”Tales From The Underbrush” documents, with occasional hyperbole, the experiences of the artist over a lifetime of interaction with what used to be called nature, now reinvented as the environment for reasons apparently best known by just about everyone in the world excepting the artist-writer. These wilderness interactions have come mainly while working as a geologist, briefly as a forester, but sometimes as just a guy whose principal happiness in life has been derived from being outdoors. Not that life in the wilderness, be it at work or at play has been without pain, discomfort, deprivation and even danger. Fortunately, the passage of time more often then not artfully blots out or at least dims the recollections that wound, substituting instead a recall that if perhaps not substantiating the aging athlete’s jest of “the older I get, the better I was”, at least allows tales to unfold that warm the memory and give substance to the life that experienced them.
The artist proposes to post monthly herein a chapter from his book “Tales From The Underbrush” in the hope that his adventures may be shared and enjoyed by those who might stumble onto this blog. This month’s entry continues the tale.
FROM CORDON BLEU TO SACRE BLEU AND BACK
“It’s important to begin a search on a full stomach.”
Henry Bromel
(Northern Exposure, The Big Kiss, 1991)
As a junior geologist working in the bush for the first time, and knowing absolutely nothing about everything and everything about nothing, it would nevertheless have taken a considerable deficiency of brain-matter to not quickly learn who was the most important authority to flatter, facilitate and to cater to every, well, almost every whim and idiosyncrasy no matter how outrageous they might be. To understand this is to understand what it means to spend a minimum of five straight months without respite working in the bush. This means seven-day work weeks interrupted only occasionally by not just inclement weather, but very, very, very inclement weather; weather that might instantly and directly endanger both life and limb, although not necessarily in that order when you come to prioritize it. Not that anyone on the field party would probably care beyond the fact that it was too late to replace you and therefore this would create extra work for everyone you lousy, lazy miserable bastard, why did you have to have an accident, die, and dump your work on us? Added to that threat were the twelve hour or often longer days of constant rain, flies, traversing, back-packing, portaging and the general stink that everyone developed after a while, no matter how often you risked your procreative equipment with a frantic, bone-chilling dip in the lake or river. All that was left, aside from fantasies of both a traditional but also exceedingly dull variety, was sleep and food. The former was easy. You could soon learn to sleep draped over a branch like a fish fillet being smoked over a fire. The latter, unless on a two man fly camp, was singularly dependent on one man, “The Cook.” I say man, because we are talking about Neanderthal time when women were not ever part of a bush camp. While the party chief was the formal and nominal commander of the bush party, the general welfare of the group was principally dependent on the relationship it had with The Cook.
It was the early 1960’s and I found myself working as a drill engineer on an advanced exploration project northwest of the town of Amos in northwestern Quebec. Our camp was in turn located west of the Harricana River and was initially accessible by float plane onto the river, after which followed a long, bumpy ride west through the swamps in what was known as a muskeg tractor, muskeg being a particular Canadian term for swampy, boggy terrain that was more water than land. The muskeg tractor was a tracked, open tank-like vehicle that looked like a World War ll Bren gun carrier on which it was based. Plowing through the muskeg during heavy rains sometimes caused flooding to occur over the tractor treads and walled enclosure of the tractor, a height totaling some five feet. Such was the domination of water over land in this region which comprised the lower reaches of the James Bay lowlands.
The camp had been established to explore the potential for the subsurface extension of copper-zinc mineralization that had been discovered in a few near-miraculous surface outcrops in the muskeg, but principally through inference from geophysical surveys that had shown anomalously conductive sub-surface rock to occur in the region. Another company was developing a similar zone of mineralization in a nearby property, and indeed the whole of the northwest Quebec region was considered to be prime prospecting territory, being particularly noted for its gold mines at the time.
Having established that the property had the potential to become a commercial mining venture, the diamond drill camp was typical of its type; a fairly well established entity far from having any permanence but with a reasonable abundance of amenities. The profusion of tents had plywood floors raised off the ground on log bases together with plywood half walls over which the canvas upper halves of the tents were constructed. Enclosed plywood multi-hole toilet facilities were a distinct advancement over the simple tree branch rigged over a pit that a normal exploration camp might possess. The drill camp’s occupants lived two to a tent in reasonable comfort and the engineers’ office tent was well equipped with drafting tables, filing cabinets and other amenities not normally found in an exploration bush camp. A diesel generator enabled the camp to have lighting and certain other electrical facilities. Best and most important of all however were the cooking and dining facilities. Unlike the infamous Franklin stove (see “The Franklin Execution”), the camp cook had a proper electric stove with oven, supplemented by a couple of table-mounted, naptha gas powered two burner Coleman stoves suitable for boiling or frying functions. The generator also powered a fridge, truly a luxury in a bush camp in those days. A separate, spacious dining tent attached to the cook tent completed the facilities.
