July 15 - 18th - Thorne Bay

Whale Totem in Kasaan

The group under the World's largest Log Grappler

First my apologies on not getting all my photographs uploaded, I will be back loading all the photographs when we get close to Prince Rupert in a few weeks. Unfortunately for us, we are not able to access emails on the boats and have been reliant on places like the Thorne Bay Public Library -Hours on a volunteer basis 6:00 - 8:00 pm. So there is not always time to get everything uploaded.

Sufice it to say, its a bit frustrating but something we will be better prepared for next time we leave BC Cruising Waters. Updates will be coming your way n a few days on Thorne Bay, Craig, Klawock and Kassaan. Oh....and the whole flat tire on Dave's motorbike for Wayne......stay tuned.......I think we are still getting ointment on the blisters....

July 14th – Anan Bear Observatory to Santa Ana

Having seen quite a few Grizzly bear in Khutze, we did not have Anan on our list of stops. Anan is a protected bear reserve with a mile long boardwalk to an over the river observatory and blind from which to view and photograph the bears feeding.
When we met up with Gord Argue in Petersberg, he had said it was a great trip and that we should not miss it. The only problem is getting permits to go in for a group of 7. The permits are no charge but there is $10.00 fee at Anan, there is a daily limit of 60 people allowed into Anan to observe the bears. They do have cancellations or no shows at the observatory so we thought it wouldn’t hurt to go hang out for the day in hopes we could get a few cancellations. Turns out we were able to get 4, so by previous agreement, Dave, Penny, CJ and myself were allowed to enter. After a quick orientation by the Park Ranger, we set off (CJ & Dave first, Penny and I second). One of the warnings they give you in your orientation is “Should you encounter a bear on the boardwalk, stand your ground”…..Penny and I nervously laugh, but stop with the laughing when we see fresh bear scat all over the board walk on our walk in. We met up with CJ and Dave at the observatory and were treated to a pretty neat show by both black and brown (Grizzly) bears feeding side by side on the river. There was a Brown and Black bear within 20 feet the observatory giving us the bear eye as they trotted past to go down to gorge themselves on Salmon. It’s a bit unsettling, but we feel re-assured by the Park Ranger and his big gun. 20 feet does not appear to be much, but there is only a 2 board fence separating man and beast!
At 6:00 oclock the park is closed and we are escorted out by the park ranger and his large gun. We head about 13 miles down the strait to Santa Ana Bay for our overnight stop.

July 10th-13th – Wrangell

Massive Calving

The splash and ensuing Tidal wave are a bit daunting

LeConte Glacier from afar

Fossil emerging from a Bergie Bit

Slip Sliding off!

Alaska Marine Highway Ferry - 40 knots

Another Alaska State Ferry we met in narrow "Wrangell Narrows"

What are all those people doing on that boat

A very Happy Bean & Scott to see their accomodation

Wrangell Haida Totem

Wrangell is a quaint town that caters to a small fishing fleet, small pocket cruise ships and the logging industry. The people are fabulous and extremely friendly here. There are three taverns, 2 large grocery stores and a few trinket and trash stores. Population 1600. As in most towns in Southeast Alaska that we have been in, the over 40 crowd is seemingly always from somewhere else in the US while the new generation can boast that they were born and raised in Southeast Alaska.
We had pre-arranged our Leconte Glacier tour in Wrangell through the same company that Mike/Gayle and myself took 4 years ago. "Breakaway Adventures" is a great family run operation and we highly recommend them! The trip did not disappoint!
LeConte Glacier is the southern most Glacier in S/E Alaska that is still active and reachable by water. It too is receding but we hope it will be around for a lot more years for all to enjoy. It is not advisable to take your own boat in as the entrance and route to get in is ever changing and very shallow.
It’s an all day event going into the glacier due to the tide timings. On the jet boat, we need a minimum of 8 ½ foot tide to ensure we can cross the Stikine River Delta without coming to abrupt halts on the sandbars. We have 8.7” tide, so its seatbelt time until we clear the delta. There are 6 other people on the trip with us, and I do believe we would have them "Canadianized" prior to the end of the trip! With lunch, appies and cold beverages, we were able to pass the day in fine form. The drawback to all those cold beverages, was the “pee in a bucket” washroom! Oh well….roughing it isn’t for the faint of heart!
Our guide, Jarrod was very knowledgeable and he was able to get us very close to the glacier safely. He had some good knowledge on glaciers that we did not know about and he was very kind in making sure we received two trips to shore for washroom duty. We were treated to some pretty spectacular calving by Leconte Glacier and dodged a fair amount of ice bergs on the way out. The noise of the calving is quite loud and the ensuing spray and tidal wave are a lot of fun to enjoy when with experienced guides.

