Always Onward Adventures

Leaving Prince Rupert, we push through Grenville & Princess Royal Channels. Some long days, but we made some tremendous progress towards our Pruth Bay on Calvert Island- our last anchorage in north BC and a location that we both very much enjoyed. 8/28/2023 We had a lot of provisioning/refit to do this morning - but we couldn’t very well visit Prince Rupert without the obligatory Cowpaccinos breakfast and back in the afternoon for ice cream. We departed the dock around 2p, and after a very frustrating 45 min wait for the fuel dock to open up, we were off just before 3p. We were hoping to make it to Gunboat Harbor (the anchorage just north of the Grenville Channel), but a nasty headwind was building and it wasn’t looking likely that we would make it to Gunboat before dark. We ended up pulling off about 10 nm short of Gunboat with a 15 knt headwind - still 20 nm day leaving at 3p isn’t bad.

The weather looks spectacular for the next week - so we plan to take advantage. 2 days from Wrangell to Ketchikan and 2 days from Ketchikan to Prince Rupert. 8/24/2023 Early start today to catch the favourable tides from Wrangell to Meyers Chuck (one of our favourite stops in SE Alaska). We had a long ways to go today, 50nm. Normally we would have split this into two days, but with favourable weather, we want to get across Dixon Entrance and into North BC as quickly as possible. Turns out, calm seas, good currents, and very favourable wind got us there almost 2 hours early! We even sailed the last 3 hours of the 6 hour trip (across Ernest Sound) - holding about 6 knts the whole way.

We take on the Wrangell Narrows and on to Wrangell just in time for the Anan Bear Bay. 8/21/2023 Today was our read refit day - which has truly become an art of efficiency at this point. Kicking everything off at 8a, we wrapped up laundry, hardware store trip, and groceries with everything procured and stowed by 10a. The Wrangell Narrows (today’s adventure) requires that we leave at a specific time so that we reach the midpoint (South Flats) at high water slack tide. If we do it right, the flood tide will carry us to South Flats and then the begining of the ebb will carry us out the other side.

We head out of Juneau for some long days with good weather towards Petersburg - exploring Stephen’s passage & Frederick Sound on the way 8/18/2023 We left the dock at just after 5a - making our way down Stephen’s Passage. We will spend the next two and a half days in the passage heading south before we turn east into Frederick Sound and Petersburg. The weather is cool, but very calm - a welcome reprieve from the weather of this last week. We were treated with a beautiful view of the Mendenhall Glacier as we departed Auke Bay.

We leave Glacier Bay after taking a day to wait on some weather. We make for Hoonah in case more weather comes in and then head for Juneau. 8/12/2023 Our origional plan was to head out in the afternoon for Gustavos and make for Couverden Island tomorrow, but after looking at the forecast we decide to spend the night in Bartlett Cove instead. Dawn/Angela immediately inquire about a room at the lodge and much to our surprise they have one available. We check with the park rangers about staying an additional night (since our permit expires on 8/12) and they seem ok with us leaving tomorrow or the next day. With that out of the way, we settle in to do some laundry and relax for the rest of the day. With a tremendous amount of rain coming down all the rest of the day, we spent most of our time in the lodge or our room. The lodge resteraunt is really the only game in town (Gustavos is a 15 min cab ride away) so we head down for dinner and find the food quite delicious.

It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey. But every great journey needs a destination and Glacier Bay is our destination. Unfortunately for us, the forecast calls for rain during most of our stay at Glacier Bay. Fortunately, this place is beautiful even in the rain/fog and we are all in great spirits and ready to enjoy! 8/7/2023 While waiting for Dawn to arrive, we toured the longhouse - a traditionally constructed tribal house off the Hoonah Tlingit people. It was beautiful to see, but the best part was the artist that was showing the place off - Sara had so many questions for him about how to make drums, pendants, totem poles, etc. She asked so many good questions - many were things I didn’t think to ask but resulted in very interesting answers. For example, the green color in Tlingit artifacts is made from oxidized copper mixed with Salmon eggs…

We take do our Juneau fishing charter and depart Juneau - a bittersweet departure, but it was time - and make our way to Gustavos - to pickup Dawn and head into Glacier Bay National Park. 8/5/2023 Our day involved a later start than usual with a 10a fishing charter, departing from the marina next door (15 min walk). We met up with captain Levi and his deckhand and one other client - which we later found out also worked for the fishing charter as a mechanic, but was just on this trip for fun. We headed out to the far side of Pt Retreat near Funter Bay - a journey that took about 45 min in this boat but took us the better part of a day in our boat.

This post will cover our time in Juneau - not much boating/sailing in this one, but lots of exploring in a new town with the family. 7/30/2023 We ended up spending most of the day yesterday exploring downtown Juneau - which thankfully is a very lovely town (we were worried having already committed to spending some time here). Sara and I got some magnets for the boat and ate fish & chips on the boardwalk in downtown. We also went out to dinner at a nice resteraunt in downtown - something that hasn’t necessarily been available for many of the towns we have stopped on during this trip. Last night was our last night in the hotel, so today we will move all of our clean laundry (6 bags of it!) back to the boat and get comfortable on the boat again.