Patterson Glacier

After leaving Baird Glacier, we went over to the south side of Thomas Bay and hiked up the Patterson River.  After a 6 mile hike, we found ourselves at the end of the road, and the river kept on going up, but at a slow pace.  We found a canoe hidden in the bushes and borrowed it for the afternoon, and paddled up the river to the lake that is in front of the glacier.  We saw a few mountain goats, shedding their winter coats and looking pretty scraggy.  The glacier doesn't calve into the lake anymore, but sits along a terminal moraine, so we beached the canoe and went for a walk.  I got up on a little hill and took this picture of the weird landscape: the steep angles probably have ice under the dirt and there are muddy lakes and holes in the ground.  It looks like the surface of another planet.

We hiked up a bit further and onto the glacier itself, and there were a lot of patches of moss everywhere.  We looked a bit closer and found that the moss was in small balls: Glacier Mice!

Mostly they stay in groups, but sometimes they are alone.

Further up the blue ice shone through, and meltwater streams flowed down.  

And we found a tunnel

Of course we had to go into it.  It was very wet and drippy in the tunnel, also slick.  But the ice was the most amazing blue color.  

Here's a shot of me in the tunnel.

On our way back out we found a moose and a baby.  We had a bit of time to watch them before they went into the woods.  The baby is all legs!

I had never been up the river that far before and it was a great trip, but we covered 18 miles that day and it took 11 hours.  It rained all day too, so we were soaked and hungry and cold and tired.  And happy.

Baird Glacier

We started our trip out with a bang, when we went to Leconte and ran into some big growlers; (which are large pieces of ice) and after a few hours of trying to get up the fjord we were forced to turn back. It is really pretty up the Leconte Inlet, and we ended up anchoring up there and going for a small hike up a creek that feeds the inlet, but it was just too packed full of ice for Layla to make it up. Instead, we headed north to Thomas Bay! It was raining pretty hard all day and the wind was at our backs (unusual) and we made really good time sailing on up, but it was still pretty late when we arrived in Scenery Cove. On our way in we saw a brown bear with a big piece of machinery. Mike Justa (my companion for this trip) mentioned that it was the typical alaska: "Brown Bears and broken down boats." As we approached to get a closer look at the bear, another bear popped out. It was a black bear with two little cubs. It walked out onto the beach, then looked up and saw the brown bear, and turned right around and boogied out of there. No sense hanging around with something that will eat her cubs.

The next morning we got into the canoe and started paddling over to Baird. Scenery Cove is a few miles away from the outwash plain of Baird Glacier, and so we had to paddle about 4 miles just to get to the river, and since the tide was rising (as we had planned) we were able to catch the rising tide up the river rather than fighting the current. It took us all the way (about 1.5 miles) up the tidal flat and into the "lake" which is the basin that was gouged out by the glacier when it extended further, back in about 2002. In those days, the glacier was pushing its terminal moraine in front of it and created a hill at the top of the outwash plain. Then it began to melt, so waterways have appeared througout the area previously occupied by solid ice. This mechanism is a mystery to me, because I have seen other glaciers that melt and "retreat". They form a vertical face that calves ice off of them and that vertical face is further and further up the inlet every year, because more ice calves off them than the speed of the glacier flow. Sort of like a conveyer belt that is getting chopped up at one end and the choppers are moving up. Baird Glacier is not doing that. I can't really tell what it is doing, but the pieces that we paddled around are enormous. They are hundreds of feet long and wide and I think they are all connected, which would make them thousands of feet long and wide (and maybe hundreds deep). Which means the glacier is just submerged. Since the sea water is pretty warm compared to ice, I would figure the ice would melt, break into pieces, and float, and very soon the lake would have only floating pieces, and then a face would form on the glacier and pieces would calve off. It might take a year to do this. But I've seen this lake with channels in it for the last 4 years. Previous to that, it was much more solid, so no channels. So that means (maybe) that the glacier is moving fast enough to replenish the ice that is melted away, so it doesn't form a face.

It's the only one like this in Southeast Alaska.

So we paddled around the ice a little bit and then walked on the Moraine, and found some Semi-Palmated Plovers.

And we found this moss or something that was beautiful colored and smelled really good.

Here is a picture of us paddling around the ice.

