Pacific NW

Expeditions

8° CLEAR 12° COLD

The morning’s assessment of camp,” as we’ve come to refer to it (the term harks back to Pete’s Jawbone days), revealed a dramatic scene.  The bay was chock full of ice, with only a slight opening from the waterfall to the dock where there’s much current.  The outer bay from Chatham Strait inwards was totally frozen.  This is a rare occurrence and one which few folks have seen before.  The conditions just keep getting more extreme!

Everyday there’s new natural phenomena to behold.  Mornings are the best time to get out and see what wonders the nighttime’s plummeting temperatures have created.  Today there was spectacular hoar frost in the forest, clinging to the moss draped over spruce tree branches and forming along twigs and grass fringing the hot spring stream.  I wanted badly to go on a photo safari in this frosted wonderland but the cold was not kind to my fingers.  I did capture a few images of feathers and fungaloids,” as Pete called it, feather-like frost and free-flowing fungus side by side.  We spotted a gigantic icicle mushroom in the forest, birthed from the hydro line.  Water spouting out of small bleed holes had built up layers of ice over time to create this icicle masterpiece.  Pete took one of the icicle-laden branches, pulled it back like a slingshot, said I’ve always wanted to do this” and let the ice crystal chandelier sway wildly and shatter.  Music to our ears!

Back in the bay, paper-thin sheets of ice had been forced up by colliding sheets, forming delicate little origami figures that looked like sailboats.  While I used the Speedy Stitcher to sew foam over the sand bags where they made contact with the hull, Pete sledgehammered the dock free of ice.  The below freezing temps did not allow for nimble fingers, and the task of sewing was rather painful.  With news of an incoming storm, however, this needed to get done.  We heard a plane overhead today but, alas, it did not touch down in Baranof and was instead on its weekly run to the Hidden Falls fish hatchery.  It seemed that we were quite low on the priority list.  The frigid temps today were cause for another wood fire which brought the cabin temperature up from 50 to a balmy 60 degrees.  We’ve been snuggled up in blankets this past week, requiring lots of soup for warmth and cookies for energy to get through the days.  Given to exhaustion from all of the physical activity, we’ve also been going to bed early and sleeping a lot.