The Front Blew Through

Sunny and mild at 8pm in Ketchikan, City Floats

This morning it was raining and windy, really ugly. Now, at 9:00 PM Alaska Daylight Time, the sun is still out, we are in shorts and sandals and the weather is beautiful. The plan is still the same, depart in the morning, fuel and then head for Meyers Chuck and destinations north. Looking at the satellite weather, we see that the Pacific Northwest is getting the brunt of a low pressure system that is potentially headed our way. Hopefully we will be well inland and protected when it arrives, if it does??

Today was also Patrick's birthday, celebrated by walking 5 miles to get spare belts for the alternator, and then having clam chowder on the dock while Miriam and Patrick watched the "Amsterdam" depart and then sampling some Alaskan Brewing Company beers before walking back to the "Spirit". We still qualified for the "local" discount. The fellow in the dock shack was clear, if you are here after the boat leaves, you are a "local" and get the discount.

We will probably be out of cell phone and blog range until Wrangell, several days away.

We posted this blog from the "49er" Bar just across the street from the City Floats. It is the quintessential Alaskan bar, no food, lots of booze, several people that look like they are permanent residents of the bar, open 24 hours, and a cute older couple dancing to the recorded music while the pool tables in the back are fully occupied.

Rainy Days in Ketchikan

Ketchikan is not called the rain capital of SE Alaska for no reason. What were light showers yesterday have progressed to just plain heavy rain yesterday and today as a weak low pressure zone tracks over us for the next day or so. This has been a maintenance day, changing genset oil and filter, getting a halibut spear (and pointers from the locals on the best way to use it), doing a little tourist shopping and getting our Alaska fishing permits at Tongass Trading Company. We also moved the boat from Thomas Basin to the new city floats behind one of the cruise ship piers to be closer to the center of town by a few blocks. The disadvantage is that it is at the end of the seaplane "runway", so periodically there is quite a bit of noise. The Artic Bar is also at one end, but we are far enough away to not be bothered.

We had halibut and chips from the shack on the cruise ship dock, asking for and getting the "local", non-cruise ship passenger discount, before heading for cover on the boat and watching all the unprepared cruise ship passengers running for their gangways in the rain, only to stand in line for security checks! It was sort of amusing to see how many of them had purchased new raincoats in Ketchikan, yellow, pink or blue, especially since we did the same thing three years ago.

We also realized just how small the world is. We thought Larry and Karen Nelson looked and sounded familiar. Turns out that Margaret worked with him before he retired a few weeks ago, and both she and Sean have been aboard their Apogee 50 "Panta Rhei", which in Greek literally means "everything flows". Our former Jeanneau 49, now "Dilligaf" is travelling with "Panta Rhei" and a Valiant 47 "Ponderosa". Another interesting note is that I had periodic contact with his twin brother Gary Nelson while at Boeing. To make the world even smaller, our taxi driver yesterday was a 1967 Lincoln High School graduate, one of Queen Anne High School's perennial sports rivals.

Tomorrow, Thursday May 20 we head for the fuel dock first thing in the morning and then North to Meyers Chuck, Wrangell, Petersburg, Tracy Arm, and finally Juneau, where we will meet Julie Gill and Kathy Bullock before heading to Sitka, route currently unknown.

May 17 Photos

Sunset looking out Foggy Bay

The reflections in Foggy Bay are awesome!

Our former "Spirit" in Ketchikan City Floats, now named Dilligaf, you figure out the acronym!

Prince Rupert to Ketchikan

This morning we got up early (0450) and listened to the weather broadcast and station reports for Dixon Entrance, our second major crossing. The report sounded favorable, and we were underway at 0510, in the company of "Augenblick". We trailed astern of Augenblick through Venn Passage and by 0615 were in Chatham Sound bound for Green Island, Cape Fox and then Foggy Bay. We will stay overnight and then head for Ketchikan early in the morning before the minus tide.

Chatham Sound is nearly flat calm, with the biggest waves created by Augenblick, about ½ mile ahead of us. The skies are clearing to the west and it is looking like a beautiful day. The weather held, with calm winds as we passed by Green Island Lighthouse.

