The log of S/V Lacuna, spring and summer 2005

Chapter 9

July 27-August 9, 2005. Pelican to Petersburg via Sitka.

7/27/05. The day began with internet access and breakfast at the Highliner Lodge in Pelican, continued through driving rain in Lisianski Strait, and featured some of the most exciting navigating I’ve ever done. South of Lisianski Strait, we snaked our way through rocks, islets, passages and islands following a route that went right over the words “heavy breakers” on the chart.

Pt. Urey (click here for larger image)

The rain eased, the visibility improved, and the Gulf of Alaska was pacific, but even so the sea was boisterous with waves and chop wrapping around rocks, reflecting from intertidal cliffs, and diffracting around islands. There was no predictable pattern to the waves—they just rose and fell with little rhythm or direction. Sometimes they’d hit a rock face and throw spray a dozen feet in the air.

Lacuna bobbed and weaved through the waves as I struggled to maintain my orientation and sense of place on the chart. There were many more rocks than the chart shows, the little islands all looked alike, and none of the visible features looked much like its representation on the chart.

We had two hand-held GPS units running, one hooked to a laptop running a navigation program. Both were loaded with the day’s planned route. I fired up the chartplotter so I could get real-time charting. The first sign of trouble was when the GPS and Ed’s laptop stopped communicating. I turned the helm over to him and went below to poke and prod at it. I found that closing the program and re-opening it was enough to initiate GPS-laptop communication, but after 20 minutes or so it would again stop communicating. I gave up and went back to the helm.

Last night, I printed blow-ups of critical sections of today’s route. I had five typing-paper pages of charts with the planned route marked on them. Despite the redundancy of the electronics and the charts, it was still disorienting to sail through the rocks and islands. I frequently looked at the chart and compared it with the view around me. Islands seen end-on look quite different from their appearance broadside. Were those black marks on the chart rocks or engraver’s shading? The water around me was bouncing and frothing. I was grateful to have the route outlined on the GPS—until it, too, stopped giving me the information that I needed.

Just as we entered the narrowest, most technical part of the passage, the day’s planned route disappeared from the GPS screen. The route terminated ten waypoints short of our anchorage. I later found out that the GPS could hold only 30 waypoints in each route. Our route plan, uploaded from my laptop to the GPS, had 40 waypoints. No wonder we were left wondering where to go in the middle of all those waves and rocks.

Fortunately, I knew where we were on the chart. I asked Ed to take over the tiller (“Go between those two rocks, I think. Don’t hit them.”) while I fiddled with the electronics. I had to make a decision fast—we were in close quarters with no way to park. We had to keep moving to be able to steer. After some frantic button-pushing, I found that the waypoints had been successfully loaded into the GPS, so I set the GPS to direct me to the nearest. When I got there, I set it to take me to the next one. After a while, the action got so fast that I couldn’t fool with it any more, but the passage became more apparent. I probably could have followed the route without the GPS, but it was reassurance I needed.

We idled through a narrow, rock-lined passage, wove our way through kelp beds, ducked around uncharted rocks, and found our way into Mirror Harbor. When we entered the passage, I had a vague recollection of the cruising guide’s description of a dogleg, but I didn’t remember just where in the passage it was. Ed was on the bow as I watched nervously from the tiller for his directions. It was too late for him to review the cruising guide’s narrative. He suddenly saw the underwater reef and pointed the direction to steer. Lacuna’s big rudder was quick to respond and we eased our way through a 60-degree dodge to starboard and a 90-degree dodge to port.

Mirror Harbor (click here for larger image)

Then we were in Mirror Harbor, one of the most protected and secluded anchorages I’ve ever seen. North Mountain, a glacier-polished tooth, towered over the low islands at the edge of the bay. Low rocky shores and tree-covered islets surrounded us. Quiet prevailed. In the background, we heard surf breaking on the rocks where we entered.

Lacuna in Mirror Harbor

Once we set the hook, we hung our rain clothes out to dry, put up the bug screen (no-see-ums again!), ate dinner, and marveled at the vista. On three sides, steep mountains falling thousands of feet to the sea. On the fourth, flashes of white foam as waves washed over the rocks in the entrance. Overhead, constantly changing clouds and sun holes, rain, then sun, then sun and rain, then rain, then more rain.

7/28/05. I talked Ed into staying a day in Mirror Harbor. White Sulfur Springs sounded worth taking the time to enjoy. The trailhead was about half a mile from our anchorage. While paddling the kayak toward the trail, we scouted the dogleg rock that blocks big boats from entering.

It was scary—the point of the rock was visible above a moderate tide, but there was a long spine just under the surface that stretched out from both sides of the point at a diagonal to the apparent passage. By luck, we had chosen the better of the two sides of the rock when we entered—and thanks to Lacuna’s small size and maneuverability and Ed’s good directions on the bow, we made it through without a scratch.

North Mountain from Mirror Harbor (click here for a larger image)

Near the trailhead, one boat was anchored. I recognized it as belonging to the Highliner Lodge and wondered if we’d see Steve, the proprietor, at the springs. We carried Bratwurst well above the high tide line and began the “15-minute” boardwalk to the springs. The guidebooks were in error. Even with a consistent pace, it was more like 45 minutes, but it was so delightful that I didn’t mind at all.

