Full Circle

I left Nanaimo early to slip through Dodd Narrows on the tail of the ebb tide. Dodd Narrows is the last, albeit minor, tidal rapids between me and Anacortes. The weather was pretty good but I could have done with a little less breeze.

There were many options and I could have extended the cruise but I was still focused on going home. I called the Small Boat Clearance Center and was once again a bit surprised at the apparent lack of coordination in the Department of Homeland Security. However, I was able to clear Customs without another face to face. I then called the marina in Anacortes and scheduled a haul out for 1000hrs on Friday, the 27^th. The next call was to the Motor Carrier Services Division of Montana Department of Transportation to have an over-width permit faxed to the marina. Everything was in place to drag DUNVEGAN back home to Montana.

I motored to an anchorage in Shoal Bay on Lopez Island to make a short hop across Rosario Strait to Anacortes in the morning. I had anchored in Shoal Bay on a previous cruise and found it nice and quiet. This time there were crab trap buoys everywhere and crab boats zipping around the bay like it was some kind of demolition derby competition that lasted until sundown. I stayed anyway and it did quiet down.

I awoke at 0300hrs and climbed into the pilothouse. The water was like glass, the air was warm and still and the sky was light. I stood there at the bridge and looked through all the pilothouse windows, remembering all the days of the cruise. The boat had done everything I asked of her and all without hesitation. She carried me and my first mate on a wonderful passage to Alaska and, with the Lord’s blessing, returned us safely home. It was so peaceful and I felt so at ease. It came to me at that moment; I must sell DUNVEGAN.

I knew I would not be making a similar or better cruise than this one, at least not in this boat, and I would not want to diminish the experience by doing something less. I will return to Alaska in a boat, but under different circumstances. It is now time to pass this great little tug on to someone else so they can experience the joys she still has to offer. I will not be towing DUNVEGAN back to Montana. I will probably leave her in Anacortes and list her with a broker (ouch!).

I hope some of you have enjoyed this blog as much as I have enjoyed putting it together. I am thankful for the encouragement of friends and family along the way and am eternally thankful for having had the opportunity to experience the wonders we’ve seen on this trip and the ability, through technology, to share some of that with you.

I will probably make a couple more posts in the near future when I have an opportunity and will be glad to address any comments. Here are some leftover photos. Thanks!

M/V DUNVEGAN is officially for sale. Inquiries can be sent to fogillin@gmail.com.

My Headed Home Face

The weather has turned absolutely beautiful! Unfortunately, as you know Ginger has flown out back to hot, hot, hot Montana.

I have gotten the romantic vision of solo cruising out of my head and so I am now focused on going home.

For those of you who know the area, I motored from Lagoon Cove to Francis Bay (N 50 degrees 21.011' W 125 degrees 02.506') at the lower end of Yaculta Rapids, 69nm, transiting all five tidal rapids. I noticed a Sundowner Tug at the dock in Shoal Bay but I was between rapids and couldn't take the time to stop in. I think it was a 36' with red trim. The further south I get the more boats there are. Going through the rapids was like playing bumper cars! That was the day after Ginger left, yesterday.

Today I left Francis Bay and am now at anchor in Nanaimo Harbour, 88nm! New record for me in a slow boat solo. Excellent traveling weather and favorable currents.

These photos are; my going home face, another shot of Cutter Cove and an example of what I mean when I say there are too many boats. That is a shot of my radar screen while at anchor in Nanaimo (notice the scale).

I should be back in Anacortes in acouple of days. 1963nm to date.

Alaska veteran M/V DUNVEGAN may be for sale.

Changeup

(This was written two days ago and I've traveled a lot since but here is what I had to say then.)

Fog, fog, fog and five straight days of driving rain. These photos are of Lagoon Cove Marina, Ginger's ride and morning in Cutter Cove.

But today is a transition day. Same weather this morning but much improved in the afternoon. Broken skies and the sun is burning hot when it peeks through. The boat is soggy. Soggy to the point that there is mold growing in many, many hard to clean places. Everything that can be opened is now open.

The other part of this transition is that Ginger flew out of Lagoon Cove (N 50 degrees 35.939’ W 126 degrees 18.821’) on a Kenmore Air float plane. The plan was that I would see that she got off OK and then I would head downstream trying to make a full day’s transit in a half of a day. But Kenmore Air was four hours late and put me way behind the curve so I am spending the night in Lagoon Cove again. There are worse things than spending another night here. Tomorrow morning I will shove off at 0530hrs.

