Oct-Nov 1988 Travel in the Kodiak Archipelago - Prologue

PROLOGUE

I am awakened by the sounds of scratching. Paws scraping against loosened topsoil on a frozen ground. The sound is unmistakable; a bear. No. Sounds more like three bears, two adults and the hungry mews of a cub; they dig seeking nourishment to sustain them during hibernation. It is a cold November night and here in the wilds of Alaska the coming winter makes scavengers of us all. Us with a recent acquisition of venison and them, unfortunately, the discarded deer pelts that we foolishly buried just outside of the tent. The shallow dig must have attracted them.

PROLOGUE

I am awakened by the sounds of scratching. Paws scraping against loosened topsoil on a frozen ground. The sound is unmistakable; a bear. No. Sounds more like three bears, two adults and the hungry mews of a cub; they dig seeking nourishment to sustain them during hibernation. It is a cold November night and here in the wilds of Alaska the coming winter makes scavengers of us all. Us with a recent acquisition of venison and them, unfortunately, the discarded deer pelts that we foolishly buried just outside of the tent. The shallow dig must have attracted them.
Truthfully, at this point I am not even sure if I am awake. With eyes wide open I am blind in the darkness, so absolute that I doubt whether eyes are open or closed. Nothing can be seen as I wave my hand in front of my eyes and see nothing but black (am I waving my hand? Without the reliance of visual cues for validation I cannot be sure). Overcast skies, always overcast these days, keeps the moon from shining over this wide expanse of the back country. An area so vast that even a powerful flashlight shines only a thin beam in the darkness. In all of my days I have never experienced such a void. There are occasional reflected pairs of red eyes of creatures with night vision meet the beam’s sweep only to disappear on the return swing. In this I realize that I am never alone; the beasts always spying on the humans at safe distances.
So as I lay trying to regain my bearings, confused and bundled in my sleeping bag, the frosty cold on my exposed face is a slap me awake and reminds me where I am at. With that jolt I immediately deduce what is happening. I hear them just on the other side of my tent’s canvas wall. Scraping dirt and exhaling gruffly. Tearing at and chewing the hides that will provide little nutrition. Fortunately (or unfortunate depending on the point of view) the prized purchase they seek was stored earlier that night in plastic coolers that possibly smell unappetizing and foreign for these Kodiak bears. I wonder if they can they see in the dark as well. If not surely the smell of sweat, grime and musk, the byproduct of week’s lack of bathing, from two human males a few feet away must be evident.  
If we are discovered, thick canvas walls will ply away like rice paper under the threatening power behind those claws. Without my sense of sight to evade them, I will surely be a tasty substitute for pelts. I am sure of it.
 Jim will know what to do.
“Jim…” I say, with a slight and quivering whisper.
My coworker in this unfortunate adventure is James Purdy, a gentleman surveyor from Carolina. Ginger haired with a matching beard and a southern drawl that had me apologizing for queries and interruptions (Jim hated my apologizing for everything so when he did chide me about it I would apologize to him again…for the apology). This man was my antithesis. Where I was sorely inexperienced in all things natural, truthfully a burden and hindrance on this expedition, he was a confident and experienced outdoors man with skills that, unknown at this moment, we needed to survive. My urban ways had no relevance here in the wilds. He, being a proper southern gentleman of course, never expressed such thoughts in all our time together out here. Patient and understanding over the next few weeks he would introduce me to the art of self-sustenance during our unexpected situations we would soon encounter.
We were to be here a mere two weeks. A deadline that expired two weeks ago and now have run out of our rations once again and this time a restock was not going to fly in from the city. We were all but forgotten here. We attempted to fish in the local lagoon with no success. Everything edible already foraged by bears in expectations for hibernation. Jim says he can probably find game up on the mountain. He is a hunter and, fortuitous in his foresight to pack his hunting rifle in anticipation of getting some downtime out here, decides to leave to restock our waning supplies. While he is gone I hunt for stocked blinds left by hunters for the upcoming season. Finding tarp covered surpluses of canned goods supplemented our spent stocks. Thieving only minimum amounts so their owners will not find themselves in the same situation we are in.
Earlier tonight, after a couple of days absence he returned with tonight’s prize meat, a backpack full of venison. Skinning and storing the excess amount we ate heartily that evening. The skins buried just outside of the tent is what has placed us in this situation now.
“JIM” I whisper louder.
“Shhh…” he replies.
Good, not a dream. Bad for he confirms what I feared. If we are heard we will surely be in trouble. The last thing you do not want to do is instigate the world’s largest bear as it hunts for food.
Surely they smell my fear by now. Is this sleeping bag thick enough to mask such odors? The body heat building inside as the outside temperatures are in the teens this cold November night. Sweat trickles down from my hairline to my cold forehead.
How did I get here? Up until this assignment I never really spent any time outdoors. I have done odd jobs in my year on Kodiak Island but always returned to a warm home at days end. This job was well outside of my experience. How, what why?