We climbed out and looked at the ice from on the hills over the sides of the glacier, but those hills are polished smooth by the passage of the glacier and we couldn't get very high. Very slippery.

We hauled the canoe out on some of the icebergs and went for a walk.

Here's a shot of Mike looking like John Muir. It was pretty cold so we were wearing the life jackets because the were warm. Also if something happened we could float a bit better, or if we fell they were padding.

Baird Glacier is one of the most interesting places up here to me, since it is really difficult to get to and quite dangerous; there are lots of gigantic forces at work here, with calving ice chunks, rock slides, and currents in really cold water and no place way to climb out on land. With Uncruise, though we came here reasonably often, we barely scratched of exploring this area, and we never had enough time. It changes all the time as well. If I come back this summer it will be completely different. We paddled back to the boat late in the day, and since the tide had fallen, we had a raging river to head down, with icebergs both floating along with us and grounded (with the river making rapids around them). I used a lot of adrenaline in one day. When we got back to the boat we had been out 11 hours.   

Misty Fiords

 I did a little trip over to Rudyerd Bay, because I've always wanted to see what is up this one little river, and it was a nice trip.  On the way over I found some Red-Necked Phalaropes...   And also some Orcas, but I was trying to shoot video and didn't get any still pictures.  I passed by this volcanic plug, called New Eddystone Rock.  I pass this all the time with uncruise, but this time I had more time to look and think about what it would be like to climb it.

 I went past Punchbowl Cove, and the cliffs above punchbowl looked down on me with some snow on their brow. 

 As I got towards God's Pocket, I began to see Brown Bears in all the grassy meadows.  This one was a biggie...

 I went for a paddle and found some Common Mergansers

 And then for a short walk amongst the Nootka Lupine.  Unless these are not Nootka Lupine, maybe Abe will comment with a correction here.  The meadows are beginning to flower and full of green and lush leaves.  I wanted to lie down and nap in them, but it was rainy and there were bears all around.

 Like this one.  This bear was eating grass (as they do a lot) and never noticed me arrive, but I still kept my distance.  Its a big difference to be alone with a bear than to have friends along. 

 There was another bear that sauntered out but it retreated again.  The tide was dropping and I took this picture of Layla out at the edge of the tide flat.  It goes from 400 ft deep to about 5 ft deep very quickly and its hard to find the right spot to anchor in where you don't go aground at low tide, but you aren't too deep. 

 I paddled up the river at high tide later on and found this little spotted sandpiper

 Here's another Layla shot.  I set up a tarp as a rain shelter and it works great

 I moved to another location and found some more bears, and a wolverine which ran away before I could get a picture of it, and also some mating river otters. 

I'm back in Ketchikan now and trying to fix all the things that have broken since I started out, and the list seems to keep growing, but I also working it down.  Its a differential equation, actually, it is being added to and depleted from at the same time and at rates that depend on each other...  Since fixing the rudder up, I added some more support for the pulleys that are used to turn the rudder when using the wheel (you can also use a tiller on this one so if the wheel breaks it is a backup).  This was a very difficult job because of the access, but I managed to get it done.  I'm quite happy with it now.  The engine had a few leaks in it and I have patched them up as well, so that feels great, but the inverter, which turns the solar panel power and battery power into 120 volt power that I use to charge my cameras and computer, that has broken.  The heater is also finicky, and it was just working pretty well a few moments ago, but it likes to "pulse" and then go out a lot, so I think I need a new fuel pump for it.  But when it works, the world is so much nicer.
I made a rain collection system for filling the fresh water tank, and filled the ice box with snow from an avalanche chute, so hopefully I can only need to get fuel and food from towns.

North, to Alaska!

I've made it to Ketchikan. It was a great trip north, with lots of sunshine and no rain, and at times, quite hot, but fun and tiring. I'm glad to be stopped now for a little while.

Before I left, I took Mom and David out sailing, and I did a lot of testing the boat out to see how it sailed and anchored and motored. I learned a lot, but I learned more on the trip north, so there is projects to work on still.

 My Crew:

I had some friends from Uncruise join me, Shane

and Ted

And of course me.

