Inside Passage – Riveted

Hoonah to Excursion Inlet

Laura Domela — Mon, 25 Jul 2016 00:39:44 +0000

The weather was supposed to pick up in Icy Strait on Friday afternoon and continue through Saturday, and since we needed to be in Gustavus to pick up Tiffani and Deke on Saturday, we figured it’d be a good idea to be nearer than Hoonah, so we left on Friday morning and headed for Excursion Inlet, just east of Gustavus.

Calm in Hoonah harbor:

No cruise ships here during our visit (which might explain why the brewery was closed):

See you in a couple days, Hoonah!

We saw some splashing in the distance as we made our way across Icy Strait…there were a few humpbacks over by the Porpoise Islands doing a whole lot of breaching and fin slapping, so we headed their way and watched them for a bit before going on into Excursion Inlet.

The east arm of Excursion Inlet is not part of Glacier Bay National Park, but the west arm is, so on the right side you’ll see houses dotting the shore, a seafood processing plant, and a gathering of buildings up from the public dock that was a prisoner of war encampment during WWII, but now houses a store and a small museum.

We continued up the left arm toward a little cove called Sawmill Bay. There were two humpbacks making their way along the shore (taking advantage of the large schools of tiny fish we could see on sonar, I assume) and we had to wait for them to finish up in our cove before we could anchor. We anchored in about 60 feet. Gorgeous here!

Sam on Safe Harbour met up with us a few hours later and once it stopped raining we went exploring in Sam’s (fast) dinghy.

Tons of jellies in here:

Cannery remains (I think) in the east arm:

Cabin on the shore:

We tied up to the public dock, which looked quite a bit better from Airship as we passed it from a distance than it does up close.

The little store (Coho General Mercantile) has a surprising selection of goods! The Cannery Museum appeared to be closed:

Our friends Tiffani and Deke were scheduled to come into Gustavus last night, but their flight into Seattle was too late to catch the connection, so they stayed in Seattle last night and are booked on the flight into Gustavus today. We just stayed another night in Sawmill Bay and had a nice time cooking dinner with Sam. We rafted to each other this time…eliminating the wet rainy dinghy rides to and fro.

View from Airship this morning:

The route from Hoonah to Sawmill Bay in Excursion Inlet (25.4 miles, 4 hours 47 minutes):

We’re in Gustavus now, tied up to the public dock waiting for “the jet” (as the locals call it). The guy working the dock here was super friendly and told me that the few taxis in town are usually booked ahead of time for when “the jet” comes in. We still had a few hours before “the jet” arrived, so I was able to call and reserve “the cab.” Whew!!

We’ll get T&D and then head across Icy Strait this evening to meet back up with Sam in Flynn Cove. We’ve got a Glacier Bay flightseeing trip scheduled for tomorrow at 11:30 out of Hoonah, so we’ll be in Hoonah tomorrow for that, as well as some provisioning (and maybe some touristing out at Icy Strait Point).

Posting might be less regular for the next couple weeks, but I’ll take tons of photos (of course) and catch up when there’s time.

Happy Sunday!

Skagway, AK

Laura Domela — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 01:56:42 +0000

Another gorgeous day in Lynn Canal and up the Taiya Inlet to Skagway! Here’s our new view, at the Small Boat Harbor:

Skagway, Alaska is pretty much the furthest north in the Inside Passage that we can travel by boat. I’m so glad the weather was great and we got to come all the way up here. It’s beautiful! Blue dot on map is us:

There’s only one cruise ship here today, so the town is pretty quiet.

There are roads that lead from both Haines and Skagway to other places in Alaska (unlike all other SE Alaska towns we visit by boat), so we’ve met several sets of folks from Whitehorse and other towns in Alaska, Canada, and the Yukon Territory. Whitehorse is only about 90 minutes by car, so maybe next time we’re here, we can rent a car and do some land exploring.

Skagway is actually pretty charming. Yes, it’s a cruise ship town (of only about 900 people), but they’ve done a good job with the vibe of the place…it doesn’t feel all cruiseshipppy. I’m not sure if it’s that the buildings all mostly match and have that slightly Old West look and there aren’t A TON of tanzanite and cruise ship jewelry stores (there are still a few), or that there was only one ship here today, but it was quite nice walking around town. We had lunch at the Skagway Fish Company (a salad with king crab, and halibut fish & chips, to share). The food was solid. Not amazing, but solid.

