unexpected and we need to discuss it. Did Harry know of this when he issued the order to move the camp before abandoning us to the wild? Do we dare navigate the living labyrinth? One of those boulders emerging under us will surely roll us if not split our hull. If we were to be stranded, stranded without housing or protection from the elements, the overland route to return to the lagoon would be long and dangerous over treacherous mountains. That is if we survived the experience.
Who wants this land surveyed anyway?
I suggest that we roll through slowly; I will hang out over the bow. The water is clear enough that I can see the boulders before they erupt out of the trough of water. I will guide Jim to move left, right, fore and aft to avoid collision.
Jim reneges a bit but in truth, we are losing daylight. Moreover, a trip back in fully loaded skiff would be a treacherous endeavor. The collected foot of sloshing water on the exposed ribs of our inner hull that I could not scoop out fast enough attests to it.
We have no choice but continue forward.
As we trickle onward, I am half out of the skiff gut on to the keel that connects the port and starboard hull. Eagle eyed trough misted glasses.
The first boulders are easy, too large to submerge completely. I guide around them simple enough. Then as I see one about to emerge off our right side...
“LEFT!”
“LEFT?”
“RIGHT!” meaning affirmative.
“RIGHT?” he responds.
“NO! NO! TO THE LEFT!” I reiterate with wildly waving hands.
“DAMMIT GIL!”
“SORRY SORRY…RIGHT!” waving to the right.
Left right speed up slow down. We are nearly through! I cannot believe this is wor…
“STOP!!! REVERSE REVERSE!”
The largest flat obstruction is about to emerge in front of us. I have to move back into the skiff to avoid it myself. Jim reacts but not quickly enough. Our bow is about to crack on impact. I grab an oar and push with all my strength against the behemoth. The oar's tip chips under the force.  Not sure whether it is Jim’s reversing or my full effort on the rock but we slowly roll off the beast without damage. Just a scrape on wood like nails on chalkboard.
We navigate around it and finally move toward clear waters. We land on a short strip of beach just beyond. We unpack the equipment and move it far enough up shore so it would not wash off during high tide. We explore around and cannot find a clear path inland from that place. Did Harry consider this when planning our new camp here? The beach did not even have enough strip to land his Piper Cub plane, let alone take off.
Our plan: return with our tent and the rest of the equipment, set up camp and await his return. He was now gone for three weeks. He was sure to return…the topic invades every conversation these past days.
Jim remains optimistic. I am starting to have my doubts.
“Let’s go. It’s getting late.”
I concur. We heave to our vessel back on the water, lighter than we arrived. After unloading, while Jim took measurements to jot down the longitude and latitude of our stash and jot it down in our journal for future recovery I had a chance to roll the skiff and empty it of all water. With just us two, we rode higher over the surface of the water, with less of it lapping in.
The return was uneventful. We were too exhausted to even muster a word to yell across to each other the entire time. To say we rode in silence would be a misnomer, the elements still raged in our ears. However, the motor held for the entire trip, our one and only concern now.
We arrive at the lagoon at sunset, minutes earlier than yesterday’s sunset. We barely light the stove in the near darkness of our tent’s interior. We can take to our sleeping bags and let the exhaustion take us but the nights now dip to freezing temperatures. We heat the tent in preparation for it and let the fire die out gradually while we sleep. I place my damp clothes near the stove in hopes that its cherry red heat will dry them. It is futile though. Since the deluge during our first week, and lack of sufficient warming sunlight since and colder ambient temperatures, I have not had one dry scrap of clothing. I wandered about in dampness. The best it can offer is some drying before the plummeting nighttime temperatures freeze them in place, I would awake to find them frozen solid. Which I would then spend half an hour kneading them inside the heat of my sleeping bag to flex them enough to wear. My body heat the only furnace in the dawning days here.
Before we retire for the day, I look at Jim and say the obvious “I don’t think we should return.” No one knows where we are. No one would look for us here, let alone at Boulder Bay. The promise of a two-week well-paid contract fooled us into believing we would be back before anyone would notice. I did not tell my family on our last call nor any of my roommates before my departure. Jim was a loner; it has been months since he reported to anyone. Now four weeks gone and I have missed my monthly check in. My mother will surely be worried by now. The only person in the world aware of our location is Harry Waterfield and it seems his interest in us is not prevalent.
Our blind confidence will surely be the means of our demise,
Jim agrees. We should stay. There is more traffic at the lagoon with hunting season starting. The lagoon is a prime spot for seaplanes for drop offs and pick-ups during the season. We can send a message with imminent encounters if necessary.
We will worry how to report this to Harry another day. If that other day occurs. For now all hope of his return is as exhausted as our weary bodies.

After nearly twenty hours of planes, busing and taxis, six of them consisting of an uneventful and boring layover in Dallas. Not to mention the day of preparation before that. We have arrived at our small burg in Guanajuato Mexico nearly at 11 PM that February 16th. Fatigued, looking to retire in our familiar room at the back of my grandfather’s house. The same room we've inhabited all those years of travel as a whole family but my uncle Rodolfo says I need to go with him to settle arrangements with the mortician.
“Now?”
“Yes, he has been waiting two days for your arrival now.” I was the oldest member of my family now. The patriarchy unexpectedly fell on me unwanted.
With an exhale I replied, "OK".
We leave the rest to settle in our awaiting rooms as my uncle and I depart.

