Rhapsody on a Theme of Ice

April-May 2001

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.
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by Joanna Streetly

As you gain paddling experience, you can embark on new adventures such as this.

An Iceburg Coffee Break - Photo Courtesy D.Weir

An army is bearing down on me. I am trying to make a run for it, but the soldiers move forward relentlessly, borne by the tide, their turquoise uniforms gleaming. Did Salvador Dali paint me into this scene? No, this is not a painting, there is movement. But like Dali's clocks, these soldiers are melting with every minute. Their bizarre shapes mesmerize, fascinate, lure my eyes. They are dogs, seals, birds, hands-even the legs of a synchronized swimmer. The water is a deep, frigid green-impossibly smooth-interrupted only by these dying blocks of ice.

Today is typical of southeast Alaska, I'm told. I can almost make out the horizon, but only because is has been brought nearer-everything else blotted out by the softest swathe of grey. It is not raining, but the air is moist and thick. In this phantom sky, every nearby object pulses with colour and shape. And so it is that these chunks of ice command my attention completely. They pockmark every degree of the view, many of them stranded on the land.

A huge expanse of mudflat stretches from the main shoreline, out to Camp Island, blocking the mouth of the bay. With this extreme, negative tide, there is only one exit route-a narrow channel to the northwest of the island, through which the green water is now pouring. And with the water comes the ice. Fresh water that has travelled for millennia on land, now succumbs to the salt of the ocean. The bergs get smaller and smaller, valiantly sailing on out into Frederick Sound to meet their fate.

Like a crop of strange jewels. Photo by Joanna Streetly

I am in my kayak, trying to cross over the fast water, but I feel like a squirrel trying to dodge the cars on a highway. At least I only have to look in one direction. The idea of a collision is, quite frankly, nasty. I already know how cold the water is. I can feel it through the soft skin of the Feathercraft kayak. And I have already seen what can happen when an iceberg collapses. I have watched from shore, alerted by the screams of the seagulls and the ear-filling boom that reverberates across the wide open space; I have watched the resulting waves pound the beach, hundreds of yards from the source; and I have picked up even the smallest pieces of glacial ice and felt its weight-not something to be trifled with.

The previous night, my friends and I had camped in LeConte Bay, near the snout of the LeConte glacier. Short of water, we had collected pieces of glacial ice to melt. It took a suprisingly long time. This ice is so different from the ice from a freezer. Having been subjected to the intense pressure of glacial processes, it is much denser than regular ice. That density is apparent in the deep, tremendous colour. From a distance I thought that the colour was turquoise. Under closer observation it seemed that the impenetrable heart of the colour could have been cyan-cyan obscured by layer upon layer of glass. After further consideration, I realised what should have been obvious right away: that the colour is, in fact, far beyond description; a colour-if indeed it falls into such a category-entirely of its own.

That same evening, after melting ice for water and cooking dinner, my friends and I had walked out onto the low tide land. It was surreal to be examining icebergs on foot this way, but there they were, newly birthed, already out of sight of the glacier and now abandoned by the retreating water. Like a crop of strange jewels, deposited willy-nilly, through which we wandered, looking, touching, admiring. . . .

One had a slight depression, in which I found a puddle of water. I couldn't resist tasting it. How decadent to drink this ancient lifeblood! The grandness of the moment evaporated, however, as a dose of salt soon hit my unsuspecting tongue. Needless to say I didn't try the same thing twice.

Photo courtesy of Bluewater Adventures

In the end we were driven back to camp by the cold. It was a memorable evening, but one which hadn't finished with us yet. That night, the wind howled down off the glacier, building slowly and battering the thin walls of our tents. Buried deep in my sleeping bag, the cold still found me. Collapsing bergs thundered explosively, punctuating my dreams with moments of alarm. I began to wonder, anxiously, about the next day's travel.

But now it was the next day, and here we were, early in the morning, afloat on the thick green water, racing across a fairway of strange, frozen creatures. The current was moving at about 4 knots, but we could see the quiet water of a back eddy just ahead. As I neared the relative safety of the eddy, an ice floe passed me, replete with reclining harbour seal. Superior swimming ability gives the seals much less to fear from collapsing ice. They can slip between worlds with ease. That seal had only just drifted out of sight, when along came another one, also on an ice floe. The procession was on. We saw many more seals that morning, enjoying their free rides, unconcerned with us.

Even when we had finally crossed over to the main shoreline the icebergs dotted our route. The tide was still low and there they were along the steep, rocky shore, some tilted at rakish angles, some with holes right through them - perfect frames for the lush Alaskan rainforest behind them. But gradually, our eyes began to leave the shore and wander upwards at the steepest coastline I have ever seen. And as we pondered the ability of trees to grow so tall on vertical granite, the ice gradually disappeared behind us - melting into the past as sublimely as it had first slipped into view. The cloud moved closer around us. Our world of colour began to shrink to grey and green. Even the cliffs began to fade in and out of view.

As the first moisture drizzled down on us, I looked behind me for one last glimpse of ice. There was nothing. Not even an horizon. The spectral curtain had closed on a bizarre and stunning play of colour and light, sound and sensation, texture and movement. But for the distant echo of a crash, that rhapsody of glacial ice might never have been.

Joanna Streetly is a freelance writer, illustrator and long-time kayak guide living in Clayoquot Sound. She is past editor of The Sound Magazine and author of "Paddling Through Time - a sea-kayaking journey in Clayoquot Sound" Raincoast Books 2000. Read a review in this month's Book Reviews©