Muskeg along the White Sulfur Springs trail (click here for a larger image)

Much of the trail was on boards, but it wasn’t like the boardwalk main street of Pelican. The boards were laid on the ground lengthwise, two boards wide. Some boards were pressure-treated two-by lumber. Some might have been milled with a chain saw from nearby trees. Some were salvaged from the beach. One piece was especially notable—a big piece of glue-lam beam laid on its side, its edges and ends rounded by the surf. Sometimes the trail was boggy, with giant, luxuriant skunk cabbages crowding the path. Sometimes we had to clamber up slippery slopes by stepping on roots. The path wandered through muskeg, with stunted pine trees, moss, and pools of tannin-stained water. It skirted low rocky cliffs with views of driftwood piles, rocks, and breaking seas.

When we finally got to the hot springs, we saw a couple of small buildings, one housing the hot pool and the other described in the guide book as a US Forest Service cabin. The door of the latter was open, there was a small barbeque and a big, fishing-guide style cooler on the deck. Hearing our voices, a man came to the window and said, “Small world!” It was Steve and his wife enjoying a day away from their lives as hoteliers.

We went into the pool building and found one of the best hot springs I’ve ever enjoyed. There was a small changing room with plenty of hooks on which to hang clothing and towels. The pool was built in the native rock by damming up a natural pool. It was about five feet deep at its deepest, probably about 104 degrees, constantly flowing through. The sulfur smell was just enough to spice the experience.

The pool building had a translucent fiberglass roof, walls of milled log-like timbers, an open window looking out over a cove surrounded by rocks and islets, and a deck surrounding the pool on three sides. The window had glass panels that could be slid into place to protect bathers from driving rain. Under the window, the builders had left the view open between the underside of the deck and the top of the concrete dam that was the fourth side of the pool, allowing bathers a clear view of the scenery.

I stood on the deck, which drained to the intertidal rocks below, and bathed with copious amounts of soap, shampoo, and hot water. I took buckets full of water from the pool and poured it over myself. It felt great not to worry about the global energy implications of a hot bath!

North Mountain from the trail to White Sulfur Springs (click here for a larger image)

7/29/05. We got up early to make two shoal passages on the rising tide. It’s the neap tide, and the highs are not very high, so we had to time our passage of Dry Pass to coincide with the last hour of the rising tide.

We got underway in Mirror Harbor by 0610. After warming OB up, I turned the idle way down. Before I made the adjustment, OB pushed Lacuna at 2.5 knots while idling. After the adjustment, we made only 1.5 knots. After our exciting (a mariner's term meaning "scary") passage into Mirror Harbor, I wanted to have the option of going a bit slower. Thanks to our in-depth kayak survey of the dreaded dogleg, we knew the way out. We eased our way through, around the reef, between the rocks and islands, and soon we had passed the kelp and were bouncing in the chop of the Gulf of Alaska. We made an early departure to catch the rising tide at Dry Pass, a transit that promised to be even more exciting than the entry into Mirror Harbor.

Within an hour, we were entering Dry Pass, described by Don Douglass and Reanne Hemingway-Douglas in their outstanding (and essential) cruising guide as “an adrenaline rush that explorers live for.” They point out that, in addition to being shallow, the pass is “chock-full of eel grass and a few patches of kelp, confusing an echo-sounder and adding to the excitement…The narrows are a good half-mile long, requiring that you find a suitable route between and around the shoals, avoiding grass, kelp, and who knows what else! We recommend Dry Pass ONLY if you truly want to explore the off-the-beaten route.”

Dry Pass lived up to its reputation. According to Douglass, a 4-foot draft boat can transit safely on a 6-foot tide at Sitka. Lacuna can float safely in less than 3 feet. The high was predicted to be 6.2 feet. The math looked good. I set the depth sounder’s shallow alarm for 4 feet. We ventured in among the rocks and kelp patches. Ed was on the bow. A few times he directed me away from rocks, but for the most part we were scooting over a sandy bottom with lots of eelgrass.

We dodged the worst of the kelp patches (they often mark rocks) but still had to force our way through some dense growth. OB slowed a bit as the propeller chopped through the algae. The depth sounder skipped from 6 feet to 4 feet to 2.5 feet, emitting a shrill beep-beep-beep every time we went over a patch of eelgrass.

Dry Pass (click here for larger image)

I was ready to throw OB in reverse, pull the tiller hard over, or take some other evasive action, but for the most part the channel was straight. We never touched the bottom. I breathed a big sigh of relief when we got through! We went through other relatively tight passages today, including Surveyor Passage, Smooth Channel, Neva Strait, and Olga Strait, but they felt spacious after Dry Pass.

Mt. Lydonia (click here for a larger image)

We made the 22-mile run to our intended anchorage, Double Cove, before noon. As we neared the cove, we agreed that it would be wise to make progress while the weather was good and the sea calm, so we took a turn to starboard out of Khaz Bay and headed into the Gulf of Alaska.

Khaz Bay (click here for larger image)

Skirting the areas marked on the chart with notations such as “breaks in heavy swell,” “awash at high water,” “foul ground with heavy breakers,” we made a 20 mile run through the edge of the Gulf before entering inside water at Salisbury Sound. It was a rocking and rolling ride in what amounted to a calm sea for the Gulf. We agreed that this would not be a good place to be when the wind was up and the seas were big. Once again I feel humbled by Alaska fishermen and their little, slow boats out in these waters in all weather.

The view astern as we entered Salisbury Sound (click here for a larger image)

The mountains on the west coast of Chichagof Island are spectacular. Many are 3,000 feet high, with steep slopes that fall directly to the sea. Polished and shaped by the glaciers, the peaks are as sharp, smooth, and rounded as a canine tooth. The ridges are knife-edged, falling in near-vertical cliffs down both sides.

