One of our objectives of this trip is to arrive in Petersburg, Alaska in time to join in the Little Norway Celebration with begins with Norwegian Independence Day on May 17th. So we plan a long travel day to make up for the time we lost in Prince Rupert. We untie the boat and slip out of the harbor past two large cruise ships into Tongass Narrows just before 5:30 am. The sun is already out and there is almost no boat traffic. The forecast calls for perfect weather and as we enter Clarence Strait, we find the water placid.
Our course takes us up Clarence Strait for almost 70 miles
before we enter Sumner Strait and work our way around Zarembo Island to St.
John’s Harbor. This anchorage is just 4
nautical miles from the entrance to the Wrangell Narrows which we will transit
in the morning.
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| Dahl's Porpoise |
Along the way we are
reminded how critical it is to keep a constant eye out for logs and debris. We hit a partially submerged log on our
starboard bow with enough force to cause a real scare. Luckily it was a glancing blow entirely
missing the propeller. The noise from
the impact echoed through the boat and we were pushed to port while the log
went to starboard. Barrie quickly
inspected the hull from every available vantage and determined there was no
damage. We consider ourselves very lucky
and hope to never repeat the experience.
We continued on our days journey but it took several minutes
for our heart rates to return to normal.
A few miles later a pod of dolphins spent 10 minutes or so playing in
our bow wake. They were great fun to
watch.
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| St. John's Bay |
We arrived at St. John’s Bay about 5:30 and found a
beautiful anchorage in 72 feet of water.
It takes a lot of ground tackle to anchor in Alaska where the tides can
rise and fall over 20 feet twice a day!
We shared the anchorage with two boats.
We sat in the sun on the aft deck drinking scotch while celebrating a
successful (albeit a bit scary) day, reviewing tide and current tables and
planning our course for the morning.
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