Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Ketchikan, AK
I cannot believe that we have been on the water for over 7 weeks!  A new adventure every day and this year, in spite of the weather, the boat has not seemed to shrink at all!!! 
After leaving Craig we continued down the south west side of POW....it is a very large island..the largest of the hundreds, if not a thousand or so, of islands in SE Alaska.  We spent a couple of fairly uneventful days which is not a bad thing..........until we had to ride out a storm.  We had heard weather reports of an upcoming event and found a lovely anchorage called Mabel Bay where we would be sheltered from the predicted SW winds....and we were.  It rained horizontally and blew pretty hard in our little cove but we got mainly gusts that blew over the tree tops.  We did hear that night about 8PM that is was blowing at Cape Decision...20 miles to the west...at 71 MPH.  Now that is a heavy blow and to think that we got maybe 40MPH gusts out of it.  Gary makes very good anchorage choices....I opt for scenic....he opts for safety!!!  We did not however score on the crabs there.  Gary says many of these bays have been "otter-sized".  The lovely little furry creatures are decimating the abalone, clam and crab populations.  We are sure they will slowly move south towards Puget Sound and then we will be out of crab as well.  But then, they are protected creatures.  Wish the bears were.
The next day all was calm and we continued on POW to a lovely place called Keete Inlet.  We were once again graced with the presence of bears.  A couple of them just grazing along the grassy waterfronts.  But then a third came along.  I was overjoyed until I saw that he was lame....actually badly maimed.  Missing his L front paw and the back L was barely keeping him upright.  No doubt he had been caught in a trap.  He probably won't live long and it made my stomach just flip for him.
This has been the first trip we have ever taken where we have had such bad bear sightings.  First was 5/15 with the hunters shooting the bear, then later on at Murder Cove where Gary found the bear carcass on the beach intact except for the missing HEAD and front paws and now this third badly crippled guy.   We have had Bad Bear Bay, Butchered Bear Bay and now Maimed Bear Bay.
Enough already!!
But the whale sightings have been quite good this year.   And with my new camera we are actually getting some fairly (OK not by professional standards, Chris) good shots of tails which is an improvement over the frustration of missing ALL the good shots in the past.  Whales in your water always makes for a good day.  Am anxious to get home to MY computer and my Picasa and get some REAL photos online!!! 
On south to Hunter Bay where we expected a good beach bear showing but got nada.  Instead we were treated to a breeding pair of Sandhill Cranes with babe in tow.  I guess they are quite rare in this part of the world.  I am not Audubon-ite but it was pretty exciting.  There are also several old dock "ruins" in this bay which was the site of a large cannery and a copper mine years ago.  It is amazing how heavy weather will quickly turn perfectly good buildings and docks into nothingness in a fairly short period of time.
Next stop, after an absolutely flat rounding of Cape Chacon on the Dixon Entrance, we spent the night in Hidden Bay on the EAST side of POW...finally made it around the south end.  Saw another couple of bear, a couple of dear and a beaver swimming in the water.  Hidden Bay is indeed hidden.  It is entered via a winding channel of rocks and drying reefs that make it a landlocked bay protected from all wind and things that go bump in the night.  Very pretty place.
OK, have made it to Ketchikan and will begin our slow journey south toward home tomorrow.
Have many more stops to make and a lot of salmon fishing to do in BC waters.  The Kings have already been through and the Silvers are not here yet!  For the first time ever, Gary has not caught a salmon in Alaska!!  On to BC where the salmon are easy.................
Now to try and load some photos!

I called him Two Dot

Beautiful Baronof Island

Cozy little stateroom

A whale of a day!

Perfectly calm Dixon Entrance!!

June 12, 2012
Craig AK
My apologies!!!  Mea culpa!!  Sometimes internet connections are just impossible to come by.
We used to be able to just grab onto a "large" yachts' wifi but those days are over.   Even in downtown Juneau there was no internet at the docks.  But we have had a lovely two weeks since last I jotted down a few thought.  I'll try to bring you up to date on our travels and adventures.