As we headed north we passed through Seymore Narrows, and I went through at a pretty high flow time and hit 15.1 knots according to the GPS. That's pretty quick. As we passed through Johnstone Strait we saw an Elephant Seal resting at the surface. I tried to get a look, but it dove before I could get closer. If you click on the picture you can zoom in on the seal. They look so funny.

Crossing Queen Charlotte Sound was good, we had some wind behind us for a while and I ran the spinnaker and also flew the kite for some pictures.

There are lots of very close channels and we saw a black bear pretty close on Princess Royal Island

And some nice lichens in the trees with the sun beaming though...

As we crossed Dixon Entrance, we passed by a lighthouse that I took a picture of from Altair when I passed by 11 years ago. It was good to see it again, and this time with calmer seas.

And our arrival in Ketchikan. Here is the city from the water.

I also hit a log on the way up and wanted to have a look. I hauled out on the "grid" to fix it, and that took about 2 hours, so I cleaned the bottom and put a new "knot meter" propeller in as well. Its a pretty neat system, just uses the tide to expose the bottom of the boat, but most people don't put sailboats on there, so a lot of folks were coming by to ask me how I did it. The grid spacing is not very wide and you need a long enough keel to sit on two beams, and Layla has a long enough keel, but only just. I did a lot of adjusting as the tide was dropping to make sure the keel lined up just right.

I dropped off my crew and now I'll spend a few days here before heading out into the wilderness for a bit.

I bought another sailboat!

 I recently bought a new (to me) boat! Its another Ericson, but this time it is an Ericso 32, instead of a 27. So that's 5 whole feet of extra room, which actually makes a huge difference. I think its about twice the size of my dear little Altair. The outside of the boat is pretty similar to Altair, but larger. It has one jib, on a furler, and one mainsail, on the mast, and then also has a spinnaker that I can put up if I choose. It has wheel steering. The little diesel engine inside is 3 cylinders, and 20 hp, and sounds good when running, but is kind of difficult to start (maybe the glow plugs are bad?).

Inside the boat there is lots of space (at least compared to what I am used to). In the front there is a V berth that is easily big enough for two, and there is a quarter berth in the back under the port side of the cockpit where two could fit, but its large for one. Additional sleeping can be made by dropping the table down and fitting the cushion.

The head is sensible and simple, and also clean.

There are these nice drop down hatches that have storage behind them, and you can set stuff on the hatch temporarily.

It has a propane stove and oven, and pressure hot and cold water, and put in my Orca cooler as a fridge.

Sailing, its similar to Altair in a lot of respects, quick and fairly tender. It heels over and goes! I flew the spinnaker to test it out; it is a big and powerful sail, but also in great shape and with a sock.

The jib is not huge, but a good size for sailing and also for being able to see forward, since it has a higher cut than a bigger sail would. The mainsail is in good shape also.

When I bought the boat there were a few projects to work on, and I'm pleased to say that I've conquered a lot of them already (after one week). I got the diesel heater working, and that is a wonderful thing. I am sitting in the boat and toasty warm, basking in the glorious heat. It might be 80 degrees inside right now! It burns Diesel, so it doesn't need to be plugged in to work, but it makes a bit of fan noise. Speaking of being plugged in, I also installed a solar panel, and am just about ready to add a second, for 200W of solar capacity. I hope that this will keep the batteries happy without having to run the engine ever.

My plan is to anchor in Fairhaven and spend the spring and summer there, or until work starts. If work doesn't start, then maybe I will see if I can take the boat up to Alaska or Canada.   

Return to the Northwest

 On my drive back up the coast, I stopped back in Baja and hiked a few canyons.  One of them, the "Steinbeck" canyon, had some nice pools and hummingbirds...

 And some frogs in the clear water...

 Another view of the Hummer...

 And I managed to meet up with the Safari Endeavor and go out whale watching with them!  They go over to the lagoons where the Gray Whales give birth and then out on small Pangas, and we had a year old one come up and nuzzle the boat.

 It was pretty big, but not as big as a mama whale, but covered in barnacles and pretty nasty. 

 And at one of my camping spots there was a curious pelican and I got a shot of him looking at me from close range.

Of course upon entering the USA and heading north the world got more and more crazy, and so I scampered pretty quick up to Bellingham and will hole up here for a while until I find out what will become of the summer.  I'm sure there will be some sort of adventure.