We saw many otters in Ogden Passage. “Many” is the operative word. We were joking about how routine the frequent sightings of individual otters lounging on the surface were becoming when I saw a mass of animals near the shore. I asked Ed, who had the binoculars, whether they were otters. At first he couldn’t believe his eyes and thought that they were birds—but it was a group of at least 20 otters lounging together in a loose line, their feet and faces in the air as they lay on their backs. Many were curious about us. They swam toward us and spy-hopped, holding their heads as high out of the water as they could to get a view of us. It might be a sign of how rare small sailboats are in these waters. As we motored along, we saw several more individuals and another group that was even larger than the first. What a delight!

Our blissfull solitude was rudely brought to an end when we passed the west entrance to Peril Strait, on the main passage from Sitka to the Inside Passage. Traffic picked up. Lots of 26- to 30-foot sportsfishing boats zoomed past us. Fishing boats plodded alongside us.

seiner Lisa Jean

In Neva Strait, when we were approaching a narrow point between two reefs, I slowed to drop behind a 36-foot troller that had been pacing us. As we entered the choke point, a 58-foot seiner entered from the opposite direction and two 26-foot sportsfishers zoomed in, one from each direction. Two slow boats and two fast boats crossed paths in the narrowest part of the channel. I couldn’t turn Lacuna into or away from the wakes of the speedboats because it would put me into the path of the seiner or onto the reef, so I just cursed and took the rocking. Ed and I wished we had a high-powered spud gun. Some powerboaters would be eating mashed potato pie!

Rainbow in Olga Strait

After a 12-hour, 54 nautical mile passage, we found a snug anchorage in the NE cove of East Bay, just nine miles from Sitka. Along the shore were three float homes, one listing badly. The other two looked inhabited, judging from the smoke coming from one chimney and the amount of stuff piled on the decks of both. All were of rather crude and impromptu construction.

East Bay float house

7/30/05. I slept so well that ten hours passed in slumber before I roused myself and began rattling around in the galley. Soon coffee and granola powered up the day and we set off for Sitka. It was an easy two-hour passage through East Bay and into Sitka Harbor. We tied up at the end of the outer breakwater. I like being out at the end of the dock for the privacy, but in retrospect this might be overdoing it. It seems like a half-mile walk on the dock to the shore.

New Thomsen Harbor, Sitka (click here for a larger image)

The dock system was built just a few years ago. It’s a huge maze of floats and slips with a couple of ramps down from the shore and lots of dead ends. If, by chance, one were to forget which of the two ramps to take from the shore, one could walk hundreds of yards along the floats before coming to the realization that one would have to swim to get to the boat (Ed came to this geographic epiphany the hard way). I had to study the harbor chart for quite a while to fix the layout in my mind.

Sitka (click here for larger image)

We put up the boom tent, waited for the rain to abate, then set off in search of the harbormaster and lunch. After paying the slip fees and finishing lunch, Ed rented a room at the Sitka Hotel so he could make a phone call to Dell. He knew he’d have to spend a lot of time on hold and decided it was worth the better part of a C-note to avoid making the calls in a phone booth.

He had just bought a 12V power plug for his laptop. When he plugged it into his computer a few days ago, it started smoking and emitting foul, sharp-smelling vapors. I yanked the plug out of the socket immediately and Ed threw the offending device out into the cockpit, but even so the smell lingered for hours. He hoped to get Dell to send another ASAP.

I walked to the south side of town, where I came across a shallow stream just south of the breakwater around the Crescent Bay marina. It had so many salmon (pinks, AKA humpies) loitering in it that there seemed to be more fish by volume than water. It was so shallow that their dorsal fins showed above the water. I walked down beside the stream and saw that it had a low fish ladder leading into a hatchery—and the stream into the hatchery was barred by a grate. Fish climbed the ladder not by jumping, but by swimming up the water discharging from shallow slots cut in the steps and by belly-crawling and thrashing their tails against the rocks in the shallows. The chute to the grate was so full with fish that every fish joining the pack had to displace another, which drifted back downstream. The shore was littered with a dozen half-decomposed carcasses. Several silver bellies showed in a pool where the bodies lodged.

Sitka has attracted cruise ships, but it doesn’t seem to be as warped by it (yet) as Juneau and Ketchikan. Maybe it's because they don't have a cruise ship dock; all the passengers who want to come ashore must be ferried in the ship's small boats, which reduces the number that visit shore. The installation of a cruise ship dock has been proposed and has met stiff opposition. It’s a town with a lot of civic pride, well kept and busy. There are two colleges, two museums, a strong Russian heritage, and a respect for native culture.

A house decorated with Tlingit totem motifs

This canoe was carved from a single log (with additional material scarfed on the bow and stern). The motifs are of the two Tlingit clans, the eagle and the raven. On one side of the boat, the eagle is at the bow. On the other side, the raven leads the way.

Totem Park, Sitka

Sunset at Sitka (click here for a larger image)

7/31/05. Wanting to get some exercise, we decided to hike up the Gavan Hill trail. It looked like a good workout: 2400’ vertical in three miles, an average of 800’ of elevation gain per mile. Despite the slope, the write-ups described it as a “moderate” hike.

