Pacific NW

Expeditions

Shrieking winds whistled through the shrouds when we awoke. Another stiff breeze was blowing up Stephen’s Passage. Christoph prepared a batch of delicious johnny cakes for breakfast and Lee pulled up a giant hermit crab in the trap. It was one of the coolest things the trap has ever caught. I didn’t know hermit crabs could get as big a grapefruit. We eagerly donned our foul-weather gear and sailing gloves, excited for a good sail and our arrival in Juneau, where Christoph and Lee will depart from the voyage and my Dad will join on. We were met by huge rollers in Stephen’s Passage. We put up the jib and we were on our way. At 10 knots of speed over ground! “Silent Partner” loves a broad reach. She surged through the waves, and we did a 10.5 knot surf down one particularly large roller, with the jib alone. The 27′ O’day is built with a long waterline, giving her the speed of other 32-33′ boats. We sailed to Juneau in style, and I was so proud of “Silent Partner”. Her bow would lift clear out of the water all the way to the keel as she surfed across Taku Inlet. I harnessed myself to the bow and felt the sheer exhilaration of flying through the waves, my trusted crew at the helm. We were met by a white-out and thick snowstorm one mile south of Juneau, and I radioed the harbormaster for a slip in the harbor. “Hello, I’m a 27′ sail—” “Are you the Silent Partner”, she cut in. “We’ve been expecting you, waiting for you”. Two scuba divers on their boat also told us they’d heard our name on the radio and asked if we were okay. “Well, yeah” I said. Apparently the whole town was waiting our arrival! They were worried because of the high wind warnings on the radio, and the harbormaster had been trying to contact us for a week. But we had been out of radio reception range and were thoroughly enjoying the breeze! We brought “Silent Partner” into the harbor, safe and sound. Juneau! I congratulated Christoph and Lee on our successful transit of the entire Inside Passage, I couldn’t have done it without them. 1,164 nautical miles is the length of our journey thus far. We swaggered into the harbormaster’s office and she said “You guys must be the Silent Partners! You have it written all over your faces!” We wouldn’t have been able to force our smiles away if we had tried.