on the Outside

Dear friends and family,

It is weird that I have the ability to send this out via Starlink satellite from here as this is one of the more remote places I have ever been. 

I am anchored in a tiny protected cove on the outside of Chichigof Island. The side open to the Gulf of Alaska, where storms and foul weather are born. Like Bethlehem for weather. 

To get here today I left Pelican in low clouds and poor visibility until I got to the open Gulf, then rode the ten foot swell with waves on top opposing it. Kind of like a corkscrew every time the swell came through. Hongvi handled it like a charm. The captain was just starting to wonder if he were out there longer if he might make a donation to Neptune of his lunch. 

The entrance into the protected Bay looked tiny on the chart, but was wide enough to enter without danger, even thought the guidebook mentioned not entering in a big swell or fog. As soon as I got halfway inside the swell went away, but the fog came on strong and I found my way via radar to the anchorage. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of traffic over here. I didn’t see anyone while out there and sure don’t see anyone inside here. 

Of course the rain didn’t start hard until I was ready to anchor, then came with a vengeance. Funny way to describe it I guess, there was no vengeance at all about it. It is the Tongass rain forest in Alaska. Normal even? The forest should be healthy as it is raining steadily now. Cold out too. Different than a lot of the US these days, so I am enjoying that.

Sometimes it takes a bit of pain to enjoy the pleasure of this wild and beautiful place. 

A couple of days ago while at the dock, a guy came by admiring the boat. Since he was interested, I gave him a tour of the inside. He just kept telling me how lucky I was to have such a boat and life.

I tried to explain that there were sacrifices to be made to get here, like not owning a house, staying in one community, or being close to friends and family. I could have added working hard for many many years and being a good saver and more along those lines. And even knowing skilled boatbuilders to rebuild her so well after the fire. 

Once he walked away I realized that he was indeed correct; I AM so lucky. 

I came today from Pelican, a very remote town in the Lisianski inlet. The population yesterday was 60, and I noticed that the population sign was temporary hanging on the wall, so easy to change if someone died. I saw two tiny babies yesterday, and wonder if it needed updating.

Pelican is a town of boardwalks and all the businesses are along these boardwalks. About as cute as you could ever imagine. I went twice to the famous Rose’s bar,with one dollar bills posted everywhere, still in business even though Rose died a couple of years ago. The first night I was the only customer. The next night the workers from the fish plant were there to watch the NBA finals. A couple of guys must have been from New York as they were avidly cheering on the Knicks. Just for fun I started to cheer for the Spurs just to get their goat and we ended up both laughing a lot about our “opposites”. When I told them I watched the 1973 Knicks win the championship,they looked at me in amused wonder. Their parents probably weren’t born yet then. 

The town has a small fish processing plant, a couple of dozen trollers in the harbor, but now seems mostly focused on the sport fish business. A float plane flies people in from Juneau, then they spend each entire day out on the water catching fish, stay in the lodge and when finished have their fish all processsed and meet them at the Juneau airport. They pay a big price for all of this and the locals respect that this is big business for this little town and also begrudge all the fish that they take and let me know that this is where they think the overfishing is from. Blame the outsiders? I have heard that a number of times at a number of locations from locals. I don’t know what is true. 

There was one other sailboat at the guest dock my first day in Pelican. Next two nights I was the only guest there. I continue to wonder where everyone went this year. 

The dockmaster (and librarian-same person) said this is the slowest June she has seen since 1972, when she started that job. I am not the only one who can remember things that far back. 

There is an inside passage most of the way down this west side of Chichigof Island to stay out of the swell. I intend to use most of that, but if the weather is fair, get outside in the big ocean and sail. Hongvi might like that. I’ve got a couple of weeks until I plan on arriving Sitka, so time to poke around and explore slowly. Like I do everything these days. 

Sending love,

Charley