Wrangell to Petersburg: June 10 - 17

Wrangell to Petersburg:  June 10 – 17

We spent three nights in Wrangell, June 10, 11, and 12.  We basically had a week to kill before we go to get to Petersburg to pick up Jim and Chris Munch on Sunday, so we weren’t in any hurry to leave Wrangell.  We emptied a propane tank on Saturday morning and couldn’t get more until Monday, so that pretty much made up our minds!

      So….a little about the cute little town of Wrangell.  It has a population of about 1500 people and obviously less in the winter.  The winters are moderated by the ocean but they still get snow, wind, and freezing temps.  They used to have big cruise ships come in, but the cruise ships basically wanted to buy the town for themselves, and the town said, “No!”  The town also said no to the cruise ships’ request to have 15% of all the merchants’ profits!  Good for them!

Wrangell is obviously a fishing town.  The king salmon season for Commercial boats was to open on 6/13/11, so there was a lot of activity getting ready.  We were fortunate to moor at Reliance Harbor, the commercial dock so we got to see lots of activity! There are lots of fishing and sightseeing charters out of Wrangell.  Anan Creek Bear Observatory is not far.  It’s a great place to see grizzlies, especially in August when the salmon are running.  We’ve got reservations to spend the day there on August 5.

     It looked like the fishermen were converting their boats from crab fishing to salmon fishing.  The crane on the dock near us was busy all day every day!  The baskets at the end of the boom are crab pots…huge ones!  They are cone shaped mesh baskets with the top opening about 3’ in diameter and bottom of the cone about 8’ in diameter!  As you know the king crabs in Alaska get quite large! 

     A large fishing boat came in Friday afternoon and parked behind us, called “Savage”.  LaDonna, the secretary in the harbormaster’s office knew the boat and was friends with the captain – a petite Japanese-American woman from Seattle!  The captain, her crew, and LaDonna cooked hot dogs on the boat deck on Friday night…sure smelled good!  Savage is a salmon tender, which means they offload the salmon catches from smaller boats to allow them to continue fishing.  Quite a process!

We were parked right in there with all the big boys!  The white yacht in the foreground left Friday afternoon.  The dock with the crane is just forward of that white yacht, so the rest of the weekend boats were in and out of there.  Like I said, it was really fun to watch all the activity.

This marina has a tidal grid at the head of the harbor.  This is a do-it-yourself means of hauling a boat out of the water.  At high tide the captain moors the boat at the dock above the grid and then the boat settles onto the wooden beams as the tide goes out.  Lots of boats were in and out of here, mostly having their hulls power washed.  It was a busy spot!  It looked like a tough, dirty job and one that needed to be completed in a few hours, since the tide changes about every 6 hours.  The boat owner is charged by the foot per tide, so finishing during one low tide would be half as expensive as requiring two tide cycles.

Do you notice in these marina pictures how tall the pilings are that hold the piers in place?  Alaska can have tides that change as much as 25 feet!  We see tide changes of 10-12 feet in LaConner and think that is quite a lot.  When we were sailing with Chuck in San Francisco Bay, a tide swing of 5 feet was pretty typical!  Knowing what the tides will do is really important to us when we anchor.  If we find a lovely spot in 25 feet of water at high tide, low tide can mean we’ll be sitting in 5 feet of water.  Yikes!  Probably wouldn’t be a problem since our draft is 4’6” but that’s cutting it pretty close…too close for us! As we approach summer solstice, the tides are increasing and then new moon and full moon tides are always bigger too…so many things to keep track of!  The folks who built this house on the dock across the channel from apparently forgot to figure in all those issues!  Kinda funny, but sad, too.

     Since we were in Wrangell for 2 ½ days, we got a lot of chores done.  We did all our laundry on the boat since we had access to power and lots of water.  Our little washer/dryer combination isn’t very big so two regular loads is 4-5 in this little machine.  We were within walking distance of “downtown” Wrangell so we got groceries…they have two grocery stores!  In this photo, you’ll see how we transport our purchases back to the boat! 

     When we checked in at the harbormaster’s office on Friday afternoon, LaDonna told us that there would be a showing of a first-run movie that night at the museum’s auditorium.  Well, this we had to see!  We saw “Thor” – sort of like a Scandinavian superman!  The auditorium was pretty impressive – had portable stadium seating and a VERY LOUD surround sound system.  What a hoot!

     We returned the next day to walk through the museum.  It had been developed through a private donation and gave an excellent history of the area, Tlingits, loggers, fishermen, and everyone in between.  The museum sits right on the bay

in Juneau.  If you look east you can see the mouth of the Stikine River, which drains British Columbian glaciers and the water in Wrangell was milky green with all the glacial melt.