There was nothing moderate about the slope, but the trail surface was much better than we expected. For the most part, it was a boardwalk of pressure-treated steps and planks. Sometimes the treads were as short as any stairs in a public building. Sometimes the treads were long enough to require a pace, thus putting the strain of the lift on the same knee over and over again. I’d take a short two steps per tread occasionally to put the repetitive strain on the other knee. On the face of one tread, I saw “HOEDADS” stenciled in black paint. It made me wonder whether our home-grown Oregon co-op worked this far afield and built this boardwalk. Sometimes the treads weren’t level because a support had slumped. Some single-plank bridges over ravines had a dogleg in the middle. Sometimes we had to scramble up short rock faces. In some steep places, the builders left a tangle of tree roots to suffice for ladder treads.

Silly-walking on the crooked stairs of the Gavan Hill boardwalk

For all our efforts, we didn’t get any grand vistas—just impenetrable gray clouds. But the close-up view was often spectacular on slopes so steep that the tops of 100-foot-tall spruces were almost within reach of the trail.

We took our rain coats, but we might as well have left them in the boat because by the time we were done with the hike we were soaked from outside and inside. It started sprinkling as we walked through town to the trailhead, so I put on my Goretex pants. After twenty minutes up the trail, I was overheating so I started disrobing. By the time we got to the summit, I was wearing only a t-shirt and nylon pants, both soaked by sweat and rain, while my shirt, raincoat, and rain pants hung from my fanny pack. The rain wasn’t heavy, but the trees were constantly dripping and every shrub I shouldered aside made my shirt wetter.

The lungs cried for mercy. The legs threatened rebellion. But we pressed on to the summit, looked around for the shelter said to be there without finding it, and started downhill again. I took off my wet, cold cotton t-shirt and put on the wet but not so cold nylon shirt and raincoat, and we set off down the thousands of steps we had climbed. As we got close to town, the rain started in earnest. The streets were running with water. Storm drains were almost overwhelmed. Drops were bouncing inches off the pavement from the impact of rain on the sheet of water flowing downhill. By the time I had walked the mile or two from the trailhead to Lacuna, my clothes were soaked. Only my fanny pack, under my soaked raincoat, was less than saturated. I was carrying a couple of cameras and lenses there, so it got preferential treatment.

I stripped under the cockpit tent—I didn’t want any of those wet clothes below until they’d had a chance to drain. After I put on dry clothes, I hung the wet clothes up in the cockpit until they stopped dripping. Then I set up the electric space heater (we were hooked to shore power) to blow into the head compartment, hung the clothes on the line over the toilet, turned on fans, and dried them for hours.

8/1/05. Today, another lay day in Sitka, I devoted myself to re-provisioning Lacuna’s supplies and exploring native culture. I bought fresh groceries at the supermarket a couple of blocks from the marina, wandered through downtown shops looking for souvenir trinkets, and attended the demonstration of native dances at the Sheet’Ka Kwaan Naa Kahidi community house, a traditional longhouse build of modern materials. The dancers perform only when cruise ships are in town, so I feel fortunate that I was able to catch a performance. They explained and performed a series of dances from the entry song, traditionally performed when visitors were approaching a village, through a greeting dance, the raven dance, friendship dances, and finally, the exit dance.

(click here for larger image)

I visited the Sheldon Jackson Museum, which features native artifacts collected near the end of the nineteenth century by the Rev. Sheldon Jackson, a Presbyterian missionary who was Alaska’s first general agent for education. The displays are informative and interesting, with wonderful examples of clothing, kayaks, tools, weapons, hunting gear, ceremonial masks, dogsleds, baskets, food dishes, and personal goods from most of the native peoples of Alaska. Jackson collected both artifacts made for daily use and items made for trade.

The good Reverend also founded Sheldon Jackson College, still offering courses and degrees. The college maintains a small aquarium with several petting tanks were visitors can touch sea stars, anemones, sea cucumbers, juvenile halibut, and other marine creatures. Although I didn’t feel the desire to touch any of them (I’d had plenty of that in my younger days when I studied oceanography), I enjoyed being able to study them closely.

I hadn’t been in Sitka long, but it was long enough to lead me to believe that if it’s not raining, it will rain soon. So I wore my North Face rain parka all day, but contrary to my expectation, it didn’t rain. I felt overdressed, but it was handy to have so many pockets to carry my map, camera, reading glasses, the literature I’d picked up at various places, and the socks that I bought.

As I walked along the dock, I came across another aggregation of moon jellies drifting through the marina on the tidal current. Thousands of animals were massed together, bells pulsing, forming a translucent greenish-white school. Once again, I marveled at the drive for social contact and paid my respects to them for opening my eyes to their abilities and motivation.

Moon jellies and bull kelp in New Thomsen Harbor

In the evening, as I was lounging on Lacuna, Ed burst in and pawed through the stuff on the galley counter. I asked what he was looking for. He said he’d lost his driver’s license. He realized that he might not be able to get back to the lower 48 without it—photo ID is required to get on a ferry or plane. He went back to the Sitka Hotel, where he stayed the past couple of nights, to see whether he’d left it in his room. He shopped at several places today, but they’re closed tonight so he’ll have to wait until tomorrow to ask them whether it showed up there.

8/2/05. Ed spent most of the day in one government office or another—or in transit between them. He finally ended up getting a fax of his Oregon driver’s license from the Alaska DMV. He had the local INS agent make a note on it and sign it. Together with his birth certificate, it should be enough to get him into the country.

