tinkered with the Johnson, using the only two tools I had, a screwdriver and a pair of pliers. Steering to keep the bow into the waves was difficult without enough power and we both had to hold on to the gunwales to keep our balance in the sloppy weather. Soon waves were five feet high coming from the stern on our starboard quarter. As we came close to Sanak we could see the breakers dashing against the rocky cliffs next to the harbor entrance. We had to run along these cliffs in order to get into the mouth of the harbor. The unreliable motor gave us some anxious moments when it coughed. If it should stop at this time we’d be carried onto those jagged rocks and be churned up into kindling in a minute.
As we neared our island home, I assumed the sputtering motor might be caused by lack of fuel. So I took the can and tried to pour gas into the tank while the boat was rolling. I didn’t try to stop the motor to fill it because I needed to keep the boat going forward as we were too close to the rocks. I managed to splash some gas in the general direction of the opened lid of the tank, but some gas washed over the spark plugs grounding them out. That was bad!! I furiously wrapped the starting chord around the top of
We were now in sight of our cozy calm harbor, but still outside of that safe haven. Our biggest challenge was yet to come. The sea was coming from the starboard side and our harbor lay on our port side. Sometime we must turn away from the swells to enter the harbor and at that precise moment we would be broadside to the waves and at risk of having one come over our starboard gunwale. I made the move and when we turned were in a delicate balance on top of a giant comber. Suddenly we were hit with a big foamy cresting wave, just at the wrong time.
It heeled us over. A dory is a very seaworthy boat normally, but when it has a foot of water in the bilge, it gets “cranky.” We had been too busy to bail and there was all that electrical wiring in the bilge, so we couldn’t get at the water anyway. All that bilge water rushed to the downhill side when that big comber hit us. We took water over the gunwale and almost tipped over. We both leaned to the high side and righted our filled-up craft. In next few minutes we drove our half sunk dory safely through the Pillars of Hercules only to run out of gas before we hit shore in front of school. We were one wet but happy crew.
Many a story ends with a "just-in-time climax" of the hero and heroine ducking out of danger just as the violent villain misses them. Not so this one. Ten minutes after bailing the boat, we looked out to see the storm had spent its fury. The very sea that had just threatened us with disaster had quickly changed back to be again flat calm and peaceful.
During the war many soldiers went stir crazy in these islands from the fog, the gloom, the isolation and the continuous wind flapping their tents. We found a way to keep our minds in balance by merely taking walks on the beach and climbing the mountains.
Marie and I decided to climb our mountain one week end. We knew from the summit we could see all over the tiny island, the surf pounding on its rocky shore, the many streams chucked full of spawning salmon as well as the three hundred sixty five lakes, one for every day of the year. On a rare clear day a person could even make out the range of smoking volcanoes way over on the mainland, stretching westward all along the Aleutian chain.
All the villagers thought we had missed too many boats when one morning we started out with our sleeping bags, tent and two days food. We were not only going to merely climb to the summit, but try to camp over night on top of Sanak Mountain. We had to put our tent stakes into solid ice and were almost blown off the summit in the middle of the night but we succeeded in our goal. The next morning we had an experience so emotional it still affects me to this day.
We had finished our meager mountaineer’s breakfast, packed up camp and were hiking along the highest ridge with fog on both sides of us. All of a sudden, the sun came out on our right side like a spotlight. That was nice, but when we looked to our left, we saw a circle rainbow. In the middle was an image of some kind. As we moved, it moved. We waved and it waved back, but on the opposite side. Marie was on a different side of me in the image. It was a mirror of us in the sky below the crest of the mountain. That image was on a silver screen made of fog. The rainbow was in a complete circle around the two of us. It was incredible! I had never heard of such a thing happening to anyone. This was the first year of our marriage and we had had some pretty traumatic events happen to us so far. Undoubtedly, there’d be more ahead. and this clearly was a “mountain top" experience for us.
On our return to the village, Ol’ Chris Halverson told us the early Aleut culture that inhabited Sanak, were directed by the village Shaman who might have said that experiences such as this were “sacred messages” directed solely to the person receiving them. This Shaman era had been during the ancient island times, long before Vitus Bering and the Russians came. After this talk with Chris, who had become my mentor of the island culture, I became very interested in Aleut history and later did some research through the Fitzhugh-Crowell book, “Crossroads of Continents, Cultures of Siberia and Alaska.” Through that source, I learned of the dominating influence each Shaman held over the life of the early Aleuts. Since our rainbow experience happened on his turf, it could mean that this ancient Shaman had given a sort of guardian spirit to Marie and I, as a favored couple of his island. The circle rainbow might have been the manifestation of that promise. Even though this Shaman ruled in the distant past, his influence may have continued on because this, clearly, had been his island.
Whether that was the true message is not certain, yet because I chose to (sort of) believe it, the fable became a reality. Obviously, we knew there would be a purely scientific explanation of the phenomenon, that we discovered much later. After extensive research, we found that an image of themselves had appeared inside a circle rainbow to some climbers while hiking near the summit of a steaming volcano in Hawaii.
Chris also told us of the existence of that ancient Shaman’s cave located along the western shore of the island. Although he said it was considered a sacred place known only to a few ol’ timers who cherished the old traditions. They warned their children to keep away from it as they feared it harbored an aura of bad luck. This was never discussed among outsiders, especially the former teachers, though Chris did disclose, it to me. I immediately became curious and planned to search it out. Marie was of the opposite view, saying, “Haven’t we got enough trouble without you defying the local taboo of an ancient spirit?” So without telling anyone, including my wife, I set out one Sunday to search for this mystic place. I wanted to prove my total infallibility to any no trespassing label. As the big white macho explorer, I expected to be unscathed from any curse given to “non-believers ” by the locals.
After checking every inch of the shoreline, I succeeded in finding the cave and immediately felt a strange sense of reverence, similar to the time I visited the Civil War battlefield of Gettysburg. Merely by knowing what historically had happened, at the spot in the past, made me feel I was standing on hallowed ground. It was a cave carved, somehow, out of solid rock with the opening facing the ocean. A rock bench inside must have been his bed or maybe the alter for his worship activities. It might have had a seal skin draped over the entrance to make a door. Since it had been centuries since its use, part of the rock cliff could have cracked and slid off so I might have been seeing merely part of his den. The blackened ceiling gave evidence of a cooking or ceremonial fire, but I couldn't see how the smoke could have flowed out except through the door. The whole cave wasn't anymore than twelve feet long and four feet wide. I wasn’t sure if he had used that cave for his dwelling place or, more likely, for the sacrifice of