Lost at Sea in Petersburg Alaska
Our first adventure in Alaska began in Petersburg, a small town known as Little Norway. Petersburg is located on Mitkof Island and only has 26 miles of paved road. We were drawn to this little town because of the mountain known as the Devils Thumb. The Devils Thumb is part of the Stikine Icecap and is one of the most dangerous mountaineering objectives in North America due to difficult routes and fast unpredictable weather. The Northwest Face still remains unclimbed.
We arrived on the island with hopes of chartering an aerial tour around the Devils Thumb. However, the weather had a different idea. This summer, Alaska has had record breaking temperatures and forest fires. The only clear day we had, the Devils Thumb was obscured by haze from the fires in Northern Alaska. To Grant’s dismay, we were unable to fly around the peak which meant I had to spend the next couple of days comforting him.
Since our ferry trip wasn’t until four days later, Grant had to get creative with ways to stay productive with photography. We drove to the end of the paved road on the island where Grant spotted what appeared to be a sandbar. He imagined with low tide, the sandbar would create a unique abstract pattern from the air. To confirm his hypothesis, he fired up the drone and experienced a different kind of “aerial” tour. He was pleased with what he saw from the air but the photograph was still missing something. For this epic shot he had envision, he needed a person to show the scale. Lucky for him, he has me as a wife.
The sandbar was about two hundred yards out and extended a couple of miles down the coastline. We had discussed in great detail our plan since our radios were not working. I would enter the inside of the sandbar through a small channel separating the sand from the shore. As soon as I began to paddle, we realized it was impossible to make it through the shallow channel. Grant was still close enough for me to get his attention and change our plans. We decided that I would paddle around the sandbar cause according to Grant, “It’s not that far.”
As I began to maneuver my way around the sandbar, I became increasingly more aware that it was much larger than we had anticipated. I kept looking for areas to cut through but unfortunately couldn’t find any. After an hour of paddling, I finally made it around the far end of the sandbar but couldn’t see Grant along the shoreline. After a few minutes of paddling aimlessly, I heard a drone flying over me. A sudden sense of relief came over me knowing that Grant knew where I was even though I couldn’t see him. I knew the drone battery would only last about 30 minutes so I decided I would just keep an eye on the drone and follow it to where it landed. Unfortunately, I lost sight of the drone as it went over the forest. At this point, I had been paddling for sometime and started to get anxious that I couldn’t see Grant on the shoreline. As I became more anxious, the tears began to flow. I didn’t know where to go. After what seemed like forever, I finally heard Grant yell, “Alexis, are you alright?” I yelled back, “Where are you?!?” Through the tears, I saw Grant standing on the shore. Again a sudden sense of relief overwhelmed me as my experience at being “lost at sea” came to an end. When I finally reached Grant, I was done with paddling. Grant on the other hand, was not. He hadn’t quite gotten the photo. So I bucked up (now knowing where Grant was) and continued to paddle so he could capture the photo that he imagined.
Now if you were to ask Grant about this story, I was never “lost at sea” because he could see me the whole time and there was only one direction to go. But luckily for me, this is my blog.