Traveling by night another 45 minutes down a dark winding back-road toward the city of my birth, Acambaro, Guanajuato, my uncle drives alarmingly fast in the void, more out of memory than visible markers. This road is reputed to be a bandit haven; rumors of hijackings foster his fear. If the need were not immediate, my uncle would avoid it until the safety of daylight. But urgency prevails.
We arrived without a dreaded incident of piracy. The streets of the sleeping community were long deserted and slick with dew. Located at the skirts of a butte, and at 6000 feet above sea level, the weather varied greatly from day to night in February. The midday temperatures reach a hot 85 degrees and now, near midnight, they drop to a chilling 40. An unfortunate condensation slick the pavement now. Not properly prepared I regret only having a thin hoodie to shield me from the brisk cold.
Acambaro sits on the flanks of a flat-topped butte called El Cerro del Toro. The streets rise toward the top, steadily increasing in grade along the rise, like threading veins that abruptly stop where wagons could no longer climb. During the day one can witness this jagged advancement of civilization against the restricting forces of nature. A sharp divide from grayish concrete to green foliage. At night, the towering mount is obscured by the darkness, only the sporadic flicker of lights from a tower above it  betray its presence.
As we ascend the empty street, my shoes barely keep traction on the slippery incline; the echoed bark of an unseen dog nearby accompany the magnified sounds of our footfalls. The effort in the thin air robs my breath, increases my heart rate.
 A solitary streetlight behind and below casts our long shadows against the shingle that hangs above a stenciled glass window of the funeral home. The shingle, too heavy to swing, just read “Funeraria San Francisco” with opposing cocked crosses on each side of the ‘San’. The stencil on the window further stated this was San Francisco’s Victoria Hall and below that: “24-hour service”, a convenience because death has no itinerary. My uncle rapped hard on the corrugated garage door where a “No Parking” sign rattled as a result. More unseen dogs joined in the chorus.
Moments pass and the sound of a key in the lock of the man door begins to rotate. One. Two…and a half turns, all Mexican deadbolts have a long play before release. The door parts and a gray-haired man greeted us silently with a polite “Yes?” His face was thin and pale with a long thin European nose. His cheekbones protruding that practically made him look cadaverous in the dim light.
My uncle did all the talking, Apologizing for the late arrival. He introduced me but I said nothing. I could not stop my jaw from shivering. Perhaps because of the frigid cold of the night or maybe because I realize now that I was facing the unexpected fact that my immortal father lays defunct on the other side of these doors. A place that reeked of formaldehyde carried out to me on the heated draft pouring through the parted door. Though informed a few days already of his passing, it was at this point when I realized that I would never speak with my father ever again.
In an exhaust of breath, my heart plunged. I had to remind myself to draw in the next.
The man, Don Anselmo, assures us that he was awake and preparing the “guest”. He invites us in and leads us to his office, the inside of the stenciled glass. Sits us in comfortable wooden chairs with leather cushions tacked on and excuses himself for a moment. Wood is a rare commodity at these elevations, the finely lacquered armrest and a curly grooved design suggest colonial affluence. This arrangement will be pricey is my thought, I already gave Marty the Mortician back in Indiana a deposit for the transport. He was waiting for the body to arrive for his preparations for burial back home.
Don Anselmo returns with freshly made coffee, pours us each a cup and sits behind the oak desk. I barely hear his statement because of jet-lag, or because of shock, so my uncle answers all the basic questions. One that begged my attention was his questioning the scars. I explain to him that my father was sick lately, already going through preparations for dialysis as his kidney functionality depleted.
“…We four, my brothers and sister, were going to be tested to see if we could donate one of ours. Our father wouldn’t have it. If it wasn’t for the aneurysm, I am sure my father would succumb to several other maladies.”
“Aneurism?” don Anselmo questioned with a confused glance toward my uncle. Rodolfo returning a pleading look back. (An exchange I missed completely then yet it comes back to me later in the memory of the moment).
How does he not know the cause of my father’s death?
“And the toes?”
“Yes, he sacrificed them in recent years to the altar of the diabetic gods.” The joke falls flat. As an apology, I add, “If you’ve noticed, there was dark patching at the ankles…”
                                                             ***
As I mumbled my explanation, I am distracted by the memory of the day after the surgery where they removed the long and middle toes from his left foot. That evening my brother Gabe and I kept our father company in his hospital room. The rest of the family went home to freshen up. The nurse entered the room informing my father that she needed to change the bandages and inspect the stitches. “Sure,” replied my father while distracted with a sporting event on the TV, I read a book. Gabe sat at the foot of the bed with a magazine.
After the removal of bandages, prodding and pulling at the loose ends of the threads, the nurse then excused herself to dispose of the old and bring in some fresh bandages.
There was a pregnant pause before Gabe says “Hey Pops! Do you know that I can see your entire head through the gap of your foot?”
A short silence as we looked at each other, then we all guffawed and then laughed without restraint. My father shed tears and minutes later, we managed settled down because the annoyed nurse had to finish her job. However, after she left all it took was only one snicker for the room to erupt in laughter once again.
I tried to refrain the release of a chortle at the memory but failed.
Another specter of remembrance that has an unyielding habit to chase me for two thousand miles in the past few days.
                                                                      ***
I was lost in that thought, my finger tracing along a groove of the armrest, when don Anselmo breaks my reverie:
…” I must inform you that your father and I were good friends in Seminary School back in the day. He was so healthy then which is why it is difficult for me to see that he has had such a hard life.”
Refreshed I asked, “Excuse me?”
“Yes. We met our first year at San Antonio seminary school, just the other side of ‘Toro’. We became fast friends.” He paused to sip from his coffee. “We had plans to open orphanages when we finished. All was fine until one day he returns from a visit home and says he could not stay here anymore and left for El Norte. That is the last I have seen of him until…” Gazing to his shop beyond, “It is funny how life comes around when you do not expect it.”
It was then that I realized that the display of sympathy from this man was genuine. Up to now, I assumed it was a professional mechanism to deal with the bereaved.
“Which brings me to the point as to why I have asked your uncle to bring you to me as soon as you have arrived. I have received an order to prepare your father for transport to the United States. Is this so?”
“Yes, he was adamant that he wanted to be buried next to my mother. The lot already purchased when we buried her a few months back.”
“Your uncle also discussed that he would like to hold a vigil in your father’s memory. But the process requested was for basic preparation and to ship to…” he picks up some documents from the desk “…this place ‘Baran’s Funeral Home’ in Indiana. If it is all right with you we can prepare him for the display here and provide a decent casket for that.”
“I appreciate that but truthfully, with my mother’s recent burial and now my father’s, as well as this international transport cost. Well, the funds are a bit limited.”
“I am sorry, you misunderstand. I would do this for you at the cost of materials only. One last favor for an old friend. I assure you this will be the best I can do for him. It is the least I can do”
I look at Uncle Rodolfo’s hopeful face, I can tell that this has been discussed in my absence.
I believed Anselmo’s intentions to be honest and so I assented. With a handshake, our business was settled.  Anselmo asked further questions of his life after seminary school and we continued talking about my father until the purple hue of dawn glowed through the window. I tried to convey a good tale but with a limited Spanish vocabulary and Spanglish substitutes, some gestures, I am sure that I did not do my father’s tale any justice with my restrictions. It was then I realized that if I were going to represent him from here forward I would need to master his native tongue better. Assuredly, my sixth-grade level Spanglish was lovingly tolerated by my parents, the only ones I ever spoke it with. Now without them…
Don Anselmo was true to his word. My father looked regal in a dark jacket and red tie. Laying in a pine coffin with a glass top for all to observe. My sister choked back tears to comment that he looked like Sleeping Beauty awaiting the kiss of life.
In Mexico, a nine-day prayer vigil, called a Novena, is conducted in honor for the recently departed. The dead are displayed in a common room of the bereaved family home while friends and family visit, pray, and pay their respects for the duration. Embalming in Mexico is a fleeting discipline and good work depends on the mortician’s profit incentive. You might get a decent service or you might not. As a result, most of the dead may not last the entire term and so the prayers continue in memory of those absent.
As was the case when my grandmother passed nearly a decade prior. Being short and plump, she was a difficult fit for the available coffins and so was placed in one too small for her stout frame. Adjusted as comfortable as possible in the provided narrow box she was poised prominently for her Novena, in the same room that some years hence my father would have his. All nine of her mourning children were at her side, piously chanting the Mysteries of Magdalena. On about the third day of the vigil, a scion notices her face starting to swell, odors being excreted. The casket was then closed. A few days further the lid started to separate and lift. Gases in her body started to brew, expanding and disfiguring her peaceful form, pressuring the inner walls out. In haste, attempts to hold the coffin together were in vain, no duct tape or rope could restrain the expansion. The casket refused to remain closed.  In a mad dash to the cemetery across town, with the heavy load over the shoulder, she was lowered to an awaiting expedited grave. Suddenly, one rope gives way unbalancing the drop and one uncle slips and falls onto the skewed box, his arm wedges between the box and the earth. His frightened wails fall on her dead ears “Mother, please! I know I am your favorite but please do not take me with you!”
The remaining time of her prayer vigil proceeded without a casket and a copious amount of alcohol.
My father will not suffer the same indignity.
Don Anselmo’s work was so immaculate that my father remained preserved and displayed throughout his Novena. Weeks later upon arrival in the United States, Marty the Mortician was so impressed with the work that he confessed he did not need to redo any work for his presentation at his funeral home. My father had yet another open casket service before his burial. The only loss was the glass casket, the pine beauty provided by don Anselmo was not up to code for burial here in the states.
There is a pricey code to bury the dead.


Later that morning of February 17th, with arrangements and discussions concluded, we returned to our small town.  I entered the house quietly as to not wake anyone. I find my siblings sleeping in the same bed of our childhood. All bundled together with their jackets still on, under layers of blankets. Sharing their heat through the cold of the night. I did not want to disturb them so I lay in my parents’ bed adjacent to theirs. My body relaxes immediately. I look at the clay shingles on the ceiling that have daylight seeping through the cracks and uneven seams, light mottles the sea-foam green plastered walls and on the cracks exposing the ancient adobe bricks beneath. On a support beam over my head, a spider’s web glow with the golden light.
I believe that I have done my father a just service. I have done my duty. I hope I did. The fatigue and sleep that I have allayed in the past week finally overtake me and with one final lapping of eyelids I succumb to comfortable oblivion.

The burs and frayed strands of the hemp rope burned in my bare palms. Not a problem under normal circumstances, I would simply let go and re re-grip with care and continue, but this was not normal circumstance and I had to grip harder and ignore the pain. I held on as if my life depended on it. Because it did, literally.
I hung precariously on a Jacob’s ladder.
What is a Jacob's ladder? Well, that is the same question I have asked just moments ago.