My principal job as drill engineer/geologist was to measure the subsurface paths of diamond drill holes in process, and “log” or examine and map the pieces of cylindrical rock that emerged from the piece of drill tubing designed to hold the section of rock drilled by the hollow diamond bit just ahead of it. After describing and measuring this rock core and any mineralization present, the results were plotted on maps and the continuity of the data from the various drill holes was extrapolated. From that information a picture of the subsurface geology and mineralization could gradually be developed. Unfortunately, when a hole is drilled into the ground over any appreciable length, say one or two thousand feet, it tends to wander around like some recalcitrant child as it encounters rocks of different types and structures. Not knowing where the drill hole is going precludes knowing the location of the rock core samples that are brought to the surface. Enter the acid test followed by the Pajari compass and inclinometer.
The principle behind the acid test tube was simple. Attach onto the front end of the drill rods a test tube half full of concentrated acid solution which is then lowered down the hole to near its prevailing, known inclined depth. When left for a couple of hours and the test tube then retrieved, the acid will have etched a line on the glass walls of the tube that reflects the angle of the tube in the hole, and hence the angle of the hole itself. Unfortunately, in addition to wandering up and down, drill rods wander directionally as well and the acid test did not provide for measuring the latter misconduct. The introduction of the Pajari instrument about the time I became involved in the mining business made a large step in redressing this problem. This gizmo combined a compass and inclinometer associated with a timer that tripped a spring mechanism. Lowered into the drill hole in the same fashion as the acid tube, when the Pajari reached the bottom of the hole and the timer tripped the spring, the compass and the inclinometer were locked in positions that reflected both the direction and inclination of the drill hole at that depth. By taking measurements in the hole every one hundred feet or so, the subsurface path of the drill hole could be plotted over its course. The fact that the magnetic properties of certain rocks could affect the accuracy of the directional measurement was but one of the many dubious joys of attempting to determine what exactly was going on in the earth below our modest point of reference on surface. But as usual, I digress.
To coin a tired phrase, “time is money” and as a consequence, diamond drilling in this camp was undertaken on a twenty-four hour basis, seven days a week. I recall there were two drills in operation, later perhaps three, each employing a driller and a helper. The shifts were long ones, being twelve hours each with drill crews lunching on the job on food prepared by the cook. As a consequence of this schedule, there were each day two breakfasts and two suppers to be prepared and served and two lunches to be made for the drill crews. This was in addition to luncheon cold cuts to be made available to the geologists and other non-drilling crew working more conventional schedules in the camp. That would be me, interrupted not infrequently by some development or other that required my presence at the drill sites in the middle of the night. Unbelievably, all these meal logistics were to be undertaken by a single cook. That cook in this instance was a man named Jean-Pierre as I recall.
Jean-Pierre was a quiet, courteous man who very rarely smiled, and during the year I knew him I never once saw him laugh. Portly and middle-aged, he had a smooth, olive skinned appearance that perhaps belied a Mediterranean origin, although as far as I knew he was French-Canadian. A graduate of a famous Swiss cooking school, he had been a leading chef at a well known, large Montreal hotel. Then one day the story goes, he came home to find his wife in bed with another man. He never recovered. A fantastic cook, he had also become a seriously self-destructive alcoholic.
With Jean-Pierre as cook however, gastronomic life in the drill camp was about as idyllic as one could possibly imagine, particularly when compared to the output that could be managed by even the best of cooks in the more primitive environment of exploration bush camps. The mouth-watering smells of freshly baked bread and pastries continuously wafted through the cook and dining tents, and roasts from the oven were a magnificent contrast to the fried food of a typical bush camp. Indeed, the nearly continuous supply of fresh meat, vegetables, eggs, and even fruit made the drill camp in relative terms seem like a centre for epicurean delights.
Only in dreams and fairy tales however, can such a seemingly perfect situation be maintained indefinitely or without hiccups. In this case a major hiccup would occur approximately every six weeks if we were lucky and every four weeks if we were not. During the era I am talking about it was, if not standard practice, then most often, that bush camps of whatever type were normally “dry”, that is to say, liquor in the camp was not permitted. On occasion a case of beer might be allowed into camp for immediate consumption during a one night party, but most often one just got used to being alcoholically dry for the duration of one’s stay in the bush at any one time. I use that adjective to describe that particular type of dryness because the weather and muskeg ensured that other types of dryness were mainly in one’s imagination and longings. A bush camp, even one having the relatively exotic facilities of a drill camp, is nonetheless inhabited by a quite unique society. Take a small group of men of disparate backgrounds living in close proximity to each other as strangers over lengthy periods of time in relatively primitive conditions; add to that long hours of hard physical work without break under the discomforts of bad weather, difficult terrain, and incessant biting flies; add further an environment featuring the deprivation of family, wives and girl friends, and normal social contact and activities, and you have a very fragile society with a recipe for inefficiency and possible mayhem. Becoming “bushed” is a term that describes the erratic behaviour of individuals that often develops from an extended time without respite from these somewhat unnatural conditions.
