Fanshaw Bay anchorage, July 28th

Leaving Petersburg Pete was eager to try more fishing. He had gotten a new lure at the fishing shop in town and wanted to give it a go. He picked a spot on the way and we started to troll. Not sure if I mentioned this before but we’ve been trolling for salmon many times and so far with no luck. We’ve had close calls and caught a juvenile and lots of kelp, but no keepers.

After about 30 minutes or so we were starting to think of moving on when suddenly the line zinged off and Pete grabbed it and said it felt like something was on it. He started to reel it in and I grabbed the net. After a few minutes we were able to see a tail and know for sure we had a fish on the line! Now we just had to get it on the boat. Pete slowly kept reeling it in and as it got closer to the boat I put the net in the water. He guided the fish towards the net but it started to fight as if knowing the end was near. After 2 close misses I was able to get the net around the fish and bring it onto the boat. It was a beauty, a 28 inch King. I’m not a big fisherman by any means but catching a salmon is very exciting. Not to mention makes planning dinner a whole lot easier and more delicious. As non-Alaskan residents, you are only allowed to catch one king  and so we were done for the day

That night, as we anchored at Fanshaw Bay, Pete grilled the salmon and I have to say it tasted noticeably better than the frozen kind I buy back home. Not to mention another member of the boat, Kona, was fascinated by the whole process. We gave her some small raw chunks as we ate and she gobbled them down. She is a seafood loving cat. We are all hoping to catch more salmon of different varieties (pink, coho, etc) in the near future. 

Petersburg, July 27th

A long and winding trip up through the Wrangell narrows (over 60 nav aids are needed to mark the channel), we arrived in Petersburg. With a strong Norwegian history, the main industry here is still fishing and fish processing, and its probably one of the most active fishing towns I've ever been in. The processing and packaging plants operate at very capacity and fishing boats and tenders are coming and going throughout the day and night delivering their catch (mostly salmon). Despite this, it has a friendly small working class town vibe. We really liked it here:

Tidal Grid. This is how you haul your boat out for  quick maintenance and repairs here. With a 20 ft tidal range to work with, you just position your boat on the timbers at high tide and tie off to the pilings alongside. When the tide goes down you are high and dry and can work on the bottom of your boat (until the next high tide):

The best dinner joint we found in town. Not much to look at, but great rockfish tacos:

Never get tired of looking at fishing boats:

We had just finished tying our lines after arriving in Petersburg when a fellow-cruiser came over and told us about Pack Creek. Definitely worth the trip she declared. We were planning on heading to Tracy Arm and saw that Pack Creek (a 50-mile round-trip detour on our journey north) was kind of on the way. After we secured a permit (only 24 people a day are allowed) on-line for the following Tuesday we started to get excited about the prospect of seeing bears close-up in their natural habitat. The night before we set off, I checked my email confirmation and discovered we had to have a printed copy of our permit as the confirmation email would not suffice (no cell signal at Pack Creek). My job was to find a place to print out the permit on a Sunday morning in Petersburg. Not an easy task as everything was closed. Harbor office, museum, library all closed until Monday. What to do? Pete went into the one open store to get more fishing supplies. While there I wandered around & sweet talked a very nice guy into printing out our permit on his office computer. Whew, another odd cruising challenge accomplished. -SP

Next day we were on our way to look for bears...

Saint John Harbor, July 26th

Saint Johns is a very scenic little anchorage between Wrangell and Petersburg. Had a peaceful night there with an amazing sunset. 

Lots of little fish jumping around the boat, so I fished off the boat for a bit, then let the baited hook sit on the bottom while while we ate dinner. When I reeled up, we had nice dungeness crab (male, legal sized keeper) on the hook. Talk about low effort fishing... -PB

Wrangell, July 25th

We didn’t plan on spending the night in Wrangell but we’re glad we did. Our first option was to anchor in an inlet a few miles south. However, as we approached, we found the entrance to the inlet packed with seiners (fish boats that deploy long nets to corral big schools of salmon) working their nets making it hard to maneuver around. Also, we realized the inlet was very long and it would take awhile to get to the anchorage which was up at the mouth. Though one of the fishing boats called us on the radio and said it was ok to go ahead and work our way around the nets we decided it would be easier (and make the next days trip shorter) to head up to Wrangell and tie up at the dock. We didn’t arrive until early evening and after dinner we walked over to the harbor office to drop off payment. 

When we returned we found ourselves surrounded by fishing boats. My impression of the boats up until then was that they are big and a little scary. You don’t want to go anywhere near them while they’re fishing as you don’t know where the gear is and they tend to zoom around and set up their equipment anywhere they want. But at Wrangell I met some of the people from the boats and my impression of most of them was they were nice, interesting folk from all over. For most of them, fishing in Alaska was a seasonal job and they then spent their winters doing other things such as UPS drivers and theater scenery designers. Interesting. For me those big, aggressive looking boats took on a more human side. 

Meyers Chuck, July 24th

As we headed North out of Ketchikan it was gray and rainy.  Definitely felt like Alaska weather. Also, as we continued, the wind started to pick up and we were grateful to duck into Meyers Chuck, our anchorage for the evening. As soon as you turn into the narrow entrance the wind and waves are behind you and in front is a beautiful cove that houses a small community with post office, art gallery and dock. Though we had planned to anchor we saw room at the dock and decided to moor for the night much to the dismay of the large yacht following close behind us who then had to anchor out. We’re glad we did as the price for docking was very affordable. Overall the cost of docking in Alaska compared to BC is much less which is good as we ended up docking unexpectedly a few evenings.

After getting our lines adjusted, we took a walk past some of the houses and through a forest to a log strewn beach. The sun had come out and it was nice to smell woods instead of car fumes again. From the beach you could really see the wind creating wind chop in the channel we had been in earlier. Nice to be safe and sound with that much energy close by. Though the best part of the walk was seeing a board with notices on it. One of them announced a homemade cinnamon roll service that would be delivered to your boat by calling and ordering the night before. Heck yeah! Two for Kama Hele please with walnuts.

We spent a peaceful evening at dock enjoying the sunset. The next morning as we prepared to get underway, the lady with the baked goods (didn’t catch her name) came over on her dinghy and handed out the treats. Not sure if it was the setting or the fact that they were indeed homemade but they were some of the tastiest cinnamon rolls we’ve had so far. Though we might have to stop back on the way back home just to make sure.