Icy Bay to Cordova

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220 miles, 24 hours  non-stop…the trip length, complete with an overnighter, is a first for us and a first for NWExplorations' Mother Goose.

We were off at 8am. The anchor chain was the worst we’d ever seen, coated with what looked like gray cement, courtesy of the nearby glacier. Even Brian said it was the worst he’d ever seen. It took Karen quite a while to get the chain cleaned and stowed…and she was covered with grey goop. Luckily, I appeased her with pancakes for breakfast and all was well.

The weather was perfect and sunny, winds were less than 10 knots from the east and southeast, with seas less than 2 feet on the quartering stern.

Orca parallels our course

With just Karen and I onboard, we decided to try a four hour on, four hour off watch schedule. With such benign conditions, four hours at the helm was no problem. And the four hours off gave you the opportunity to read, wind down or actually get some sleep. We drove for quite a while from the flybridge, it was so calm with such an amazing vista. Dinner was chili and cornbread, which was easy and filling.

Sunset in the Gulf of Alaska

For the night portion of our journey, Karen set the schedule so that I stood watch on for the 11pm to 3am period. She did not want to take the “dark” watch.  I smilingly informed her at 3am, when she came to relieve me and asked if the night transit was scary, that it never really got dark this time of the year at these latitudes.

One of the unusual aspects of the trip is that most of it was comprised of a westerly heading. You think that you “go north” to Alaska, but Alaska actually arches over to the west, so our crossing of the Gulf of Alaska was actually due west.

In terms of scenery, snow-covered mountains were off in the distance.  Kayak Island was stark and eerie, jutting out of the water like something from a science fiction movie. We saw no traffic, except for a fishing boat or two as we neared Hinchinbrook Entrance.

"Deception" approaching Kayak Island

Looking back on Kayak Island

Our approach to Cordova was into the rising sun. Luckily for me, Karen was at the helm so she had to deal with the navigational challenge.

Sunrise is welcomed after an all night passage

Early morning passage through Hinchinbrook Entrance

Alaska high-speed ferry Chenga coming out of Cordova

Our first stop in Cordova was the fuel dock. Like most facilities in this part of Alaska, it is not a floating dock. At 6:30am, Deception and Telita tied up on opposite sides of the dock and OceanFlyer and Patos rafted to them. Four diesel hoses came down to us, and we all took on a little less than 250 gallons each when we were done. Good thing, because the local fishing boats started lining up to get fuel, wondering who these pleasure boaters were that were hogging their access.

Cordova Harbor, guest dock on the starboard side

Cordova is a very nice and large fishing port. It features wide fairways and large slips. The harbor master had us raft up along “G” (guest) dock, even though there are many open slips. Seems the fishing fleet of 350 boats is due in tomorrow, so he is leaving plenty of room for their arrival.

It’s still early in the morning, so after securing the boats, we walked up town for breakfast with the crew of Telita. The Killer Whale Café is a local favorite, and while the food was good, the service is very slow. The back of the menu warns of this, but it took over an hour for the six of us to get our breakfast. If we were not so happy to be sitting on land, rocking as we were from the effect of more than 3 days at sea (especially Karen), there might have been a revolt. But wait we did and we all inhaled our breakfast. It was good.

Breakfast in Cordova

You gotta go to Copper River Fleece

"Downtown" Cordova

Our first stop after breakfast was to visit Copper River Fleece. Karen had read all about this place and it was on her “must see” list. Their unique service is that they customize their products with a wide range of unique embroidered tape. I picked out a plain black weatherproof jacket and then picked out my pattern, the location where I wanted the adornment added and even had them shorten the sleeves a bit. Two hours later it was ready. A custom jacket all my own to remember Cordova by. We also enjoyed a trip to the local library to see a small but very interesting museum with lots of information on the effects to this day of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

View of the Cordova harbor from the town

There are a couple of great grocery stores in town. The most convenient is the AC Value Center at the head of the docks, but the Camtu (box store) was good too. I made a trip to Redden Marine Supplies just behind the grocery store, for some fuel filters and we checked out the recommended pizza place, Harborview Pizza. It’s a humble looking shack, but it has a wood fire oven and best of all, they deliver directly to your boat. We picked up a menu and pizza became the plan for dinner.

