Pacific NW

Expeditions

Alarm goes off at 4AM. Listen to forecast. Great! The sky was clear, brilliant stars and planets. Yes, no fog!! Wake Justin, reef the mainsail, prepare for the crossing. We had a totally successful crossing in bright sunshine and almost no swell. Justin even caught a bit of sleep on the lee rail. In the late afternoon we arrived at Sandpit with the hopes of obtaining fuel. But the dock was only open from 6PM to 9PM. “Welcome to the Charlottes” said a local when we asked why the hours were so strange. We steamed on another 6 miles to Queen Charlotte City. It turned out to be our favorite city in B.C.! We met many nice people. At Howlers Pub I had the most pleasant bar experience I’ve ever had. We spent the evening talking with a great group of Canadians and making new friends.

I almost fell off overboard while peeing off the stern in the black of night. I jumpd when a sudden splash and flash of light erupted in the water below me. It was a surprised seal, and I could clearly see it swimming underwater in a brilliant cloud of phosphorescence. We slept in this morning, napping, while listening to the lonely fog horns of the big ships in the channel. It remained completely socked in until noon. It was good to wait for a better tide anyways. The wind came up in the afternoon and gave us high-adrenaline beam seas on our way to Larsen Harbor. Larsen Harbor is an awesome place that we had all to ourselves. It is sea-swept and perched on the edge of the Hecate Strait. Tomorrow we make the jump to the Queen Charlotte Islands, 60 nautical miles away.

What a hot, sweltering day to be on land! Ugh. We ran around and did necessary chores until I was drenched in sweat and ready to hit the water again. I rode our shopping cart down a long hill and all the way to the boat, Picking up speed I pulled into the main traffic lane and enjoyed the breeze. Traffic began to yield for me as the cart achieved “terminal velocity”. Several kids whose strength I underestimated helped me to lower the cart the final step to the dock, and I unloaded our precious cargo of perishable foods into the cool lockers of the boat before the sun had a chance to get to them. We had a good little sail down Chatham Strait, to Lawson Harbor. A strong outflow wind blew down off the Fraser River delta, making our anchorage a bit windy, but nice and cool.

Today marks a major turning point in the voyage. Crossing the international maritime boundry back into upper British Columbia, “Silent Partner” bid farewell to Alaskan waters. She is ready to make her fourth trip down the B.C. coast. Morningtime found us in a thick fog, making it impossible to see even the shoreline of our anchorage 100 feet away. However, we had a long day ahead of us sailing down the middle of Dixon Entrance, and we prepared for sea. One last time we broke the anchor out of Alaskan mud and hauled it aboard and steamed from the foggy archipelago of the Barrier Islands. For several hours visibility was zero. Strange shapes of blurred logs, kelp, birds, and nearby islands loomed past and then vaporized into the thick billows of fog. We proceeded out to sea issuing “securite” broadcasts on the radio and blowing our fog horn every two minutes. Once in the Dixon Entrance the sun began to break through, creating “fogbows” and revealing a cloudless blue sky above. Several humpback whales were far out in the entrance, feeding. The fog finally cleared and afforded us one last look at the magnificent shores of Alaska before it faded into obscurity with haze and increasing distance. I have seen the most amazing natural wonders here in Alaska, far beyond anything I could ever have imagined. Already even my own memories of the place seem legendary to me–some instances have been so spectacular and beyond the description of words that I can scarecly believe what I saw! But all those images are permanently etched in my mind, and I will never forget them. I will return. I had many mixed feelings as we sailed into British Columbia. First and foremost was the exhilration at having safely navigated the coast of Alaska all the way to Homer. I am also beginning to ask myself why am I heading back down to all the madness and pandemonium of Puget Sound? This morning all we could hear were the echoes of chattering eagles, the splash of salmon, and the soft sounds of rushing water from the sea surge. And despite the pure remoteness of the place, we have met so many incredible people with whom we share common bonds with, just because we’re there. Everybody has adventures to share. We celebrated our crossing the line with a few cans of Canada Dry ginger ale. I became morose upon leaving incredible Alaska, although I can’t complain about the coast of B.C. Dixon Entrance treated us well today. We sailed right down the middle of it, losing all sight of land for several hours. Towering cumulus clouds built up over all the continental landmasses. It was remarkable to see the shapes of the shorelines mimicked by the clouds, but not the land itself. In the evening we caught a perfect tide into Venn Passage. All the mountains of the B.C. mainland coast turned a deep purple in the sunset. I cleared customs by telephone ( a long way to go for a phone call!) and we marched up to the bar and had victory margaritas.