I am sad to see her go. Ginger has been the best first mate. I have put her through the fog, the endless rain, the five footers, the eight foot steep-to swells and the long days with not a whimper. There have also been the amazing, beyond belief days sprinkled throughout! She spent 44 days on this little boat with me, that might be asking too much. I would do it again in a heartbeat!

It is really amazing how quickly things can change. I am rapidly shifting back into my singlehanding mode. I have been aboard 65 days as of today and am feeling quite comfortable with it. I was feeling very pressed to push hard to get back to Anacortes once Ginger left but with the weather change and the experiences along the way, I am now starting to want this to never end.

Dear Owen

Owen,
As much as I sometimes worry about something going wrong, DUNVEGAN (PLACEBO) has not missed a beat. she is a natural for this kind of cruising. We have met a lot of people cruising who admire her even though she is usually the smallest boat in the harbour. Thanks for taking such good care of PLACEBO (DUNVEGAN) and passing her onto us. She has given us a once in a lifetime experience and we are grateful. (Although, this trip has convinced us that we will return to Alaska in a boat).

Tom and Ann remembered the boat and said to say hi to you and Suzette. I updated them on BOOMER, I think they would like to hear from you sometime.

My advice to you is to not wait until everything is perfect with BOOMER to cruise to Alaska, just do it! You will probably want to make some modifications as a result of the cruise anyway.

We are currently sitting at the dock in Kwatsi Bay, still as wonderous as ever. In two days we will be in Lagoon Cove where Ginger will fly from, back to the lower 48. I will singlehand back to Anacortes on no particular schedule. We stopped by Lacy Falls on the way in. Here are some shots of the falls and Kwatsi Bay.

Fog and Fish

Arriving at Shearwater after a long run we took on fuel, took showers, did the laundry, shopped for groceries and went to dinner in a real restaurant. Sorry, no time for blogging.

As I write this (7-19-07, 2112hrs.Pacific Time), we are at the dock at Greenway Sound Marine Resort (N 50 degrees 50.323' W126 degrees 46.290'). Business looks to be a little slow here but they weren’t even open when I came by here on the way up.

I will catch you up on the last three days.

We left Shearwater knowing we would find an anchorage north of Cape Caution and stage for the big crossing. Cape Caution, you will remember is the biggest crossing on this cruise and feared by many and I am at the top of the list. As we approached the SE end of Fitz Hugh Sound we were monitoring the weather, buoy and lighthouse reports and everything was looking good. Except, of course, the fog bank at Egg Island. We decided to push on to find the edge of the fog bank and then find the nearest anchorage. At some point you reach a point of no return in this area and we reached that point before we got to the fog bank. The sea state was looking good and we still had some daylight left. One thing I’ve learned on this trip is, if you see an open window, jump through it!

So we did. About a half of a mile past Egg Island we ran into the fog. At first it still allowed about a quarter of a mile of visibility but that soon went away. The rest of the crossing to Allison Harbour past Cape Caution was in less than fifty yards of visibility, we never saw Cape Caution. The approach to Allison is littered with rocks, small islets and Allison Reef. Sometimes the word "cruising" just doesn't seem to fit.

Right in the middle of trying to decipher all the little black and grey splotches chasing each other around on the RADAR screen, two targets abruptly appeared on a heading intersecting with our course making us ground zero. The targets were moving together leading me to believe a vessel was towing something and it was moving much faster than we were. The prudent thing to do would be to deviate from your course to starboard hoping to pass port to port. All the while hoping the skipper of the other vessel picked you up on his RADAR and was also prudent enough to deviate from his course to starboard. We passed within 1/8 of a mile and didn’t see each other so I guess one could say it was a successful maneuver.

We spent the night in Allison Harbour and awoke to heavy fog again. About mid afternoon we decided to spend another night due to the fog. After setting the crab trap we motored out to the mouth of the harbour to look for a good fishing spot in deeper water and could see that the visibility had improved somewhat. So we ran back, grabbed the trap and headed to Blunden Harbour 20nm away.

