In
1991 Audrey Sutherland reported that she had run across Kayak Bill on her way north
to Alaska. He told her that he had
wintered at Goose the previous Winter. He
told an acquaintance that he had built it to get away from “tourists”. It was both a natural and unfortunate choice. Natural in that Goose is very remote and
requires a committed crossing that limited traffic and unfortunate in that he initially
built it on a reserve near the north end of Duck Island. The reserve marked the site that had once
been a seasonal harvesting village and the Heiltsuk took exception to it. After finding it destroyed twice he moved
from Duck Island to Gosling Island and it was there that he would spend the
last days of his life.
The
access to the Goose Group filtered out most casual visitors by requiring a
significant crossing of Queens Sound or a northern approach with a crossing of
Golby Channel. A typical crossing of
Queens Sound is between 7 – 8 NM. Crossing
Golby from the McMullin Group sounds pedestrian at 2 NM but the water through
Golby can move surprising fast during medium to large exchanges and the
addition of a typical wind component can make for a challenging transit that
some may look at and choose to forego. Most
of the traffic into Goose Anchorage consists of pleasure boaters passing
through or locals from Bella Bella / Shearwater who motor out to camp and fish. During the ‘90’s there just weren’t that many
kayakers out there.
Bill had his camp at Swordfish Bay which required a 7.5 NM
crossing and a camp somewhere on Horsfall Island that he described as a “Good complete camp (wet spot in rainy
season)”. It doesn’t show up on the
materials that I have gathered so I don’t know how distant it was from Goose
but it would have reduced the exposure to ~5 NM. When he was on the move he favored his own
camps but wasn’t tied to them and would use common camps when they made
sense.
On October 12, 2003 after four months away Bill Davidson paddled
in from Cockle Bay to Denny Island and immediately started preparing for his
final trip. He painted ~1/2 of the 29
days before departure and in the end had a $500 grubstake. He spent about half of it on debts, tobacco,
supplies and $50 for a meat grinder. He
had $260 left over and on his final evening “in town” he dined with his friends
Brian and Andrea Clerx.
Bill
had his camp at Swordfish Bay which required a 7.5 NM crossing and a camp
somewhere on Horsfall Island that he described as a “Good complete camp (wet
spot in rainy season)”. It doesn’t
show up on the materials that I have gathered so I don’t know how distant it
was from Goose but it would have reduced the exposure to ~5 NM. When he was on the move he favored his own
camps but wasn’t tied to them and would use common camps when they made sense.
Over the next two weeks he encountered two separate groups
of hunters and saw a number of deer near camp.
He built a trail to the SE beach, hunted deer and engaged in standard
camp improvements. The weather was
typical and borderline nasty for the next four weeks with strong winds,
showers, freezing rain and hail.
On December 6th he reported overcast skies with
moderate to strong east to southeast winds and light rain. Also of note were “Lower back & stomach
pains”.
Bill Davidson kept track of everything that affected him on
any particular day. He religiously
recorded the wind, rain and changes of both.
He recorded any meaningful activity that he undertook, every out of the
ordinary encounter, if he read, if he painted, how much money he received and
what he spent it on, the number of candles he had left and what color they
were, what the level of the water was in his wells, how many mice he saw
raiding his camp, how many he eradicated, how many and what type of bugs were
bothering him, what he ate, if he burnt garbage, what animals he saw and in
many cases what time the moon rose or set.
On Sunday December 7th Bill made his last entry
when he journaled that the conditions were “overcast
with light rain showers and light & variable winds. Fog & drizzle with light north to
northwest winds by noon.” After that
there was nothing more. There was
nothing about winds in the evening, whether the moon was visible, what he did
or what he ate. Lighthouse weather reported
6.1 C with winds N-NW @ 11kt gusting to 24kt.
That afternoon, evening or perhaps the next morning the things that had
mattered to Bill no longer did and he opted out.
I have visited the Gosling Camp on two occasions, once in
2007 and again in 2012.
Gosling Beach at Low Tide
Both times I was struck by how remote the Goose Group seemed
and yet what a toll traffic had taken on the group. There were regrettable signs of heavy and careless
usage everywhere. Four years after his
death the windscreen was standing and was clearly visible from our Snipe Island
beach.
Windscreen 2007
His shelter stood with both tarps in place along with most
major elements, including the firestand, in a mossy, shaded Hobbit Forest just
above the beach.
Shelter 2007
Bits and pieces of his life were scattered about by people
who had indiscriminately picked through Bill’s estate and discarded what they
had no use for. The order that was
displayed on Dallas was absent on Goose.
Shelter 2007
In 2012 I returned for a couple of days with the intent of camping
nearby in the Hobbit Forest.
Shelter 2012
I found that the windscreen was gone. It had been removed and used for firewood in the
many large bon fires that had scarred the forest with charred wood and fire
rings. The camp was trashed to the point
that if you didn’t know what you were looking at you would never guess that it had
once been someone’s home. Empty beer
cans, whisky bottles, jackets, socks and general garbage littered the woods.
Shelter 2012
I combed the area looking for some personal item that might
have been his and finally found a whisk hanging from a string that had most
likely been used to whip up chapatis using flour, sea water and seal oil.
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