
{"id":1088,"date":"2007-10-11T07:33:18","date_gmt":"2007-10-11T15:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2007\/10\/11\/recently-visitors-of-the-wild\/"},"modified":"2007-10-11T07:34:44","modified_gmt":"2007-10-11T15:34:44","slug":"recently-visitors-of-the-wild","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2007\/10\/11\/recently-visitors-of-the-wild\/","title":{"rendered":"Recently: Visitors of the wild"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/10\/recentlyresized.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/10\/recentlyresized.jpg\" height=\"195\" width=\"260\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>\u00c2\u00a0By Valarie Schwartz<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>A call from Mel Rashkis in June was my first knowledge of Arthur Clark. The men had become acquainted at the Cedars of Chapel Hill, where each resides. Mel thought I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d want to know about his peer, soon to leave on another trip to the Arctic.<\/p>\n<p>Clark, 85, has trekked through the Northwest Passage so many times he couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t count how many when we met upon his latest return in July. But he knows this about his 2007 trip: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We saw essentially no ice. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen a lot of ice at the same time of year,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d previously. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen a difference in the glaciers,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>He doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t go to study the melting ice caps; he goes for the adventure and to observe the flora and (especially) fauna. Photos of polar bears, grizzlies, caribou, reindeer, whale, walrus and more provide proof of his sightings, along with stories that describe his adventures.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->His was a Sierra Club party of 12, traveling for over a week aboard a small-expedition vessel known as an \u00e2\u20ac\u0153icebreaker.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<br \/>\nOne day headed toward the Bering Strait, they passed a herd of about 20,000 caribou, he said, pulling up photos on his computer. Watching the herd they noticed a grizzly sow with her cubs headed toward a lame caribou. It was an old lame doe that couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t keep up with the herd \u00e2\u20ac\u201d \u00e2\u20ac\u0153grizzly bait,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>His photos showed polar bears waking up, sprawling, stretching, yawning, fighting, dancing, eating kelp (which is only in a bear\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s diet when meat cannot be found), followed by what a bear is often referred to as doing in the woods after the kelp didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t agree with him, and cavorting himself into a snow hole, all shot with a long lens from about 20 yards away.<br \/>\nHis most frightening adventure took place some years ago when his party was exploring in a Zodiac (an inflatable boat) and got between a herd of walrus and the beach.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I was in the greatest danger of my life,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Clark said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I thought they were going to take us out,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d but little more than a tusk-length away, with Clark shooting photos madly, the boat passed out of harm\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s way.<\/p>\n<p>Life is rough, rugged and raw in the Arctic, a place where nobody goes out alone and each of any party carries a loaded firearm \u00e2\u20ac\u201d to be shot only if threatened. After all, humans are minorities in this wild land where many natives are carnivores struggling to survive.<\/p>\n<p>These examples are but the tip of the iceberg (sorry) of what this retired U.S. Air Force general who led an exciting life involved with U.S. intelligence during the Soviet age can share.<\/p>\n<p>Of all the things Clark enlightened me about during two visits, the thing that stuck most was his secret to success.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The secret of success is making a habit of things that failures don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like to do,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said simply.<\/p>\n<p>For instance, he gets up each morning at 4:42.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I used to sleep \u00e2\u20ac\u02dctil 5.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Daily, he rises, walks up the hill to the UNC Wellness Center at Meadowmont and is standing at the door as it is unlocked at 5, for his morning workout. Though legally blind, he walks each weekday to an office he rents about a mile up the road.<\/p>\n<p>He continues to travel; he and his wife spent much of September in France. He presents a slideshow to interested groups about his travels to the Arctic, where he plans to return next year.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Why would I stop? I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m trying to deteriorate in an orderly way,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he quipped.<\/p>\n<p>Any group interested in his fascinating presentation may contact Arthur Clark at ArtWClark@aol.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00c2\u00a0By Valarie Schwartz A call from Mel Rashkis in June was my first knowledge of Arthur Clark. The men had become acquainted at the Cedars of Chapel Hill, where each resides. Mel thought I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d want to know about his peer, soon to leave on another trip to the Arctic. Clark, 85, has trekked through the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1088\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}