North of Nain
August 2011
Mountains with the ocean lapping their mid-sections, tent circles maybe 50 years old, maybe 150 years old, the remains of a Moravian Mission building nestled among waving grasses . . . It’s often felt like we were sailing into a postcard.
All of the places we go, Bee asks me what it feels like. It’s made me tune in more or maybe there’s just more silence up here so I can tune in more. She’s right, each place, each postcard, does have it’s own “feel” - some happy, some sad, some waiting.
Our chart calls them The Kaumajet Mountains. Everyone around here calls them simply "The Mugfords." Totally unexpected, this felt like a postcard of Arizona’s mesas. Water gathered at the mesa’s top then plummeted over the edge. Along the way strands of water converged forming spectacular waterfalls. Hitting a ledge, water angled until the next opportunity to leap into space. I loved this area’s feel of wildness. For all its isolation, it was a welcoming wildness that seemed to say, “ Stay awhile. Explore, enjoy.”
Nanutak Island (White Bear Island) earned the nickname “Evil Island” as we passed on the way up. Peaks shrouded in glooming fog, it just looked menacing. We started calling it the lair of the evil Dr. No. A lunch stop on the way back deepened the feeling.
The first thing we saw on landing were bear prints, not the small prints of a black bear but dinner plate sized prints. We were on red alert scanning the rocks for bears. Venturing further we saw well trod critter paths weaving around the lake and up into the landscape. We didn’t stay long!
The Spanish Influenza Pandemic of 1918 spread through the Inuit communities of coastal Labrador like wildfire in a rainless forest. The Moravian Missionary’s ship Harmony and the mail boat were the carriers.
Two hundred and sixty six people lived in Okak and hundreds of dogs. The swiftness of the virus left people unable to tend the sick or feed the dogs. Crazed with hunger, the dogs devoured each other and then smashed into homes where small children fought them off. The fifty-nine survivors dug a mass grave by setting fires to thaw frozen ground, digging and repeating the process. Okak was abandoned shortly after the epidemic, no one having the heart to rebuild the once thriving community.
We strolled the beach, finding bits of pottery and signs of the old wharf. Wildflowers colored the hill and reeds whispered in a gentle breeze. A light melancholy seemed to seep from the ground, not a heavy burden just a waiting . . .