The cause of my current dilemma was an emergency service call. An LMSR (Large, Medium-Speed Roll-On/Roll-Off) transport ship that was trying to dock in Jacksonville Florida refuses to go astern (backward) and as a result, cannot dock. It has been circling five miles out in the Atlantic for a couple of days. The perpetrator of the current problem, a computerized propulsion system that my company replaced five years ago had a computer program that ‘changed' its programming! The mechanical engineer insists on this, all other mechanical components verified to be working. A corrupt program must be the only solution. The emergency was that every hour of ship run time consumed 1500 gallons of diesel fuel. Like a shark, the ship must always be in motion while away. With my 12 hours delayed response her tanks are almost depleted.
I did not write the program in question, my three bosses did and kept it close to the cuff. When awarded such a prestigious job they planned proprietary rights for future conversions. Yet when this call was made none of them wanted to respond. During the installation, I was the one in charge of the demolition and replacement. Spending 6 months on the ship while at a Bayonne dry-dock running the work crew. After a long day’s work, my crew crossed the river and partied it up at New York’s Times Square while I stayed and filed the late hours with documentation of the day's activities. Redlining modifications and organizing schedules for the next day’s activities. My only compensation for the trip was the assignment an officer’s quarters where a view of the Statue of Liberty was available from the porthole in my cabin. As ship life became my commonplace, getting up in the mornings I would greet her form in the dawning light.  "Mornin' Libby!"(My constant friend and I on first-name basis by then), the New York skyline a haze in the morning mist behind her. I would head down to the mess hall for breakfast where I would discuss the day’s plans with the Chief Engineer then. Schedule crane usage with the Boatswain to lift our heavy cabinets seven levels in or out from the engine room. Then continue even further down to the bowels of the behemoth for another 12-hour workday.
At the end of the day, the same occurred. Documentation, scheduling. Over and over again. This experience informed my decision against incumbent management position offers.
The job concludes with a successful sea trial and the gratitude of Military Sealift Command, we thought it was the end of that. The ship now self-reliant, she did not need our service agreement. Our company decided not to pursue further ship jobs. Too many regulations.
In the five years since I have settled into an undemanding job for the same company as a resident engineer at a soap factory, basic unchallenged work, but with the factory being a mile from my home I settled for this banal existence. Daily I would wake, walk the tracks to work, settle into a small desk in our company trailer where I would create spreadsheets of existing process hardware that need upgrades, investigate that my part numbers match the existing hardware and then walk the tracks home at end of the day. Every day the same mundane activity. So often did I walk that I soon realized my physical tolerance for the 40-minute one-way trek was only between 10 to 90 degrees Fahrenheit. One sixty-degree afternoon as I prepared for the afternoon walk home I get an urgent call from my project manager. "Gil! Drop everything! You gotta go to Florida!"
"Sure. Tomorrow?" absently considering if I should detour to Dairy Queen for a Dilly bar during tonight’s walk home.
"No. Now! You have to be on the Jacksonville docks by 6 AM!"
The current time was 5 PM CST, six Florida time. I was still a good half hour from home. My mind was computing the logistics as he explains the situation over the phone. To find a flight to Jacksonville that late in the evening would be tough. Even tougher to be riding against traffic to the airport I pointed out. "I'll take care of it." The manager assures.
He did not. Chicago flights to Jacksonville were not as common as to tourist destinations. Littered with multiple east coast layovers his plan had me landing a full hour past the demand time. Unsatisfied, I rearranged the schedule for a red-eye to Orlando, then hours driving a rental on the darkened Beeline highway. On the way, I am fighting off sleepiness and fatigue of the day by singing with the radio at the top of my lungs, slapping my face and punching my chest. Windows wide open so the cold air hits my waning system. I arrived at my destination in the predawn light. Parking at a hotel across the docks, I walked over and waited for the appointed time slumped on a hitching post, my test equipment, and tools at my feet. I am soon approached by the Chief Engineer and his first mate from a sister ship, they too are here to help with the problem. Both surprised to see me already there. “You came from where?”
How are we to get on the ship, I asked. The fact of the implication that we were going to be Helo’d in excited me; I have never been on a helicopter. However, news soon came that a growing storm was too strong for an aerial approach. There's a storm? It started to drizzle on the docks.
A new plan was hatched, we are going by Zodiac boat. The three of us jump into the small inflatable raft with potent engines and take off, skipping on smooth waters was promising but as soon as we breached the break wall we were met the rage of five-foot waves. The pilot slowed and deferred to our decision but the look on his face betrayed his concerns. We turn back.
The last option was a Pilot boat. An aluminum transport with an enclosed cabin that meets ships to move crew and equipment to and from the approaching vessels without requiring docking. This was our solution we boarded promptly and took off.
Passing the break wall we ride the violent waves. Unexpected undulations, unpredictable directions, rising, falling, floating midair until the pull of gravity crashes us on hard water. Our frail bodies are jerks about in the enclosed cabin. I was sitting sideward to the attempted forward momentum and soon began the motion sickness. I never get motion sickness. Nauseous, my mouth watered up and chokes me with the urge to spew I swallowed copiously the excess buildup of bile tasting saliva to belay the instinct to release. It works and with an adjustment in my seat, the dizziness dissipates, but not without an injury. In an unexpected roll, my thumb jams between the back of the chair and a strut on the wall, the pain like that of getting a car door slammed on it. Damn, I'm going to lose that nail!
As I attended the thumb, sucking the pain away, the pilot yells, "There she is!"
I look out of his forward window and see nothing. Just waves and storm clouds. How can I be missing it, the ship is 900 feet long and seven stories tall! A sideways building on water. I soon realize that when he yelled it we were on the rise of a wave and as soon as we crested and fell to the other side of the wave and the ship appears, blocking our view of everything. A gray metal wall towered before us.
A thought occurs to me at that moment, during dry-dock our only access to the ship was a steadied stern ramp always lowered. This extended rear ramp is where tanks, troops, and supplies would be loaded onto the ship while docked. Foolishly, for those months I have never considered any other forms of access. Even during the sea trials after the installation, we boarded and disembarked when the ramp was deployed and secured. A process that took up to two hours.
"Are they going to lower the ramp for us?" I yell in the din.
They all look at me stunned for a moment then guffawed. "No! We are going up by Jacob's ladder!"
"What's a Jacob's ladder?"
                                                                                    ***
The rope was thick and damp with evenly knotted intervals spaced to hold slats of wood for rungs. A sailor’s contraption known as a Jacob's ladder. We are now standing on the roof of the Pilot boat’s cabin, exposed to the elements and only a low rail against our shins keeping us from going overboard. The ship, empty of cargo, rode higher on the water and the bottom rung of the ladder above our heads just beyond reach. But the swelling waves brings the bottom rungs near, but briefly, and in reach for an instant before the pilot boat is bounced away from the ship’s hull. As one swell rises us near…
“JUMP!” the pilot’s yell barely a whisper.
I lurch hands out, eyes bleary with rain droplets, and tools hoisted on hips. Attempting to use the rail as leverage but its slickness makes me slip a bit, enough to barely purchase the bottom rungs with my hands only, slipping rope burning my palms. My feet dangling, panic kicking trying to find the last rung. My left eventually lands on it it but my right keeps missing. I pull up with my few points of contact but find myself stuck. One foot still dangling and kicking contorts the ladder. The slat is not where it should be. Struggling to find a balance and still not realizing the mechanics that pulling one side of the rope towards you causes the other to push away, all the while needing to step from one unsteady rung to the next requires synchronicity in motion. The counterweight of my laptop and tools slung over a shoulder and off my right hip is no help and puts me further off balance. No problem, I will just step back down to the boat and restart with a better grip.
I look down and find that the pilot has moved away to not be buffeted against the behemoth's hull in the rage of waves. He will approach again for the next person once I clear my ascent. Directly below me is the swelling ocean waiting to swallow me up if I miss a step or let go. The view mesmerizing, for a moment there, I think I hear Odysseus' sirens.
I cannot go down I can only go but up. The perilous situation suddenly dawns on me. I’m gonna die here! If only I had accepted the life vest.
Ah, yes the life vest. An oversized Styrofoam stock that protruded straight out from my chest when worn. I would have had to climb all the way up the ladder at arm's length. I can't do that. I refuse it. "He doesn’t want the vest…" was the radio call to the boatswain waiting for us three stories up. A concerned "…all right." Was his delayed response.
My foot finally catches the rung and I am finally stable with all four points on the swinging ladder. Bouncing off the gray wall with every sway. My knuckles meet the slick steel every time. My grip so hard that I wring the moisture from the held rope.
I soon figure it out. Keep both hands on the rope, no matter the pain. Move one foot up, place, then the other, place. Then one hand up and finally the other. Two steps up, infinity to go. The swing continues but I now steadied on the ladder. I kept going. Foot, foot, hand, hand. I do not know how long it took but I was grateful to for the howl of the storm and for covering my cries for mercy and the falling rain for shedding of tears from those above and below to witness.
Eventually I get to the top. Throw my bags on the deck as the boatswain and his mate pull me up by my pits. I breathed heavily, exhausted more from fear than the exertion. "Permission to come aboard."
They look at one other and the disappointed one hands the other a twenty. He was sure I would fall.
For the next twenty hours we tested all systems. I would prove that the program was not corrupted by showing them the execution on my computer screen and them verifying mechanical movements as a result. The mechanical engineer who determined the cause was surely electronic was beside himself. He then had a thought, told us to hold on while he checks something. With a radio call to the control room he finally found the root of the problem. One of his Zerk fittings, a plug, fell out from an oil reservoir into the bilge in transit days before. This quarter inch item prevented hydraulics build up to move the propeller into a reversing position.
He fixes it, returns sheepishly to the engine room and reluctantly admits his failure. All stunned they all look at me, for once without accusation. I shrug it off "Hey, next time you people want to give me a free cruise like this I'm golden!"
From that moment they would not execute another sea trial without contracting me to verify the systems (electronic and mechanical) operated properly. In subsequent visits I made sure I always boarded from the safe and steady stern ramp.

The sights to be seen was spectacular...

As we clear the shoreline cove and approach open water we are now fully in the chop. Waves rolling as high as five feet with the wind whips shore-ward. Our skiff rolls up and down with a left and right sway on the water. As we gained momentum westward against the current the experience was surreal, if not exhausting.

As we crest on the waves the din of wind and water was deafening. The winds awash over me already drying me out from the sandy reef incident. In this chaos I could barely communicate with Jim who was just a few feet to the rear. Nor could I hear the roar of the motor pushing us along. But then we dip to the trough there is a silence so bizarre. I can hear my breathing. The motor roar echoes on the walls of water surrounding us. The walls surrounding us rises above our heads and our world is claustrophobic with only water and billowy grey clouds visible in an aperture above. It is while in this position where I can talk to Jim at normal voice levels (he asks how I am doing, I reply that I am better, good enough to continue), the convex waves blocking all outside noises like walls in a room. Each moment of trough and peak are brief as we oscillate between them continuously.
At an adequate distance we change course southward on the outer edge of the bay. I sit at the bow with an oar crossed in front of me poised on port and starboard gunwales. I lean on it for support and am at the ready to use if necessary. The overcast skies seem to be only covering the island to the west of us because eastward it clears and the morning sun shines over the horizon.
 
At one point, as we crest the waves, I notice a porpoise swimming to the adjacent to us, keeping pace with our slow moving boat. That moment, clouds being chased away by the by a westerly sun, and caught in its amber light a beautiful sliver of silver floating midway from one wave to the next, that moment’s image will remains with me forever. The porpoise’s lithe form effortlessly flitting between of the waves, as if mocking that we are jostled fore and aft by the undulation of those same waves, jeering our sensation of nausea. As we dip to silence I inform Jim of the sight and the next peak we both enjoy the sight for a few moments. The world pauses and we forget ourselves, stunned by the wonder of the sight.  Not realizing how long this went on eventually as we crested once more the creature was gone. Our world returns to the chaos of the waves and we continue on our way as if uninterrupted by the spectacle.
 To our west the shore became a mountainous terrain, a continuous ridge of cliffs extends for an undetermined length. Precipitous drops from up to 500 feet straight into the water at certain areas, from our vantage point we could see the waves crashing against the cliff walls spraying in thunderous geysers. We were sure nothing man made would survive that impact. With a glance Jim and I nodded our gestured agreement that we would put more distance between us and the shore. At the trough he confirms our change of direction.
“Go!” stating my preparation for the maneuver.
The motor purred harder as we poured on speed to overtake the onrushing waves. Up and over the peaks we went and toward the silence of the troughs. But after a few dips I notice that the motor sound was missing from the silence. I turn to see Jim tooling the motor.
The added effort of our maneuver stalled our motor and we were now powerless against the force of the current. A force that lead to one conclusion, certain doom.

