Our progress was stopped yesterday evening

08-08-2025 | 70°12’N 163°25’W

After passing Cape Lisburn, the northeasterly winds picked up. Together with the north-setting tide, they kicked up a nasty swell. The short waves carried a lot of energy. We tried a long tack east in the hope of finding shelter from the shore that bends north, but we were sadly disappointed. The wind backed with it—no place to hide.

The 20-knot breeze would otherwise not have been a problem, but in these latitudes, different rules apply. We proceeded with short tacks inshore and off. Nothing seemed to help. It wasn’t until the end of the morning, when we tacked back toward the shore, that the wind started to veer.

The first sign was a woolly cotton floating through the rigging. First one, then more followed. Arctic cotton grass, part of the sedge family. Migrating snow geese and caribou feed on it. The Inuit used it as candle wicks—collected in summer, dried, then rolled in seal fat and burned in winter lamps. It is one of the most widespread plants on the tundra.

For us, it meant the end of our struggle. We tacked again, and for the first time we could follow the low-lying coast. Speed picked up, and so did morale.

In the night, we managed to pass Cape Sabine at the mouth of the Pitmegea River. The low-lying promontory got its name during the Blossom expedition in 1826. Inuit had used the area for centuries for fishing and hunting. The Long Mountains seemed to end not far from here, and the general low tundra took over. It was hard to see where the land started and the sea began.

After having passed Lisburn the day before, we had entered the Chukchi Sea, a sea in the Arctic Ocean. Only four months of the year can a ship enter here. The Arctic whalers of two centuries ago were well aware of this, yet many ships still foundered here.

In 1913, the Karluk was abandoned and drifted in the ice of the Chukchi Sea before she was crushed on Herald Island. Her survivors made it to Wrangel Island off the north coast of Siberia. Their hopeless situation forced their captain and an Inuk man to undertake a journey over the ice for hundreds of kilometres. Nine months after they reached Cape Vankarem, the twelve survivors were rescued by the King & Wing, an Arctic fishing schooner.

For us, the ice is getting closer and closer. The northeasterly winds have been bringing the storis back south. Parts of the year-old ice have connected again with the Alaskan coast, and the pack is not far behind. In two more days, we could be rounding Point Barrow—and that is where we expect to meet the first pieces of ice.

For now, it does not seem all bad. The first southerlies have appeared in the weather forecast, and the melting process is also taking its toll. Still, according to the statistics, ’25 is a heavy ice year for the Western Arctic. Not so for the East. The coasts there seem to be becoming ice-free very quickly this year.

So eyes are open for new possibilities…

At the moment of writing, we are 5 NML off Icy Cape. On the 17th of August 1778, James Cook named it after the amount of ice accumulated on the coast.

Different times…

All is well, Gijs