Lunch in the Arctic Circle

With the midsummer night and the longest day of the year rapidly approaching, life in the Ten Thousand Islands is occasionally overwhelming. The tropical heat and humidity that rise with the sun can be oppressive. When a thunderstorm bursts over the islands and delivers thunderclaps, lighting, and a downpour reminiscent of a biblical event, the glowing rainbows that follow always offer inspiration. Within our sultry dreamscape where rainbows live on the edge of lighting, stories from far away can cool the heat of a tropical summer and allow full-time islanders to understand why they became Marco Beach Boys and Girls.

With the popularity of our islands growing, it cannot be surprising when some of our visitors offer chilling narratives from opposite ends of the earth. During a recent encounter, a traveler from New London, Connecticut was a passenger on the Marco River when - with his wife’s encouragement - began to expound upon a different kind of maritime adventure.

With a little coaxing, we soon learned that our visitors from New London were a U.S. Navy family. A family with the husband and father being an executive officer on a Los Angeles Class nuclear submarine.

After learning of the exciting career path of our special passenger, questions began coming like raindrops in a Marco thunderstorm. “Where have you been - which was the most exotic mission?” were some of the first questions. “What is it like living underwater in a nuclear submarine?” 

“There are some things I can tell you,” the second in command of the nuclear sub began, “And, other events I cannot explain because these are classified.”

Our visiting submariner was a very good sport, a great storyteller, and soon everyone was under the spell from 20,000 Leagues under the Sea.

“I can tell you some of the most exciting maneuvers we undertook were with U.S. Navy Seals. I cannot tell you where we went, but I can relate some of what the Seals did when we arrived at a secret location. When the Seals went on an operation, they went into a special chamber and left the submarine when we were underwater. When they surfaced near a hostile shore, it was always under the cover of darkness. Once on the surface, they inflated black rubber rafts, climbed aboard, and then tied the rubber boats together with a length of rope. This was when the two blacked-out boats gathered the towrope around the raised periscope - with the periscope the only part of our boat showing - and our submarine towed the Seals as near as possible to the shore. We never knew what the Seals did when they were ashore, because we did not need to know, but they always came back exactly on time. They’re mission might have been six hours or three days, but they were always on time when they came back aboard.”

“On another patrol, our captain began hatching a plan when we were cruising under the ice of the Arctic Circle. On a nuclear boat, we can sometimes be underwater for long periods. On this particular Arctic patrol, our captain began dropping hints to help with morale. “For this ice pack mission,” the captain offered, “we are going to do something you can tell your children and grandchildren about. This will be a great adventure!”

“After about a week of traveling under the Arctic icebergs and measuring the thickness of the ice, we found a shallow section of icepack where we could surface the submarine,” he continued. “A thin enough section where the conning tower of the sub would break through the ice and we could go outside through an open hatch. When we successfully broke through the rime and the snow, the captain outlined his plan. ‘Today,’ he announced over the intercom, ‘We are going to have lunch on the ice pack in the Arctic Circle. To my knowledge, no other submarine crew has ever had banquet on the Arctic Ice.”

After the captain’s announcement, the preparations for “Lunch on the Ice” began. Folding tables and chairs were broken out of storage and festive tablecloths became splashes of color upon the snow-white setting. When the banquet tables and chairs were ready, and everyone was dressed for the cold and walking around and taking pictures of the setup with the crew and the black conning tower rising up out of the ice, the mess crew began sending up steaming plates of cheeseburgers and French fries.

Luckily for the crew, when the Lunch in the Arctic Circle began and massive amounts of cheeseburgers and fries began steaming in the blue Arctic air, everyone began making their way back to the tables and chairs resting on the snow and ice. Before most of the crew were ready for seating however, a strange rumbling sound began in the snowy distance. Because everything on the Arctic ice pack is white, including polar bears, the rumbling pounding of twenty hungry polar bears running on the ice toward the scent of cheeseburgers and fries was not something that anyone saw until the aggressive Arctic residents were almost to the tables with the food.

Before the altercation of Arctic polar bears versus American submariners was about to begin, the clever mess crew began kicking over the tables that were groaning under the weight of a hundred cheeseburgers. When the cheeseburgers and fries crashed onto the snow, the roaming herd of polar bears were not interested in anything but the food and this allowed enough time for the crew on the ice pack to scramble back up to the safety of the open hatches of the surfaced conning tower.

When the American Submariners were no longer in danger of being between the polar bears and their “Lunch on the Arctic Circle,” everyone aboard took turns from the safety of the submarine to film and watch with great amusement as everyone aboard did indeed have a great story to tell their children and grandchildren.

Tom Williams is a Marco Islander. He is the author of two books. Lost and Found and Surrounded by Thunder—the Story of Darrell Loan and the Rocket Men. Both books are available on Kindle and Nook.

Tom Williams is a Marco Islander and the author of two books: “Lost and Found” and “Surrounded by Thunder - The Story of Darrell Loan and the Rocket Men.” Both books are available on Kindle and Nook.