After leaving Hoonah  we traveled east on Icy Strait where we spent a night at Couverden Cove (Swanson Harbor) where the city of Haines has erected two "refuge" floats for fishermen (mainly) to get away from weather and be safe at a dock.  Most anyone uses the floats...we were one of many pleasure craft tied there.  The bad news was that there were no crab in our pots!  We moved on to Admiralty Cove  on the north end of Admiralty Island for just a temporary anchorage while we awaited the tide to flood so we could access another anchorage for the night.  About 4 in the afternoon we left anchorage #1 and moved on to Oliver Inlet.  What a perfectly lovely and beatuiful place!!  Two photos above.  We were surrounded by beautiful mountains and by 5 bears!!  All big Grizz.  Just spectacular.  The only catch was getting through the narrows.  We should have had about 4 feet under the boat (by tide reports) when in actuality we had only 1.7 feet!!!!  We were holding our feet up with concern!.   And many parts of Alaska are so poorly charted, I guess because there are that many people here.....that the charts details only go down to 3 miles.  That is not helpful when trying to get into a tight space.  But we made it safely in without having a rock named for us and safely out on a much higher tide the next day.

We cruised on to Taku Harbor for a day.  Taku is the site of an abandoned cannery now in ruins.  You feel like you are in no man's land when suddenly a large ship passes by your little cove.

On 5/31 we moved on to Juneau where we met up with a couple of Skagit boating friends.  We rented a car, made the obligatory Costco run, Fred Meyers (they were both very happy to see us) and them moved on to Mendenhall Glacier, the Alaska State Museum and the Mt Roberts Tram.
I had posted on FB (while at the library waiting for the laundry to finish) that we had made it Juneau and received a message from Carl Heine ( a former ER doc at Skagit, now in Juneau) that he and his wife were in town and to call them.  Much to our surprise they invited Gary and me and our two boating friends to dinner!  We had a wonderful dinner of grilled salmon with to die for Brownies (made by Carl's visiting from NH mom) in a lovely home with a killer view of the Juneau downtown from high above the water.  They told us that they had bought their home from an artist who has an current exhibit at the Ak State History Museum (Photo of exhibit above)  I was much surprised to see the exhibit!!  Very large encompassing two rooms of the museum.  I felt almost special.....like I had dinner at "his" house last night!!

The next day we moved on to Windfall Harbor in Seymour Canal on Admiralty Island.  This may be one of the most visually productive anchorages of all of our trips combined.  We had bears on the beach, loons on the water, eagles in the sky and kayakers with tents on the beach.  The next morning we pulled big prawns from our pots and had whales in our water.  We had humpbacks and orcas as well as pacific white sided dolphins and sea lions and otters.  AND, the sun was out.  It was a sun in your face, wind in your hair, prawns in your pot and whales in your water kind of day!!  Perfection!!

Moving on past Admiralty and on to Kupreanof Island and again through Rocky Pass!! 
When we got back to Prince of Wales (POW) Island we stopped at Port Protection to see if I could find another former colleague.  To my almost immediate surprise I found Jubal ( the medic) at the grocery store.  I looks happy and healthy and told me to tell everyone that his is now a long haired hippy!!
Down the west side of POW and onto to a few more anchorages before making it into Craig yesterday.  Made it to the grocery this morning so we are once again provisioned.  Our current plan is to continue south around POW and then back up to Ketchikan for final provisions before beginning our southward journey towards home.  We have been out on the water 6 weeks!!  Seems like yesterday that we left home but it is time to think about heading south.  Gary would like to spend awhile fishing Squally Channel in BC....the fishing here has been non existent.  The kings are not in yet and the silvers are still out too.  Read this morning that Copper River kings are way behind this year too....they are usually at Haggen's by mid May!!  And since the otters are protected they are wiping out the clams and crabs in most of the little coves......we may starve....or be forced to eat chicken!
It may be a bit before I am able to post another update but I will as soon as possible. 
Thanks for reading this and traveling along with us on our little boat.  I appreciate all the comments.
Happy travels.