CALL OF THE WILD ECHOES THROUGHOUT GREENLAND & LABRADOR
Small-ship expeditions employ local guides to help travellers connect, understand cultures
The goal of throat singing is to make one another laugh, and a chorus of shy giggles erupts from the two high-school girls holding each other's forearms as their breathy, raspy exhales pulse through a pair of microphones. Today would normally be an uneventful Tuesday morning in the remote community of Nain; instead, the school gym is full of curious onlookers visiting the Labrador coast with Adventure Canada, applauding each round of this Inuit pastime that dates back generations.
Character building, strength and endurance are on display as students demonstrate a series of traditional games, complete with seal-like manoeuvring and impressive high kicks as the crowd roars its approval.
“To bring people there, for me, it's almost a little bit of showing it off,” expedition leader Jason Edmunds tells me the next day, as we chat about his hometown visit from the sun-soaked top floor on board the Ocean Endeavour. The hardy ship is chartered by Adventure Canada, an Ontario-based, family-run company offering small-ship expedition cruises primarily in the Arctic. On this 15-day itinerary called Greenland & Wild Labrador: A Torngat Mountains Adventure, we're sailing from the glaciers and fiords of Greenland, across the Davis Strait and down the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador.
Edmunds is a proud Inuk who grew up in Nain and still has family in the community. As a teen, he'd work on his father's charter boat during the summer, bringing `southerners' to what is now Torngat Mountains National Park, a rugged region home to towering peaks, tranquil waterways and polar bears that's only accessible by boat or plane.
He recalls the guests seeming genuinely interested in Inuit culture and daily life, and those early conversations inspired his career in tourism.
“It's all about connecting and understanding of cultures,” Edmunds says. “I want people to have had a personal connection and be moved by something along the way, to the point where they become an advocate for the place.”
That's the entire ethos behind Adventure Canada's journeys, which navigate to isolated communities in places like Nunavut and the Northwest Passage. On a typical day, several hours are spent exploring on land, then there are a series of educational talks and seminars back on board. The talented roster of expedition guides have deep ties to the communities, along with impressive resumés.
“Our on-board programming is so important to us. It's not just taking people to incredible places, it's how do you create that passion and connection?” Edmunds explains. “It's through an education program with that `oomph' behind it of having these experts in their fields.”
Those experts include cultural teachers from Nunatsiavut, which is Labrador's self-governed Inuit region, a geologist from the Geological Survey of Canada to educate guests about the two-billion-year-old basaltic dikes we scamper over during shore excursions, seafaring Labradorians who are always ready with a song or story, and even Greenland's first female prime minister Aleqa Hammond.
“Usually we start to build our programs based on relationships. It's not like `Oh, this would be a cool place to visit,' it's that the people here are going to help create a really cool program.
“I think it's absolutely vital when you're talking about regenerative programming that those programs are built with regions that aren't visited,” Edmunds continues. “Right now there's this idea that people want to go places, versus a holistic approach to `we want to bring people here' and people live there. We want people to see it.”
In Eclipse Sound, our plans for a waterfall walk are foiled when one of the bear monitors spots a roaming polar bear. Lucky for us, she parks herself on the cliff 's edge and watches curiously, allowing us a close-up look at the magnificent creature from the safety of the boats.
In Greenland, we gasp as the skies overhead dance with the vibrant greens, pinks and purples of the Northern Lights two nights in a row. We're treated to the sight of humpback whales and dolphins frolicking in the waves while sailing near Battle Harbour, and on another sunny afternoon, platters of raw meat and fish like tuktu (Caribou), Arctic char and maktaaq (whale skin) are laid out for us to sample the traditional Inuit diet. Over in the Nachvak Fjord and Ramah in the Torngats, we watch in awe as Lena Onalik, an archeologist from Nain who works for the Nunatsiavut government, points out and meticulously documents the sod house depressions, cairns and gravesites we come across. A small one overlooking the sea possibly holds one of her ancestors.
“I love being able to share, and it's not just through storytelling and interpretation, but also information,” Onalik says. “That's why I like to give gifts, because it embodies what Inuit are like. We share, we're very open and giving of our time, of material things. We're just very much like that as people.”
Onalik first joined the Adventure Canada team in 2011, bringing both traditional and academic knowledge. Along with educating guests, she also updates site record forms at each stop, which are then shared with the province and Parks Canada.
“One thing that we're starting to notice is impacts from climate change. Storm surges are coming higher up on the beaches which are causing coastal erosion, and a lot of sites are right on the water which could be potentially washing away the sites,” she explains. “At Nachvak for example, I was so surprised by how close those graves were to the water.”
She hopes guests can take something away from the experience, and that she can help provide more understanding about Inuit culture.
“They respect us, and are advocates for our people in a way that doesn't discriminate against us and can be helpers for us as well.”
That type of transformative travel is exactly what Adventure Canada works to foster, which goes well beyond the typical checklist of scenic stops favoured by other cruise lines. The scene was set from day one of our adventure, with Edmunds greeting passengers by saying that a way of reclamation was to have their team there, welcoming us to this territory and seeing the places beyond their natural beauty.
“What I love about this itinerary is almost everywhere we go, someone has a deep connection to the place,” he says.