i’ve recently added some photos from the beginning and end of the trip. click on “photo” from the categories list to filter for only those posts with photos…
it’s hard to believe it was only seven days ago we were tired and hungry and paddling around the harbor looking for a customs dock that didn’t exist in ketchikan. our short life as long distance kayakers is history and regularly scheduled programming has resumed.
we caught the ferry home, which was a little like pushing the rewind button and watching the past two months go by. the ferry cruised along at 22 knots, so an hour was roughly a day’s paddling; it was 38 hours nonstop from ketchikan to bellingham. the perspective was different but i gained a whole new appreciation for how well we came to know the coast as we paddled north… after a few hours’ sleep or other distraction, it was eerie how quickly i could pick out a landmark and fix our location with confidence.
i’m sure it will be a little while until we really have any real perspective on the summer’s adventures, but i won’t let that stop me from trying now…we paddled to alaska. when we started this trip, dean and i had logged about a dozen days in a kayak between us. we spent the winter reading and provisioning and then we pushed off, quite literally, into the deep. we played some things more conservatively than a veteran would have, but the inside passage was not beyond us. i hesitate to say “anyone could do it” but our patience was tested far more frequently than our paddling skills. we spent a lot of time on this trip on shore, whether it was the afternoon winds picking up or the cold rain encouraging us to seek shelter or a day off when a storm front passed… we had lots of time to read and reread a guidebook or hope for good weather or ponder the meaning of life. lots of time to kill. too much time, as it turned out, for my restless mind but…
we paddled to alaska.
seiner pulling in net
7/13, day 61, 24 mi, 831 mi total
we made it. it wasn’t quite a paddle in the park, but it was fitting. we left in a cloud this morning but the sky slowly lifted all morning until we actually saw blue sky by the time we pulled in.
we started the day with one of the nastiest launches we’ve had yet. the tide was all the way out, which meant the only bit of beach was a long walk across slippery rocks (not too unusual) and a stream. fording the shin-deep stream swollen with rain and full of seaweed to mask the rocks was interesting. doing so while carrying a 100-plus pound kayak was, well, challenging.
fought the southerly wind for a couple miles until we were back in the straight and heading north again… watched giant seiners pulling up their giants nets… stared bewilderedly at the increasingly constant stream of tour boats and flightseeing planes and fishing charters as we neared ketchikan… watched porpoises playing around the bow of a fishing charter speeding by…
finally paddled into town and checked in with us customs, which was almost easier than the canadian version. we had to walk up to an office building to find anyone and they did check our passports, but once again no one even confirmed that the kayak we claimed to arrive in actually existed.
and then we mostly just gawked at the crazy world of cruise ship tourism. there are docks for 4 monsters to line the shore here. that’s something like 4-6,000 tourists swarming the place in bus tours and trolley tours and duck tours and horse-drawn carriage tours… and then evening comes and the whole place empties and it starts all over the next day. when the ships are in dock, the view of the ocean and mountains and anything else is entirely blocked out. the only view is of the artificial floating cities.
it’s a little disorienting, a little overwhelming… kind of like jumping off the deep end back into society. or maybe getting thrown in…
view of misty fjords from porch
7/12, day 60, 0 mi, 807 mi total
totally gratuitous rain day. pick your excuse – it’s pouring, yesterday was a long day, no point in hurrying to ketchikan over the weekend, we have this great little cabin… they’re all good.
it’s been one of those days when i don’t even want to go outside to make the mad dash to the privy. other than the occassional trip dictated by nature, we’ve hardly moved from our bunks. a very good day reading, daydreaming, playing cribbage, watching the rain, and generally feeling smug about being lazy.
dixon entrance
7/11, day 59, 39 mi, 807 mi total
a nearly perfect day. the weather was absolutely beautiful – partly cloudy with a light breeze all day. it was a long day of paddling, but my favorites are days when we get to stay in the boat all day. it was beautiful. nothing that really stands out i guess, but hour and hour of ocean, beach, forest, and mountains. we’ve seen a lot of all of those things on this trip, but that scene never really grows old.
and we’ve got a postcard view of all that tonight, looking up into misty fjords… from the window of a sweet little forest service cabin. it’s simple, but perfect for us. we get a roof and a privy tonight. hooray!