Traveling south toward the inlet we checked our buoyancy. Making sure that the load, especially the motorbike, was evenly distributed and would not dip us below the waterline. Of course, in the steady waters of the lagoon this check was conclusive. The water level just under twelve inches from the lip we were certain we were well prepared to go out to open water.
But as we rounded the inlet we looked out to an overcast horizon over jagged water ridges we soon realized that the calm waters were surely behind us. The sea was frenetic, choppy white heads as far as the eye can see, yet for a few feet from the mouth the waters were calm. Jim and I eye each other, questioning the same phenomenon. With the wind howling where we could not communicate without shouting so we nodded our mutual agreement to continue on, a side sway of the head indicating “cautiously”. So with the on-board motor puttering we veered out a bit more. For a few feet the calm before the chop was steady, two mortals daring the rage of the surf.
At the edge of the calm and the froth of a crashed surf bubbling away around the bow our forward momentum was halted, suddenly we bottomed out.
Apparently during the recent squall, the storm drove the bed of sand toward the shore creating a reef just under the water level. The reason for the calm before the waves. We have beached ourselves just shy of the beach. And no amount of maneuvering with the motor would dislodge us. Forward, reverse, increase and decrease of speed, we were stuck. And now our boat was being broadsided the force of incoming waves, rocking us in place and threatening to overturn us. I grab the one oar and push against shifting sands. No movement.
“We got to do something!” Jim yells. “Those waves will surely tip us over!”
Though as close as we were to shore the swim in uncertain waters was not recommended. Undertow current bound to draw us further out to sea than allow us to near the shore, compounded by cold waters that would induce hypothermia within a few minutes of exposure.
I nod in agreement and consider for a minute. “I’ve got an idea!” I shout back.
With that I step out of the skiff and step on the sandy reef which at that point was a few inches under the surface. Several meters away off the shore and I am standing on the water surface next to the beached skiff. I calculated that being layered in rain gear I would keep most of that cold water off me and minimizing the risk of hypothermia, and it did with the exception of a small hole burnt on the inside of my left boot by the ankle. Water trickled in and soaked my sock and feet with the cold water immediately. Yet, despite the discomfort, I dig my feet into the reef and start pushing the skiff over the ridge to dislodge it. Heavy as it was and with Jim pushing the motor in odd angles the skiff gives bit by bit.
“Now?!” I yell for confirmation from Jim that the skiff is navigable.
“No! More!”
Pushing a bit more I feel myself descending on the leading edge of the sand shelf. Water level rising to my knees. Still it was not enough to clear the ledge. So I keep pushing. Waist deep, “Nope!” he reports.  I reach to my chest when the skiff finally runs free.
“OK! Get back in!”
With an exhale of relief, I pull at the skiff to get back into it. Unfortunately, my plastic overalls and a coat, now logged with water, made me heavier than expected. I was not only pulling my weight but that of collected water. Exhausted from the push I now hung on to the boat, toes barely registering the ocean floor as we floated away. The frigidity of the water against my skin was just now registering.
“Quit horsing around!”
“I can’t! Too heavy!!”  The excess weight of water, and the futility of my feet failing to find a purchase against the hull of the skiff to push myself up causes me to panic.
Realizing the severity of the situation Jim rushes over to help drag me back on board. Due to the slickness of the rain-gear fails to be able to grasp and hold any part of me to pull me in. Without a second thought he grabs an oar so he can lever me up, his entire body weigh as a counterweight.  With enough of me out of water he pulls me in by my overall straps while I push my knee against the lip.  After a Herculean effort from the both of us I finally flopped in like a prize catch.  I lay there at the bottom trying to calm my breath as water drains from my rain-gear. Shivering from the exposure, but mostly the realization of my mortality, I try to regain my courage to continue.
The skiff continues its forward momentum uncaring of the peril its human passengers endure.
Jim wasting no time returns to the rear and gets the motor turned and we are back on our way, wondering if there will be any more unexpected obstacles for the remainder of the trip.

At first we were a bit hesitant to undertake this chore. A large mountainous range separating us from the destination made overland travel impossible, even with the aid of the Rokon trail breaker motorcycle-if we repaired it yet again. Our only option was a water route. That meant taking the 20ft skiff, loaded with the equipment and venturing out of the safety of our lagoon onto the open waters of the Pacific waters.
By now the days were noticeably short. By December’s solstice we will reach four hours of daylight and twenty of night. So delaying the chore meant losing daylight on a daily basis and this endeavor will be taking the better part of a day to complete. So we discussed this option on one of our down days.
“We don’t need to do this Jim. Harry isn’t even coming back.”
“Now, Gil. I got to believe that he is just delayed,” Jim says trying to stay optimistic still. “So I say we rest up today and git a move on in the morning.”
We discussed a bit more and I relented. He made a point. Harry owed us quite a bit of money now with the additional weeks of work. Any break in the agreement would give him fuel to deny payment.
That evening we prepared the skiff for an early launch the next day. Loading the first of what was to be multiple runs. We calculated one run per day allowable. All the survey equipment, along with the motor bike and other non-essentials. We would continue the run the following day with supplies and eventually the tent on a final run. We were meant to uproot and move on to the next site. The final run nagged at me. Something permanent about it that if Harry does not return for us no one would know where to find us.
I kept that doubt to myself for the time being. But I was sure Jim was battling the same demon.
We continued as planned. That night was a windy one, ocean winds rattled the tent as it flowed over the sandy break wall separating our open field from the beach. Cold set in and we retired into our sleeping bags and passed out into the bitter night under the reddish glow of our overstuffed stove.
We woke to a squall blowing in off the shore. At first we only noticed the heavy rain but walking over the break wall we were met with heavy winds and overcast skies. So obviously the trip was on hold for that day. And for the next couple of days as well, instead we struggled from keeping ourselves, and more importantly our firewood, dry.
Not much occurring within the tent for the day except reading an already read book. So bored we couldn’t even find conversation topics to keep ourselves occupied. By the third day the storm abates and conditions turn favorable.
 Looking out over the open water that morning we saw the choppy whiteheads at a distance. Debating this we figure that they may not be as dangerous as they appeared.

We counted our money, one thousand dollars per week for additional work. Our final tally would be worth the inconvenience.
I planned to pay off creditors. Jim had a dream of buying a freezer trailer. So when fishermen needed to store their catch in warmer weather to sell during off season. It was a sound investment. He was convincing me in partnering with him on this. This is how we not spent down time. Talking of dreams and plans. By this time, we were intimate to each other’s story. Two isolated souls whose only contact with the world was an occasional BBC broadcast at a specific evening hour. My batteries starting to wane I was selective when using my Sony Walkman these days.
During the shortening days we worked the sites. When we returned for the evenings we prepared for the increasing cold nights. With night lengthening our heating fuel starts getting exhausted before we could retire to warm ourselves in the recycled body heat within our subzero sleeping bags. Once comfortable in those bags outside temperatures were negligible. Cocooned in the bag kept the heat from getting out, the cold from getting in. With the exception of the face. I tried to cover myself with the bag but suffocation soon set. I was forced to endure the cold bite of winter on my cheeks. But it was useless to attempt to bag ourselves as early as it got dark, we would then lay there for hours without sleep coming and if it did we would wake too early to be effective.
The trick was to make the kindling last as long as necessary. Warming ourselves staying active. Within the lighted tent or outside close to the only light available in those overcast nights. Mostly keeping our wood stocks replenished but at times building furniture from scraps.
Sometimes at first light I would wake looking directly at the tip of a stalactite, hanging from the tent’s ceiling over my head, created from my warm exhales, heavy snores as Jim would say, that dry my mouth and chap my lips nightly. If I was not careful I could stab myself with it upon getting up. The daily routine now typical. After the morning dance to get our blood circulation in our bodies one of us would go get the water to boil for coffee and the other prepare breakfast. This we would alternate.
Each day the dawn delayed about six minutes from the last. We would consider this when we would start our hike. So off we go in the predawn light, work our day and return six minutes earlier each night.
Arriving at the tent I would go and gather wood on the beach. Daily more surplus would wash up on shore and Jim would chop it down with a hack saw of the chainsaw. Any means possible to make the larger portions easier to burn.
Our food stocks dwindling again even though we rationed for two more weeks. It has been a bit more than one week now since Harry’s brief arrival. The given timeline for his return now expired. But we now being accustomed to his delay did not worry about it this time. Our food situation being better. But dwindle is still became. We began talking about hunting to supplement. We also made note of food blinds we would find along the route. Supplies stored by returning hunters so they would not have to transport so much when dropped off during the season. At first the blue tarps secured by heavy rocks were an odd sight. But Jim soon educated me of their purpose. They would have canned food or powdered stores. Apparently the plastic of the tarp hid the smell from the most olfactory sensitive of animal. So our food concerns were not prevalent at this time.
We were finishing up, ours and others projects. We were within a day from completing all needed for this part of the island. We considered the transportation to another part of the island. Since Harry has not returned, hence we could not return, we should keep ourselves busy. We will start working the new site. Leave word here as to our location and expect our extraction there.
It was settled. We finish up here in a couple of days and start packing for the new site. So the next few days we packed and transported all from our sites back to shore station and started packing a twenty-foot skiff with the necessary equipment. Even the Rokon motorcycle was loaded.
In a few days all was set. We would shove off that weekend and start a new assignment. Just in time as it started to rain. That rain did not relent and what now became a torrent was a squall blowing in from the Pacific. We stayed locked in our tent. To windy and wet to go out and do our daily chores. Keeping ourselves warm with wet wood and listening to the news of the storm on the radio. My cassette starting to drag because of low voltage The Georgia Satellite’s version of Hippy Hippy Shake sounding more like a country ballad. I have long abandoned my Start Trek novel.
We waited for the storm to abate.