We finally saw sunbreaks today! In Charlie’s Cove, I took my last exploration of Alaskan soil for this trip. We watched a stellar sunset while dining on sockeye salmon. Justin made an attempt at dessert: bananas fried in rum with chocolate and toasted walnuts on top. I thought it was pretty good, but Justin was dissatisfied with the presentation. The meal looked as if a seagull might have visited the plate. Oh well. I have come to really appreciate all of Justin’s cooking. He takes great pride in it, is good at experimenting in the galley, and always hands me the nicer plate of food. A true chef, and a true friend. While Justin is growing ecstatic about entering BC tomorrow, I am sad to be leaving Alaska. The “Alaska” chapter of Voyage Alaska 2005 is coming to an end. I will return. This place is in my blood.

Justin and I skipped out of town in the rain, happy to be on the road again. We have a lot of British Columbia stretching out below us, and not a lot of time to explore it. Before leaving we took on a load of wood scraps from the dock. Good cedar planings, perfect for kindling! Overall, it was a fairly uneventful day. Lots of motoring in the rain. Kit left us a gift of red snapper which we found in the cockpit. Justin and I stopped the boat in the afternoon when the weather cleared a bit. We took a “siesta” and ate the delicious red snapper in the cockpit. Jakob and Amos gave us halibut and salmon, and once again we have all the fish we can handle. Kit offered us another salmon before we left, too, and I had to regretfully decline. I timed the tides wrong in the Tlevak narrows and we managed to just barely get through, going one knot with the engine full-out.

The weather collapsed the following week and we were storm-bound in Craig for several days. Jakob, Amos, Alison, and Davis (whom I fished with last fall) came into town on their day off. It was a great rendez-vous! Fishing has been going well for them, despite a bit more rain than usual and lower prices for the fish. Several days blended into one another, with nights in the bars and days frittered away doing town chores.

A light westerly breeze produced a fantastic sail across the Gulf of Esquibel this morning. The humpback whales were out in full force, putting on quite a show! It turned into a beautiful sunny day, as is usual when we come into a town. Justin and I secured a berth in the marina, then walked all over town, stretching our legs. In the evening we even went for a run (a long run!) down the road to Klawock and it got very dark out. We tried hitchhiking back to Craig, with no luck! It must be a combination of the darkness, my beard, and our sweaty appearance. Still, we stood under a light and over 40 cars passed us! Finally we gave up in disgust and started running the long dark road back. Thank god we got picked up mid-way back by a man named Kit! We were exhausted after our ambitious run. One of the fishermen let me use the shower on his seiner. “You a water person? Good. Shower’s right here, I just got the hot water hooked up today”. Later on I was invited to a salmon dinner aboard his boat. I spent the evening with him and his crew, and two fine young ladies who are living aboard another boat adjacent to ours. I am beginning to love this life of the traveller.

By 5:10 AM I had seen whales, bears, eagles, and salmon again. As I hauled anchor in the early morning light I watched a massive grizzly strut the beach, pawing at the boulders in search for crab. Out in the straits many humpback whales continued to breach completely out of the water. Viewing such a colossal animal–even from as close as we were–is like watching a slow motion re-play. Sort of like watching waves crash on a beach from an airplane. When the whales hit the water again they made gigantic splashes accompanied by big foaming piles of seething white water. “Storm white” is what my family uses to describe the remarkable color that white objects take on when viewed at sea on an overcast day. This morning the whales leapt as if in slow motion and created billowing storm-white splashes all around. The whole scene was quite surreal. In the afternoon we enjoyed sunshine and had an uneventful yet beautiful passage into the Gulf of Esquibel. The Gulf turned out to be another major whale feeding ground. I was surprised when the giant arched back surfaced directly under our bow. The whale threw its flukes to the side and narrowly missed hitting the boat. Whenever I see a whale this close I am too preoccupied by the unbelievability of it all to think about a collision. But I suppose, on a rare event, one of these giant leviathans could surface under the boat. At 50 feet long they are almost twice as long as “Silent Partner” and weigh who knows how many times as much. We wove our way into the Maurelle Islands archipelago in the Gulf of Esquibel, past kelp-covered reefs, forested inlets, storm-beaten cliffs, and the ever-present humpback whales. Our anchorage is teeming with deer. Everywhere they are grazing on tall green beachgrasses and don’t seem to mind us being here at all.