In the process, he had to tell the Oregon DMV where to mail his temporary (no-photo) driver’s license. Pressed for an answer, he remembered that we had the option of going either to Petersburg or to Ketchikan on the way to Behm Canal and Misty Fjords. Remembering my favorable review of Petersburg, he said General Delivery, Petersburg. I had hoped to take a route I hadn’t navigated yet, through Keku Strait, but that would have led to Ketchikan, a town I’m not eager to re-visit. So we’ll travel through Frederick Sound and Wrangell Narrows, which I’ve already seen.

I went walking a couple of times and spent hours on the computer. By the time Ed got back to Lacuna, it was after 1400 and well into the time we’d be facing adverse currents. We decided to stay another night and leave before 0900 tomorrow, which should give us good currents all the way to Sergius Narrows. We’ll anchor just this side of the Narrows and wait until the next day to pass through them.

8/3/05. The weather forecast predicted 20 – 25 knot SE winds and lots of rain (“heavy at times” was the expression). I expected the rain but didn’t expect much wind in the narrow channels we faced today. The weather gods certainly satisfied the “rain” prediction—it rained all day long, sometimes light, sometimes hard. The clouds were low so we didn’t get the great views in Salisbury Sound that we’d had on the way south.

Dressed in a couple of layers of fleece and Goretex pants and coat, I was comfortable enough piloting Lacuna except when the rain drove under my bill cap and stung my eyes. I turned my back and stood watch facing astern, with quick peeks ahead, until the worst of the squall passed.

There was very little wind. As we left Sitka, we had a 5-knot apparent tailwind, so I raised the jib and throttled OB back, content to make 5 knots with it running just above idle. That lasted only an hour or so. When the wind died, I dropped the sail, never to raise it again during the day’s voyage.

Ed navigating.

We anchored in Shulze Cove, a quiet shelter just a few miles from Sergius Narrows. We’ll have to get up early to make the transit at slack, and should have a good ride to Hoonah Sound. There, we’ll have to kill a couple of hours waiting for the favorable current in the eastern half of Peril Strait.

Shulze Cove (click here for larger image)

8/4/05. We got up at the ungodly early hour of 0400 in order to make the passage through Sergius Narrows at the low slack, 0537. We hit the narrows right on the money and had favorable currents, at times over two knots, all the way to Hoonah Sound, halfway through Peril Strait.

About 0600, I pointed out to Ed that most people who work for a living were still asleep. Vacationing is cruel duty, having to get up so early!

The rain and wind eased, and though the ceiling was dense at about 1500 feet, the rain was intermittent and light. After yesterday’s rain, my raincoat was still soggy throughout. The air was dry enough between showers that I felt as if I should unzip the coat and stand with my arms outstretched in the breeze like a cormorant drying his feathers.

Where Peril Strait turns from northeast to southeast, at Hoonah Sound, we set the anchor in Nismeni Cove at 0905 to wait for the turn of the tide at 1300. It was a bit of a rolly ride with a low chop coming into the cove, especially when Lacuna turned beam-on to the chop and started rolling from side to side. Drinking water bottles fell off the cockpit seats and started rolling back and forth on the deck and thumping up against the cockpit footwell sides, adding percussion to the mix. I put up the riding sail to keep her cocked into the wind—we had no more wild rolling.

I expected that we would get a current boost down the eastern half of Peril Strait, but it wasn’t to be. The boost, if there was any, was minimal, but the wind was on the nose, making progress slow and uncomfortable. It wasn’t enough wind to tempt even Ed to raise the sails; it was just enough to raise an unpleasant chop. It rained, sometimes harder, sometimes lighter, all afternoon.

The high point of the day for Ed (who was on the tiller today) was seeing a humpback whale breach less than a hundred yards away. He shouted and beat on the deck. I popped my head up in just enough time to see the ripples spreading, but soon I spied the whale lying on his side, slapping the water lightly with a pectoral fin.

We arrived at Hanus Bay, our intended anchorage, at 1718, happy to be out of the chop and blowing rain. The bay is shoal. Half of the basin was occupied by logging operations in the recent past, and on the chart there are warnings about submerged pilings and unseen obstructions, so we anchored out more in the middle of the bay over a nice shoal spot.

Hanus Bay (click here for larger image)

8/5/05. When we weighed anchor at 0600, the tide wasn’t at its lowest, but we could see the bottom clearly—we were in only seven feet of clear water with few wind ripples. Ed enjoyed the view of the bottom as he pulled on the rode and watched the anchor pull out of its set, the mud sliding away as he lifted it.

I love this new anchor! It’s a Bruce knockoff (a fraction of the price of a genuine Bruce) and it sure does hold. It has set every time I’ve dropped it, which is a much different experience from using the Fortress danforth-style anchor (the best of its breed), which was often a little difficult to set. Many times I’ve had to pull it up and re-do the set because the Fortress just didn’t hook the substrate securely. The bow roller and the deck-mounted anchor lock make deploying, retrieving, and securing the anchor easy.

We exited from Peril Strait and headed south in Chatham Strait in a heavy, low overcast and light rain. It was my day on watch, so I was dressed for it. Even though the temperature was a relatively balmy 57 degrees, I was ready for cold. I wore rubber boots with two pairs of socks, fleece pants under Goretex rain bibs, a tee-shirt under two layers of fleece and a Goretex parka, and a bill cap (I have three that I rotate, from the soggiest to the least damp). I wasn’t overdressed.

We had only mixed success riding the currents south. At times, it seemed as if we were being headed. At other times, we got brief bursts of helpful current. I really feel frustrated that the knotmeter doesn’t work! With it, I could compare speed over water to the GPS’s report of speed over ground to tell what the currents were doing. Now, I have to go by the sound of the motor and the amount of water welling up in the back of the cockpit footwell (Lacuna squats when OB is pushing her at 5.5 knots or more) to tell what the speed over water is.