The "pleasure yachts" stand out in the working harbor of Cordova

Although we are traveling with our friends on Telita, we have not seen much of the crew since we were always at sea. So we took this time in Cordova to sit on the rear covered deck of Telita and catch up, enjoying our libations, eventually ordering pizza and then moving inside as the temperatures cooled. We stumbled home to bed about 9pm, ready for a good night’s sleep.


Lituya Bay To Yakutat

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The days are getting longer. Yakutat lies 100 nautical miles from our anchorage in Lituya Bay. Our course is simple. Exit Lituya Bay, turn right and turn right again into Yakutat Bay.

Before we could clear the entrance to Lituya bay, Patos called Deception to report that one of the shafts was making a screaming noise. We all came to a stop inside the bay as Deception came along side Patos to take a look.

We started speculating the source, narrowing it down to either the shaft seal or, heaven forbid, a cutlass bearing. The crew from Deception isolated it to the shaft seal and the decision was made to secure the shaft to prevent it from turning and continue on using one engine while they researched possible solutions.

As a result, we and Telita continued on at our normal 9 knots, and Deception matched the slower speed of Patos. The exit out of Lituya was with about a 1.6kt flood, and it was a bit swelly. It was a very “traffic free” day. We only passed a Uniflite-styled vessel and a small fishing vessel, both headed south.

The skies were cloudy and the seas were about as good as you can hope for with swells ranging from 1 to 3 feet.

Nice ride on the way to Yakutat

The Fairweather mountain range hid behind the cloud deck for most of our trip. Winds remained below 10 knots but rain showers were our constant companion. According to Wikipedia the Fairweather Mountain was named on May 3, 1778 by Captain James Cook, apparently for the unusually good weather encountered at the time. It is one of the world's highest coastal mountains at 15,325 feet. It is located 12 miles east of the Pacific Ocean on the border of Alaska, and western British Columbia.

About an hour out of Yakutat, the skies finally lifted and the Fairweathers revealed themselves in all their glory. Truly amazing to see snow covered mountains from horizon to horizon.

Yakutat is a fuel stop for the fleet. All but Patos could make it to Cordova without adding fuel, but NW Explorations arranged for a fuel truck to meet us so we could all top off and have lots of safety fuel aboard.

We found the truck waiting atop a fixed high dock. Not our favorite when compared to a floating dock but we’ve done it before and it is more common than not around here.

Telita fueled first and then came our turn. As we approached we could see that there were large monster tires mounted as protection from the vertical pilings. We did not appreciate just how high these were mounted.

We were as well fendered as we could be, but fenders were basically useless. The tires barely came to the top of our stainless handrail. So, on our approach,  we touched one of these tires and our momentum against the tire seriously bent the handrail. Karen was totally devastated. After we set a stern and bow line to the pilings, we were held off the tires by the prevailing wind. If the wind was on the dock I doubt we could have made it work at all until we gained six feet more tide. We later learned that Deception also bent their railing during the fueling process. To add insult to injury, the fuel guys in Yakutat charged 1.25 more per gallon than the “going rate” in most of Central Alaska. AND they charged a “callout fee” to deliver the fuel to the dock. It does not stop there. While there was a floating dock that connected to the end of the high pier, the operator said he did not want to drag the heavy hose all the way down there. I would love to send him all the repair bills his laziness caused.

Not certain what this is, but they had one at the docks in Yakutat. Beautiful aluminium construction. I'm guessing some sort of oil mitigation emergency response barge.

We docked easily at the small boat harbor, which was nice and even had 30amp power. It was too far a walk to town for dinner, given how tired we were after an eleven hour trip and the fueling fiasco. So we broke out the frozen pizza which we have on standby for just these occasions. By 9:15 we were in bed, after all we have 70 miles to go tomorrow to Icy Bay.

The weather looks like it's going to be great as we settle in for the night on the docks.

Elfin Cove to Lituya Bay

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Another 55 nautical miles and we’ll be in Lituya Bay today.

These long trips make for boring blog entries. That is good, because it means we have not had any issues or problems worth noting. Except for rounding Cape Spencer, the seas were kind to us.

Deception makes her way into the seas rounding Cape Spencer.

