Ketchikan to Wrangell

May 18, 2012

Today we played tour guide for Bill, Ruth, Colin and Donna.  After picking up a rental minivan we headed to Saxman Village for photos and browsing the shop.  Heading down the road towards Herring Cove we stopped and watched a pod of Orca’s close to the beach.  Turning around at the end of the paved road, a mere 11 miles from Ketchikan we stopped once again and watched the orcas.  After parking at Creek Street and walking the boardwalks down to Dolly’s, the brothel museum, we had halibut and chips at the Alaska Fish House before heading out the northerly direction from town. Driving to the end of the road we stopped at Settlers Cove park and walked the trails around Lunch Falls.

Getting back in the car we then stopped at Totem Bight, with a collection of totem poles and a longhouse and then stopped at Wal Mart, a waste of time before pre-provisioning at Safeway and finally returning to downtown Ketchikan where we searched for Bill’s brother’s house from 60 years ago.  We could not find it!

After a long day we returned to City Floats for dinner and a obligatory stop at the Arctic Bar, Ketchikan’s oldest surviving bar, celebrating 75 years in business.  After Bill called his brother Howard we discovered we had the wrong address, confirmed by the lady bartender in the Arctic Bar.

May 19, 2012

Bill found the house he remembered this morning and after turning in the rental car we departed Ketchikan City Floats and refueled both vessels.  Spirit took on 640 gallons of fuel and headed up Tongass Narrows, up Clarence Strait, turning into Ernest Sound just past Meyers Chuck and headed for Santa Anna Inlet where we arrived at 1730.

After anchoring we set two prawn pots before grilling flank steak for dinner.  After dinner we pulled the two pots and found 32 spot prawns in our two pots.  After chocolate cake and drinks to celebrate Patrick's 65th birthday we finally called it a night in peaceful but cool conditions.

May 20, 2012

The rain continued overnight, but not heavy.  The prawn pots had mixed results in the morning, with only 3 dozen more prawns.  We decided to move on to Wrangell and arrived at 1415 after an uneventful trip up Zimovia Strait.  Since it was Sunday, everything closed at 3:00 PM so we missed shopping.

 The man street is torn up for repaving, so the town is even less attractive than usual, but as friendly as usual.

We have now travelled 874 nautical miles since leaving Anacortes.

Pictures in a few days!