And so it was with Jean-Pierre, if only for the particular and immensely sorrowful reason that would forever destroy this gentle man. Every four to six weeks, the magnificent efficiency and quality output that so characterized his work as camp cook completely broke down. Not that his quiet manner deteriorated into distemper. If anything he became even more introspective, a part of the signs that were unmistakably there. Meal service became a little tardy and their quality uncharacteristically uneven. Lunches, so impeccably prepared by Jean-Pierre to custom orders were now left for the individual to prepare. Disruptions due to “illness” became more frequent. Allowed to continue, all the indications became obvious of a deteriorating situation that would ultimately have a material effect on the efficiency of work in the camp. Drillers labouring long shifts on unhappy bellies are a recipe for disaster.
Fortunately, I had been earlier primed by my boss of this development prior to taking on the position of managing the camp. As with every other facet of life, choices have to be made; yin and yang, risk and reward, however you wish to characterize alternatives. In this case we had a camp cook with abilities and temperament that were hugely superior to the norm. The alternatives were simple. Either we deal with his particular quirk or we hire a less capable cook who might provide a relatively more level and enduring stability but who would surely bring his own particular weaknesses with him while at the same time lowering the standard of cooking. Hiccups and quality versus the unknown and lower quality. Which to choose? Employing the old adage, “better the devil you know than the devil you don’t”, we chose the former. This meant that when the “hiccup” occurred, we sent Jean to town for a period that rarely lasted even a week. During this time he would withdraw from his bank account all his accrued pay since the last “hiccup” and go on an uninterrupted alcoholic “bender” until he had spent every last cent of his savings. Being that liquor laws in small towns were largely ignored, Jean- Pierre’s binging could largely be maintained on a twenty-four hour basis, so that normally by the end of four or five days at the very latest, his financial resources had been exhausted. Before leaving camp on his quest for oblivion, I would, with his complete agreement and understanding, pin a note on his shirt instructing whoever found him after the exhaustion of his resources to put him in a taxi, at our cost, and ship him to the float plane base outside town, and from where he would be loaded into a plane, met at the river landing, put in the muskeg tractor and thence returned to camp.
In the meantime however, the quality of dining in the drill camp during Jean-Pierre’s absence went from four stars to one star or less. Amazingly however, and in a unanimous display of common sense and unity of purpose that would put politicians to shame, everybody pitched in to bridge the gap during Jean-Pierre’s little “holiday.” People like me took their turn at cooking and nobody died as a result. The main challenge was to keep the drillers not only relatively happy, but alive and well to carry out their long, arduous shifts. With their understanding and tolerance, that was accomplished. Those unnamed of us with twisted mentalities took the opportunity to recall with a certain sense of perverted humour the standard of cuisine normally endured when on small, temporary exploration fly camps, where the junior geologist was assigned the responsibility of producing meals using a small portable naptha gas stove or even the time honoured wood campfire. Such a sojourn where nobody died of food poisoning or the junior geologist was not murdered was considered to be highly successful.
Ultimately, after what seemed like an eternity but was often only four or five days, a message would come over the camp radio that a certain two hundred thirty pound “package” had been dropped off at the air base and was ready for delivery to the river landing. After a hearty round of cheers, there were no lacking volunteers to undertake the uncomfortable, jolting ride to the river in the muskeg tractor to collect our “package.”
You have never known what two hundred and thirty pounds really weighs until you have, albeit with help, undertaken to extricate from a bush plane the dead-weight of a still unconscious man without bouncing him off the plane’s floats or dropping him into the river. Equally challenging was the subsequent effort to manhandle the gently snoring cook up over the high sides of the muskeg tractor and down into the belly of the beast. Enviably asleep over the course of the trip back to camp, as such Jean avoided the constant jolting and bouncing that sometimes threatened to launch the occupants of the tractor out into the swamp-ridden bush. While it was no doubt a contravention of the privacy laws of today, then as now bush life often dictated the making of its own laws based on survival, or at the very least the benefits to be derived for the group at the expense of the individual. So it was that my first move upon disembarking the cook from the muskeg tractor and putting him to bed on arrival back in camp, was to thoroughly search the contents of his suitcase brought back with him. Invariably I would find one or more bottles of booze that were, perhaps with some measure of discomfort, emptied into the bush. There was never any subsequent resentment by Jean-Pierre either to the search or its inevitable results. He probably did not even recall having purchased and stowed the liquor, but in any case he knowingly accepted without protest the reasons for the search and the realities of the result it produced. In any event, after a day or so of recuperation, epicurean magic was once again introduced to the drill camp and continued unabated until the next “hiccup.”
Copyright © 2009 Ian de W. Semple
