Kabloona In Yellow Kayak
by Victoria Jason
Category: Sports & Recreation

During the summer of 1991 Victoria Jason embarked on a journey together with Don Starkell (author of the bestselling Paddle to the Amazon) and Fred Reffler to kayak the Northwest Passage, starting at Churchill, Manitoba and aiming to reach Tuktoyaktuk on the Beaufort Sea. When she set out in 1991, Victoria, already a grandmother of two, had only been kayaking for a year and was still recovering from the second of two strokes. Her 7,500 kilometre journey lasted four years. In the first year, Fred Reffler dropped out due to an injury, and Victoria suffered serious internal bleeding from ulcers. The second year Victoria and Don reached Gjoa Haven together, hauling their kayaks by sled, but Victoria was forced to drop out there, suffering from edema (muscle breakdown) caused by excessive fatigue. Don Starkell continued alone, reaching the Tuktoyaktuk Peninsula, where he was rescued by authorities suffering from severe frostbite which resulted in the loss of all his fingers and parts of four toes. Their first two summers together were also a time of tension and conflict between Victoria and Don. Not content with failure, Victoria returned North the following two years and completed her triumphant journey alone from west to east, paddling from Fort Providence on the Mackenzie River to Paulatuk in 1993, and from Paulatuk to Gjoa Haven in 1994. Among the Inuit people she became known as the Kabloona (the Inuktituk word for stranger) in the Yellow Kayak.