We managed to hit two of the three taverns in Wrangell and we had pizza and pull tabs for dinner one night – a $200.00 winner was had by CJ and Cathy! Thanks for buying the pizza! Gayle, Bean and Scott flew out on the 13th and we head down to Anan.

Forgotton Moment: As you are aware, we have the three boat meal rotation. On our arrival in Wrangell, it was Cathy's turn to make Dinner. So all 10 of us piled onto Sambuca for Shepards Pie. After a day of catching up and an impromptu Secret Cheese and Port Meeting, it was time for dinner. In the blink of an eye, the smoke alarm goes off and there are flames in the oven.....picture this: Mike running around looking for a fire extinguisher, Wayne yelling "Noooooooo" - don't ruin our dinner....Bean sprinting for the door, Betty Looking for her camera, CJ wedged in between his uncle Scott and Dave deciding that sitting between "older than Dirt Dave" and the past president of the "Sausage Club" Scott, his only recourse to get off the boat was to open the window and jump into the water. Thankfully Cathy had a calm head, turned off the oven, closed the oven door tight and let the fire extinguish itself. It was a very funny sight, in retrospect!

July 9th – Petersberg to Wrangell

A short run down (26 miles)“Wrangell Narrows” to Wrangell to pick up Bean and Scott. We screw up the time that we think they are arriving and they phone us in Petersberg that they have arrived in Wrangell. We are sure they can amuse themselves in town while waiting for the flotilla to arrive. While traversing Wrangell Narrows, we hear on the VHF that the ferry has just entered the Narrows from the other end. We spot him early enough and pull over to let him by. It certainly gave Dave a pucker factor of 7 when Dave and Wayne encountered the ferry a few miles behind us. We were able to blow the cobwebs out of the motors by cruising over at 17 knots (gulp…..the horror…the horror of it all….the fuel consumption) allowing Wayne and Dave to catch up to us at their own pace.
We stayed at the new marina in Wrangell (Reliance Harbour) for three nights and then moved over to the inner harbor for our last night.

July 8th – Endicott Arm to Petersberg

Petersberg, Fishing Marina

Sambuca Driving past a manned Lighthouse

Close up of the Manned Lighthouse in Fredrick Sound

Norweigian Monument to all those who have lost their lives to the sea

"Sons of Norway" Center

Overview of the Marina basin

A long run from Endicott Arm takes us into the picturesque town of Petersberg. A Norwegian founded town with everything related to fishing can be found here. We recognize quite a few of the fishboats from Baronoff Warm Springs in the marina and they tell us that the fish opening on July 2nd was not all that great. We also ran into Gord Argue and his wife Nancy from BYC who are on their way up to Glacier Bay. Our new Sailboat friends “Good News” from Bishop Bay and Ketchikan are also in this marina on their way north and Wayne’s good friend Craig whom we saw in Fury Bay was also in Petersberg. It was good to catch up with all these people. We went to dinner at the café at the head of the ramp to the marina and found the food to be quite good. A walk to town to pay our moorage in the morning and do a little bit of shopping and sightseeing. With Mike’s roots being Norwegian, it was great to see all of the Norwegian trinkets and monuments to the norse fishing fleet in Petersberg.

July 7th – Taku Harbour to Endicott Arm

Mike & Betty waiting for some Calving

Not To Be disappointed, a rather large chunk falls off

A view from afar to give you some depth of the size of Calving

The Davisons playing in a large Bergie Bit

One of the Larger Breaks in the Glacier we witnessed

The noise is tremendous when the glacier Calves

Receding Glacier "Sum Dum Glacier" (name is real)

Shaman Playing in the Bergs

Oceanaire playing Hide & Seek

Our First Look at "Dawes Glacier"

Bad Kids playing in the bergs

"I'll get the ice for Martinis"

"Nice Hat"