Rounding Cape Spencer

Deception had decided to brave a bit of gnarly seas in that area to get us to Lituya Bay at the right time to safely enter and still have time to enjoy exploring this rarely visited Bay. To put it in perspective, the Bay is about 125 nautical miles to the north of Sitka.  

Sea Caves populate the west coast as a tribute to the power of seawater erosion.

The Fairweather Mountain Range in all its glory.

In addition to the out-of-the-way location, the Bay has a deadly history that often keeps pleasure boats away. The entry “bar” has taken its toll on a wide range of boats and people over the years.  The potential of an ebb tide from the Bay developing standing waves as the ocean meets the shallow water can be epic. We planned for a high slack tide entrance, as per the Coast Pilot (“no stranger should attempt to enter except at slack water.”) Add to this, the entrance is small (150’ wide at maximum navigable water), rocky and visually not self-evident. Thankfully, to help the mariner, there is a range for the entrance.

The range for the entrance to Lituya Bay shows the challenge. NOT FOR NAVIGATION

The fleet spread itself among three anchorages in Lituya Bay.

The fleet spread itself among three anchorages in Lituya Bay.

The ranges were easy to see starting five miles out.

With the weather clear and the sun at our backs, we could visually pick up the range as soon as we turned on our inbound heading, five miles out. We were getting set to the south, but the range made this obvious and aided in making the needed correction.

The sea was following, so we surfed into Lituya Bay. We breathed a sigh of relief to have made it past La Chaussee spit. Karen had done a lot of research on Lituya Bay, and we knew once we made it through the entrance, all would be well (barring any tsunamis or earthquakes!)  It is part of Glacier Bay National Park, but does not require permits. The Bay is very large and seems to support its own weather system.

We headed towards Centotaph Island, thinking of the anchorage behind the island that might allow for fun exploring later in the day. To our surprise, clouds and rain greeted us. However, to the west of the island, it was still clear. Others in the fleet headed toward the glaciers in the rain. We decided to turn around and bask in the sun. We picked a spot on the south east shore, called “the Paps”, and while a constant breeze tugged at our anchor, the sun never stopped shining down on us. We spent a lazy afternoon relaxing, interspersed with installing a depth sounder on our dinghy and looking for elusive halibut. We were later visited by Brian and Rich in Deception’s dinghy. They couldn't believe the weather difference between their location and ours.

Brian, at the helm, and Rich on a mission.

The most interesting feature of Lituya Bay is the scarring of the tree line from the 1958 Tsunami. The wave was 1720 feet tall, the highest in recorded history. If you are a student of the marine environment and geology there is a wealth of information on the internet about this amazing event.

Klag Bay to Elfin Cove

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Today our destination is Elfin Cove, 55 miles from Klag Bay. The wind was cooperative, generally remaining less than 15 knots, and the skies were sunny and bright.

We weaved our way inside as much as possible because when we did have to go out into the ocean, the waves were 8-footers with a short period,  producing what I call “hard chop”. Not dangerous, just annoying.

A little bit of follow the leader as we sneak inside.

Nice ride and beautiful scenery up Lisianski Straight.

Elfin Cove is unique and charming and certainly worth the stop. But there is not much dock space in the outer harbor, and it is always busy. Deception went in first to reconnoiter the berthing situation. There was a cargo barge working adjacent to the dock, loading all kinds of refuse from Elfin Cove residents. There were fish-boats galore. Patos, Telita and OceanFlyer hovered outside for an hour in swells while Brian and Rich negotiated with the fishermen to move boats around and make some room for the “fleet”. Everyone was great. In the end, Patos rafted to Deception and Telita rafted to OceanFlyer, and several fishing boats were rafted together in front of us.

The docks at Elfin Cove.

There was a mad dash to the little grocery store thinking that, being Sunday, the shop would close soon. The store was just as we remembered, perhaps with the stock down a bit. After we made our stop at the store, purchasing what turned out later to be stale lemon cookies, we walked the boardwalk to see what has changed and what has stayed the same. The inner harbor was packed and quite active.

The inner harbor at Elfin Cove.

We were disappointed to find that the fish smoker had retired. Our hope was for some fresh-smoked salmon to add to our larder, but we were skunked.

