NIFTY LITTLE WEATHER STATION

We have this neat little weather station gauge that tells us the temp, barometer, wind, humidity, and all kinds of great things.  It even amazingly forecasts the weather.  It's been a fun thing to watch each day this entire trip. 

Well, Larry made a bunch of phone calls today.  Called Bill Wilson to see if he's going to join us for part of the trip back.  Bill doesn’t think he can get away to join us on the BC part.

LOTS OF TALK ABOUT FOOD

Larry took the laundry in.  I wrote emails all morning so we could unload them at the internet cafe.  Then at lunch time we went to Alaskafe and had soup and sandwich.  Soup was like a can of cream of mushroom soup with beans, sausage and zucchini in it.  We had gorgonzola, red pepper, egg plant sandwich toasted with our latte and coffee.  Seems silly writing about what we ate but on this trip food is important and hard to get.  Larry asked the cafe owner what was for dinner tonight and she said the same thing, Halibut and pasta but she said she would prepare it differently for us if we came back.  We then headed to the fish market and bought a bunch of halibut, cod, and salmon, frozen to store on board.  We took our rented movies back and funny thing is we didn’t watch one of them.  Larry picked up the laundry that we dropped off the day before. 

LAST MINUTE ERRANDS BEFORE WE HEAD OUT

I called the market to pick me up at the harbor office so I could stock up on groceries.    The van picked up three of us, some other boaters had the same idea.  They have a great thing going here for the boaters and locals alike.  The market will send a van to pick anyone up in town, bring them to the market and then drop them off.  You can do all your shopping, lots of it, without worrying about having too much to lug back to the boat as they pack all the stuff for the boaters nicely in boxes and shuttle it back to your boat for you.  This service is mostly designed for the fishermen but it sure comes in handy for cruisers like us.   Again the produce was limited like every other place.  I bought the old stand by, granny apples, lettuce, onions, potatoes, carrots, broccoli, etc., you know, stuff that lasts a long time.  Well, except for lettuce, but that is such a treat up here that I bought some for the next few days.   I tipped the boxer and one of the fishermen who helped load my boxes in the van for me.  The van driver brought the boxes all the way to the boat and refused a tip. 

WET, WET, WET

Larry was washing the boat when I arrived.  I put all the food away and the laundry too.  The boat is getting really damp and wet.  Even my PJs were damp and some of the things had mildew on them.  Then I noticed in the galley floor and other areas things were getting wet. It's very damp here.  After all we are in a rain forest area where it rains most of the time.  I don’t know what we can do about it.  We went to the hardware store and I bought some more plastic containers with lids to put the corn meal and flour in and two plastic baskets to put potatoes and onions in so they would be able to aerate.   I also found and bought an electric burner so I can cook something like pasta outside the boat on the deck so as not to bring in humidity.

 We also bought three dehumidifiers.  I hope they work out.  I put one in the guest quarters and guest bath and one by our bed. 

BERNSTEIN'S AGAIN

We stopped at another little store and got Larry a t-shirt with Petersburg and a bear on it and I got four little wood carvings, a bear, a salmon, an otter, and a whale's tale.  The Bernstein’s from Santa Barbara arrived today.  They seem to be having a good time.  They said they stopped in Portage Bay yesterday.  They said they were glad to be in a town.  We saw him walking around with his funny suspenders on and was enjoying a big chocolate shake. 

UNUSUAL LIFESTYLES

We went to Northern Lights on the dock for dinner.  We got to talking to one of the girls that buses the tables.  She’s only 18 and on her own, away from home.  I asked if she was going to spend the winter and she said no that she and her boy friend were going to New Orleans.  He’s the cook.  They didn’t want to go back to Las Vegas where she last lived.  What a sweet girl but what a funny life she leads.  We didn’t get to the little book store.  Petersburg is a great town and we like the people.  We would definitely like to come back to this place.  I had teriyaki salmon, green beans rice and salad.  It was pretty good.  Larry had prime rib special, same sides. 

LOVE THOSE FISHERMEN

We walked around the dock for the last time.  All the seiners are back again.  They only fish 2 days out of the week Thursdays and Sundays.  They are told when and where they can fish.  The guy next to us said he got a full load.  They’re fishing the fishery salmon now and then in August the other fish come.  I love these boats, they’re all painted different and have some great names.  Their nets are all neatly stacked and the decks cleaned.  These guys are always working on their boats and they come and go at all hours.  They are a happy bunch and many take their kids with them on their fishing trips. One guy says they have camp fires on the beach and enjoy being out with the family. 

SORRY TO LEAVE 

What a great life and great people!  Sorry to leave but tomorrow early we'll be heading south over paths traveled before.  That will be a first for us.

