Stuck on a Rock in the Northwest Passage

My spouse and I have just returned from what was mostly a delightful adventure cruise through the Northwest Passage. That is, until we got grounded on a rock.
It was August 27th, and we had just had a most delightful day with two Zodiac landings in the Coronation Gulf at Port Epworth. The morning sun shone brightly as we hiked through the beautiful stromatolite rocks dating back about 195 billion years. We marveled at the captivating colorful layered formations as Marc, our geologist, described them to us; he was more excited than we were.
Our second hike in the afternoon was from a different location with less rock but more lush vegetation with colorful red and yellow foliage interspersed with green. A delightful setting made more pleasant by the warm sun. We hiked up a slope to view a couple of graves where an RCMP officer, who died in the line of duty, and a Hudson Bay employee, were buried in 1922. It was food for thought; there are no signs of any buildings here, but obviously there must have been a Hudson Bay fort nearby. The Adventure Canada staff has been great in organizing something new for us to see and do everyday.
About 7:00 p.m., the staff had just finished their farewell speeches, and some of the passengers had just gotten up to leave, when suddenly we heard a loud crash; the ship rocked, and a few people screamed, and others got down on the floor. My first thought, ‘It’s an earthquake!’ After all, Ottawa had one just a couple of months ago. As the Clipper Adventurer lurched to a halt, listing a bit to the left, I realized we had hit a rock.
Within a couple of minutes, our Expedition leader, Aaran, told us to go to our rooms put on warm clothes and bring our life jackets up with us. We sat around in the lecture hall and waited for news. It came soon; the crash was not life threatening and there were no leaks. After a while we were invited to go the dining room for dinner, ‘but bring your life jackets along.’ By the time we were finished dinner, about 10:30, we were informed it was safe to go back to our rooms, we were definitely not going to sink; we were stuck on top of an uncharted rock.
However, with all that happened, many passengers were not ready for sleep, but gathered in the lecture hall. About midnight, my spouse, Byron and I turned in hoping to sleep. About 12:30 a.m., an announcement came that the aurora borealis had a lovely display in the southern sky. Up we went with a large number of other passengers, and what a lovely display! Not very colorful, but they danced beautifully across the sky. I like to think that the aurora borealis display was especially for us – a way to de-stress us, and it did.
The next morning, life was back to normal on the listing ship. The air was warm, (well 11 degrees C, warm for this area), and the sun was shining. This was the day we were to disembark, but obviously it wasn’t going to happen. By mid-morning many passengers had found a spot on the aft deck to sun themselves. The staff had organized a couple of lectures for the day, and so no one was bored. It was a wonderfully relaxing day, perhaps appreciated by the passengers as we had been kept fairly busy the past couple of weeks.
We were informed that the Canadian Coast Guard vessel, the Amundsen, would be arriving Sunday shortly after lunch from Sachs Harbor in the Beaufort Sea. That’s about 42 hours after we were hung up on a rock. We were lucky that the ship’s damage was minimal and did not endanger our lives. This is not a high traffic route; no other ship was near by. The closest Coast Guard vessel was 500 km away.
The Admundsen parked about six km away from our ship, and sent out their Zodiac to collect our passengers; it was considerably bigger than our Zodiacs though it only carried eight passengers. This was really taking a lot of time, and they would not accept help from our Zodiacs, regulations, I guess. Each return trip took about 20-25 minutes. Eventually they brought out their barge that transported 10 passengers; still the transfer of about 120 persons took about four hours. The trip to Kugluktuk (Coppermine) on the Admundsen took another 4-5 hours. Staff took good care of us – feeding all 120 people in shifts. Once we arrived in Kugluktuk which was about 2:00 -3:00 a.m., they started to ferry us to shore, and with a small yellow bus take us to a gymnasium where we tried to get a few hours of sleep.
Monday was another sunny morning when, after eating a sandwich, we were transported to the airport for our charter to Edmonton. Of course this was another long process since their airport is very small. It was a great inconvenience to the residents of Kugluktuk, but they did what they could to make such a large group comfortable, and we're grateful for that.