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Published: July 24th 2011
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First night
Theresa, Dawn, Matty, Rachel Hey Everyone! We are finally feeling settled in Churchill as our "work season" continues to bring us great weather here in the sub-arctic. The last few weeks have been a flurry of movement for me (Theresa) as I travelled to the James Bay area for work, came back, then a couple of weeks later, flew to Winnipeg for the Winnipeg Folk Festival. I used to go to Folk Fest regularly when I lived there 10 years ago. Now, I was able to reunite with this splendid 5 days of music, entertainment, friends and camping at the Birds Hill Provincial Park. I now have the music back in my soul! That would be the only way to describe a complete immersion of music, good food and dancing from awesome bands from around the world. A special mention goes to KD Lang and Matt Anderson (some amazing performances by these two!!!) and of course poetry - the spoken word. There was an amazing venue on Sunday afternoon of amazing poetry by Shane Koyczan and the Short Story Long group that left me with a lingering sparkle of inspiration...
Upon my return to Churchill, the weather was perfect on a particular night (definition
of perfect in Churchill: warm, sunny, low wind, low bug activity) that inspired us to go out and paddle on the Churchill River to see the Beluga Whales. We launched the kayak at 8 pm (the sun still high in the sky - remember, we have very long days here in the summer). High tide at 10:30 pm gave us loads of time to paddle on the calm waters.
As we got closer to pods of Beluga Whales, we could see details of marks on their skin as they dove in and out of the water displaying their curved backs. Just when we thought we had the up-close-and-personal experience with these amazing mammals, a large pod swam around us, under us and very close beside us. As we thought we were whale watching, they were human-watching! Many times I looked over into the water to get a glimpse of eye contact as they watched us, turning their heads up to see us as they glided by just under the surface of the water.
As we sat idle in the water, we watched in awe as the belugas entertained us. One beluga began to rub up against the side
of my end of the kayak (the stern). And then again. At Dave's end, a beluga idled straight up and down in the water and nudged his/her head against the kayak bow, rocking the boat, repetitively, but gently. The excitement was felt on both dimensions of the water - they seemed to be getting more curious, and we were getting more excited (and nervous). Worse-case-scenario was that we would tip and have to swim to shore in our life jackets. The catch is that the water is still very cold. That was not an appealing outcome.
So we slowly paddled the kayak forward towards the direction that the pod was swimming before they stopped to check us out. They seemed to be content with that as they swam beside us in formation. There was a moment there, that we felt part of the family.
An afterthought occurred to us. Either they were being playful and curious and wanted to test our reaction to their nudging, perhaps their way of communication, or they thought we were an injured Beluga that they were nudging to revive. (the kayak is light grey with white mottled patterns - the colour of juvenile
belugas) We will never really figure that interaction out. But it left me with a sense of awe, wonderment and mystery that will stay with me forever. Sorry, there are no photos of this event, as we obviously were unsure of what was really happening at the time. My camera was sitting in my dry bag tucked safely inside the kayak.
We would not have been able to experience this were it not for the kayak. So a big thank you goes to Donna and Chris Giles for lending us their tandem kayak. Thanks, you guys! We love you! A kayak in Churchill is truly invaluable, we are learning. Hope to see you in the fall!
Enjoy the pics from the Festival, some wildlife in Churchill and a few macro shots I took from Dave's orchid tour for Ursula and I when we walked down a deserted gravel road.
Amphibiously yours, Theresa (and Dave)
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D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
You live in an amazing part of the world
I'm glad you are publishing again as we always enjoy reading about your adventures.