Special Note 7 years Later

We saw a fishing boat names Defiance from Friday Harbor WA with 3 young men on it.  We had no Idea 7 years later we would be living and seeing  the same boat in our new home of Friday Harbor

   

MOMENTOS

We're up at 7:00 AM.  It's a lazy morning.  We don’t have to leave until 9:30 to 10:00 to go through Wrangell Narrows at the right time.  I unpack my purchases from yesterday afternoon which are several hand carved wood animals; a bear, sea otter, salmon, whale tale.  I could’ve bought an eagle but it was so out of proportion from the others I didn’t like it and there was a moose but we haven’t seen a moose so I passed on it.  Since then I’ve dreamed of seeing a moose so I could get the moose.  Larry wanted a Petersburg t-shirt so I bought one, a khaki colored one with a small black bear on it and the script saying Petersburg.  We returned “Ocean’s Eleven” never watching it.  There was so much to do and see that who has time to watch TV?

FISHING CREW ARRIVES

We talked to the fisherman next door.  He said they were all getting ready to go out again.  He has a young crew of 3.  We watched as they arrived and came aboard.  One little black kid went right in and dropped off his back pack and went into the galley to get a cup of coffee, another, a chunky looking Eskimo kid in white t-shirt, long white shorts, and hair that had bleached ends on his short hair cut, and finally another Eskimo-Indian mix, a beautiful girl with long straight black hair and cute build got on.  She dad little rimless glasses and tied her hair up on the top of her head. She never cracked a smile, very serious, all business.  We watched as she helped the captain do something with the lines to get ready to pull the seine skiff in a little higher out of water. 

THREE GENERATIONS LIVING IN ALASKA

They will fish tomorrow and come back late.  They fish nine months out of the year.  1^st carb?, herring, different type of salmon and then up to Kodiak to do something else which I don’t remember now, I think some kind of crab fishing.  The captain is a 3^rd generation Alaskan.  Says his great grandfather was one of Soapy's side kicks in Skagway.  Says he was a prospector.  He himself is originally from Wrangell and married a girl from Petersburg and settled here.  Their whole family in fact has been fishing for 3 generations.  His son came finally and off they went.  We wished them lots of good fishing and they wished us a good safe summer.

LAST MINUTE TREATS

I took Zig for a walk.  Got some money at the ATM and went to the little grocery store near the harbor and got a few extra things to tide us over.  I was happy to find some fresh mangos, cookies, frozen hash browns, and ginger bread and scone mix.  What a treat!  Little things like that are important here to make your trip more enjoyable as funny as it seems.  You have to get what you can get when you can get it.  They didn’t have those things at the other store when I went there yesterday.

When I came out some guy was sitting on the bench out front and staring at Zig with his muzzle.  He was probably wondering what an innocent looking little dog like him was doing with a muzzle on.  If he only knew.

I stopped and got a latte at the Scandinavian Inn.

BERNSTEIN

When I got back Larry says the “Bernstein" we met at Red Bluff, from Santa Barbara, composes music for the movies.  His name is Ernest Bernstein.  Of course he didn’t think to ask what movies when I asked him.  Larry said he'd been doing it for 20 years.  He’s an unlikely character up here, Jewish with his heavy NY accent but a really nice guy.

COLORFUL CHARACTERS LIVE HERE

Well, it’s time to go and we pull out.  Again no problem with the current in Petersburg harbor.  Zig & I set on the bow for a long time looking at the scenery.  It was nice out for a change.  The channel is a beautiful area with some nice homes along the way and sports fishing lodges.  There are some open flat areas with tall mountains in the back, great vistas and many inlets that look like rivers and lagoons.  It’s interesting to read the history about the Narrows and about the lonely weird characters that lived out here all by themselves.  They were mostly bachelors and hunters.  One guy sadly said his family paid him to leave because he had a bad stutter.  Poor guy came here to live in the wilderness and lived his life all by himself.  Another guy never took a bath and smelled so much like a dog that when ever he came to town the cat would take for the hills and sometimes he would crawl into bed with his sourdough rolls to help them rise. It's a wonderful little place with lots of stories of strong original people.

The little river side road from Petersburg now ends about midway down the channel so the houses now are built from whatever they can bring by boat.  One cottage looked very nice.  It was small and had a wonderful vegetable garden lined with netting and floats to keep the animals and birds away.  They built a meat smoker on the shore with a couple of picnic tables nearby and they must be smoking some fish inside become billows of smoke was coming out of the chimney top.

Larry and I have welts now on our foreheads from the mosquitoes that bit us in Red Bluff.

SAME ROUTE BUT LOOKS DIFFERENT

We're going through the area at North Ledge and Halfmoon Anchorage now.  When we came north here about 6 weeks ago this area was crawling with sports fishermen all getting in your way making for nerve wracking travel up the Narrows.  Now there is no one.  There's lots of kelp in the area and I think to myself, probably getting wrapped around our stabilizers.  There are a zillion little black birds perched on the rocks at one stretch.  They are different than any birds I’ve seen the whole trip.  Maybe they too are making their way south no like us.

THREE HOURS OF CONCENTRATION

12:30 PM:  We came out of Wrangell Narrows into Sumner Strait.  It took us about 3 hours to get through Wrangell Narrows.  The seas are calm and flat and the skies cloudy.  Now that we are through the narrows I'm suddenly very tired now. I take a nap on the sofa. 

