Archive for the ‘Wrangell to Juneau’ Category
Posted on July 13, 2012 - by Nadia
Home invasion leads to haven
Pua surveys Taku Harbor in the morning light.
Tuesday July 10, 2012
Taku Harbor
Few places are as social as a safe harbor in a storm. I cut short my planned exploration of the gorgeous, glacier-sided Endicott Arm and beat a hasty retreat through eyelash-bending fog. The forecast indicated that wherever I spent Monday night would be home for at least Tuesday as well, maybe longer. I was anxious that that place should be within striking distance of Juneau.
I’ve extended my daily paddling range, doing more 30-plus mile days in Alaska than was possible further south. Here, tidal currents have less impact because the water is deep and wide, so my schedule is not driven as much by the turning of the tides. Campsites are more abundant so I can push on, confident I will find a place to stop. And the landscape is huge, I can take it in as I paddle hard, so long as the fog allows. But those long days depend on relatively calm waters and winds, and that, I knew, was about to end. (more…)
Posted on July 11, 2012 - by Nadia
Thar she blows! And thar, and thar, and … hey, that’s close enough
A humpback in a feeding frenzy.
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Entrance Island, Hobart Bay
The water ahead of me began to bubble and spin and I threw it in reverse. This was getting crazy. I was hemmed in between a kelp-draped rock pile and a couple of energetically feeding humpbacks. My right paddle blade was literally on the rocks and my bow, well, it was retreating as fast as I could make it. The whale surfaced on its side, leading with its long, white and grey striped pectoral fin held high, then it let the fin flop onto the water, rolled to expose its blow hole, took a gulp of water and slid under the surface. It was about 10 yards away. I could see into its blow hole. That’s more intimate than I need in my life with whales.
“Come on, you two, take it to deeper water, will ya?” I asked. They had been in deeper water when I started around the point and I figured they would pass on by. I had gotten a late start. I had lain in the tent, wishing it would stop pouring rain. When I got up I saw the tide had left and all I had to show for it was a long drag over sharp, slippery rocks. I had camped on a mossy shelf near a spring and the rain and spring rose up into a sop of tea-colored water around and under the tent. It was an awkward and soggy morning and now I had whales to contend with.
It had been shaping up as a whale weekend.
Posted on July 11, 2012 - by Nadia
A very cool Independence Day
A parade unlike any other.
July 4, 2012
Wrangell to Le Conte Bay
I could see the parade from a half-dozen miles away. In bright contrast to the silty, grey-green shallows of the Stikine Delta they appeared in a line, bobbing to their own rhythm. At first, I thought they were white power boats, sleek and low to the water. That was strange. I hadn’t seen a boat since leaving Wrangell; virtually everyone was in town for the festivities. Then it struck me. Icebergs! The white shapes were icebergs marching out of Le Conte Bay. It was true! The southernmost tidal glacier was a prodigious calfer of bergs! There was no stopping me now, I thought, and I started the sweeping seven-mile crossing to the bay.