The Elfin Cove Lodge and adjacent Coho Bar and Grill has been rebuilt since our last visit in 2010 when it was still smoldering from a devastating fire.  We were in the mood to relax on our boat rather than eat out (or drink out), although most of the fleet found their way at one time or another to the Coho Bar!

A little Elfin Cove humor. A lot of the "uphill" residences have a cart track alongside the stairs for getting groceries home.

A couple of Alaskan Amber beers onboard OceanFlyer were our reward for a long day of cruising. We had a peaceful night…and unlike our last trip in 2010, no naked men knocked on the hull at 2am!

Sitka to Klag Bay

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We’re off!

We’ve been contemplating this journey to Prince William Sound for almost two years now. We’ll be traveling farther north than we ever have before. We’ll have longer legs, some 24 hours long; that too will be a new experience. And we’ll be exploring areas that few pleasure boats visit.

We have lots of confidence in our boat and in our preparation. Now, with a little cooperation from the winds and seas, we should enjoy these new waters as they pass under our hull.

Heading north out of Sitka, we worked our way through Olga Strait and then through Whitestone Narrows. These “shortcuts” are well charted and well-marked, allowing you to cut off many less-protected miles in the ocean. The weather was gloomy with only 2 miles visibility and rain that vacillated between light to moderate.

Fresh fruit does not last long, so we "eat it up" in the first few days of the trip. Strawberry, blueberry, granola and Greek yogurt parfait for breakfast.

We passed the M/V Explorer, a National Geographic tour vessel.

The range in the Narrows was one of many well positioned aids to navigation.

Simple construction, but it gets the job done.

After making our way between Klokahef Island and Chichagof Island,  we emerged to enter the ocean which was confused to say the least. The seas, at four to six feet plus the occasional “surprise” wave, kept the boat in motion and gave the stabilizers a workout. We were truly grateful for the stabilizers!

OceanFlyer rode well, and our new GARMIN nav system was awesome, but as we turned into the entrance of Piehle Pass, it turned out we would be in for an interesting ride. Why does that always happen when you have the toughest navigational challenges and smallest fairways? We watched Deception and Patos ride the waves through the pass with no issue. But just as we crossed the bar, a roguish wave gave us a big roll and jog to starboard. Karen, sitting in the alternate portable (but quite sturdy) helm chair in the galley, was thrown out of her seat. The chair went flying, and she landed sprawled across my lap at the helm. No injuries, but what a surprise. Once we were inside the pass, the waters calmed just as fast as they rose. Karen’s pride, however, took a few more minutes to return fully.

Deception took the lead as we entered Klag Bay through “The Gate”. As we approached the head, suddenly, Brian came on the radio and said that they just “touched” bottom. We all noted Deception’s location on the chart using his AIS target, and modified our course to avoid going where they touched. It was not charted to be shallow there. Fortunately it was soft mud, so it was no more consequential than a rude wake up for the Deception crew.

Give the rock and shallows on the west side a respectful distance. NOT FOR NAVIGATION

Talking with Brian later, he was amazed they found a shallow spot as he had been to Klag Bay many times and traveled over that same “spot” without incident. It’s a good lesson on how the bottom can shift and change over time.

Klag Bay is very well protected and offers a good holding mud bottom in 15-20 feet. After we all set anchor and settled in, it was a short dinghy ride to explore the old abandoned gold mines with Emily and Rowan from Deception and the crew of Patos.  

Klag Bay landing party.

Emily, the naturalist, looking for gold.

Finding lots of derelict and rusty machinery, we enjoyed trying to determine what each piece of equipment may have been used for in the mining operation. Some of them were really interesting and would have made great “garden art”! As part of the shore party climbed a bit higher they reported some fresh bear scat so they quickly rejoined us at the lower mine entrance. After all, you only need to be able to run faster than the next slowest person, so we all found safety in numbers.

The abandoned gold mine site in Klag Bay.

We had appetizers and drinks on Deception to get to know everyone a little better and talk about tomorrow’s run to Elfin Cove.  We were too lazy to redeploy our dinghy, so we hitched a ride over to Deception with Lance on “Little T”. As the sun was “setting”, a term we use very loosely in these high latitudes (given that we did not stay up until 11:30 which is the time of official sunset!), the clouds started to break up. Maybe that’s a good omen for tomorrow.

Deception enjoying the "sunset" in Klag Bay.