The wildlife that Justin and I witnessed from the decks of “Silent Partner” and Modulus today has forever changed my outlook on the world. I will begin by simply presenting a list of some of the animals we saw today:
–Sitka deer
–100+ humpback whales
–River otters
–Sea otters
–Bald eagles by the hundred
–Salmon by the million
–One dozen grizzly bears
–Kingfishers and hundreds of ther kinds of birds

I got up early in the morning to take in more of our awesome surroundings. Thick swirls and bands of salmon swam tornadoes around Modulus as I rowed through the channel. A few of the thigh-sized fish jumped close enough to splash me, and I was actually surprised that one of them didn’t just jump into the boat. When they become airborne they shake their bodies and tails very powerfully. It makes the sound similar to that of a heliocopter, and is heard constantly due to their phenomenal numbers. On shore I watched a tan sitka black-tailed deer feeding at the edge of a clearing. I was surprised to see the deer so close to so many bears! In mid-afternoon we steamed from Gut Bay and out into Chatham Strait. The humpback whales were lunging and breaching completely out of the water in great numbers! For several hours I could see a whale everywhere I looked. Justin cooked a great meal over the wood stove while we were underweigh. Midway through he gashed his finger with a cleaver. We dressed the wound and he insisted that the meal must go on. He maintained the fire, monitored multiple cast-irons, and stirred the soup while trying to control the bleeding as we bounced around in the waves. It was a truly heroic feat! The meal was excellent and Justin promised there was no blood in any of it. I whittled a wooden splint for his finger and signed it as friends will sign a cast. The things we do to amuse ourselves on a sailboat…We enjoyed our meal as we watched the whales lunge-feeding in the strait. Gedney Harbor turned out to be a true adventure. Right away upon entering the bay we saw a grizzly bear on shore. We anchored the boat off of a stream, around which was growing a towering forest as impressive as the one we found in Gut Bay. We could scarcely contain our excitement as we clambered into the Modulus to gain a closer view of the bear. Nearing the beach another grizzly bear materialized from the tall grasses on shore. They were beautiful 600 pound bears with glossy coats and rippling layers of fat. And then the bears just kept on coming. A mother with two cubs emerged from a streambed to the right, then we saw two more on the stream to the left, and several more romping along the far shore. It was a smorgasboard of grizzly bears, and we saw perhaps a dozen on this short outing. Drawn to the skyrocketing and massive trees on shore, we rowed a little ways up a stream. We briefly stepped into the woods. What a fantastic forest! We went no more than 15 feet into the woods when a massive brown bear charged out of the bushes directly in front of our faces. Without thinking I began shouting at the advancing bear. It was followed by a moment of terror as the bear reared back and tore off into the woods in mild agitation. Our legs felt like jello as we clambered back into the dinghy and rowed out into the bay. Going to shore was simply out of the question. As we watched several bears on the beach a large salmon breached right behind us. It gave us quite a scare! We were completely inundated by all the wildlife around us. A beautiful sunset broke through the pink and orange clouds, casting a glow over the families of grizzly bears on shore. Out in the straits leapt the whales, and in the bay leapt the salmon. Bald eagles perched in the tops of all the tallest trees. I have never seen such a remarkable abundance of animals or old-growth lowland timber. It is beyond anything I had ever imagined. “Silent Partner” sits proud and peacefully at anchor, and we feel priviledged to be in such an amazing part of the world.