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In the Wake of the Jomon: Stone Age Mariners and a Voyage Across the Pacific Review
By Bill Marsano. "In the Wake of the Jomon" starts poorly--too much prattle. In 1996 a couple of collegians frolicking in/near/around Kennewick, Washington discovered the skull of a fellow soon to be called Kennewick Man. He was a Jomon, one of a Stone Age tribe from 9,500 to 20,000 years ago that had settled in, of all places, Japan. How came he to Washington? Turk thinks it possible he came not by the Bering Land Bridge but by boat. The Land Bridge explanation for early immigrations is, it seems, a little too simple. Fair enough--we need this background. The irksome part is the relentless blue-skying about WHY. Were the Jomon fleeing hunger or enemies? Misfortune or mayhem? Or were they (drumroll, please!) fired by man's inborn spirit of adventure?
I can put up with a certain amount of this but not too much, which is what Turk has on offer. So much so that toward the end, when he actually produces something more interesting on the subject, I almost missed it, having long since become used to skimming.
But all right--that's the worst of it, and not really so terrible, just an irritant that made me want to yell "Shut up and paddle!" every so often. When Turk gets the show on the road he begins producing a very fine book. It follows the old Kon-Tiki routine, and a good one it is: tracing the presumed route to turn speculation into plausibility. It offers many possibilities and he makes the most of them.
Turk plans to sail from northeastern Japan to St. Lawrence Island, Alaska. His is no National Geographic expedition, where suffering means only having to load your own film. He has three tiny Wind Riders (plastic trimarans) donated by the manufacturer, some Gore-Tex, some Polartec. He's got his skillful accomplice Franz and a Russian translator, hired over the internet, who proves to speak almost no English and whose experience of water is confined to bathtubs. He cracks and splits after a week.
I don't want to spoil this adventure but must give a few details beyond the murderous shear waves and the killer surf and the whirlpool so wide Turk didn't recognize what it was until he was in it. So: Only a third of the way along, safety and sanity dictate quitting and returning next year. Round Two is much the best part. Now Turk sets out with his wife, Chris, some Prijon Kodiak kayaks and, best of all, a translator who speaks more than one language. This is Mischa, an unlikely but utterly wonderful hero. He joins the expedition knowing that survival at sea is unlikely (he too has no boating experience) but that death ashore is certain: His stressful and ulcerous office job will kill him, literally, unless he escapes to what he calls "the wild nature."
Putting his ego in a shoebox, Turk lets Mischa have the stage, for it is Mischa who earns it, who won't give up; when even Turk knows it's senseless to go on, Mischa simply won't be stopped. "Labor and defend," he cries, loosely translating an old Soviet slogan while launching into nightmare. "We must paddle to Alaska by our own hands," he reminds whenever Turk feels daunted. Turk's generosity here is admirable, and so is his writing skill: He brings all this alive and into focus so that you almost watch this book as you read it. (It would make a fine movie on the order of "Dersu Uzala.")
Turk and Mischa become boon companions as they meet and master the usual obstructions: filthy weather, stiff-necked officialdom, short rations, incessant discomfort and worse. They also meet and are helped (once being pulled from the surf by a tank) by a wonderfully odd assortment of people who live in lonely privation on the miserable shores farthest-east Russia, but who somehow understand and welcome explorers in any language. This is a book you won't lend out.--Bill Marsano is an award-winning writer and editor, and a marginally competent kayaker to boot.
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