Day Two: Thursday, July 24th

 

Morning brought another warm and very smoky day with a sun nothing more than a red disc overhead. Visibility seemed to be only one to two miles.  Gregg made a fire about 7:00 a.m. and got coffee going.  We held off on any breakfast waiting for the second charter that arrived around 10:30 a.m.,  D’Arcy piloting this time, bringing Evann Goltz, Michelle Goltz, Ben Goltz and Grandpa Ray, Linda Goltz’ father.  We unloaded the plane then had a wonderful breakfast of sausages and pancakes. In the afternoon we did some fishing and hiking along the esker ridge that provided a park-like backdrop to the beach. 

 

Eskers are glacial river beds that form ridges across the landscape where, in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, when the ancient glaciers in the arctic retreated 10,000 years age, these washed gravel and sand beds become deposited mounds and ridges on the exposed bedrock and now fully visible due to sparse vegetation along the tree line.  An esker is defined as “a long narrow ridge, often sinuous, composed of stratified sediment and marking the former location of a glacial tunnel.”   (www.landforms.eu.cairngorms/esker.htm)

 

Since these ridges rising above the surrounding landscape are composed of gravel and loose sandy soil, animals use them for travel and for denning.  Being attractive habitat to wolves, fox, caribou, bear, and other animals, the Dene and Inuit see eskers as prime territory for hunting and trapping. 

 

This afternoon Greg Providence was exploring the ridges of our esker and miraculously spotted what appears to be a large stone-hewn spear head, clearly showing intentional chipping along the edges.  Its age could be a few hundred years old or even a few thousand.  It would be interesting to get the piece carbon dated.