Blunden is a nice place and had about a dozen boats sitting in it waiting to head north or south, either way in the fog. We left in the morning at a time that would get us to Wells Passage on the flood tide and carry us out of Queen Charlotte Sound and into the protected cruising waters of the Broughton Archipelago.

We have been running pretty hard for two weeks now and haven’t done any fishing so I decided to tease some bottom fish on the way in to Wells Passage. I turned back a couple small rockfish and then found a nice wall to fish. One 36” lingcod, in the boat! In case you don't know, lingcod are really mean looking with big mouths and taste really good.

I filleted him (actually her) in the driving rain, drove to Greenway Marina in the driving rain and am writing this in the driving rain. At least it is not windy.

Tomorrow will be here soon.

We have put on 702nm in 14 days since leaving Juneau averaging 50nm per day. 1761nm total to date.

Admit It, There are Easier Routes

We left Klemtu with a favorable weather report (except for the fog which didn’t last very long) and decided to take on Milbanke Sound where I got me butt kicked on the way up. Well, that lasted about three miles, or until the swells reached about eight feet and a little too steep. Ginger didn’t much like that and I didn’t either. We reversed course and headed for Oscar Passage to take the much more protected inside route to Ivory Island. This route is very interesting in a lot of ways. At one point we transited a narrow point against 5kts of current. That is a lot when your boat only goes 7kts.

Once inside Reid Passage we saw a humpback whale in 20 to 30 feet of water! There is something amazing around every corner.

The water smoothed out and the run past Bella Bella to Shearwater put on another 50nm. As happens quite often, we were the smallest cruising boat in the harbour.

Spirit Bear Makes an Appearance

Note to “Chicago”:

The reason the glaciers are blue is because the ice is formed under tremendous pressure, and all the oxygen is forced out of the ice. So it is not at all like the stuff that comes out of the freezer compartment of your Frigidaire. Like getting diamonds from coal, except not. Anyway, the glacier ice absorbs most of the light spectrum, except the blue light, which is reflected, making the ice blue.

Note to Gigi:

Think I’m pulling your leg on the halibut huh? Here is an exact quote, taken from the British Columbia sport fishing guide, “Halibut larvae begin life in an upright position with an eye on each side of the head. When they are an inch long, the left eye moves over the snout to the right side of the head and pigmentation on the left side fades.”

Ain’t nature wonderful!

From Coghlan Anchorage we crossed Wright Sound and entered Princess Royal Channel. This channel is also long and narrow but is beautiful. I posted some waterfall photos from this area earlier. Here are a couple photos of the channel where you can get an idea of the weather and spectacular scenery.

The Canadian Coast guard was conducting some barge, helicopter and ship training exercises in the channel so we had to behave ourselves as we passed by.

Now the best part! I had been feeling bad about not being able to spend the time to explore the west side of Princess Royal Island looking for the elusive Kermode bear, a white phase black bear called the “Spirit Bear”. Motoring down the channel I just happened to be looking in the right place at the right time and saw one on the shoreline! We slipped slowly in towards shore and cut the engine. The bear was grazing on the new grass high on the rocky shoreline and didn’t seem to mind the attention. I do have to apologize for the poor quality photos but I will run them anyway.

The end of the day’s run found us at Klemtu, a little native village that the guide books glamorize far beyond any stretch of the imagination. We made fast to the rapidly failing government dock and awoke to Mr. FOG once again. 65nm today and 1574 nm to date.

Big Ships, Little Boats

Here is the range of sizes of vessels plying the waters of the Prince Rupert area.

Leaving the harbour, within one hour we were back in the fog. Two hours of dodging navy ships, fishing boats, logs and islands led us to the top of Grenville Channel, or "The Ditch" as it is called because it is a channel 45nm long and an average of about two miles wide. Here we got a pretty good closeup view of a large killer whale. We motored 77nm today to an anchorage called Coghlan (N 53 degrees 23.740' W 129 degrees 17.211') near Hartley Bay. Not much time for play right now, just putting some miles on.

Full Steam Ahead!

If every day was perfect, how would you expand your experience?

Yesterday was great, sunny skies, running with the wind and tide. We anchored in a spot that isn’t even in the books, just north of the border, our last full day in Alaska (N 54 degrees 44.303’ W 130 degrees 41.095’). A saltwater lagoon, a bit of a deep anchorage, 76 to 96 feet counting the 20 foot tidal exchange. Caught a couple of halibut right in the anchorage. Woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of Dalls Porpoise surfacing in the channel. Beautiful, the grandeur of Alaska is overwhelming.