Kasnyku Falls

I stayed close to shore, watching for helpful currents, waterfalls, shelter from the chop, and rocks that barred the way. We just kept working our way south, with a brief digression to inspect Kasnyku Falls, until noon when we turned into Warm Springs Bay. We had kept our options open during the passage, with several potential anchorages at our disposal. We could have pressed on to Red Bluff Bay, but decided to turn in here. What a blessing that we did!

I was a little put off by the description in the cruising guide. A photo showed yachts rafted up at the small public dock. Specialty tours make this a destination. As we approached the town site of Baranof, marked by a few buildings and yachts tied up at the dock, we agreed we’d take a look. If it was a zoo, we’d anchor out and take the kayak in. Or we would press on to Red Bluff Bay, another 20 miles.

There was room at the dock for Lacuna. We decided to stop. The guide book said to beware of easterly current from the river flowing out of the 100-foot waterfall at the head of the cove. I saw it as we were approaching the dock. We were set up for a port tie, which would give us the best view of the waterfall a hundred yards away (the spot we were aiming for was at the head of the dock, with no boat to block our view). But a port tie put us stern to the current. It was a tricky entry and I blew it. I tried to make a U-turn too late, ended up bumping the bow into the dock, and was set crosswise to the current with a yacht close by downstream.

Fortunately, Ed had jumped off the bow onto the dock. He held the bow while I put OB in reverse, turned it to pull us toward the dock, and cranked up the throttle. As smooth as can be, the stern pulled up-current and into the dock, just as if we had practiced the routine. I realized in hindsight that I should have made the U-turn closer to the falls, up-current from the dock, and kept OB in reverse while letting the current carry me down to the dock. I could have backed in against the current with no bumping.

Warm Springs Bay

A big trawler yacht backed into the space off our bow by idling in forward gear and slowly losing way to the current while ferrying into the dock. It was a nice piece of boat handling. It was a little disconcerting to look out Lacuna’s portlight to see the pulpit of this yacht, halfway up our mast, slowly sliding toward us.

Baranof was once the site of a salmon cannery. It had copious quantities of fresh water, hydropower, and hot water (from the springs). Now, it still has the fresh and hot water, and apparently electricity from hydropower. It also has high-speed satellite link internet access and an espresso machine. And hot springs that draw tourists.

In a light rain, we set off to find the hot springs. The trail was sometimes heavily-built pressure-treated four-by material. Sometimes it was roots. Sometimes it was rocks. Just when I thought the trail builders had given up and left the pedestrian to scramble through muskeg and mire, another well-built boardwalk would appear.

We got all the way to the lake mentioned in the guidebook (something to the effect of “The trail goes past the hot springs to a lake. Rubber boots recommended.”) I knew we had missed the springs.

We turned around and as we were descending, two women came up the boardwalk and stepped off onto a muddy trail that led toward the river. They carried bags that suggested towels and swim suits. I asked if that was the trail to the springs. One pointed to the other and said, “She said so. I haven’t been here before.”

We followed them over a very sketchy trail to an idyllic setting. On a rocky cliff overlooking major rapids, almost a waterfall, a hot, sulfurous stream was intercepted by a concrete basin. White filamentous sulfur bacteria formed mats and long, waving threads in the basin. Pipes led to two rock-bound basins, the first too hot for me (but Ed enjoyed it, cooking out all the cold that he had accumulated in the past few days). The lower basin was sized just right for four or five people, lined with rocks slimy with algae that rubbed off and circulated through the pool every time someone slid along a rock. We adjusted the temperature by moving the outlet of a pipe supplying cold water.

We sat with the two women and found not seven degrees of separation but barely one. Wendy, who has lived aboard her sailboat for the last seven years with her husband, is from Australia. Her guest on board, Heidi, worked at Scripps Institution of Oceanography for 30 years, having recently retired. She started working at the aquarium in 1972, my last year as a graduate student there. (Burned out on academia, I left SIO and returned to Oregon.) We knew many people in common: Bob Warner, Isabel Downs, Doug Diener, Terry Parr, Richard Rosenblatt, Mia Tegner, Harry Lyons, and my good friends Bob and Sally Guza, whose son had attended high school with her son. It was great to hear about some of the people I hadn’t been in touch with for more than 30 years.

On the way back to Lacuna, we passed the Baranof General Store, which had a sign saying “open” in the window. I had no cash with me (and no undies, either, having dropped my wet bathing suit and put on my thin Goretex pants in their place), so I went back to the boat, changed, got my billfold, and walked back up the dock to the store.

When I stepped in, there were four people playing monopoly and eating ice cream at a table in the center of the room. Two were speaking Swedish. A fire burned in a wood stove near one corner. A Boston terrier came up to get strokes. I knelt down for a dog kiss. A chihuaha strolled through but wanted no more of me than a sniff of my hand.

One wall had shelves stocked with basic necessities: toilet paper, canned tuna, Rice-a-Roni. A computer keyboard and monitor sat on a small table near the wood stove. In response to a casual question from the table about whether I wanted anything, I replied a latte but don’t hurry (the ice cream was only half done). I took off my coat and stood by the stove for as long as I could. Finally, it was my time in the coffee line. I got a tall latte and asked about internet access. The barista (and monopolist) said help yourself, just keep track of the time you use. I sent a message to Jill to let her know I was OK and another to Kathryn to let her know that Ed was OK. It’s amazing to have internet access where there are no roads, power lines, or phone lines.

