Going home

Note: I tried to post this last night before I went to bed but the signal was too weak:

If all goes as currently planned, I will leave here in the morning and be back in Wasilla by Thursday evening. There is another segment to the whaling story coming up and I have been feeling the temptation to rebook my flight for a later day. However, there is a very important birthday about to be celebrated in Anchorage, I need to be there and I did photograph the segment in 2010, when the entire hunt happened in just three days and was completely over when I arrived on Cross Island September 3. So in that year, I missed the actual hunt but photographed the subsequent activities up to storing the meat and maktak in the ice cellar.

Plus, the fact is that as result of my little mishap Friday I have not been able to get a good night's sleep since. It hurts too much to lie in any position except flat on my back and even that hurts, just not as bad. Wrong movements, whether made asleep or awake, bring a sudden sharp pain, so I think I will go ahead and go home, go to that birthday party and try and take it easy for a week or so.

But it has been wonderful. Cross Island is no place for sunbathers and beach bunnies, but I love the island, the waters that surround it and the Iñupiat whalers who took me there and shared it with me. Thank you, EMN and all the whaling crews of the great village of Nuiqsut - right smack in the middle of oil country, but with a Native Iñupiat heart that beats loud and strong