Shortly after 8 am Alaska Time (9 am PDT) we crossed back into US waters. The low westerly swell increased somewhat, but the wind remained light. Cape Fox was abeam at 0830. By 1030 we were anchored in 30 feet of water in the inner inlet at Foggy Bay, having called Customs and informed them that we would check in on Monday morning. Cell Phone service is non-existent in Foggy Bay, but was 4 bars at Tree Point, just 5 miles further south from Ketchikan.

By 1630, there were four boats anchored in the inner inlet, all of them had been at Prince Rupert in the morning when we left. Two sail and two power boats fill the inlet. The day has continued mostly sunny, with just a light westerly breeze. Since we have not yet cleared Customs, we think we must stay on the boat, but not everyone has the same idea, especially the one Canadian boat, which has set crab pots and taken off in the tender to explore the rest of Very Inlet.

As we approach Ketchikan for our first refueling stop, we are pleased that we have burned slightly less fuel than planned, and accumulated slightly less hours on the main engine. Due to the cruising alternator failure, we will need to arrange an oil change for the Northern Lights genset in Ketchikan since we are running it more, before we continue on North. We have shelved the charts for British Columbia, and the cruising guides such as Waggoner, which stop at Prince Rupert.

Some statistics:

Miles covered: 740 NM

Hours on main engine: 97

Hours on Generator: 80

Total Fuel, all sources ( the Kabola heater has been operating continuously except when the main engine is running): 610 gallons

Days at anchor: 8

Equipment Failures: Cruising Alternator, sea temp sensor on one of the depth sounders (it thinks we are in the Caribbean, reading 80 degrees), BBQ propane switch.

May 17, 2010

After a quiet night an anchor in Foggy Bay, we headed for Ketchikan. We arrived about 1045 am and are moored in Thomas Basin. We called on the alternator status and it had just arrived, so we hopped a taxi to the other end of town and picked it up, and shipped the bad one back in the same container. The new one has been installed and tested dockside and appears to be working normally.

While waiting for the taxi, we ran into the owner of "Panta Rhei", an Apogee 50, who we had met at Roche Harbor several years ago on our Jeanneau 49 DS "Spirit". To our surprise, he was travelling with "Dilligaf", our former "Spirit", so we walked down to the city floats, and sure enough, there she was!

Photos - Through May 15

Swells breaking off Libby Rocks, Percival Narrows
Patrick in front of Kynock Falls

Miriam with the same photo op!

Peacefully anchored in Khutze Inlet, inner basin,

the only boat!

The crumbling remains of Butedale!

Verney Falls, our anchorage spot in Nettle Basin, Lowe Inlet.

We are the only boat.

Shearwater to Prince Rupert

May 13, 2010

Yesterday we left Shearwater under gray skies, but with little wind. As we headed down Seaforth Channel, the swell in Milbanke Sound continued to build, along with the wind, and now some light rain. We decided that rather than have a 6-8 foot beam swell crossing Milbanke Sound we would go up Reid Passage, which we had not done before. There were a few exciting moments as we turned 90 degrees and headed into the entrance of the passage, with the swell breaking on the rocks on either side of us. However, in less than 5 minutes the swell dissipated and we headed up Reid Passage and then a few more minutes of exposure to the growing swell as we passed by Libby Rocks and through Percival Narrows into Mathieson Channel proper. We saw a few porpoise, and one whale in the distance. By this time, the rain was no longer light and the squalls even showed on the radar. The rain continued to build, visibility dropped and we motored up to Rescue Bay, at the entrance to Jackson Narrows, in weather reminiscent of our first trip to Alaska. The bay was deserted, and we anchored in 50 feet of water under a drenching rain, but no wind.

Later, two sailboats entered and anchored. We watched as one of boats set up a ramp and took a large German Shepard ashore for a walk. Both the dog and the owner looked miserable. The rain lightened so we launched the tender and set two crab pots. By evening, the rain stopped entirely as the front passed by. The crab pots were empty at dusk, so we moved them to a new location, hoping for some luck overnight.

