http://www.threesheetsnw.com/blog/2009/11/crew-arrives-in-seattle-after-journey-through-northwest-passage/
Crew arrives in Seattle after journey through Northwest Passage
Photos Copyright Hole in the Wall Productions
Filmmaker Sprague Theobald and his crew spent four months traveling through the fabled Northwest Passage.
When Sprague Theobald arrived in Seattle yesterday afternoon by boat, it marked the end of a journey many mariners have dreamed about but few have accomplished.
Theobald, 58, spent the past four months traveling across the fabled Northwest Passage, a treacherous and ice-choked route between Canada and Greenland. Since Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen became the first to conquer the Northwest Passage in 1906, only about 100 boats have completed the journey and numerous others have been lost while attempting it.
At one point in his journey, Theobald, with three family members aboard, feared his boat—and perhaps his crew—could meet the same fate.
An Emmy Award-winning filmmaker from Newport, Rhode Island, Theobald undertook the 8,500-mile journey in mid-June with a specific mission: to make a documentary film chronicling the cultural and environmental impact of climate change on the Arctic.
Climate change is causing temperatures to rise more rapidly in the Arctic than anywhere else in the world, forcing the region’s people and wildlife to adjust in order to survive. Receding ice is making it possible for more boats to navigate the passage, generating intense interest in the region’s natural resources and potential as a shipping route—and equally intense concerns about preserving the area’s ecosystem and culture.
Professional diver Greg Deascentis joined the crew to take underwater photos of shipwrecks and icebergs.
Via an earlier email interview while enroute to Seattle, Theobald said he decided to make his documentary partly out of frustration over the media’s “broad sweeps” of how climate change is impacting the Arctic. The media, he said, hasn’t adequately shown the public what the passage looks like or sufficiently chronicled its history, fragility and isolation.
An accomplished seaman, Theobald decided to embark on his own Arctic expedition, assembling a crew of five to accompany him. But one of the project’s biggest challenges was thrown Theobald’s way before the boat even left the dock in Newport. The deepening recession prompted the project’s two main funders to pull their support two months before the start of the trip.
Theobald was devastated. By that time, he’d hired two crew members for a full year of work and committed to paying their salaries. He ended up spending the proceeds from a house sale that he’d planned to use to buy another house, plus a small stock fund—about $300,000 in total—to finance the project.
The crew got underway June 17 on Theobald’s Nordhavn 57, Bagan, traveling to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland before crossing Baffin Bay into Greenland. Theobald was stunned by what he saw.
“The desolation was indescribable,” he said. “I’m a person who enjoys being alone, but this was staggering. It’s truly the essence of ‘the last people on earth.’”
The crew continued on to Lancaster Sound, Nunavut, and into Peel Sound, located between eastern Prince of Wales Island and northwestern Somerset Island. There, the expedition narrowly averted disaster. The boat was held captive by ice for two very long days. Sprague worried about his son and two stepchildren, who were part of the crew. They had camping gear onboard and might have trekked to safety across the ice, but Theobald feared he might lose his boat.
“It was horrific,” he said. “We had no options and were truly on our own.”
He was eventually able to free the boat and continued on into the Beaufort, Chukchi and Bering seas, then down through the Aleutian Islands and finally onto Alaska and the Inside Passage.
Rapidly receding ice is threatening Arctic wildlife, including polar bears.
Along the route, Theobald interviewed residents about what’s at stake as the Northwest Passage opens up. He wants his documentary to provide viewers with a glimpse into the small communities that are thriving in the harsh Arctic, whose residents live on resource-rich lands vulnerable to exploitation.
“The ground on which they live is far richer in natural resources than just the gas the oil the media talks about,” said Theobald, who won an Emmy for his work on “The 25th Defense,” a documentary about the America’s Cup.
“Diamonds, nickel, copper lay just under the surface, and the companies are lining up to dig for them,” he said. “If we don’t watch what we do up there and let the money win, we’ll lose not only one of the most pristine areas in the world, but also one that is amazingly steeped in marine history, successful and tragic.”
Indeed, the Northwest Passage has been the site of numerous failed expeditions. Captain James Cook was dispatched in 1776 by the British Admiralty to find the storied passage, but was unsuccessful, although he did successfully explore much of the Pacific Northwest. In 1845, Royal Navy officer and seasoned explorer Sir John Franklin set off from England on a two-ship expedition bound for the Northwest Passage. Franklin and 128 men—the entire expedition—were lost.
For Theobald, the adventure of transiting the Northwest Passage was undeniably part of the appeal. He’s long been fascinated by tales of historic explorers who have tried to find the Northwest Passage. Six boats made it through the passage last year, a record high number.
The sense of desolation in the Arctic, Theobald said, is "indescribable."
And two other expeditions with Northwest connections have transited the passage this year. The Around the Americas expedition, which left from Seattle in May in the 64-foot steel sailboat Ocean Watch, traveled through the Northwest Passage and will sail down the east coast and around Cape Horn before heading back to Seattle. The project aims to raise awareness about the state of ocean health.
Silent Sound, a 40-foot sailboat, left Victoria, British Columbia in June and traveled through the Northwest Passage before arriving in Halifax on Oct. 10. The crew plans to tell the story of climate change in the Arctic through words, photos and video.
A boater since childhood, Theobald spent three years sailing on Intrepid, a trial horse for France’s Americas Cup challenger, France III, from 1978 to 1980 . He raced in sailing regattas on the east coast and as far as Bermuda before undergoing two back surgeries and giving up sailing.
Theobald got into trawlers, previously living in Seattle for a year on a Nordhavn 46. When he departs from Seattle after this weekend and reaches Dana Point, California, he’ll have completed another rare feat—a circumnavigation of North American on his current boat.
Having successfully navigated through the Northwest Passage, Theobald now faces another monumental task—editing more than 250 hours of footage into a documentary that he’ll try to sell. He hopes to have his film finished by next summer.
Seeing the Northwest Passage up close, he said, only strengthened his conviction in the importance of what he’s doing.
“I’m broke,” he said, “but enriched beyond words.”
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