Heading ever northward, we make our way up the beautiful and remote east coast of Ellesmere Island. Cruise along scenic Smith Bay bordered by a steep wall of mountains, with a glacial ice tongue which pours down the mountains on either side. Be up on the bridge as we search for a patch of "polar bear ice", the mixture of first-year and multi-year sea ice that is the preferred habitat of the ice bears. Our binoculars seek out any small ivory-colored dot on an otherwise white ice surface. We strain to see the dot move. Yes, it is a bear, spotted at a considerable distance. We approach, ever so slowly, stalking the polar bear much as the bear stalks seals on the ice. At the end of the bay, we go ashore to hike or kayak in picturesque surroundings. Ice is always present here. On our next day, we enter Buchanan Bay, and turn into Alexandra Fjord to reach the area of Skraeling Island. ("Skraeling" is the word that the Norse settlers of Greenland used for the Inuit.) This is the site of an important archaeological find. Norse artifacts show that the Norse traded with the natives here on Ellesmere Island, far north of their settlements on Greenland. Last summer, quite unexpectedly, we discovered the remains of a summer encampment of natives, we think of the Thule Culture (the third of the three Inuit cultures to occupy this area). We saw rings of stones that held down the edges of skin tents against the wind, and stone chambers that might have been constructed for storage. Perhaps the Inuit camped at this very site as they traded with the Norsemen, exchanging skins and walrus ivory for European goods, especially metal. (B,L,D) ...
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