My mind races to four weeks ago when the Kodiak Job Service office calls me with an offer. Two weeks of survey work for a $2000 lump payment. When the posting came to them they immediately thought of me, their one reliable agent. All other job seekers utilizing the service so they could only seek signatures from the job’s foreman stating that they were unqualified for the posted job and then they can collect unemployment benefit checks. In the year I worked for them I accepted all assigned jobs. This was notices and presumably rewarded.
I agree to meet Harry Waterfield at a dockside diner by the airfield. Through the plate glass majestic white capped mountains in view, evidence of a cold winter approaching. Docked float planes bobbing in the swell of the bay in the foreground.The air was ripe with the smells of Pacific waters and crustaceans, everything smells fishy in this small cannery town. He sits across me already finishing a second cup of coffee and waiting on another one while lighting a cigarette a white topped scraggly face of an old man (he claimed to be younger), his shifty eyes squinting at any direction but mine. Lacking eye contact and his hesitant speech should have warned me of his character on the get go. But my mind distracted on the lump sum. He describes the job. Surveying plots of land in the bush for hunters to build their cabins for use during the season, but avoids more direct questions. Questions I should have made sure were answered then. But what did I know. Surely he was vetted by the job service and so with that expectation he had a fraction of my trust already.
“I am no surveyor.” I tell him.
“No need to be. I have one already. We need a mule.”
“A mule?”
I was to be the heavy laborer of the three man crew, carrying equipment in and out of the from one survey site to the other along with holding the reflector while the surveyor, Jim, takes readings and calculations. Cook when necessary. Oh by the way, you can cook right? Sure! I would lie.
“Two thousand is a bit generous for mule work.” I said suspiciously.
Thin slits over eyes blink erratically as he finally settles on me. He takes a long drag from his cigarette. Then he says “Flat rate for all my workers. Hazard conditions and all, we will be gone for two weeks straight. What do you say; the service tells me you are reliable.”
And that is how he got me. Playing my ego against me. I totally did not trust him from the start but here I was, taking this field job on a compliment.
That following dawn I would return to the airfield to meet him at his plane, a small Piper Club with room for two only. Jim, the other member of the expedition and our surveyor, was already on site setting up camp. We take off after loading additional supplies to  join him. After a rough and turbulent flight over the Kodiak’s mountainous range to the south, crossing the enormous and impressive Ugak bay, that cuts miles deep inland before traversing more mountains on its southern edge. We land on a small peninsula strip of beach just of the eastern shores of the island. More mountain ranges to the north and south, the Gulf of Alaska to the east and a small seasonal lagoon towards the west, typically dry in the summer. The job site was a two hour hike west, beyond that lagoon. We were quite isolated from civilization out here. Truly out in the bush.
We would spend the first week settling in with mishaps and bad weather hindering our progress. It rained the entire week. I, of course, had no idea what to do, quickly learning by example. We worked entire days to meet the needs. Three men finding little comfort in a two man tent because the leased cabin we expected to use was no longer available for Waterfield and Associates. Must be a misunderstanding Harry says, suspicious.
Then suddenly Harry leaves. Excused as business in Anchorage, be back in a week’s time along with more supplies; we might need to stay another week. Keep working until I get back.
At first his departure was a welcomed reprieve. Two men better accommodated in confined spaces. The inconvenience of rains cease as well and all that is soaked starting to dry out, not completely but enough. With Harry’s extra portion of the rations and expecting a resupply within a week's time we ate like kings. But that week came and went and no sigh of Harry. In our gluttony we run out of food. Without any recourse we continued to work hungry and with the expectation that his delay must be excused, he will return with food eventually; he is coming back, right?
Harry does return, a few days late. As soon as we saw his plane pass overhead we dropped everything to start our long hike back to meet him and, more importantly, food. But shortly afterward, long before our arrival, Harry takes off and was on his way back to the city.
True to his word there was a pile of food waiting for us. Yet on that pile was a note written on a paper plate stating “Business in Anchorage not concluded. Be back in another week.”
Briefly disappointed at the news but soon forgotten because we ate heartily that night. Learning from our previous mistake we knew to ration better this time just in case.
That was the last we would ever see Harry Waterfield. Granted we did not even see him in his brief stay that last time. But For the remainder of our time here he failed to return.
So now two weeks later and we were out of rations again. While disputing our separation we plan our survival for the days are far shorter and the nights much colder.  Jim goes up the mountain to hunt for food. I will stay behind to set up for the colder nights coming. Cutting dried grass stalks to lay under our sleeping bags for insulation against frosted ground. I was to also come up with plenty of firewood to keep us warm. eventually we would need to figure our way back to civilization, winters out here was not an option. In the meantime we required a lot of wood. By the December solstice the night gets as long as twenty hours here. This would be the start of many such decisions we would concede to make our time here survivable.
Optimism waning, Jim finally concedes with my weeks long assessment that Harry is not coming back. Inconceivable, he would state. Abandonment to the elements is not what one man does to another according to the rules of the wild. Even more unbearable was that no one knew our condition or where we are at. We will need to bear down, survive this cold, and figure a way back to Kodiak City on our own skills and wits. the longer we delay the shorter the days would be to make any progress.
As Jim returns with his purchase the success of his excursion foolishly convinces us that our situation may not be as untenable as we thought. Of course the feeling is short lived later that same night as we now realize that all of our misfortunes lead to this moment. With us lying in a tent in the dead of a dark night, blind to all that goes on, with hungry bears just outside its walls. Scared for our lives and remembering the events that lead to this moment. My mind races again and again. Remembering these sequences of events in a foolish attempt distract myself of the inevitable, that final moment with the bears' realization of our presence. One thing is certain; I would never sleep ever again…