FARTHBY DAVID B. OFFER

Correspondent

First in a monthly series about people from Maine in Alaska.

Ted Worcester didn't really go swimming in the Arctic Ocean this summer. It was more like wading, walking in to about knee level.

But he was in the water, and it was the Arctic, and it was, indeed, cold -- part of a very cool and unusual summer spent by a college student from Waterville.

Worcester, 19, who is now back in more normal surroundings at Wheaton College in Norton, Mass., spent the summer with Cory Limberger, a friend from Vassalboro, and about 35 other workers at a remote lodge in Coldfoot, Alaska -- 250 miles north of Fairbanks, 210 miles from the Arctic Ocean. Some of the staff members were college students like Worcester and Limberger. Others, from all over the world, were people who look for unusual experiences wherever they can be found.

Together, they worked for a company that runs a lodge and campgrounds in remote parts of Alaska. Coldfoot is a convenient overnight stopping point for trucks and tour buses on the rough road north.

The two Mainers were part of a crew that made beds, cleaned rooms and did whatever was needed to keep the lodge running. That was four or five days a week. The rest of the time was theirs for exploration.

"It was neat being surrounded by mountains and no form of civilization within 250 miles each way," Worcester said recently during a stopover in Fairbanks before he boarded a plane to take him back to Boston.

When space was available, the company allowed staff members to hitch rides on buses, and sometimes small planes, and stay in camps in other parts of Alaska where it has operations.

That made the Arctic trip possible.

They hitched a ride with a traveler passing through Coldfoot and headed north to Prudhoe Bay, where they stayed in a trailer at a camp run by the company. The next day they joined a tour group heading to the ocean.

Worcester described his dip in the water in a blog -- whileinalaska.com -- he kept of his summer adventure:

"Cory and I were the first on the tour to take off our shoes, roll up our pants and wade in the Arctic Ocean. ... The water was cold but not unbearable. Some people never even got off the bus to go down to the water but others followed our lead and dipped their feet in the ocean."

The two Mainers also went hiking in the Alaska mountains; encountered golf-ball-size hail; saw moose, caribou, musk oxen, sheep and snow owls -- "but not a single grizzly bear," he said with what sounded like reluctance.

They joined local residents and workers for a bonfire to celebrate the summer solstice with a midnight bonfire.

"It was still light as day" at midnight, he said. One unusual feature was seeing both the moon and the sun together in the sky.

Worcester described the solstice party on his blog:

"They grilled up moose and bratwurst for dinner. Our camp manager had shot the moose last winter. It was my first time trying moose. I had it in the form of a hot dog, or a moose dog as they called it. Moose meat virtually has no fat. To cook it, they had to add a little fat to it. Very, very delicious. It's a lot better tasting than beef. A large amount of people attended the celebration. Most of the coworkers attended, along with staff from the visitor center and nearby campers. A group of holistic doctors who had been camping in the area stopped in. They called themselves healers and resembled a cult. In fact, several of our staff were convinced they were in a cult. It was an interesting crowd to say the least. We stayed by the fire drinking and socializing until 6AM. It was the first time I had ever celebrated Summer Solstice. It's a big occasion up here in Alaska. Down in Fairbanks, there are several Summer Solstice activities including a midnight baseball game!"

Worcester and Limberger visited Anaktuvuk, a native village with a population of about 250, where they saw a way of living far different than what they experience in Maine.

They arrived in Coldfoot in mid-May, in time to see the winter snow melt and the temperature rise to the 70s; but the nights, with the thermometer in the 20s, were a reminder that Alaska is a different sort of place.

Life at Coldfoot was not luxurious. Worcester and Limberger lived in a large two-man tent; bed was a sleeping bag; plumbing was a walk -- a cold one at night. The sun was shining at bedtime and, of course, still shining in the morning. The extended light allowed for late night hikes in the nearby woods and mountains. Hiking often involved dressing in full netting to avoid voracious mosquitos.

The two found their summer job through www.coolworks.com, a site that links college students with unusual summer jobs. Their first choice in Denali didn't work out. Then Coldfoot came along. There were what Worcester called "three big interviews" by phone.

Once it hired them, the company paid to fly them to Alaska.

Worcester said when he told his parents, Edward and Kathy Worcester, of 3 Greylock Road, Waterville, what he wanted to do for the summer, they "wanted to know that I knew what I was getting myself into," he said. Once satisfied, they were supportive.

Worcester, an economics major at Wheaton, is the grandson of the late Clayton LaVerdiere, who was a writer for the Morning Sentinel for 50 years. He is a sophomore at Wheaton this year.

After a summer of cleaning rooms and making beds at a lodge, will he make his bed every day back at college?

"Perhaps," he said.

David B. Offer is the retired executive editor of the Kennebec Journal and the Morning Sentinel. He is spending a year as a journalism professor at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.