Airship Goes to Alaska -Day 5
Our scheduled departure from Teakerne Arm this morning was a luxurious 9:30am! (We woke up at 6am anyway, but it was nice to have a bit more time to get around before getting under way.)
The weather was again gorgeous…sunny and high 70s.
Mark pulling up his anchor near the falls:
With the stern tie, you just untie the line from one cleat on your boat and then pull it through the ring or cable and you're free without ever leaving the boat:
We met up with the rest of our fleet and continued north.
American Tug (Big Red) joined up with us at the bottom of Stuart Island (they’d left a week early or so and had planned to meet up with before the rapids):
We got to our staging spot just outside Yuculta rapids about a half an hour early, so we hung out and waited until just after the local fish boat headed in, and then followed shortly after.
The current in Gillard Passage was the most squirrely, but not bad.
We got through and were still about a half hour before slack at Dent Rapids, so we made some lunch and milled about until it was time. Not a bad place for a boat picnic:
Dent Rapids were a non event at slack. This is right over "Devil's Hole" … see? Not too scary at all.
We continued on through Mayne Passage and then on to Blind Channel Resort & Marina, where we met up with another member of our fleet (Paul, in his Coastal Craft named Taleisin).
Mark and Margaret ready to grab lines from Thelonius:
The restaurant here at Blind Channel Resort isn’t open for the season yet, but they cooked up some pork roasts for us and we all brought sides up to the big patio for a nice group dinner.
Here we all are:
Here's today's track (36 nautical miles, 6 hours 3 minutes):
Our departure time in the morning is a bright and shiny 5:45am. We’ve got two more rapids to go through (Greene Point Rapids and Whirlpool Rapids) before heading into Johnstone Strait for a 14 mile stretch up to our next destination: Port Harvey.
