A short trip to Point Lay, Part 2: a walk in the vicinity - retiring boats, waiting snow machines, police woman on patrol, gravel truck, construction, culture bearer with daughter and granddaughter

After lunch, there was plenty of time to kill before the scheduled unveiling in the evening. I am a person who needs to walk, and so I headed out on a two hour stroll during which I would traverse just about, but not quite, every inch of road in the Point Lay vicinity. Not long after I began to walk, I came upon these boats lying on the autumn tundra, ready to settle down for the winter.

The fence, btw, is a snow fence - built to catch the wind-blown snow and cause it stack up in a high drift along the fence, rather than in the village.

These snowmachines, parked behind the home of whaling captain Julius Rexford, stood ready to transport their owners over the snow and ice of imprending winter.

As I walked, a North Slope Borough police vehicle headed down the road ahead of me, toward the gravel pit - just doing her rounds, nothing serious happening.

Early in the walk, a sunbeam had fallen on the village, but my vantage point was all wrong for the picture I wanted. Unfortunately, well before I got to the point where I wanted to take the picture, the sunbeam had vanished.

About 20 minutes to half-an-hour after she passed out of sight over this ridge, the police officer came driving back.

James Henry came along, headed to the gravel pit to pick up another load, and stopped briefly to say "hi." James whales with the Nukapigak crew and was with them when I followed in 2008, a month before I took a bad fall in Barrow, shattered my shoulder which had to be replaced with titanium and so put myself out of action for the better part of a year.

Here's James a bit later, returning to Point Lay with a full load of gravel. Whaling captain Julius Rexford came along in his work pickup truck shortly after. I was nearly back to the village by then, so I jumped and went riding around with him. We got busy talking and I forgot to take any pictures. You will see Julius in the pictures from the unveiling.

Julius dropped me off by the biggest construction project currently under way in Point Lay - the reason Cully Camp is full. A new power plant is being built to replace the one that was destroyed by fire in October of last year.

Before the unveiling, I stopped to see whaling captain Thomas Nukapigak, whose crew I had followed in 2008 - the first year Point Lay had whaled again in seven decades. By the 1950's, the forces of modern life reduced the population of the village to two people, Warren and Dorcas Neakok. After passage of the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act in 1971 and the formation of the North Slope Borough in 1972, the people of Point Lay came back and reclaimed their village.

In 2008, they finally got a small bowhead quota, but caught no bowheads that year. The Rexford crew landed a whale the following year. I missed it, but returned for their Nalukataq. Thomas and his crew of mostly youth and very young men, landed their first whale this past spring. I should note that when one Point Lay crew harpoons a whale, the other is right there, side by side with them, doing its part to help land and take care of the whale.

For his part in bringing whaling back to his village and for teaching so many youth and young people - many of whom had never been on the spring ice before - how to whale, Thomas has been nominated for the Alaska Federation of Natives Culture Bearer award, the winner of which will be announced at next months AFN Convention.

Thomas holds his six-month old granddaughter, Adrian, whose mother, his 21 year-old daughter Carla, stands at his side.

Comments

[Mrs Gunka]

That was so interesting. I thought about you in NY City and what a contrast from this small far off village. I see why it draws you in. So far from no where. Peace, quiet. Beautiful people around you. I hope this is making you stronger every day. It is a very healing place.

[twain12]

i see what draws to too, strange not to see any snow

[Little Sister]

I can't even describe how beautiful these photos are.