The morning broke not quite so bright. Fog, fog, fog. The weather report included a disturbance moving in with high winds for the afternoon and possible thunderstorms for the late morning. Do you sit and wait it out or do you stick your nose out and see what is happening. We still needed to cross Portland Canal which is part of Dixon Entrance, a big crossing.

I have been practicing for a big crossing in the fog for a long time, all the while hoping I would not ever need to do it. This is a lot like SCUBA diving, especially in low or no visibility. You need to know and trust your instruments. So, instead of risking losing one or two days waiting for the weather, we headed out into the big water. Eyes on the RADAR and the chartplotter. The visibility was about ¼ mile and within 20 minutes it got bad. After another 20 minutes I was adjusting and feeling a little more comfortable. I could see the little cells of rain and waves on the RADAR as we passed through. The sea state was about a two foot chop. OK.

And then the lightening started. Big bright close strikes. No place to run and hide and it doesn’t do any good to whine or run in circles. Stay the course! Damn you George Bush!

We had battened down the hatches before we left the anchorage so I couldn’t give that order but it would have been fitting. So I told Ginger that maybe she should dig out the life jackets and put together an abandon ship bag with all the necessaries. I didn’t mean to scare her but it did distract me somewhat from the dire situation at hand, watching her scurry about gathering up all our survival gear.

The lightening continued until we reached the mainland, about 1 1/2 hours. The leg from here to Prince Rupert is through a shallow and complicated, winding passage called Venn Passage. I have been saving my tracks on the GPS throughout this cruise so I was able to call up a saved track and run a reverse course on it through the passage. That was helpful but the other thing that helped was that the fog finally lifted. Wow! What a difference a little visibility makes!

It actually turned out to be quite a nice day in Rainy Rupert. 1432nm. Cleared Canadian Customs.

Leaving Ketchikan

We are leaving Ketchikan heading down coast towards the big Dixon Entrance Crossing and Canada. We won't actually make the crossing today as it is about 100nm, too much for one day. The Canadian Environment Canada weather info, which is quite good, says the weather is perfect for the crossing. A big high pressure system is building and I think it will last a few days.

Ketchikan has no clouds and is warm and absolutely beautiful!

Too Cool!

This blog site will allow only five photos per post and I know how hot it is down there so I will try my best to add some more relief.

Special Edition

Sometimes on this cruise, posts can get a little out of sequence as you may have noticed. I hope that most of it makes sense though. Here is one that I didn’t get to and I have posted some similar photos before but these are better.

It sounds like the lower 48 is scorched and burning up. Up here it nice and cool, not too cool, just right.

We wanted to go into a long inlet called Tracy Arm south of Juneau but I didn’t want the wear and tear on the boat. The wear and tear would come from all the ice floating away from Sawyer Glacier that we would have to navigate through. A company runs a charter service using two boats, one 58 feet and the other 65 feet long. The owner and captain did a great job of getting us up close and personal with the glacier. To be honest, Tracy Arm would be absolutely spectacular even if there was no ice! Again, the blue of the ice is just amazing and the glacier was actively calving when we were there.

I will include a photo of a 37’ Nordic Tug that I will guess was a charter because I don’t think this guy would take his own boat into this place.

So, I hope that gazing at these beautiful ice photos will provide some relief from the heat. Fire up the air conditioner, grab an ice cold beverage and click on the photos for a close up view. Enjoy!

The Wonders of Stephens Passage

July 7 - Ginger started the day in a sad and somber mood, mourning the death of a friend, but Alaska just kept throwing spectacular nature shows at us, making it impossible not to smile. We motored down Stephens Passage from Taku Harbor, expecting a south wind and rough seas. The passage stayed a mill pond all day. Passing Sunset Island we came upon a colony of sea lions. There must have been a hundred, swimming, fishing, and lolling on the rocks. Wish this blog had a sound track so you could hear their groaning and growls. The bigger ones looked like they weighed 1000 lbs.

We were seeing whales all along the route, but at the southern end of Stephens Passage, the humpbacks started breaching. We first noticed it off in the distance, by the giant splashes they were making. Leaping into the air and landing on their backs- kerplosh!