Not tempting fate, and with the knowledge that in this late date in October our days were shortening, an average of about four minutes and 53 seconds daily,  this was the reason for our long hours working the sites. The sooner we were done the sooner we would return to the city.  These shortened days, compounded with our long hikes to and fro meant delaying our scheduled two weeks’ time period.
We really did not want to delay our work further but we sacrificed the one day to get the new tent situated.
Learning from the mistakes our three men in a two man tent experience during our first week here, we make sure to find an area that was relatively flat. Our sleeping bags were to be placed flat on the ground the need to lie unhindered by bumps and inclines ensures a more comfortable sleep. That is, once acclimated to the nights becoming so freezing cold that even pads can’t prevent the cold to permeate to the base of the bag and chill your bones.
Clearing the brush, stomping the grassy stalks flat we place our tent halfway between the lagoon and the beach. At first we feared that flooding would threaten this lowest elevation of the terrain turned out to be a better decision as we would later find. Along the edge of the beach was a ridge of high sand that we need to climb over when coming and going to the beach. During inclement weather the storm winds rush inland from sea at high speeds and colder temperatures, yet we sat in relative safety from these gusts because of the height of this ridge. Our little depressed lot was beneficial for our comfort.
We created furniture out of debris found on the beach. Flotsam awash on the shore brought in all kinds of materials that were either blown off the decks of passing ships or purposefully tossed overboard. There was always some kind of material sporadically washing to shore there. Pallets and such were apt for makeshift tables and chairs and shelving.
The furnace provided (borrowed from an igloo) was another matter. Too small to provide any lasting heat for the new space available. There was little choice in this. If anyone were to appear to claim it we would surrender it surely. But no one was going to. We were sure of that.
Once finished the layout was simple. The tent’s entrance was situated northward toward the common trail visible through the swaying grass; eventually our traffic would create a small path to the door. Locating our sleeping bags to the far side of the tent away from the gusts of the door when entering/exiting, mine southwest and his south east. Laying dry grass under the sleeping bag pad gave us adequate insulation against the colder ground at nights.  A created pallet table, cookware shelving and cooking stove at the center by the support post. The stove for heat was to the south of the tent, at our bag’s feet, where a chimney hole dictated its placement. And the most important comfort, not available in the smaller igloos, a laundry line hanging in the northwest corner to dry all of our sodden clothes. This luxury definitely needed that first week of constant rain here.
Our new abode spacey and where we did not need to duck into or shuffle around in was definitely more comfortable than our previous arrangements.
That afternoon Jim tasked me to collect driftwood to fire the furnace. Not knowing the amount needed I came back with a small pile of kindling. A couple of larger trunks were dragged over the ridge to the tent. Looking at the pile Jim was sure that it was not enough. So I had to chop up the trunks. He insists on my using the chainsaw but being a novice in its operation I stated that I could cut it with the bow saw available and conserve the fuel in the chain saw.
He was hesitant, surely knowing that I was not going to cut up enough to keep the fire going. Assuming that our evening was not to be as cold, he conceded and proceeded in making our dinner.
As he anticipated, that evening our stove died out long before we even hit the bags for the night. We started burning the kindling as soon as it darkened that evening; It turned out to be a cold that night and we woke frozen to the bone. The body feeling like a solidified sack of cement we stomped around for half an hour to get circulation going. Once our body heat produced enough warmth in our iced solid clothes we started our day.
So in future I made sure to cut excess. Fortunately the washed up lumber was plentiful. Enough to keep us supplied in the time we expected to remain here.
In the proceeding days we had developed a new system. I would collect the driftwood and Jim would cut it to usable cords with the chainsaw. This, of course, was my idea, still hesitant in using it for lack of knowing how. I suspect Jim knew but was forgiving.
The one absolute accessory for our new home was a clipping Jim had taken from a newspaper. It had a promotional black and white photo for an upcoming film called “The Girl in a Swing”. On it the actress Meg Tilly sits on a swing that hangs off a tree branch.  Clothed in a wide brimmed hat and summer dress where the hem of the skirt surely to hike further up in the draft from the sway, threatening to expose more of her already generous exposed thighs. She was looking equal parts of innocence and seductiveness. The attached article promises the film to be an erotic escape to the commonplace English countryside. She became our companion, our crush and obsession in our isolation.
I knew Jim would be a while at the latrine (an isolated spot in the brush far from the tent where a shovel laid ready to bury discarded matter) if I found that picture missing from the post.
the tent was more comfortable than previous arrangements and the begrudging expressed soon was replaced with satisfaction. During the rains the leaking was isolated to the chimney access hole, an acceptable inconvenience.
This was to be our final abode for the remainder of our time here.

We walked for a ways talking of the meals we were desperately missing by then, commenting our hopes that Harry did not forget certain condiments. Of course, as long as it was not Spam we would even consider eating it raw.
Because of our location in the valley tightly fit between northern and southern mountain ranges the walls would echo back distant sounds. Waves from the shore miles away would vibrate against itself and eventually sound like the roar of an airplane engine. This auditory mirage was maddening and would later torment us when expecting arrivals. We would know better after a while but when about half an hour into our hike back we hear that familiar sound we dismissed it as the mirage.
“Is that the plane?”
“Naw, it couldn’t be…”
But it was. Shortly after the buzz we see Harry’s red trimmed Piper PA-18 Super Cub fly overhead. Circling over us once and tipping his wing as he turns northward back toward Kodiak City quickly disappearing over the ridge of the mountains.
Maybe he is going for more supplies Jim states hopefully. Me, I already have a bad feeling about this since he was already nearly a week late for this arrival. But I keep to myself, my hunger probably jading my opinion.
We arrive to the shore at midafternoon. The brown igloo contained fresh foodstuff piled waist high. The vision was a welcomed sight. On it a note scratched on a paper plate explains why Harry departed. Apparently his business at Anchorage was ongoing and he had to return, promising to return in a week’s time. This extends our stay to four weeks now.
With the recent experience still fresh in our minds we agree that we should be more frugal with this stash of food, to be more selective of our meals. Bad weather or further business might delay his final return.
What followed in the note soured our good mood though. We have been evicted from the igloos. Our sanctuary from the elements is no longer ours to use. The owner required us to vacate upon notice. Harry indicated that the content of a bundle placed next to the supply pile, a tent, was to be set up just beyond the trail twixt beach and lagoon.
This news was disturbing, even Jim’s absolute faith was about to wane. First was the chance eviction of the cabin in the woods, because as Harry stated, of a misunderstanding. Now the same was ordered by another set of owners, it seemed that Waterfield and Associates were misunderstood. Or maybe something was more obvious to them and not us.
The bundle contained a military surplus 6-man tent. Olive green canvas screen was and 70 pounds heavy. How that old man dragged it from the beach to the igloo was a point of speculation. But truthfully upon retrospect that bundled tent was probably already brought in by another crew Harry hired before us. Not being a thing to pique our curiosity in that igloo the eviction was probably pre-existing before our arrival. I haven’t seen it before so I was not sure as to its origin.
Yet the tent with its heavy canvas seemed adequate enough to withstand the current element but we wondered how it would fare in incumbent colder conditions. Being October the winter weather imminent and in just a few short months we were glad to miss it because we had one more week for Harry’s return.
But first we ate. Not having eaten in a couple of days already, expecting that Harry’s arrival with resupplies to be sooner than this. We each prepared a full meal for each other, eating our first full satisfying meal before subjecting ourselves to the rations.
That night, our last in the igloo, we slept full and content.

Getting used to his routines I was able to forecast Jim’s requests. As he logged his results for one measurement I would automatically move to the next position with my reflector where he would call me over the two way radio with positioning details.
Soon we were finishing up with our initial work load, preparing to start on the additional lots Harry mentioned.
It was at this time we notice that we have arrived at the date Harry promised to return. A full week has elapsed since his departure.
Ordinarily his tardiness would not be a concern but we were running low on food stock. Mostly this was our fault. We were anticipating Harry’s return with restock that we decided to finish off the existing rations. With the added hiking to and from and weighted runs our caloric intake was increased. We ate well and we ate repeatedly. We were hungry most of the time as our bodies finally acclimated to the added activities of the past week.
So on the eve of Harry’s promised return we had a grand dinner. The last of the stores, notwithstanding a few boxes of powdered potatoes or several tins of Spam we did not spare much for contingencies. His return with the promise of restocked provisions highly expected.
The scheduled day went without event, and no sign of Harry’s return. We worked and dined on Spam and remaining powdered potatoes. Maybe tomorrow he would show. It was possible that the weather to the north of us was too turbulent for flight. Maybe. We would wait a few more days still.
Again we had a Spam dinner. This time it was all that was available. At this point we did have a few cans of Spam left. But the greasy salt lick of mystery meat was starting to turn our stomachs and became unappetizing. We couldn’t stomach it. We did try because it was all that was available. Finally on one day I tell Jim that I have had enough. Looking at the open can he agreed and in response he chucked the last available meal we had into the woods, soon to be picked up by wandering wildlife. Jim states that Harry is sure to return with more food in any case.
Jim’s faith in Harry’s return was absolute at this point. Even at this later time as he was late Jim would reassure:
“Maybe weather. Maybe more work.” There must be a reasonable explanation. He was a patient and trusting but for me the doubt would start niggling its way into my head. I started worrying about abandonment
No food available now we continued working and going to the bag hungry at night. Even filling with water was a brief relief.
It would be yet one more day without evidence of Harry’s return now. Two days without eating now.
Finally! It was on a midday when we notice a faint roar of propeller against the mountain walls. At first we assume it as the echoes of crashing waves along the shore a few miles away. This audio mirage always present out here. But as the din grew louder we realize it to be the unmistakable sound of a single engine plane, it could only be Harry. As the sound fills the valley, undeterminable from what direction as it bounces of northern and southern canyons we instinctively look northward, the only logical direction where a plane can approach us here. At the appearance of the unmistakable white Piper single engine plane Harry does indeed returns from his Delphic meetings in Anchorage!  We pause our surveying to meet the welcomed sight, Jim measuring out a length of terrain and I on the opposite hilltop holding the reflector.
“You hear that?” I call on the radio.
“Yeah!” was Jim’s reply. “I say we are done here for today. Let’s go eat.”
Of course he did not have to finish that statement because I dropped everything on the spot and went on to meet him at the riverbed to start our long hike back.