After dinner on board, I went back up the boardwalk a short ways to a public bathhouse constructed by the good citizens of Baranof with donated materials and labor, according to a sign. The building, on 12-foot pilings over the intertidal zone, included three bathing rooms, each equipped with a galvanized metal stock tank, 8 feet by 4 feet by 2 feet deep. Black plastic plumbing led hot water into each. One side had a locking door. The opposite was open to the 100-foot falls roaring in the foreground. Curtains could be slid across the opening for privacy.

Baranof bathhouse

Unfortunately, only one of the tubs was getting water. It had a standpipe about 18 inches tall, which should have retained water to that depth, but the water level was less than a foot. I figured that with such a big tub, I could stretch out flat and virtually submerge myself in that much water. I took off my clothes and climbed in. While soaking, I realized why the tub’s water level was so low—a hole had rusted through the floor and was leaking as much as was flowing in. I put my hand over the hole, closing off the leak. The response was immediate—the sound of water falling on the intertidal rocks fell to a whisper. The water level started to rise. I floated deeper, eventually floating off the rust-scabbed bottom of the stock tank.

Then a sudden, ominous sound hit—like a hammer striking the pilings below. After a brief alarm, I settled back into reverie. Then another, closer, more recognizable—the SPROING! of galvanized metal stretched past its accustomed limits. As the water level rose, the tank was responding by stretching and snapping into new configurations. I took my hand off the hole and let the water level return to equilibrium. I didn’t want to be in the middle of any tub failures. I imagined the bottom of the tub giving way and the headline: “Bathhouse collapses. Nude body found on intertidal rocks!” After a long soak, I oozed my way back to Lacuna, had a hit of 151 rum and lemonade (courtesy of Ed), and went to bed.

8/6/05. We got up at 0500 to catch favorable currents south in Chatham Strait. When I put on my glasses and looked out through the hatch, it was foggy. By the time we finished breakfast, it had cleared up enough to leave the cove. But when we got out into Chatham Strait, the fog settled in. Ed, on the tiller, followed the route line on the GPS. Down below, I checked our progress on the chartplotter and turned on the radar periodically to look for traffic.

The sea and air were flat calm. I knew we were missing lots of scenery—I could see the peaks on the chart. About the only interesting event was coming across four seiners setting out and pulling in their nets.

Seiner in Chatham Strait fog (click here for a larger image)

As we got close to Red Bluff Bay, the fog thickened. The entry requires passage among several small islands. We couldn’t see the rocky, tree-covered shore of the islands until we were almost on them. Twenty feet away, they were indistinguishable in the fog. They materialized in the next couple of yards and by ten feet were too solid and too close. I was grateful for the radar and GPS! The GPS pointed the way and the radar showed where obstacles and passages were.

Red Bluff Bay (click here for larger image)

As we entered the bay, the fog and clouds started to lift, and by the time we made it to the head of the bay we could sometimes get glimpses of the 4000-foot peaks around us. With a little difficulty, we found a suitable anchorage (most of the bay was too deep for our rode) where we set the anchor well on a short (3:1) scope to keep Lacuna off the rocky intertidal.

Red Bluff Bay (click here for a larger image)

We anchored by noon, so we had plenty of time to watch the scenery reveal itself. I counted a dozen waterfalls on two slopes visible from Lacuna at anchor. Most are thin wisps that form white threads down steep rocky faces. One is a substantial river that falls down a steep rock face hundreds of feet high. I’m sure that there are many more that I can’t see from this vantage—deep in erosion-carved draws, they are invisible from most perspectives. Rocky cliffs, steep faces with trees clinging to them, broad snowfields in cirque bowls, more steep rocks on every hand, surround the bay. At the head is a broad meadow around a stream flowing from a classic U-shaped valley.

Red Bluff Bay (click here for a larger image)

We had passed a big power yacht near the bay’s entry, but otherwise had it to ourselves all afternoon. Around 1700 I heard the low purr of a small diesel. I looked out to see Sea Fever, the yacht carrying our friends from the hot springs. When I popped my head out of the hatch, they all waved. Wendy said, “I told you we’d see you again!” A ferrocement schooner and a big power yacht followed them in and dropped anchor. We were secure in our little cove, and there was so little wind that we didn’t swing far.

After dinner, Ed spotted a bear loping across the aptly-named Bear Meadow at the head of the bay--the first bear either of us has seen on this voyage! The water is full of fish. Around the boat, schools of hundreds of salmon drift slowly by. All around is the constant noise of splashing as fish jump a foot or a yard out of the water.

8/7/05. Although I hadn’t intended for it to do so, the alarm woke me at 0500 with its shrill beeping. Even worse, I had left it on the electronics shelf on the far side of the cabin, closed in its case. We’d been getting up early and this was a day we could sleep late (or until 0700, whichever came first). The clock has a funky sliding switch that moves indeterminately through several settings, most of which sound the alarm at the set time. I had thought that I had found the no-alarm setting, but the evidence was to the contrary.

I scrambled across the cabin, pawed blindly through the stuff on the shelf (wearing neither glasses nor contacts), and finally found and silenced it. I had hoped to see dawn alpenglow on the peaks next to the bay, but the fog was thick enough that all I could see was a suggestion of brightness in that direction. I got back into my sleeping bag, zipped it up, and went back to sleep.

At 0630 I woke up again and glanced out the hatch to see that the fog had lifted and the sun was shining. Without dressing, I grabbed my cameras for some quick shots in the brilliant low-angle light. No more sleeping today!