had one view today that i haven’t seen all trip – my lap. every other day it’s been covered with a chart case but there was no need for it today… when i ordered charts last spring, i missed the one covering the area from cape fox (where we camped yesterday) to ketchikan somehow. i made a note to myself and figured we’d pick it up in prince rupert – surely it would be simple to find a chart for nearby waters in the major city/marine center of the area. i failed to appreciate that whole border thing. only one place in prince rupert carried any us charts, and they didn’t have the one i needed. so we’re navigating off the topo map for a few days, which has worked just fine. but dean keeps the topos, so i had nothing but the scenery to look at today. felt a little naked (lost?) this morning, but i think i could get used to it… blissful ignorance might be better than looking at the charts and trying to reconcile dean’s steering with them. :)
fish buyer in fox cove
7/10, day 58, 11 mi, 768 mi total
woke up to the familiar chorus of watch alarms and raindrops on nylon this morning. by the time i had dressed and packed up, though, the rain had quieted. there were hints of weakness in the clouds off to the north, and the seas were calm. all signs pointed towards a good day.
and mostly, the day followed suit. we paddled on glassy water across the imaginary border line into alaska. the first boat we saw in american waters was a commercial fisherman who unnerved us a little by heading straight for us, then pulled up to say hello and have a chat. first time this trip a boat has done that, it was nice to have a friendly conversation… we saw blue sky. mostly off in the distance, but our shadows did make a brief appearance this afternoon. and then the winds kicked up in our faces about half a mile before we reached cape fox. it was our last possible campsite before a couple hours of exposed shoreline paddling. this is the dixon entrance, where there’s precious little between us and the open pacific, so a little headwind could turn into something much bigger pretty easily. so… we played it safe and set up camp early again. even without sunshine, the stiff breeze dried out all of our gear (8 days since we could say that), so the short day was almost! worth it just for that.
it’s been awhile since we had an early camp on a day when one might actually want to be outside. it was nice to explore the beach and sit outside instead of just hunkering down in the tent all day…
7/9, day 57, 8 mi, 757 mi total
argh. i’m generally not superstitious, but i sincerely regret the comment about last night being our last in canada. we didn’t make it across the border today.
by the time we stopped for a mid-morning snack break the wind was raging and the waters were a confused mess with the wind and the swell and the tide all pushing in different directions. we had stopped at a good beach with room to camp, and just stayed.
it absolutely poured all day. hard enough that we would have to wait for one of the brief respites to make the mad dash from our tent to the cook tarp, all of about 10 steps. in full rain gear. i’m about ready to turn in now, and it seems like things have finally cleared up a bit and calmed down. maybe we’ll get lucky and it’ll still be that way in the morning.
i’m so over this weather. it’s july!
7/8, day 56, 28 mi, 749 mi total
today started out promising, but pretty much went downhill from there. which is a remarkable thing to say about a day when we covered 28 miles pretty easily.
prince rupert harbour was calm as we paddled away early, although there was plenty of other traffic buzzing about soon enough. i started to wonder if there was a season opening or closing as there seemd to be a steady stream of fishing boats passing us. the winds picked up some, but they pushed us along so i can’t really complain about that. the weather was miserable – foggy and chilly, it rained on and off all day. on for half an hour, off for 5 minutes, repeat for 12 hours. we set up camp and both immediately crawled into our sleeping bags to try to warm up.
we were warm and dry in prince rupert but all of our gear stayed damp. it was raining most of the time we were there and while the hostel was great for us, it was packed and there was no chance of drying gear there. so we set up camp in the rain and crawled into our damp little world. the dinner hour coincided with a storm moving through that repeatedly blew our tarp down and drenched us. we’re tucked away again for the night, warm if not exactly dry. i had an extra serving of chocolate after supper to stoke the furnace. maybe the extra warmth will be enough to dry my sleeping bag from the inside… it’s a nice thought.
it’s our last night in canada! (unless i just jinxed us.) we’re maybe 10 miles from alaska… i hadn’t really thought about it until just now but that’s a nice milestone to ponder.
7/7, day 55, 0 mi, 721 mi total
good town day. got all of the usual errands done, took advantage of the “big town” and treated ourselves to bad chinese and excellent pizza, and scored a warm dry bed again when someone didn’t show up for their room at the hostel. good day.
7/6, day 54, 23 mi, 721 mi total
we escaped! the weather calmed just enough to let us off the island this morning and we were not about to let an opportunity pass.
we had a little exciting paddling… at one point the wind waves were meeting the current and the raging runoff from the skeena river over a shallow bank while no less than 3 boats appeared to be heading for us. but it was fine. the strong tailwind meant we covered the first 11 miles of the day in less than 2 1/2 hours and the last 12 miles were just a long easy approach to prince rupert.
landing in a city from a kayak is a little daunting… it’s not like there are facilities designed to accommodate you or anticipate your needs, and our guidebooks are almost useless on the matter. i prepared town maps once we’re walking around but that doesn’t help with the transition. so we paddled around for awhile and i finally managed to convince the harbourmaster at the marina to let us stow our boat on her dock for a couple nights. from there, everything fell into place and we found a warm bed at the hostel and a friendly cafe… life is good tonight.