I started the motorbike (a quick read of the manual that was available in our campsite) and proceeded on the return trip. I was estimating a quick return, thinking that I can run at top speed across the terrain, but trying to speed up the bounce would send me flying. Two tires barely hitting ground at the same time and all that bouncing would cause me to lose control, midair I would instinctively tend to pull on the handlebars one way or the other and the crooked tire landed and spun in the new direction. Stop. Redirect and speed up again. I would repeat the process again and again.
I would admit though that I might have yipped and yahooed as the bike bounced almost uncontrollable. But the progress was possibly as slow as commuting on foot.
I did slow down eventually. Still not enough to maintain a steady pace, but the bouncing was less severe. I maneuvered around the lagoon slowly and without incident. Crossing the dry creek was a welcomed relief as the terrain smoothed out, albeit a brief repast because as I approached the tall grass plains going became treacherous again because the uneven grounding was hidden in the foliage. Surprisingly, the only thing keeping me from totally losing control was the anchoring of the 2x4s dragging behind me. I continued on.
Then came the Spruce tree forest and this obstacle with the exposed roots exacerbated the bounce. The Rokon motorcycle, though tough and made for such rough terrain, had its limitations. The chain driven front tire, with complimentary chain driven back, had an enormous turn radius. Avoiding obstacles within this limiting range was a chore. Even worse that with a hollow aluminum rim in the front tire full with 2.5 gallons of petrol the force for avoidance was excessive. So at a moderate speed trying to maintain control while avoiding one tree with enough recovery to avoid the next tree impact was imminent, and so somewhere mid bounce in attempts to navigate fa narrow path I crashed into the side of an immovable tree. Eyes shut tight expecting the impact I managed to hit that tree dead center. No side swipe to deviate my course all forward motion suddenly stopped, all my carried materials crashing against my back and I fall over to my left side, almost comical really and seemingly in slow motion. But not slow enough for me to move my leg clear so as to not be pinned down by the couple hundred pound motorbike.
I land on my side, still straddling the active bike, eventually it chokes itself quiet. I was pinned in. The only thing keeping my thigh from being crushed was the wedging of 2x4s on that side of the bike. My foot likewise was fortuitously in a depression on the ground kept the force of the motorbike from snapping it under its weight; I feel the heat from the exhaust warm through the boot on my ankle. Spared the full force of the bike but wedged enough to prevent me from pulling myself out.
I try to lift the bike. But the adrenalin or shock, whatever it may be, weakened me. All I can do was laugh maniacally at the incident. It was pretty funny to me (not realizing of course my luck at the avoiding serious injury). I cackled for a bit, wiping tears from my eyes, waiting to regain my strength to lift the bike off of me.
I lay there on fallen spruce tree needles, sticking to my back (thankful now at the ignorance of knowing that the sticky gooey stuff on those leaves was aphid fecal matter), showered by more falling as a result of the impact. I see an empty bee hive above me and am thankful that I have not angered a swarm. Further evidence that the cold season is upon us bees abandons their nest at 53 degrees.
My breathing returns to regular rate, my cackle in now a huffing and puffing of attempts to catch my breath, tears running down my temples.
Suddenly I hear motion and I freeze. Looking up, well from my vantage on the floor with the sky was below and the ground above, I see movement just beyond the cluster of trees. At first assuming the wild hare Jack coming to investigate the wailing I finally see an adolescent bear had stopped in its pace and started approaching me to investigate.
Being late October these bears begin being dangerous. They seek food to keep them sustained through the hibernating months. They eat everything. Stories are told that at some point they are not particular what they eat. Other NPR stories constantly aired tell of hunters and hikers being attacked for no reason. I had no doubt at that moment that this was one of those NPR moments.
Not moving now, except for my right arm searching for the shotgun that was thrown clear during impact. It was just beyond reach. Dammit!
I lay quiet and staring at his approach, upside down I found it curious seeing it paws up. The bear approached cautiously. Almost upon me I am quiet and the only sound was the trees creak in the gust, my end was nigh.
But just then it jerks back. Annoyed, something offends it. Or some other unseen predator is present? The imagination runs at the speed of the hastened the episodes recalled in my hikes.
The bear turns and slowly departs, disappearing into the brush beyond the trees.
It takes me a few moments to notice the smell of burning rubber. I look down and a small trail of smoke rises from my pinned foot. The exhaust as hot as it was burning through my rubber boots at the ankle where it was making contact. The smell or my complete stillness (maybe it thought I was dead, bears do not approach the deceased I have heard) may have convinced the bear to abandon its investigation.
Whatever it was I did not underestimate my good fortune. The time elapsed slowed my rush and I was able to lift the bike off of my foot. For reassurance, I pounded my feet around on the ground, no breaks or strains. That was good.
The Rokon was not as fortunate. The impact broke the front chain drive. It was useless. After all that work Jim did to it just that past weekend and I break it on the first run. He will surely not be happy.
But I am stuck halfway to the work camp and all this material still to transport. I try to take it all on my back for a ways. Too heavy, too cumbersome. I will have to abandon some on the spot and return for it later. So I carry what I can and arrive at camp hours after I was expected.
Jim was about to come out to look for me, not fearing the worse just thinking I decided to stay at base instead.
I tell him of the incident. He was disappointed but not upset and we both travelled back to pick up the rest of the materials. But by the time of our return it was time to hike back to base.
We retrieved the Rokon motorcycle in the next few days and stored it next to the igloos. We are never to use it again.

Our daily hike consisted of tracking well-worn paths, created by man or beast, across the north of the lagoon and given the rainy conditions of the previous week we try to bypass now flooded rivulets of incoming water from higher ground. On the other inside of the lagoon was a young forest of spruce trees. Young being a relative term, the deceptively narrow trunks are really about fifty years old. These trees grow at a slow rate. Yet unlike the pine or beech tree that stand bare of leaves and hibernate at this time of year it still has its green needles on its branches. More adept to growing in colder climates it is predominating in our surroundings, and the patch of tall trees was large enough not to try to circumnavigate. This made it all the more difficult and extended our hike longer than expected each way.
 Another long plain with tall grass and the path was barely visible waited for us beyond the trees. And crossing a drying riverbed after negotiating a tricky ravine drop culminated in a two hour hike to our destination
So that following week we continue where we left off. The storm left a mess and clean up was necessary before returning to the duty of work. As a result of the deluge our small tent all but lost downstream. All of our abandoned clothes and equipment collected and futilely set to dry. Fifty degree weather and overcast skies did not allow much heat as needed. In retrospect we were truly never dry since that week.
Cleanup and ensuring our equipment was functional took less than a day and at its end we were back at work. We utilized the majority of a day with for work while estimating enough time for the morning and afternoon hike to the shore in the shortening daylight. Knowing that attempts in hiking at night runs out here were too dangerous and we dared not risk it. This meant that with about a five minutes loss per day our production was quickly minimizing as our stay lengthened.
Now a two man crew we picked up the slack for what used to be Harry’s contribution. All of his additional work consisting of verifications for calculations made, set ups for different angle readings, digging of posts when surveys complete cost precious time. Even worse, when we lacked materials needed at the site (materials stored in the brown igloo back at shore camp) work would all but stop as I, the mule, would hike back to retrieve.
During these solo hikes, with all that time to myself, my mind would start to race. Futile attempts to distract myself always ended in overthinking. It was hard to avoid when the only sound that echoes in your ears was the wind swaying tall grass and the crush of earth under your boots. It was a peaceful undulation of sounds that would hypnotize me to a daze. Conversations soon began, voices whispering in your ear and soon yelling for your attention. Loud enough to think someone was standing over my shoulder; I would swing around from time to time to make sure it was not the case.
The occasional wildlife call would break the monotony. On our first hike we encountered a huge wild rabbit we called Jack. He would rush by in the grass and then disappear. We ever really caught a full glimpse of it but this dog sized hare would sometimes break my daze.
But mostly conversations were persistent, some I’ve had recently or some forgotten entirely would replay in my head. I would respond and complete them in the time I hiked.
When the conversations have had enough of me then my mind would start thinking about television shows watched as a child. Star Trek, The Big Valley, M.A.S.H. Entire episodes then would play out in my mind in entirety. I realized the speed of thought as half hour to hour episodes would run its full course in less than 10 minutes in my head. The completion of one would continue to the next and I could “watch” entire seasons in one trek.
In any case, as maddening as the distraction were they made the long walk tolerable.

Jim is the first environmentalist that I have met. I would meet plenty more in the coming spring after the Exon Valdez spill would render our island a disaster area but for now he was the first whose passion for the environment defined his character. He loved nature. He would go out of his way to keep the status quo and put back what was borrowed. Always with a quip on how we need to maintain this beauty around us. One day I was drinking one of our last soft drinks just as we started our hike out. Finishing it I thoughtlessly crumpled the can and threw it into the tall grass. Angry, he stopped me and threatened that he was going to find that can and stuff it in my pillow. Telling me on how this discarded piece threatens the environment and even the wildlife having to live here long after we leave. How that piece of metal will forever be there, a blight on the landscape.
I was shocked at his reaction. It was just a can. This was never a consideration back home, I would never think of the consequences of any detritus thoughtlessly tossed aside. Somehow I thought everything disintegrated in time. In hindsight of my naiveté I now see his point. Witnessing the strain our planet has suffered with all the pollution since that point in time I too take this abuse personally. But at the time I was unforgivably oblivious.
His influence remained long after our brief expedition, about ten years later I find myself reprimanding my own father on our final family trip. At the Grand Canyon we camped on the ridge, he stressed with my mother’s progressive illness this trip was to meant to distract us from the inevitable. He realized that a refrigerator holding vital medication was never turned on possibly ruining the batch; he broke his sunglasses in his frustration and disgusted with his error proceeds to throw them over the edge of the canyon. I yelled at him on how they will be there centuries from now how carelessness will shorten the beauty of our natural wonders. I, of course, immediately felt guilt over my treating my father as a petulant child. Obviously he felt guilt over this and almost went to look for the discarded glasses.
I regret it even more for my treasured parents’ presence would be far shorter than cheap Chinese plastic littered on the canyon floor. This, as I said, was our last family trip. Both of them would sadly be lost to me by the fall of that same year.
Pardon the pause as I dry my eyes…
I am reminded on something my father said to me once, we are just wisps of mist on the morning plains, our hopes and dreams lost as soon as they are realized and the world continues her cadence, none the wiser that we ever here.
This was the influence of Jim, meaning well, I adopted his love for the environment. Love for all of nature and in his own way protecting the world by leaving it as it was found.