But OMG the weather!! Today was probably up near 80 degrees…tomorrow is supposed to be 87 (the harbormaster says that’s the hottest he’s ever seen it). We were originally thinking we’d just explore for a couple hours today, have lunch, and then head back out to fish and maybe back to Haines this afternoon, but we decided to stay the night and head down to Haines tomorrow afternoon instead. Guess what we’re doing in the morning?

Pybus Bay to Tracy Arm Cove

Laura Domela — Mon, 20 Jun 2016 02:19:20 +0000

Hey whatdy’a know? Our crab traps had crab in ‘em this morning. Cannery Cove does not disappoint. Three keeper males, and two females. One of the males was HUGE. He was so big that I thought the smallest male might not be big enough, but when we measured him, he was off the scale and definitely big enough. My calibration was totally thrown off by this guy:

Kevin cleaned the crabs while I made breakfast and then we headed out into Stephens Passage. Stephens Passage is notoriously thick with humpbacks so we figured today would be about humpbacks.

We saw two humpbacks while still in Pybus Bay, and then as we came around the corner out into Stephens Passage, we noticed a brown bear sow and two cubs on the shore, so we went in to get a closer look.

As we were passing Gambier Bay and approaching Point Hugh, the area was just THICK with whales.

Spouts everywhere, tails everywhere, and then we noticed some serious splashing a ways away, toward the point. We binoc’d it and it was a whole lot of tail slapping. Like, maybe 20 times in a row…and then all over again! Crazy!

Pretty soon we were distracted by about 10 Dall’s porpoises who came zipping over to surf our bow wake. They are SO. MUCH. FUN! They were with us for about 15 minutes, doing somersaults and corkscrew rolls…it was a blast to watch (all the while with tail slapping humpback in the background). Those porpoises peeled off, only to be replaced 10 minutes later by another group. And then repeat, several times over. It seemed like we had porpoises playing in our bow wake ALL DAY. Seriously. It was nuts.

Kevin took some video and made this very cool (and totally mesmerizing) compilation:

As we approached Tracy Arm/Endicott Arm, we decided to stop and fish for halibut for a little bit. We anchored near the opening to Endicott Arm and Kevin put two halibut lines in the water. I was uploading photos when he said (about 15 minutes after putting the lines out) “I think something’s biting on my line. Come feel.” So I went out and yeah, you could definitely feel the fish chomping on the bait and pulling on the line. We knew better than to do anything, so we just waited until the fish started to swim away with his snack all eaten, and then started reeling him in. Whoa…it was a big one. It felt like an “uh oh, how are we going to get this in the boat” big one. I was right. I took a few quick photos just as Kevin got him to the surface, and then grabbed the gaff. But when I whacked him with the gaff it just bounced off his head (oops) and then after about 30 more seconds, he got loose. We could tell that the hook was just barely in his lip, and he was able to shake it off. Well dangit. But it was super cool to see…and to get him all the way to the boat. We’re estimating it was about 48” long….and maybe 70 pounds. Hard to tell on the weight, but I’m certain of the length. It was big, and the first halibut we’ve almost caught. I think we need a longer gaff, and a harpoon. (You can’t even tell how big it is from this photo, but trust me, it was, well…too big for the boat.)

We are now anchored in Tracy Arm Cove with several other boats. Apparently Tracy Arm hasn’t been navigable to the glacier all season, not even by the small tour boats. From the looks of all the icebergs way out here at the entrance, I can see how that might be. From what we hear the glacier is having record calving, and the icebergs in Stephens Passage are moving north, when they normally move south. So…things are wacky with the glacier this year. View from our anchorage:

Melting ice:

Sumdum Glacier:

Our plan tomorrow is to maybe fish for more halibut, and then go into Ford’s Terror for a day or two, and then to the end of Endicott Arm to check out Dawes Glacier (which we haven’t seen before). For dinner tonight, we cooked up some fresh Dungeness crab and ate it as-is, with a side salad I made from shredded brussels sprouts, crushed almonds, olive oil, and a little bit of my homemade caesar dressing. It was so good!

