Tip of the Iceberg

Adams, Mark. Tip of the Iceberg: My 3,000-Mile Around Wild Alaska, the Last Great American Frontier. New York: Dutton, 2018. Print.

First Sentences:

On March 25, 1899, a gentleman from New York City arrived unannounced at the Washington D.C. office of C. Hart Merriam. At the age of forty-three, Merriam had already been practicing science seriously for three decades, dating back to some unauthorized taxidermy performed on his sister's dead cat.

 

Description: 

In 1899, railroad magnate Edward H. Harriman commissioned an exploration trip to Alaska's inner seaway passage. He included experts in a variety of fields, from geology to glaciology to botany to cartography to literature. Harriman's purpose was to have these men explore, document, and discovery interesting phenomena from this 3,000-mile voyage up the inner coast of Alaska.

The scientists included John Muir, glaciologist and wilderness expert; George Bird Grinnell, the founder of the Audubon Society; Georg Steller, naturalist; William Dall, the "dean of Alaska explorers"; Edward Curtis, photographer; and John Burroughs, writer and chronicler of the expedition. 

Harriman's mission had two personal goals:

• Enable scientists in various fields to survey the wonders of Alaska, enlarge their collections of specimens, and share their findings...
• Return...with a trophy bear

Now, over 100 years later, travel writer Mark Adams decided to re-trace the route of those scientists to understand what they first saw and how the Alaska of today had changed (or remained the same).

His trip is beautifully, often humorously chronicled in Tip of the Iceberg: My 3,000-Mile Around Wild Alaska, the Last Great American Frontier. Jumping between primary resources from Harriman's exploration, Alaskan history, and his own journey, Adams deftly manages to immerse readers into the past and present worlds of Alaska and its people.

For his trip, Adams chose to utilize the Alaska Marine Highway System of transport boats "designed to move people and vehicles long distances to remote places for a reasonable price."

Alaska's ferries have as much in common with Greyhound buses as with anything offered by Norwegian Cruise Line, but..with a little patience, Dramamine, and maybe a few time-saving shortcuts, it appeared possible to ride the three thousand miles from Washington State to Dutch Harbor, in the Aleutians, in about two months, the same time the Harriman Expedition took.

Breathtaking descriptions and adventures follow, and we lucky readers are fortunate to be able to sit close to Adams as he observes, researches, and interacts with this fascinating, challenging environment. Glaciers, indigenous people, totems, kayaks, mountains, and plenty of quiet contemplation are all on Adams' daily agenda.

Along the way, Adams learns valuable wisdom, such as how to deal with bears which are everywhere: play dead with brown bears, but fight back against black bears. Unfortunately, the only way to tell these bears apart is by a hump on the brown bear's back, (just reach around to feel for it while the bear is mauling you to determine your best course of action). The best advice he heard: "Bring a gun and someone slower than you."

Also, he learned through talking with local people and by personal observation that glaciers, which had once advanced 1,000 feet a day, were now located 63 miles back from where they were 250 years ago.

He visits Cordova, the scene of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, and Whittier (population 200, many from American Samoa); "The Weirdest Town in Alaska" and inspiration for the television series, "Northern Exposure"; and an active volcano in the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes.

Too much else to share with you. If you are interested in Alaska, exploration, history, and people, this is the travel book for you.

[While kayaking in Glacier Bay] We were surrounded on all sides by the park's namesake rivers of ice flowing down from the mountains. Their frozen innards glowed a phosphorescent blue that eclipsed the cloudless sky above. A few times every hour, the giants discharged ice from their wrinkled faces -- crack, rumble, splash -- one of nature's most spellbinding performances.

Happy reading. 

 

Fred

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