ALL THESE CRAZY RUSSIAN NAMES

We head across Sumner Strait and round the top of Zarembo Island.  We head south down Stikine Strait and cut east below Woronofski Island through Chichagof Pass and then south on Zimovia Strait to Anita Bay.  Wow, all the Russian names are a mouth full!  I think this will be the last of the Russian names now.

Sumner Strait is kind of confusing because there are so many islands and straits joining into it and map suddenly jumps to an extreme scale the minute you get into the channel.  It’s very clear out and the temperature is 56 degrees.  That's pretty warm.  This morning the barometer was 1021.1.  Wrangell Narrow’s wasn't nearly as intimidating as the first time we came up.  The clouds are high with some that are looking pretty dark like they might decide to burst.

SEINER

We follow a seiner through the Narrows in the upper end and follow “Capitol Louise”, the seiner, at the south end.  Larry calls to ask if he can pas on the portside after the flats in the wide area.  "Capitol Louise" says OK and thanks Larry for the heads up.  We pass “Island Point Lodge”.  It looks like a nice place to stay.  I’ll have to look it up on the internet to see if they have info.

I TAKE OVER A BIT TO GIVE LARRY A BREAK

Sumner Strait was cloudy but no rain developed.  After my nap, I steer boat as we come down side of Zarembo Island through Stikine Strait.  The waters become a milky jade color of green murk from Stikine River.  I take it into Chichagof Passage, South of Woronofski and then South between Etolin Island and Wrangell Island into Anita Bay.  As we come down channel to the entrance of Anita Bay the winds picked up and seas got rough.

ANITA BAY, OUR ANCHORAGE FOR THE NIGHT

Once we entered the channel into Anita Bay it’s quite a long ways to the anchorage.  Supposed to be one of “the” most beautiful SE Anchorages, like being in a lake.  We beg to differ.  There is a hatchery or fishery to the right in a cove before the anchorage.  There's a long stretch of shoreline before anchor.  We drop anchor and settle in.

ZIG GOES NUTS!

I get the kayak out and take Ziggy to shore. He got off and went crazy.  He was mesmerized by the water and shore.  He just started off down the shore jumping at things in the water.  I couldn’t get him to pay any attention to me no matter how loud and firm I called him.  He just kept going.  He must have gone two miles.  I finally had to call Larry on the two way radio to get the dinghy down to go get him.  You have to worry about the wildlife getting him around here.  An eagle was soaring overhead trying to size up if he could manage him I thought.  I was getting in a panic. 

Larry sped after him but couldn’t get close enough to shore to get him because it was so shallow so he yelled at him in a way that it sounded like the fiercest voice he could muster up, like a wild mountain man I thought.  It was so loud and literally echoed over the mountains and sounded so mad that Zig woke out of his trance.  Larry told him to "get going" back to me and he headed back immediately.  Larry followed him the whole way until he got within paddling distance for me.  I got close to shore and he finally got back on the kayak. 

I have no idea if he went to the bathroom or not because he was so far away that he looked smaller than a speck of pepper.  Wonder how far he would have gone if Larry hadn’t caught up to him?  A bear could have easily snatched up on him.  He was so interested in what was in the water that he was oblivious to anything and anybody, well except for Larry and that roar he did.  I wonder what he was so interesting in.  It may have been little fish or the flapping of the water coming in or going with the tide.

We all went back to the boat.  Ziggy was sopping wet and shivering now. 

HUNGRY

I started dinner.  Tonight we were having a treat, cooked corned beef, cabbage, carrots and potatoes.  I heated up some pastry encrusted brie with cranberries, apricots, hazelnuts and brandy for an appetizer.  We didn’t have time for lunch so we were both starved.  Didn’t have much for breakfast either except some Grape Nut Flakes. 

BERNSTEIN WAKED US OUT!

The boat that we followed through Wrangell Narrows on the South half of the stretch came in and anchored too.  And immediately after, the Bernstein's came in.  They were coming in so fast that we didn’t even see them until the last minute.  Their boat is called "Evangeline".  The wakes he created were beyond belief!  I was trying to hold the pot on the stove and the carrots that I just peeled from falling off the counter.  The wakes for some reason just wouldn’t stop so Larry got in the dinghy and pushed our boat around so we’d hit the wake at a better angle.  Bernstein I'm sure did have a clue as to the havoc he created with those wakes.  They waved hello.

NO MORE MONKEY BUSINESS!

Larry gave Zig a bath after his last P&P and he behaved this – no more monkey business.  He came in and got his babe out and then went in jumped on our bed and threw up!  It was not a good day with Zig that day!  Couldn't believe he did that!

Larry I can tell is anxious to get back home.  I don’t know whether he feels trapped on this boat every day.  Me I like it.  It starts to rain again.

Tomorrow we head out to see Anan Bear Park.

We walked around the dock for the last time