Here’s today’s track from Cannery Cove at Pybus Bay to Tracy Arm Cove (44.9 nautical miles, 6 hours 10 minutes):

And here’s a photo of many icebergs in the distance, quite a bit north from the entrance to Tracy Arm:

Behm Canal | Walker Cove to Fitzgibbon Cove

Laura Domela — Mon, 30 May 2016 12:14:00 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

Reflected landscape at Walker Cove:

Also, those are bears eating grass, just below the AK flag on the bow:

We left Walker Cove yesterday morning just after 9am (and after getting 5 more Dungeness in the traps). It rained ALL night the night before. By morning the rain had mostly stopped but it was back to being extremely misty here in Misty Fjords. Foggy, even. The group of 6 boats traveling together (from the Roche Harbor Yacht Club) was also heading out this morning, and two of them were ahead of us as the rest of them untied their stern lines and peeled off from the very organized cluster. We were about half way out of the canal when we heard them on the radio….long story short, it sounded like as one of the boats was lifting their dinghy up onto their upper deck with their crane, the main crane cable snapped and the dinghy crashed down (the side of their boat?) and ended up floating upside down next to their boat. They said everyone was okay and it sounded like they were working to get the dinghy turned over. Eeeeek! How scary would that be? The crane’s main cable! Another vote for the stern davit!

The cruise up to Fitzgibbon Cove was just gray and rainy and not all that scenic. The wind was around 15kts behind us, and the current was with us so we were going a knot or two faster at our normal cruise rpm, but going the other way would have been a bit more uncomfortable. View from our anchorage:

We anchored in about 50 feet here in Fitzgibbon, and Kevin put out the crab traps (there’s supposed to be great crabbing in here) while I picked the crab we had already cooked. Pretty soon (like, maybe today) we’ll start freezing some crab to use for less crabful times. I’d imagine the crab frozen in milk would be just about perfect for my newly found crab bisque recipe.

Pulling traps this morning got us 6 keepers!

There are supposed to be tons of grizzlies here in the sedge grass meadow at the head of the bay…we saw one lone (large) male from pretty far away, but that’s it.

The wind died down overnight, luckily. This cove might be more protected in other conditions, but certainly not these conditions.

Here’s today’s map from Walker Cove to Fitzgibbon Cove (26 nautical miles, about 3 and a half hours):

And I know what you’re thinking…”Ooooh, hot springs!” but I believe it’s a private fishing resort, and not in fact, a place we’ll be stopping. Sad face.

Misty Fjords | Day 2

Laura Domela — Sat, 28 May 2016 23:22:00 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

This morning we woke up early, made some coffee, and sat out on the bow watching bears. We decided we’d take a dinghy ride further around to the end of Walker Cove before pulling the crab traps this morning. It was early and quiet and the water was glassy still. (So nice to have the electric Torqeedo for these kinds of quiet expeditions, instead of the loud gasoline outboard!)

There are a couple of decent spots to anchor further into the cove, and I think we may try one of them next time. Bears on the beach, waterfalls and snow-capped mountains around you…it’s like a different world in here.

Little (not really) bear ears:

Kevin dropped me at the boat (after a two-hour cruise) and I started breakfast while he checked the traps. Two more Dungeness. We’re going to stay in here another night, so he reset the traps (with a little more raw bacon…it’s our secret crab-getting bait).

Here we are, from the dinghy:

After breakfast Kevin took the drone up and I shot some photos of our anchorage:

There are four bears in this picture:

The sun came out for a bit and we decided to get the kayak out and go for a paddle. First, we headed over to the river (there are two bears in this photo):

And then, we saw more bears. The sow and her one cub were eating grass on the shore, so we stopped to watch them for a bit:

Kayak. Grizzly bears.

Back to Airship:

Dinner tonight was crab enchiladas. Yes, again. Hush.

Misty Fjords | Day 1

Laura Domela — Fri, 27 May 2016 22:49:00 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

On Thursday morning we left Ketchikan and headed for Misty Fjords. We didn’t get to Misty Fjords last year and since we were about a week early to Ketchikan…what better to do with that week? We thought we’d check out New Eddystone Rock first, and then decide where to anchor for the night. New Eddystone is pretty spectacular. It rises 230 feet high and looks like something out of a video game.