Oceanaire Hiding in the Bergs

A flipped Berg with a Bird

Bergs

Posing beside Bergs

Shaman Nestling up to a berg

"I Can touch it"

Pull out time is 5:00 am. Enroute through our passage in Endicott Arm, we take big boat shots with the Ice Bergs. There are more humpback whales in the Arm than the outside straight, with plumes of “Whale Smoke” (CJ’s terminology) shooting up all around us. After dodging Ice Bergs for about 8 miles, we arrive at 11:00 am to “Fords Terror” well inside Endicott Arm. The anchorage we have chosen is a bay behind a big sand bar at the entrance to Fords Terror and we hope we are well protected from the floating ice bergs. Hopefully we do not have to fend off ice during the night. The only incident is around 3:00 am when Mike and I wake up to a really loud twang, we get dressed, go outside and look around the boat and all seems clear, it happens again when we go back to bed. We are puzzled, but do not worry as we do not see any Ice Bergs. With our morning coffee, we notice that the smaller ice bergs are swirling around the perimeter of the bay and a couple of small “Bergie Bits” get caught up on our stern line. We surmise that this is what the noise was in the middle of the night. Turns out our stern line is tight enough to be played as a Bergie Guitar.
We load up the dinghies and first go exploring around the bay where we are anchored. We clown around with our dinghys driving in and out of a beached Iceberg and chip off some ice to celebrate Dave’s 66th birthday. Within 20 minutes of leaving this iceberg, it has collapsed. Perhaps we had better listen to the advice in the books and stay away from these bergs, better yet, we are blaming Wayne for chipping off some ice for the imminent collapse of the Berg. We dinghy into “Ford’s Terror” and are not the least bit terrorized until we go to come out and the tide is against us and in order to get out, you must go a high speed against the current while dodging clear, hard to see Bergie Bits. We reload our dinghy’s with supplies (this is a high speed gunkhole), get out our rain gear and head the 11 miles to Dawes Glacier by dinghy. It’s a beautiful ride in and we spend about an hour ½ at the front of the glacier watching it calve. In hindsight, we should have left the dog on the boat, I don’t think Kobi could have been any more terrified from the noise coming off of the glacier. The sound of the cracking Ice, and the dynamite sounding crashes when the ice falls into the water is pretty loud, I think that Kobi thought it was the 4th of July all over again. We were able to get some tremendous footage both on film and in video of the crashing of ice. Pretty Awesome sight! While we are in there, a pocket cruise ship from “National Geographic” has come into the glacial bay and is letting off all of its passengers in large rubber tenders and they are getting lectures on the glacier and all that is happening while we are in there. The swell from the falling ice from the glacier is long and low and it causes quite a current inside the bay. On our way back to the big boats, it is pelting with rain and we all feel like we were sandblasted and popsiclized (air temp is around 40 degrees farenheit) A great dinner on Sambuca and off to bed early. We managed to cram 2 full days into one despite ourselves!

July 6th – Juneau to Taku Harbour

Sail Attached to Propeller traveller

Penny & Scupper check out the Forestry Cabin

View of the State Docks and our Lovely Boats

A "Secret Cheese Society" Meeting in Progress with Port

a little Cuddle on the docks after the Secret Cheese Society Meeting

View of the remains of the Dock at the old Cannery in Taku

The morning is a bit dreary and grey and the winds are light. 3 hours into our journey south, we run into some pretty hefty winds of up to 40 knots. We are only a few miles off of Taku harbor, so we pull in and spend the day waiting out the winds. The docks fill up quickly with other boats (both pleasure and commercial) wait out the winds. It appears to be a repeat of Meyers Chuck, winds are raging 40-50 knots outside and we are getting winds of 30 knots at the docks. Another wise decision to stay put. A bit of excitement when a Sailboat wraps its sail around its own prop and has to be towed into the docks via a fishboat, with no steerage and no motor. Pity the person that has to jump in to untangle that mess in 52 degree water.

Alaska Forestry folks have done a great job throughout Alaska with mooring buoys, cabins for use and boardwalks in quite a few remote locations. In Taku we view a cabin that is free to use by anyone. We see a logbook that shows that quite a few people have been staying in this cabin in Taku.

Lots of card playing, a "Secret Cheese Society" Meeting with some nice Port.Early to bed and up early to the head of Endicott Arm and our first glacier up close and personal.