“Nah!” I would reply to him. I knew that for me any courtship I may entertain would be a lengthy one. But he on the other hand… I rebutted “I think you are projecting here. YOU will be the first one to fall for fawn eyes and demure coquettishness.”
“Nonesense!”
The gauntlet was drawn, each so sure in their assessment that we ended the dispute with a bet. The first to fall to Eros’ lure, marriage being the deciding factor, would lose $500 to the other. And with a quick contract drawn on a scrap of newspaper the matter to be settled, I was certain, as soon as we left here.
The subject not broached again but over the coming days we would chide each other on how our $500 prize would be spent.
“Cheap liquor and hard women! Or is it the other way around? Ah, what do you care you’ll be forever shackled.” Guffaw!
We continued talking well after our meal of Jim’s stew.
I stepped out of the igloo to relieve myself, chucking with Jim’s assessment of my bachelorhood fresh in mind when I notice my breath misting into the cool air.
Wait up. I can see my breath.
I look up and to my surprise we have a clear night. No moon but a dome full of stars. So many of them, their sparkle sharpened by the thin cold atmosphere and that their brilliance elicits vertigo.  Abundantly so that I cannot recognize my standard stars.
At this latitude my familiar Orion is dipped chest high in the southern horizon. In my light polluted Chicago area he is usually higher in the sky and one of a few visible. In Mexico he is even higher where one can recognize the Andromeda galaxy at its hip. Here I barely realized that the bright start in to its right was Aldebaran. Let alone Jupiter paired up alongside it. And further along the lowered ecliptic towards the west I find Mars prepares to set. I was confused and thought these planets further up the plane that I’ve mistaken the Gemini stars Castor and Pollux to be them.
Overhead Ursa Minor spins on the unmoving Polaris pin through the night like a hanging pot on a nail
Unfortunately at this time of year the misty lights of the Milky Way are on the other side of the world, our skies looking away from our galactic center. Not to be seen until the spring evenings. But even without that shine tonight starlight alone casts such a dim light that I can see my night terrain. Everything from the wind swept grass to the cliff sides to our north and south.
I have watched Sagan’s Cosmos and understood his concept of astronomy but I was not aware that when he tried to portray the billions and billions of stars out there (a phrase he is credited for but never really uttered) I was sure that they were not visible from anywhere on earth, until this moment.
I am mesmerized as the beauty and a lifelong affair with the sky is born this moment.

 Jim starts on rearranging our igloo by removing unnecessary clutter to make more room for us, a pile beginning outside of the igloo. I gather wood for our heating stove from the shore. Daily deposits of detritus collect during high tide and remains in in its retreat. Anything is fuel, not just branches and felled trees but pallets, plywood boxes even dried out paper products. In a time before recycling throwing trash overboard relieved sailors of their collected burdens. We wash our dirty clothing in the lagoon and hang it to dry on a skinning rack that was just outside of view down the lagoon. They never really dried out because the fall sun is already further south along on the horizon, heat fleeting as it slides toward the solstice. Worse being our sleeping bags, heavier with dampness, would remain sodden during the rest of our stay.
At some point Jim commences to repairing the Rokon motorbike that was abandoned by previous crews. Apparently not only a natural outdoorsman but also mechanically adept, he figured out how to get it running again. “No big thing, just have to jostle this doohickey here…” His southern accent betrays his intelligence.
The motorcycle was odd contraption; it had a front wheel chain drive as well as a rear. Low in speed but high in torque they were made for rough terrain the tires were also spare containers for additional fuel. Wheel girth allowed the rider to traverse most challenging terrain. A drawback, so heavy when loaded with fuel navigation was limited; exaggerated turn radius in tight locales would prove difficult.
I would soon prove this when attempting to cross the Spruce tree forest.
This Rokon motorbike had apparently fallen off a cliff, along with its rider as we would later find out. The man survived but not without his broken bones. The accident required his evacuation back to civilization and abandonment of the work we now continued. This, by the way, is how it was known that overland travel to the south of us was treacherous.
My initial impression of Jim mistaken, this man was not the jerk I was expecting. He explains that the gun statement comes from previous experiences with other crews he has joined. They seemed to believe that all materials were community property.
Jim proved to be quite the conscientious man. His dry wit and no nonsense approach would inspire me in later times. At this moment though I did find him odd but agreeable.
Born and raised in the Carolinas he was just a bit older than me. Already experienced in his chosen career where I was still looking for my place. For someone accustomed to urban living his ideals for living off the grid and without utilities seemed odd. I found it strange that in the twentieth century someone would chose this intentionally.
He abhorred pop music (which was my passion at that time) yet he did have a convincing argument.
“Tell me Gil, who was on that top 40 list a few years ago and where are they now?”
I would think about this and could not answer. Was it possible that I only liked these songs because of overexposure on the radio as he suggested?  As he pointed out, most current pop performers will be forgotten in a few months’ time. This angered me because just before our arrival I have won a prize from the local radio station. A CD of the current top 40 or a recording of a well-designed radio program featuring themed music, I of course chose the former.
He was correct. I would collect what I thought would be a lasting tune only to find it to be an annoyance of noise a short time later.
But surely the established classics were exempt?
“So, your opinion about the Beetles and the likes then?” I would ask him.
“Pfft! The Beetles are the worse of them!” he would reply.
What?
“But they stood the test of time as your rule implies.” Since their invasion of America a mere two decades before and still popular after all this time they were surely the exception to his rule.
“No, a good singer will tell you a story. Beginning, middle and end. That is a good performance. The Beetles all they do is repeating the same lines over and over again. It is a twenty second song stretched to three minutes. It is a shame they became so popular over lazy. ‘Listen do you want to know a secret’ or ‘Yeah yeah yeah’. No originality.”
Now he has gone too far by insulting my favorites. As a youth I spent hours listening to my uncle’s Beetles albums and grew quite fond of them. How could he…
But in retrospect I do realize his point. Their early music, of course, was nothing but pop songs. Brief and formulaic, as Jim points out, their popularity only borne of their unique origins.
Though this rift in musical appreciation existed between us this did not impede our fast comradery. He soon became a close friend.
Though I might have considered letting him listen to my two audio cassettes that I did bring to play on my Sony Walkman I knew he would balk at my selections. The first being the soundtrack to ‘Cocktail’, a recent Tom Cruise movie where he plays a bartender seeking the love of a woman outside his station. This was of course different than his previous movie “Top Gun” where he was a pilot seeking the love of a woman above his ranking. Or his debut “Risky Business” where as a young man seeks the love of a working girl outside of his social …I start seeing the repetition patterns that Jim points out.
So I would not share my music with him. But we do have a fondness for NPR and rarely missed a broadcast of Paul Harvey’s news.
My second audio cassette was a Monkees anthology, that I recorded myself, the Monkees being America’s answer to the Beetles. So you see my restraint with this one as well.

Harry informs us that we cannot stay in camp though. The tent inadequate while too late into the rainy season and colder weather prevents our continuing success. We will move back to the igloos on the shore.
We do not argue this decision. We would not mind the hike, even though the loss of time the hike to and fro will cost us a chunk of our day. But it is decided. Jim and I speculate that it was because Harry could not handle the daily travel as to why we decided to pitch the tent in the first place.
Another bit of news. Harry informs us that he did not intend to stay as long as he already has. Business in Anchorage is pending his arrival. He just remained to ensure that we were set up properly and primed our initial work commencement. He is to return home. We will continue the work here for our remaining week.
This, of course is news to me. Maybe he had discussed this with Jim but seeing Jim’s reaction I realize his surprise as well.
Maybe the harsh weather or the stress of the outdoor work was a bit much for a man of Harry’s age. But a thought occurred that first niggled at me, he already allotted these two weeks to work with us out here and not even one passed when this “pending” business away needed tending. A hint of suspicion started brewing in my mind.
In preparation we were assigned a work plan for our remaining time in his absence, work will continue on at the local sites and if time permitted move the equipment to the bay south of us by boat because, as it was already determined, there was no well-worn overland path to the southern bay from our location and thus a foot crossing of the mountainous area to our south was too treacherous.
“By boat?”
 Yes, apparently a twenty foot wooden skiff was anchored on the shore of the southern edge of the lagoon, near the mouth that leads to open water. We could not see it from our base site because of the tall grass. Two oars and a small outboard engine there was enough room to pack all our supplies and head into open waters.
Any question that may have arisen about our exposure to the elements out here was quelled by the thought that we will now be staying in a solid standing structure. No more flimsy two man tent. Even at the cost of the added hike to and fro we were glad for the decision.
We start to pack for the return trip. Leaving the equipment at the site we grab our food and clothing and prepare our bundles to transport. Jim sees the condition of his rifle. He glared at me but did not say a thing about it. He must have realized my need at the moment to defy his wishes.
The hike back was a silent one. We were still exhausted from the week’s onslaught. We just traversed the grassy plains, ravines, wooded area muted. We arrive at the lagoon with new watery created after the rains from the week. At the igloo we unpack, set up drying lines inside and kindle the stove to produce heat and a top to cook our meal.
A thought crosses my mind, I am glad they did not send me back to drag this heavy die cast metal stove to supplant the open fires we tried to light. Dragging it through five kilometers of hard terrain would surely have exhausted me.
We rest. The next day we prepare Harry for his departure and we push the plane onto the beach and load his gear. He shakes our hand and promises to be back before the end of our second week contracted. Also promises to bring additional provisions because he is confident in our skills and would offer us an extension to continue working at Eagle Cove if we were interested.
We tell him that we would consider and will discuss it upon his return.
And with that he departs. Circling overhead and as we watch from the beach tips his wings and veers northward toward the city.
Jim and I watch even after he disappears over the mountain range. Still hearing his propellers…or is that the crashing surf echoing off of the mountainside. That auditory mirage would haunt us for the remainder of our stay.
Jim finally heads over the ridgeline back to the igloos. I follow shortly. But I have an uneasy feeling. We have had a rough first week. What will our remaining week be like?

