Member Contributions
Seasons Change
I have lived near the ocean all my life without realizing that in the terrible storms sailors call Nor'easters the wind actually blows from the north east. This is a fact I learned this fall at the Baffin Island Golf & Country Club.
As the days grow shorter in the Pond Inlet area, winter seems to hesitate, allowing a last few weeks of great fly-free golf. Twilight is particularly breathtaking as the whole south western sky turns shades of orange, crimson and green. Corrugated lines of black and purple clouds add horizontal texture while the odd wispy vapor trail provides some vertical highlights. Thrilled and contented after completing one last round on this demanding course, I headed for the lodge thinking about Jimmy Longshot's parting words to me. "Golfing in Baffin Island requires a profound sense of humor." One single malt and off to my room for another peaceful night.
At midnight I awoke. The lodge was shaking so concertedly that my bed was actually vibrating, creating the sensation of moving about the room. In my conversation with the front desk, I learned that a tropical weather system had come up the east coast past Newfoundland and run into a huge artic air mass. The resulting nor'easter was dragging everything it could find in Greenland, plenty of snow, leaves and the odd confused bird, and firing it at Baffin Island. A quick look around before breakfast revealed a world totally changed from the one I had marvelled at before bed. The windows on the north east and south west sides of the lodge were snow covered. Through the windows facing south toward the ocean I could hear the frenzied howl of the building-pulsating nor'easter as it drove the falling snow like dust. Tornado like swirls were thrown up 100 feet or more above the frozen courtyard and then grabbed again by the turbulent river of air. Jimmy Longshot's shop, a mere eight iron lob from the lodge, was obliterated from view.
Despite the fact that over two feet of snow had already come down since midnight, less than an inch covered the open areas around the lodge. A giant 'V' of bare ground originated at the windward end of the lodge and increased gradually in width until it ended abruptly a hundred yards down wind. The rest of the snow was in drifts that were forming around clumps of tundra grass and the stone hedges.
The sea had been egged on for over eight hours now, and down in the inlet it was reaching frightening heights where it thundered in from Baffin Bay. As the tide came near to full, the now mammoth waves flung themselves against the black rock cliffs sending salt spray exploding high into the air where driven by the unrelenting squall it smashed upon the rocks - and froze.
Winter had arrived on Baffin Island.
Contributed by Charlie Roberts a BIG&CC member from Norfolk, Va.
By the Grey Gulf-Water
Far to the Northward there lies a land,
A wonderful land that the winds blow over,
And none may fathom or understand
The charm it holds for the restless rover;
Banjo Paterson