We motored in to Port Houghton, headed for Sanborn Canal. We stopped to fish a little, mainly because we needed some fresh bait for the crab trap. We hadn’t been fishing more than a half-hour when Ginger tied into a big one! Another barn door halibut! This time, we felt like old experienced deck hands. Frank got the halibut spear ready while Ginger horsed the beast up from the bottom. Then a sea lion popped up, right next to the boat, obviously attracted by all the splashing and thrashing. So much for old experienced deck hands… we really didn’t know what we were going to do if that sea lion grabbed a hold of the halibut, which by this time was tied to the boat dragging in the water behind us. Ginger started yelling at the sea lion like it was a misbehaving dog. NO! GET BACK! And other words not suitable for a family-friendly blog. Maybe the yelling worked, because the sea lion stayed away long enough for us to get the beast hoisted up by the lifting boom.

After a couple hours of labor, the 100 lb halibut was reduced to 45 lbs of ziplock bagged fillets, completely filling the mini-fridge of the DUNVEGAN. Dinner was cooked and cleaned and it was time for rest. But no, there’s more.

All day long we had been hearing the Coast Guard talking about a boat in need of assistance, but we couldn’t really tell where the boat was located. Finally, we heard the skipper of the broken-down boat spell the name of the bay where he was located, and we realized we were in the same bay. So, off we went to do some “night ops”. The broken boat was a commercial crabber, who has lost his outdrive. I mean really lost it as in totally gone! We towed him into Sanborn Canal, a safer place for him to wait for a tow to town. (58 nm away).

Finally hit the rack at midnight, with the realization that being sad wasn’t going to help anyone. We will carry on with the trip.

Sad News

July 6, the phone rang early. Never a good sign. It was news that a close colleague and friend of Ginger’s had passed away suddenly while on a business trip. He was only 46, and left a wife and two young daughters. She will miss his bad jokes, politically incorrect everything, and his wildly creative intelligence.

With a heavy heart, we left Juneau, pointed south. It is time to retrace our steps and head in the direction of home.

Hot! Hot! Hot!

The Fourth of July appears to be a big deal in Juneau. Big parades and a great fireworks celebration, or so I’ve been told. I was in bed long before the bombs were bursting in the air. We did get mixed up with the parade a little bit when we tried to make our way down town to pick up our tickets for the Tracy Arm run tomorrow. The parade had just a bit of a freaky touch to it. Lots of politics and great diversity. This was a kind of a day off, at least we started out without any plans.

The weather here is about 58 degrees, overcast and occasional sprinkles. I did get to look at the weather in Missoula. 101 on Thursday and 103 on Friday and then cooling way off to 95. I think I will be happy with the weather here.

A nice day to go to Mendenhall Glacier! I post some photos for you folks in all those hot places so you can just gaze at them and cool off! As I’ve mentioned before, if you click on the photo, you should be able to get a much closer look at the ice!

An aside to this post; we got information today that the Ketchikan newspaper quoted this blog in reference to the situation back in Prince Rupert and the flooding problem. We’re almost famous!

Hire the Guys that do it Best.

Today we took an early cab to Auke Bay, about ten miles from Juneau, to meet with our guide, Jason from Southeast Sportfishing for a day of salmon fishing. We need to get Collin hooked up with a salmon! The outfit is running all new welded aluminum Allen Marine boats set up for charter. Jason is the kind of guy that eats, drinks and breathes fishing. Born and raised in Alaska, he knows this area and the fish intimately. He took us down the west coast of Admiralty Island to Lizard Head.

We spent the whole day and had good luck. Collin even hooked a halibut under very unusual circumstances. The bottom was at about 100 to 125 feet and we were trolling at 55 feet. We all thought he had a king salmon on; it was big and put up a pretty good fight. At the boat it turned out to be about a 35 pound halibut! Halibut are bottom fish and are almost never caught trolling, so this was a big surprise.

We also caught two king salmon, three nice bright chum, and two fresh pinks as well as assorted rockfish. The kings were undersized and were released, as were the rockfish.

We will get some of this salmon smoked and canned for the trip back to Montana. Did I mention fishing is good in Alaska?

By the way, if any cruisers read this blog and are headed to the Juneau area, Auke Bay is the place to go. I’ll expound on that a little bit later.