We did a loop around the rock and then went over to see what Checats Cove (along the east side of Behm Canal) looked like. It looked like it was totally exposed and not much of an anchorage at all. Kayley said the real highlight of this anchorage was the view of New Eddystone from there, but that’s not really true. The rock is about two miles away and looks pretty tiny from Checats Cove. I mean, you can see it, but it’s not what I’d consider a great view of it. We headed back over to the anchorage at Winstanley Island, just a bit south. It was lovely and protected. We anchored in about 50 feet not too far from the Forest Service buoy (reserved for the Forest Service cabin on the shore). We put out a couple crab traps and this morning we had five or so Dungeness…two definite male keepers, and one on-the-line male that we put back.

I made us a quick breakfast and we pulled anchor and headed for Rudyerd Bay. Our plan was to do a little tour through Rudyerd and then go on up to Walker Cove tonight.

Rudyerd Cove and Punchbowl Cove are THE most popular tourist stops for Misty Fjords. Float plane after float plane after tour boat after tour boat….it was kinda nuts. There’s one mooring ball in Punchbowl Cove and some areas to either side of it for anchoring. There was a group of several boats that looked rafted together. We had a look around, and then continued deeper on into the bay. It was beautiful…big granite bowls and cliffs carved by glaciers, snow-topped mountains, tons of waterfalls…and really a LOT of mist. We could only occasionally see the snowy mountain tops…I’m hoping it gets a little less misty while we’re in here (not holding my breath). As we passed the entrance to Punchbowl Cove on our way out, one of the boats in there hailed us on the radio to let us know the mooring ball was free and that they’d also be leaving pretty soon. How nice! We thanked them but said we thought we’d continue on up to Walker Cove. They said they were headed there next too, so they’d see us there!

So…Rudyerd Bay is beautiful. Punchbowl Cove is impressive. But holy crap Walker kicks Rudyerd’s ass. It’s not just about the plethora of float planes and tour boats, either. As you enter Walker Cove it’s majestic. Enormous. Waterfalls everywhere.

As we approach the anchorage area, there are brown bears on the beach. Six of them. One sow with three cubs and one sow with one cub. “Oh hi, bears.”

There’s one other boat when we arrive (though we’re expecting quite a few more) and that boat has the mooring ball, so we anchored on the east side of that boat. (The west side, closer to the river, shoals up REAL fast. How fast, you might ask? Well, you could be going really slow in 60 feet of water and find yourself in 4 feet of water at the blink of an eye.)

Okay, back to the bears.

Kevin went to set some crab traps as the flotilla from Rudyerd Bay arrived (turns out they’re the Roche Harbor Yacht Club flotilla…and they seem great!) While Kevin was out dropping the traps, I noticed a single young male brown bear on the shore (that makes 7 bears total here).

A float plane circled around and then landed in this cove, scaring the bear away. The passengers and pilots got out of the plane and stood on the floats for a while, and eventually the bears came back, so everyone was happy.

We took the dinghy out for some exploring and headed up the river a ways. On the way up, we passed two dinghies from the flotilla group as they were on their way out. It was a little Jungle Boat ride-like at that point…”Keep an eye out for the hippo!”

It was gorgeous in there too, but man is it difficult to get ANY photos that describe the beauty of this place.

As we passed the beach/shore/field on our way back to Airship, and…more bears! We hung out and watched them for an hour or so as they…well, as they ate grass. Lots of grass.

Nice bear family portrait:

Awww, cub nuzzling mama bear:

We pulled some of Kevin’s BBQ ribs from the freezer, thawed them and then finished them on the grill, and I made a mushroom risotto and a caesar salad. (I needed to use up the mushrooms, so we’ll have crab and asparagus pasta tonight with our fresh crab.) There were at least four bears on the beach until it was just about dark.

Here’s today’s track from Winstanley Island, into Rudyerd Bay, and on to Walker Cove (32 nautical miles, 4 hours 38 minutes):

Today in Ketchikan

Laura Domela — Tue, 24 May 2016 21:37:11 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

This is a story about a bus ride.

Here’s us today: coffee, work, work, work, breakfast, more work, go to the grocery store, back to the boat, more work, watch cruise ships leave, more work. Later we’re going to have dinner over at the Bar Harbor Restaurant.

We rode the city bus down to the Safeway near the Bar Harbor marina, but we decided to grab the bus going the other direction. The city bus has a free shuttle that does a loop from the end of downtown to the plaza where the Safeway is, so we got the whole loop in by catching it going the opposite direction.