In the morning, the skies were starting to clear. We watched a small drama of life and death in the wilderness as an adult Canadian Goose attempted to protect their young from an attack by an eagle. We believe the eagle got at least one of the goslings before the parents hustled them into the underbrush. Waiting on the sidelines were seals and some opportunistic gulls, waiting for the eagle to finish. Meanwhile, the crab pots held no keepers, just some small crabs, so we stowed the tender and headed further up Mathieson Channel to look at Kynoch Falls in Kynock Inlet. The falls are well worth the side trip up Mathieson Channel, into the beginning of the Fiordland Recreation Area (yes, BC spells it Fiordland). The area really reminded us of our trip up Sognefjord outside of Bergen, Norway and especially Naerofjord. After the photo shoot, we headed up Sheep Passage, through Hiekish Narrows and into Princess Royal Channel. We did not see another boat until we were in Sheep Passage, but as soon as we entered Princess Royal Channel, traffic appeared, including tugs, sailboats and fishing boats.

Miriam and I decided to go back to Khutze Inlet, since we had been there twice already and had good luck crabbing. We motored the 5 miles to the head of the inlet. It was deserted, and the waterfall we remembered as creating the katabatic winds in the evening was hardly running. We were the only boat, but there was a large group of seals cavorting in the shallow river delta at the head of the inlet, and one eagle circling overhead, later prowling the beach on foot. The water was murky and filled with lots of floating "stuff". After launching the tender with the intention of putting out the crab pots, the aggressive seals and the shallow water decided for us that it was not a good idea.

It is now after 10 PM, and we are still able to see (somewhat). The water is calm, but since there is a very low tide at 0830 in the morning, we plan an early departure to ride the flood tide up past Butedale and on to Bishop Bay Hot Springs, some 35 nautical miles away.

May 14, 2010

This morning, as expected, the tide was very low, and the Khutze river delta smelled terrible. The seals were still around as we raised the anchor and headed up Princess Royal Channel. We stopped for photos at Butedale, which has deteriorated even further since we passed by 3 years ago. The docks were in even worse shape and we voted to keep going, even though the welcome sign was out and a flag was flying.

We headed into Bishop Bay Hot Springs for a soak and overnight, but alas, the place is now a BC Park, with new rules on using the dock. We are too big, and the anchorage was full of large floating logs and a stiff onshore breeze. In addition, the shelter along the trail to the springs had burned down and the wood plank bridge was destroyed and blocked with yellow tape. We might have found a way around, but there were two more boats coming into the bay, and we put staying into the "been there, done that" category. We headed back down Ursula Channel, across Wright Sound where we were briefly escorted by Dall porpoises and then up Grenville Channel to Lowe Inlet. We anchored in 95 feet of water in Nettle Basin under mostly sunny skies, with the sound of Verney Falls and a 10 knot breeze the only sounds besides us. This turned into one of our longest days, at 76 nautical miles. We have now logged more than 600 nautical miles since leaving Anacortes, with only about 125 miles to Ketchikan.

 

May 15, 2010

We had a leisurely wakeup and breakfast as we prepare for the push up Grenville Channel to Prince Rupert. An uneventful trip in rain and less than 10 knots of wind. By 1630 we were tied up at Prince Rupert Rowing and Yacht Club. The weather forecast is favorable for crossing Dixon Entrance in the morning, so we will leave early.

Pictures will be in a later post after a meal at the Breakers Pub with Bill and Sherri Harpham on the Nordic Tug 42 "Augenblick". We have now crossed paths three times in the last 7 days.

 

 

 

Shearwater

Leaving Cousins Inlet with the town of Martin River in the distance

Our Smoking alternator on the test run, No Joy!

This morning, after leaving Ocean Falls, we transited Gunboat Passage (tricky) and arrived about noon at Shearwater. Just like many of the places we have stopped, no one answered either the radio or the phone. We were told they don't answer the radio until June 1.



We tied up behind a 42 foot Nordic Tug "Augenblick" that was also at Lagoon Cove several days ago. They are also headed North, and we expect to see them again as we proceed up to Ketchikan.



After contacting Selene Yacht Service to confirm plans for replacing the cruising alternator in Ketchikan, we reconnected the alternator to see the exact failure mode. Within three mintues we had smoke everywhere, and traced it back to the alternator. We spent the next hour clearing the boat of a fresh round of smoke, and then realized that we had not thought about dinner.


Pizza turned out to be the solution! We went up to the pub with the couple from "Augenblick", and had pizza's and beer before heading back to the boat. We can recommend the pizza!


In the morning we will head North again, but will probably not have either cell phone or internet until we get to Prince Rupert, which may be 4-5 days away.