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To see if the trend extended beyond my own circle, I called Steve Brownlee, the owner of Umiak Outdoor Outfitters, a Stowe, Vt., shop that caters to paddlers.

With the navigational support of Alaska Natives from Little Diomede Island in umiak boats, along with my crew and the media, I swam on, determined to succeed.

"Do you know what an Umiak is?"

Oomittuk joined the tribal council, and worked as a harpooner in his uncle’s umiak skin boat.

At this point the sole artifact in this area is a walrus-skin Iñupiaq umiak, a 34-foot boat whose frame was built around 1920 by Jonathan Onalik in Wales.