Our bus driver was a native…totally cool Tsimshian guy with great jewelry and a super dry sense of humor. We chatted with him about his family, where he lived, the woodwork/artwork he does, the silversmithing tools he gave to his grandson and how he’s going to pay for art school for him as a graduation present, and some other random stuff. We told him we’d stopped in Hartley Bay (the Tsimshian village in BC where we stayed on Day 14), and he said many of his relatives live there.

He asked us about our boat, and we talked about some places up here we have and haven’t been. Then, this cruiseshipper couple got on and asked the bus driver if he’d take them to the Ruby Princess at Berth 4 (just next to the City Floats, the stop where we got on). He said yep, he’d have them there by 4pm. (It was around noon.) They laughed and sat down in front of us, in the seats that face the center of the bus. They remarked how much larger this bus was than the one they took from the ship into town…that one was just a tiny little bus…and then they noticed they were going away from the ship. I said “This is a city bus, but it’s free, and it’s a loop, so you’ll get back to the ship” and not to worry. “This is a city bus?? Oh, okay? But it’s free? Well that’s nice!” Kevin asked them where they were from and they said Orange County, which is funny, because it was as if they expected people would know the name of their county. Not their city. Not their state, but their county. Now, I grew up in Orange County, so I did know their county, but I imagined someone (in Alaska) asking me where I was from. And what if I replied “Multnomah County” as if they should know where the hell that was?? Anyway, I digress.

They followed “Orange County” then with “Huntington Beach. California.” as if they’d been given the blank stare after the county name before. I said “Nice. I went to Huntington Beach High School. Grew up in Seal Beach.” Small talk ensued…”nice place to grow up…” “so close to the ocean…”

Then, they asked the bus driver, “Where are you from? You look to be of some Indian descent.” He said “I’m a Native.” They said “A native what? An Indian?” He said “No, I’m not from India. Columbus was lost and confused.” He patiently told them the name of his tribe, Tsimshian, and that he was also part Tlingit, and it was like they had no idea there were even any indigenous people here. It was crazy. They chatted amongst themselves a little more and he continued his conversation with us about different places to see, traditional canoes, etc.

Next, I asked the couple in front of me “So, what all have you guys seen since you’ve been in Ketchikan?” (even though I was pretty certain I knew how this would go). The wife answered with a chuckle, “Not much! Mostly the jewelry stores.” (OMG seriously??? Why on earth do people come to Alaska on a cruise to shop for stupid gemstones that no one has ever heard of, and that have nothing whatsoever to do with Alaska? It baffles me.) I’m totally cool though and ask her “So, is it a better deal to shop for jewelry here than where you live?” (Kevin was so proud of me.) She said yes, that whatever stone she bought earrings of was maybe a hundred dollars less than where she could get it at home, and they got a really good deal because they were from the cruise ship. I said I heard that all of those stores were actually owned by the cruise ship companies though…and she said, “Well, some of them, like Diamonds International and the Tanzanite places.” But apparently she thought she was shopping in a Native-owned jewelry store. She said “We’ve been here before though!” as if to excuse the fact that she’d only seen cruiseship-owned jewelry stores during her visit. I asked if they’d been down to Totem Bight State Park, or the Saxman Native Village before. Nope…like they’d never heard of those places. (Oh, but her husband just LOVES Alaska. That’s why they keep taking cruises up here.) I told her those places were definitely worth visiting and that you could get there by bus.

The bus pulled into the stop at the Totem Heritage Center and stopped. I told the cruiseshipper couple that if they had time sometime when they were here and didn’t want to leave the downtown area, they should check out this museum. There are some great exhibits with tons of interesting information. The husband noticed the totem poles out front and asked the bus driver if there was time to get out and take a quick picture. The bus driver said, in a loud booming voice “Nooooooo” and then smirked. The lady asked how long they’d be stopped here and the bus driver said “This is my 3 hour break.”

The husband got out and took a few photos the totems out front, and the lady said to the bus driver “We’re quite a ways away from our cruise ship!” and the bus driver replied, in the same loud booming voice, “GOOD!!!” (I could feel him winking at us as he said it, even from behind his dark aviator shades.)