We pulled the anchor at 0800 and idled our way out of Red Bluff Bay. This time, we got to see the spectacular scenery that we missed in the fog on the way in, including the broad, brick-red treeless bluff that gives the bay its name, standing prominently (except in cases of fog) to the north of the islands that almost block its entry.

Red Bluff

Baranof Island peaks (click here for a larger image)

But the fog soon enveloped us. I kept us alongshore so we could get views of the mountains of Baranof Island, but our route eventually took us offshore toward Frederick Sound. Finally, the last hint of a dark ridge against the sky disappeared and the world was gray above and all around. Sometimes the fog parted enough that we got some sunshine, but it kept us from getting any views. Most of the time it was thick enough that I ran the radar every few minutes to see if there were other boats around. We crossed paths with a couple of vessels that I saw only on the screen, but in a few minutes their wakes found us on the smooth sea and let me know that the radar had been right.

We made more than 20 miles in fog. I had charted a route that put us close to the Admiralty Island shore in hopes of seeing some wildlife and scenery, but we couldn’t see anything but the highest ridge tops even when we were only a quarter mile offshore. We made it to our intended anchorage, Chapin Bay, before 1300. I would have liked to have made a longer passage today, but we’re facing a stretch with few good harbors. Between Chapin Bay and Petersburg, there’s nearly a 40-mile stretch with no good harbors. Tomorrow, we’ll head for Petersburg. Another early morning!

We entered Chapin Bay in heavy fog, but as we made our way through the entrance, the fog disappeared and the view opened up. By the time we got to the cove where we intended to anchor, there was nothing left of the fog but a little tendril creeping in through the passage. Steep slopes ascend to 2000-foot ridges on both sides of the bay. The head of the bay opens up to rocky slopes that rise much higher. Fish splash and jump all around. Sometimes the glassy surface of the water is broken by dozens of dorsal fins and swirling tails as a fish school rises to the surface. Bald eagles call from nearby trees.

Some less welcome wildlife reappeared: bugs. I sat in the cockpit for a few hours this afternoon and by the time I was ready to do something else there were more than a dozen deerfly corpses on the cockpit sole. That didn’t include the ones stuck to the bottom of my sandal (these flies must be stomped—swatting just slows them down) or the bodies I’d sent to sleep with the fishes. Then as the day got cooler, no-see-ums replaced the deerflies and we had to put up the bug net.

8/8/05. When we got up at 0500, there was low fog in the bay. Dawn alpenglow lit the nearby peaks, but it was too misty to get good photos. Apprehensive about a foggy passage across Chatham Strait and Frederick Sound, I turned on the radar to warm it up before we got underway. But as we left the mouth of the bay, the fog disappeared and we found ourselves under a cloudless sky. Fog wreathed the near-shore waters, and we could see low banks of fog in the far offing, but life was good. Smiles broke out all around.

Our smiles got even bigger when I spotted a whale breaching less than a quarter mile away. We watched it breach twice, two-thirds of its huge body erupting above the surface. It fell on its side with a resounding splash. Then it lay on the surface and slapped the water with its pectoral fins. Sometimes it would float on its side and give the surface a hard forehand slap. Sometimes it would float on its back, wave its flippers languidly in the air before slapping the water back-handed. It might have slapped twenty or thirty times before rolling, breathing, and sounding, its flukes slowly disappearing into the water.

We waited a while, OB idling along, watching for it to reappear, then cranked up the throttle again and headed out on the long leg to the next waypoint, Turnabout Island. Along the southern shore of the west side of Frederick Sound, we saw many more whales. Most were in the shallows, so we stayed half a mile or more offshore to avoid disturbing them.

When we reached our first waypoint, ten miles from the anchorage, our average speed was way below what we needed to maintain to make it to the Wrangell Narrows entry at the slack, so Ed powered up OB and we started pushing hull speed, but were even so making only 4 or 4.5 knots over ground--we had a 2-knot adverse current. It looked as if we might not make it to the narrows in time. The only anchorage along the way was Portage Bay, twenty miles from Petersburg, meaning that if we decided to change our day’s destination, we’d have to cut the passage short soon after noon.

We found favorable currents and Lacuna’s speed over ground picked up until it was over 7 knots for periods and above 6 knots continuously. The current and tides software and the current atlas had been no help—they didn’t list any currents in Frederick Sound. But staying close to shore and riding eddies turned an adverse current into a helpful one.

We saw a very obvious boundary between two water masses. The helpful current we were riding was on clear, dark green water, probably coming from the west. A ripple line separated this water from a light green, milky body of water that probably came from the glacial outwash and the Stikine River to the east. In the glacial water, we got a 1.5-knot header. We chased the dark tongue as long as we could. It finally petered out near the shore and left us at the mercy of the tide. We pressed on, making up time, and by the time we were within five miles of the narrows we were able to throttle back and reduce the noise and vibration.

Petersburg (click here for larger image)

We hit the entry to the narrows at just the right time and rode the last of the flood to Petersburg. I hailed the harbormaster and asked for moorage. I gave him Lacuna’s name and overall length—the latter jogged his memory and he asked, “Weren’t you here before?” I said yes, two months ago, and it’s nice to be remembered.

We were soon snug in a slip near the ramp. Phone calls home preceded trips to the beer store and showers. The sun is bright, forecasts look good, and we’re planning to stay a day to catch up on shore-side tasks.

--Dennis Todd

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