News from the busy Bay

Now we're back to our regular programming!

can you spot the two Newfoundlander fishermen in this photo?

Cambridge Bay has been busy busy busy busy these days.  The barge ships have made it in with everyone's yearly supplies of groceries. My friends are all busy unpacking their stuff like it's a weird grownup Christmas. ("I forgot I ordered these! YES. Toilet paper FOREVER!")

The cruise ships are in and tourists are wandering all over the roads with not a care in the world, and certainly not for their own roadside safety.  I would like to apologize to a particular group of tourists who probably came to get a tour of the meat plant and instead spent the whole time there watching me try to make my credit card work while I purchased more or less all of the smoked char in town. (I'm just kidding. there's some left.)

Other ships are coming in and out. I can't even keep track of them. I partied with a bunch of sailors from the Arctic research ship the Martin Berggman (and probably amused them when I later jumped into the Arctic Ocean right by their boat), soon after which they ran aground somewhere in the Arctic ocean.  It's okay, though. One of the Franklin ships that they were looking for has finally been found.

I keep meeting Norwegians in town, and every time I do, I ask them ARE YOU HERE TO TAKE AWAY THE MAUD. I suppose it's racist to assume that all Norwegians in Cambridge Bay are here to take away the Maud, but, like, I mean, a lot of them are.

They're taking away the Maud

even while you sleep: the Norwegians are waiting to take away the Maud

The old stone church ruins has a roof now. And no longer is in ruins. Wow! I was pretty impressed how quickly that went up. I went exploring around the place, and it was starting to look pretty sharp.  There was no explanation for the random tampon I found on the ground nearby though.

(For reference, here's what the old stone church ruins used to look like.)

And as I mentioned before, they 'sploded the LORAN tower and now it's not so much of a tower as it is a bunch of kind of sad metal on the ground.

sad face

Speaking of 'splosions, especially in that area, FIREWORKS EFF YEAH. I was going go to bed early one night but then I found out they were 'sploding fireworks across the Bay by the old stone church, so I put my pants back on and set up my lawnchair and watched the explosions in the sky while listening to Sigur Ros and drinking some kind of tea called Mother's Little Helper.

This Jeep, however, has seen better days

I kind of missed the night time darkness

hiking out on the tundra