At the next stop, another cruiseshipper couple got on the boat and the women immediately compared jewelry shopping stories, the woman in front of us moving her hair to show off her whatever-ite earrings.

We got off at the Safeway and thanked our cool bus driver for the ride. I shook his hand and he asked how long we’d be in town. I said we’d be bopping around for another day, then gone, then back for a week or so and that I was sure we’d see him again.

As we were moving to the front of the bus, the lady looks at me and asks “This’ll take us to our ship, right?” I said, “Yep, next stop.”

Best bus ride ever.

Airship to Alaska | Day 16 | Prince Rupert to Ketchikan

Laura Domela — Mon, 23 May 2016 21:38:45 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

Last night's Prince Rupert view from Airship:

We set our alarm for 4am this morning to check the 4am weather and forecasted conditions for Dixon Entrance to make the final call about whether to go or wait. At Dixon Entrance East, waves were 1-2 meters. Hard to know what that means without the period of seconds between waves. At Buoy 46145, which is smack in the middle of Dixon Entrance, north of Haida Gwai (so quite a bit further out to sea than we'd be), they were 6-7 feet high at 9-10 seconds apart. So as they got closer to land they'd likely be quite a bit smaller than that. The Green Island lightstation report said "Partly cloudy, visibility 4 miles, fog, wind calm, seas rippled." (Foggy usually means calm.)

Here's what the 24-hour surface forecast looked like:

The high pressure system and the really wide/far apart isobars…? That's good for us!

Side note: It's occasionally difficult to make the decision to "Go" at 4am from a soft cozy bed while it's mostly still dark. The decision, however, is made easier when you know the weather window might not be open for all THAT long. Here's the 48-hour surface forecast:

Here we are passing the Green Island lighthouse:

Fog….check! Light wind…check! Seas rippled…check!

We took turns napping, and then I made breakfast for us (bacon and eggs underway!). Once out in Dixon Entrance we had some swells (about 6 foot swells) but they were far apart and gentle and it was all no big deal, really. (Still, I'm glad I wasn't cooking breakfast at that point.)

And just like that, we're in Alaska again!

I think the worst/choppiest conditions we had were in Revillagigedo Channel on the way into Ketchikan, because we had wind over current (wind against us, current with us), but it was still fine.

Arriving in Ketchikan is always a bit of a shock when the cruise ships are all there along the shoreline. One enormous cruise ship (as opposed to a small cruise ship) was just leaving (we watched as it headed north out of the channel) so there were only three when we arrived:

Hey, Ketchikan…I know you're in there somewhere….

The city floats are just around this cruise ship's stern:

Oh hey big guy:

We called the US Customs office in Ketchikan while we were about 4 hours out (but hey! cell service!) to let them know our ETA and give them our information. Super friendly! They told us to give a call when we were about 10 minutes out, let them know where we were going, and they'd send a customs officer down to meet us.

I called when we were just outside the cruise ships and said we were going to Casey Moran/City Floats. She asked if we were there yet, and I said "Nope, I'm just coming around the last cruise ship though." She laughed, said to call when we were docked, and she'd send a guy down. We docked, I called, the guy came down. He hopped on board, checked our passports and customs decal, asked if we had anything on board that we shouldn't have, and then wished us a great trip and was on his way. Super low key and easy.

Last year with the flotilla we started out north of town at the Bar Harbor Marina (close to the grocery store and laundromat), and then moved over to the city floats at some point. I like it down here. It's closer to town, there's a lot going on, and yeah, it's in the shadows of the cruise ships during the day, but they're mostly gone by 6pm (and there are still hours of daylight left at that point!). Plus, the city bus that runs up and down the main road here goes right to the grocery store, which is still in the free zone. Score! We'll do that tomorrow after Kevin's conference call. We need some milk, eggs, fruit, veggies.

Airship and cruise ship, for scale:

For a late lunch/early dinner (like 3:30pm early dinner) we went over to Alava's Fish-n-Chowder to get some fish and chips (only instead of chips, we got asparagus and zucchini, done fish and chips style…so good…we had some last summer and wanted to c) and then walked around town a bit. We stopped back in at the Alaska Eagle Arts gallery (where I got my salmon necklace last year) and…well, I got another Marvin Oliver necklace. This one is a salmon egg, representing the salmon in egg form, as well as the circle of life…it's really nice and I love it. I'll get a photo and post it…but for now, this is one of the art cards, showing the red salmon, as well as the salmon in egg form (the embossed image…that's what my pendant looks like):

We wandered around town a bit more and then headed back to Airship to relax a bit. Today's route was 83.7 nautical miles, and took us 10 hours and 52 minutes:

I think next we'll head around into Behm Canal and check out Misty Fjords. A new place!!

