Day 23

Today I had the luxury of getting up whenever I felt like, but it turns out that my body got so acclimated to waking up at 4:00am that I ended waking up at 8:00am, still late, but nowhere near where I would be waking up on a summer day back home. Once I woke, up I discovered that dad had already gone to get some more hardware for a little side project he was working on, and soon both he and Jason returned. Now, I did another thing that I have never done alone before, which was to re-provision.

That’s not technically true, Jason came with me, but he was there mostly to carry the jerry jugs when we filled up gas. We walked don the surprisingly sunny streets of Ketchikan, with giant backpack full of empty jerry jugs on my back, and noted that the wind was blowing pretty good from the Southwest, which was unexpected as it was supposed to be from the north today and going west tomorrow. Anyway, we got to Costco, bought some meat, dry goods, a can of beans, and some apples, then filled up the jerry jugs at a gas station before heading back to the boat.

By this time the wind had picked up to at least 15 knots southwest straight down the narrows, and with the unusual bright sun, the conditions were ideal to leave. So once we got back to the boat and had everything stowed away, Jason gave dad the keys to his apartment, and we cast off the dock lines for the first sail where I really was in command.

Getting of the dock was a close call with the wind blowing us hard onto it, but we just scraped by the end and were soon clear of the harbor, to face the much greater hazards of the narrows. As soon as we were outside the breakwater, we had at least three float planes and half a dozen fishing boats, all fighting for space in the narrow channel, and all of them moving at least twice as fast as us, bobbing along on the chop like a cork in a whirlpool of motion.

Eventually, we pulled through the traffic to the far side of the narrows, where we raised the jib to help out the engine, and by the time we were abeam of the airport we were clear of most of the small traffic. However, the Alaska Marine Highway system ferry Columbia was leaving just as we sailed past the ferry dock, so I held off raising the main until it passed. As the Columbia approached, she hailed us on the VHF radio to determine our intentions, which I thought was very considerate, as some cruise ships that had passed dad and I even closer had made no attempt to contact us at all.

After the call from the Columbia, and with Darwind’s mainsail set, we cut the engine, and were soon making 6 knots through the water, making for the perfect introductory sail for Jason. The sun was shining, not a cloud in the robin’s egg sky, and once we were safely underway with some relatively clear water ahead, I let Jason take over the helm and get a feel for the boat. I could tell from his face that he was loving it, and no wonder; there’s not much in this world to match the feeling of well-found boat surfing before a wind just this side of having to throw in another reef, and with the bright sun so unusual for Ketchikan, it was paradise. The only downside to the whole day of sailing was that it had to end so soon, for after only two hours of sailing, we were already putting out the fenders for docking at Knudson Cove.

We had arrived at Knudson Cove early, at around 3:00pm, and after moving over to the city dock, where we just barley found a sot to squeeze into, (I love small boats] there was still lots of time, and as the weather prompted something more than just sitting around, Jason and I set off for a little exploratory hiking, but unfortunately there weren’t any good trails so the most interesting thing we found was a neat bridge over a deep gorge filled with trash. When we returned to the boat, however, we had a lot more fun.

This fun came in the form of Jason’s awesome new remote controlled drone that we used to take some cool shots and video of the boat, but also just to fly around and see the world from a whole new perspective. I have to say, if I’ve ever got several hundred bucks just laying around, (not likely, what with this boat, aka black hole of money] I might just have to buy myself one of those; they are seriously amazing. And with the live video stream coming in, you don’t even really need to get any actual video, that’s just the bonus, the real reward is getting to experience everything from that point of view that we land-bound humans almost never get to see. Makes me think I might have to take up parasailing as well. Anyway, after a very good day, both on the water, on earth, and in the air, we retired back to the boat, where the day was by no means over.

Here, as there was still more than enough sunlight as we entered the land of the midnight sun and the worst sleep imaginable, I set to work on a project, the first serious task we had set to all day. What it was, was that a few days ago, when tied u to a dock, I had noticed what appeared to be a thin line trailing aft from the rudder, and so I decided to investigate further with my Gopro. It turned out that the thin line was actually a very thin piece of bull kelp, the bulb of which had gotten jammed up against the rudder. After I had determined the exact nature and location of the problem, I spent the next half-hour with the boat hook, laying on the dock and poking it blindly down under the boat. However, this proved to be a fruitless waste of time, as when I put the Gopro down a second time, it showed that the kelp hadn’t budged an inch. I then went to the other side of the boat and used the boathook to reach down and grab the trailing end of the offending piece of kelp, but only succeeded in breaking it so that I could no longer grab it. Finally Jason had the idea to turn the rudder towards the dock, forming an angle hat we could then follow with the boat hook straight down to the kelp. This worked almost instantly, and we soon had the pleasure of watching the pale strand slowly spiraling down through the clear water to the bottom of the harbor, there to cause no more harm to boat or crew. Thus ending a very busy, though short day.