      When we were in Ketchikan, we found the First Lutheran Church to attend on that Sunday morning and we were so glad we did!  Everyone was very friendly at coffee afterward and we learned a lot more about the area and the “real” folks who live there.  So, we went looking for a Lutheran Church in Wrangell.  Sure enough, found one there, too.  There were about 30 folks worshipping and they’d recently lost their part-time pastor, so the Cluster Dean was there to officiate.  This lady pastor was quite a dynamo and we learned she has a congregation in Juneau so we’re determined to find that church, too.  She told us that Petersburg and Sitka, both on our list of destinations, have Lutheran congregations.  Cool! 

     We departed Wrangell on Monday morning at 1045 and headed west.  Jim and Chris Munch were all set to join us in Petersburg on Sunday, June 19, so we had a few days to go exploring before we headed to Petersburg.  Anita and Dale Neifert gave us some ideas of places to explore and off we went…headed to Totem Bay on the SW side of Kupreanof Island.  Anita had said this was one of their favorite anchorages and they liked to explore nearby Agate Beach. 

      We dropped anchor, and watched the wind come up, and the rain begin to fall.  Oh well, so much getting the dinghy down today.  We tucked in, read our books and caught up on the letter and our notes.  No cell service, no Internet connection, no TV…wonderful!  In fact, we stayed put until Wednesday morning.  Jerry did some boaty maintenance and I cooked and cleaned.  Just another day at home!

      We pulled in to an interesting little marina, called Point Baker, at the NW corner of Prince of Wales Island.  We found plenty of room on the public dock and decided to stay.  We were so glad we did!  We met some very interesting folks and heard some amazing stories!

      The “community” of Point Baker is all on the public float…the post office, the community building, the fire-boat station, the restaurant, the little grocery, etc., etc.  Herb greeted us as we pulled in and we learned he and his wife are the go-to people in this settlement of 14 homes.  Herb and Judy are getting the restaurant ready to open on June 19 and Herb was busy cleaning the stoves and grills!  He convinced us to come back when we head south again for some of his famous pie!

We noticed a lot of activity at the other end of the dock and wandered down to see what was going on.  Stuart, another of the community’s colorful people, had taken some visitors out fishing – gill-netting – and they were cleaning all the salmon they caught.  Apparently we looked pitiful enough to warrant being given a lovely fillet for dinner.  It was delicious!  We discovered that a bag of homemade peanut butter cookies would produce salmon too.  The gill-netter parked behind us gave us half of a fish! 

A little otter lives in the marina and he kept us quite entertained.  He fished for crabs and starfish right along the edge of the pier so I got several funny shots.

While we were in Point Baker, we learned about bear hunters.  Apparently there’s quite a business for hunting guides to load up a boat full of folks and go looking for bears along the shore.  Stuart called these bears “beach bears”.  The hunters shoot the bears from their boat and don’t put a lot of effort or “sport” into the kill.  While we were in the marina, a boat moored and off came a whole family dressed in camo!  Notice one little girl in her camo outfit and pink boots!  Well, they were a whole family of bear hunters from Fresno, CA!  During our transit east on Sumner Strait to the start of Wrangell Narrows we saw a State Police boat “pull over” this bear hunting boat.  Of course, we don’t know the story, but the State Police boat paced Bear Adventures as long as we could see them.  Obviously somebody will have a bad day!

     We checked and rechecked charts, tide tables, and routes so that we could complete the 21 miles through Wrangell Narrows easily.  The tide change meets about in the middle of the narrows so our intent was to enter at the end of the tide flooding north, hit slack about in the middle of the narrows, and then ride the tide as it ebbed north to Petersburg.  And we did it!  Because we are used to piloting through Swinomish Channel, the narrows didn’t seem that intimidating, but our planning had to help.  The chart shot at the left shows the first section of the route.  The red boxes are “go to” points that the automatic pilot could follow.

     We didn’t have a pretty afternoon to enjoy the scenery.  It was overcast and sprinkled occasionally, but no wind to speak of.  Wind is our nemesis, making boat handling a challenge.

We saw this big Coast Guard ship tending one of the buoys along the channel - #5.  We think they were changing the light bulb!  Since Wrangell Narrows is a major north/south route, we thought we’d see all kinds of ships, perhaps even a cruise ship.  Meeting a really big ship in these narrow passages could be interesting.  Fortunately, Cosmo Place is equipped with an electronic system that identifies the location of big ships on our chart and gives us identification information.  We’d be able to “see” them coming long before a problem occurred.  The wonders of the electronic age!

We saw lot of fishermen along the way, but I thought these fishermen had done it right.  Even if they didn’t catch a thing, they had a beautiful spot in which to fish!

     We arrived in Petersburg about 4:45 Friday afternoon and moored in North Harbor.  We discovered this is the oldest dock, located between to fish canneries.  It’s a little rustic…makes LaConner Marina look like the Ritz!

     Saturday’s plan is to clean the boat, get groceries, and get ready for the Munch’s arrival on Sunday morning.  We’ll get in a little exploration of the town, too.  Petersburg is known for its Norwegian heritage…maybe we can find some lefse!

     That’s all for now.  The next installment will cover Munch’s week with us as we make our way from Petersburg, through glacier country to Juneau.