Airship to Alaska | Day 15 | Hartley Bay to Prince Rupert

Laura Domela — Sun, 22 May 2016 20:13:31 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

Whoa! We made it to Prince Rupert! Two weeks after leaving the San Juan Islands.

We left Hartley Bay this morning at 6am. The cruise to Prince Rupert was almost 80 miles, so we had a long day ahead of us…

…a long day in Grenville Channel, that is. (Also known as "the Ditch.") This time in Grenville Channel was not nearly as exciting as our trip south was. (See here what I mean, in our post from last summer called "Bubblenet Bonanza".)

We did see a couple of humpbacks on our way though, also heading north like us.

Today's cruise was long and gray and pretty chill. I made breakfast under way (used the last of our crab for a little crab/benedict/florentine concoction), and we took turns showering, working out, and napping.

Fairview Terminal cranes as we entered Prince Rupert:

We arrived at Prince Rupert around 4:30pm and are staying at the new Cow Bay Marina. It's super nice! They've got power and water on the docks, trash and recycling, and their showers and washrooms go in…maybe tomorrow. So they're almost there! We walked up and had an early dinner at the Cow Bay Cafe (so good!!) and we're checking weather to see if tomorrow looks good enough for a Dixon Entrance crossing. If so, it'll be another 80 mile day. Woohoo!

Today's route from Hartley Bay to Prince Rupert (78.7 nautical miles, 10 hours 47 minutes):

Airship to Alaska | Day 14 | Khutze Inlet to Hartley Bay

Laura Domela — Sat, 21 May 2016 21:32:00 +0000

Airship Goes to Alaska 2016

Kevin went out to pull crab traps while I made breakfast. When he got back to Airship, I asked "Did we get anything?" and he replied "Yes?" with kind of a question mark at the end. I went out to the cockpit to see what was up. Turns out we had 5 small Red King Crabs. (We figured that out after a while of digitally leafing through the shellfish guidelines for CA and AK.)

They were obviously too small, but it was super interesting not to have ANY Dungeness.

Look at the roe this one's got with her!

We put them all back nice and gently. Who knew that Khutze Inlet was full of king crab? I guess we need a crab trap with bigger doors, so the large ones can get in!

We had some breakfast and then headed for Hartley Bay. Oh yeah, one more moon shot from last night in Khutze Bay:

Hartley Bay is a First Nations community, and home to the Gitga'at, which means "People of the Cane." The Gitga'at are members of the Tsimshian nation. About 200 band members live here in Hartley Bay, a community with all wooden boardwalks instead of roads. I don't know if you remember the sinking of the BC Ferry vessel Queen of the North in 2006 (on March 22, with 101 persons aboard, she failed to make a planned course change, ran aground and sank…word was that the captain and co-captain were involved in some, um, compromising positions and perhaps they were neglecting to drive the boat), but we learned this additional bit of information about this accident the other day: The people from Hartley Bay, with their personal watercraft, were the ones who helped rescue the passengers of Queen of the North…they arrived before the Canadian Coast Guard and the whole town and community center was turned into a rescue center, helping keep the survivors warm and fed. The town received the Governor General's Commendation for Outstanding Service on May 3, 2006, for "initiative, selflessness and an extraordinary commitment to the well-being of others" in the rescue; the honor also cites the town's "tremendous spirit and the remarkable example it has set". Pretty cool!

We got to Hartley Bay and were able to get a bit of cell service and internet, so we cranked out some work and a couple of blog posts before going to walk around town a bit.

The docks are government-owned and free, but donations are welcome (the $ goes to the elders). It's a nice system. They've got fuel and water at the fuel dock, and we had no trouble finding some room.

We had a nice night…visited a bit with the couple on the sailboat across from us, had some leftover crab bisque, and then got to bed fairly early. We'd definitely come back to Hartley Bay.

Here's today's route (39.8 nautical miles, 5 hours 32 minutes):