Sunset is now around seven these days and we do not want to spend battery charge on lanterns staying up longer into the darkness. No point, the wet misery is just as uncomfortable as the attempts to sleep.
But somehow sleep does finds me uncomfortably cocooned between these two men. But on this night it is short lived. A downpour is now upon us. Water seepage splatters inside the tent as the deluge hits the outside.
We try to make the best of it but the din is thunderous. Our bags no longer holding any hint of dryness, a new experience of dampness is upon us.
Then the clothes we are lying on get soaked. The added water rolling down the incline toward the already swollen creek is felt as it now loosens dirt below us, shifting under our weight. Muddy depressions under our bodies.
I still try to sleep through it but the other two have had it. Utter chaos with the roar of heavy water on nylon sheeting silencing their shouts
“I’m heading to the cabin.” yells Harry. Betraying what must have been in his mind for a few nights now.
“I’m with you.” Concedes  Jim.
“Gil?”
But I remain adamant and say no. I am sure I can sleep this through.
“Fine, have it your way!” Obviously irritated with me they both scramble out of the tent. Their flashlight beams disappearing into the denseness of the waterfall as they depart.
At last, I think to myself, all this room available. I now try to get myself as comfortable as possible to last the storm. No easy task, it is like trying to sleep in a half filled bath tub. I throw Jim’s sleeping bag below me thinking the added padding will lift me from the rush of water. I cover myself with Harry’s, the soaked heft adding a comfortable pressure on mine. Their weight lulls me. And for a moment this works as I start to doze off.
But the water level continues to rise and is now flowing around my head now. I wake again to keep myself above by turning onto my left side to prop myself against my arm and shoulder which now is inches deep in the flow. I then consider that if I fall asleep (still believing it possible at this point) my head might dip into the current. I might drown myself while deep in slumber. I consider keeping my head elevated using Jim’s precious hunting rifle. I did consider his warning for a moment but then propped it across two baggage piles and lay my head on the hard gun stock. Uncomfortable but effective, my head is above the flow now.
How long I have tried to sleep in this condition I cannot recall. A moment was an eternity. Dripping water on my face kept disturbing my slumber. But confident was I that I have found a solution to this dilemma. That is until I felt water welling up at my feet. Unsure if it was that the tent loosened in the mud and slipped closer to the creek or the creek swelled up enough to reach the base of the tent. In either case I was now being submerged in rising waters of the creek.
Too late and dark to fix the tent situation I conceded.  I now needed to join the other two who have abandoned me earlier. I grab what I needed and look for my dim flashlight and start on my way.
I cross the swelled creek; at the deepest the waters are now to my knees as feel the current threatening to carry me away. I cross it with little effort. In this darkness I have trouble finding my landmarks toward that path that leads to the cabin. But I do, I have learned from the first night experience and Jim’s simple lessons what to look for, how to keep observations, even in the dark. I would not repeat the embarrassment of that first night again.
The trail slick with mud, I barely able to see through the downpour and fogged up glasses, I continually wipe them up as I proceed. Without them, being astigmatic, everything is a blur. With them on everything is similarly blurred right now. I continue on but before arriving to the destination I find with Jim and Harry. They have arrived at the cabin and started a fire. Feeling guilty about leaving me behind they decided to return and convince me to reconsider.
I inform them about the tent’s misfortune. It might be submerged or washed away now. No matter, we will address in the morning light, for now let us return to the cabin.
Arriving, the relief of being out of the elements is compounded by warm welcome provided by a started fire. We remove our wet clothes and place them by the heat to dry, finally dry properly. We eat a quick meal (stale crackers and sausage left in the cabin previously, us leaving a note that Waterfield and Associates will reimburse).  With that we pass out from exhaustion. Not realizing how much such exposure took out of us we slept soundly. Even the snoring did not wake us.

 We went over the plan, where to measure, which plots to complete. Once the assignment parsed we set off to work. Our day, third week of October, still ten hours long would give us plenty of time to complete most of the work required in the two weeks. Given we can get comfortable in the tent.
The fall skies were a constant overcast, giving way to blue skies only for the briefest days. But that first week misting rain began to fall on us, unnoticed at first. We continued our work without interruptions. My job was to hike toward distant hills as directed and hold a reflector rod for Jim to take distance measurements eyed through a telescope looking theodolite.  
“Stand aft, fore, a bit to the left, a bit to the right, just a bit more to the right.”
“I can’t! There is a cliff!”
Typical chatter through our walkie-talkies.
 Harry in turn verified and records the readings and once satisfied we place stakes in the ground, markers to indicate a measured lot.
On our fourth day mist gives way to rain and a mild pour starts becoming annoying. By then end we have accomplish quite a bit. We wait out the day hoping for better weather.
We sit in a tarped area, eat a moderate supper and continue with discussions of the progress so far sitting at the campfire struggling to stay lit. None of us eager to go to bed, unencumbered sleep a distant memory, but eventually we do.
The rain has not abated. By next dawn it is a now a steady downpour. We spend more time trying to keep sensitive equipment dry than our personal baggage. Thinking storing them in the small tent when unoccupied would keep them dry we later find that this was not the case. The nylon material of the tent starts seeping water over top and running water from higher ground toward the adjacent creek creeps in around the tarp below, our inclined position cursing us again. By week’s end we had no dry clothing to change to and no way to dry them. Damp wood makes a fire difficult to light. We are miserably drenched, our moods sour.
Rumblings between Jim and Harry about breaking into the cabin begin. More Harry but Jim complies. I abstain. In my naïve sense of justice I argue that we were told no entry and so we must comply. They know I am right and begrudgingly agree. We suffer another wet day.
The work becomes tedious in the following days. Some mistakes made so re-measurements double the load. On one such recalculation I am been sent back to the shore camp to pick up some materials. I welcome the assignment because I know that I can get out of the rain, albeit briefly, sitting in the igloo. Never thinking to bring sodden clothes to hang to dry in the igloos at that time is my one regret, damn my lack of forethought. But I do rest a bit when I arrive before packing the requested materials. It was so nice to stretch out in solitude in that enclosure and out of the rain. I assume work ceases until I return from this five hour round. I must get back.
I get ready for my return and as I leave the igloo I eye the abandoned Rokon motorcycle. It is a shame it is broken, it would make this transport of materials so much easier.
On the return trip I encounter wildlife. Up to this point I notice them in the distance but none close enough to interact. I once drew my shotgun at a family of bears thinking they were traveling in my direction but they veered off long before arriving at my location. Now, as I carried the heavy load back to the work site I heard scurrying behind me. Every few step I would hear this and as I stopped to turn and investigate. I would see nothing, maybe my vivid imagination I think but a few more steps more and more commotion behind me has me reconsidering.
Finally I see them. Two fox cubs have been trailing me since the lagoon. Keeping a safe distance of a few feet they were curious as to what I was doing or going. When I stop they stop, hide in the brush and spy on me through branches. When I started they would embolden and continue the chase.
I toy with them for a bit and then try to initiate contact but they do not trust and never approach any closer. I stop for a snack, the haul taking its toll on me I must resupply. I cut up an orange and toss them wedges. They scurry but shortly return, sniff at them suspiciously and as soon enough, as I turn away, they drag them into the bush and eat all but the rind.
Satisfied with my meal and theirs I continue on the way, noticing them behind me for some time but eventually I must have bored them because they disappeared as soon as they appeared.
Cleaver creatures. The encounter brightens my mood.
Still gleeful with the experience I arrive at the camp to find Jim and Harry sitting on logs waiting for me. The atmosphere is dreary, with the sun descending I stash the purchase under the tarp and we call it a day.

Arriving at the camp we find unexpected news
 
“Why did they leave without finishing?” asks Jim as we are inspecting the abandoned equipment
Apparently an accident incapacitated one of the workers over the summer. He had fallen off of a cliff riding the Rokon motorcycle, the same broken motorcycle found at the shore camp. With broken legs (possible back) they had to extract him back to Kodiak City thus leaving this site as is. Ours is the first attempt in returning to finish the job.

We drop our gear and start piling the remaining instruments for inspection and inventory. What is missing is what I will have to hike back the five kilometers to bring back.
Harry indicates that our accommodations were further upstream. A cabin complete with beds and a working kitchen. We were glad to hear this, the trek was long enough it would be good to take off the boots and relax for the night before starting our work in the morning. It was my turn to cook, I fretted on how they would stomach my contraptions.
Crossing the same creek we hike yet another thirty minutes through more trees, following the creek babbling in the background and hidden to us already I memorize some landmark shrubs to deter my losing my way again. I noticed the fact that trees did in fact grow more foliage on its southern side than the north, as Jim indicated on the hike. With more sunlight present, when traversing east to west along the southern range, the photosynthetic feeding was richer on that side. An excellent compass reference.  Very useful during days when overcast skies hides the direction of the traveling sun, such as the ones we will surely encounter this late in the year. Jim’s lessons taking hold just like my grandfather’s history tales.
Finally, off to the distance a wooden cabin stood profiled dark against the browning terrain. Though it was hours until the sunset the sun was now hidden behind the towering mountainsides, casting shadows on our location. I was lagging behind with my terrain observations so happily I hasten my pace.
Harry and Jim arrived sooner than I and as I approach they are standing on the steps to the cabin. What is the delay I think to myself? Uh-oh, can they not find the key?
We must return to the work site. Maybe set up a tent there. I hear them saying.
“What’s the problem?” I ask.
Jim passes me a note nailed to the door. The note states that Harry Waterfield and Associates (specifically) is not allowed to access the cabin until accounts are settled with the proprietors.
What does this mean? What accounts? Harry simply waves this off as that they probably did not get the check yet.
“Nothing to worry about.”
But I start wondering, they were here last in the summer, three months’ time has lapsed. Even in the slow delivery system of this back country mail they should have received this payment. Or maybe they received it but failed to return to remove the notice.
Returning to the work site we hastily we set up a two man tent, for the three of us, darkness already setting upon us. Sunset was around seven pm but the valley was already in relative darkness. Temperatures were falling.
We, of course, reluctant in giving up the comforts of the cabin we complied with the notification, in this wild expanse an honor system was paramount. The small nylon enclosure was put on an incline close to the creek; we would lay with our feet toward the running water. This was soon to be realized to be a mistake, for now it seemed sound. It was a typical two man unit where the men were of average size. Both Jim and Harry towered over my being closer to 6 feet tall.
But the other alternative was to hike in the dark all the way back to shore where the only other structure was located in our vicinity. Harry decided against this. The long hike for him every day would take its toll. So we tolerated the nightly discomfort.