Mon Jun 20 2022
Neither of us slept well last night and by 0600 we had the anchor up and were on our way out of through the breakwater entrance, heading for Olga Strait to begin our journey back around the top side of Baranof Island and perhaps on North, conditions permitting. We passed through Whitestone Narrows and Neva Strait with a bit of current on the stern, on up through the Kakui Narrows where we were down to about our standard 8 knots speed, then as we arrived at Sergius Narrows around 0930 OpenCPN was forecasting about 2.5 knots on the bow. We actually saw 3 knots head current just briefly, but were through the narrows in about 5 minutes then were back to about 8 knots again. As we continued into the Peril Strait the current was with us and 9 knots SOG was common on the chart plotter. We passed Poison Cove and continued to the Northwest before the channel turned back to the Southeast. Having looked at the distance we had already made, the speed we could expect and the distance remaining up to Tenakee Springs, we had decided we might as well continue on and look forward to a hot soak in the evening. However, as we continued to the Southeast a light chop began to turn into a really splashy ride as a Southeast wind built into the mid 20 knot range. We had already plotted Appleton Cove as a bail out anchorage and quickly decided to divert. Mae Marie, a boat astern which had been slowly overtaking hailed us shortly thereafter recommending the same course of action. They were familiar with the anchorage and since the entrance offered some fairly shallow rocks we elected to follow them in before finding our own spot to anchor.
Somewhere up around Poison Cove we set a world record for speed over ground on Sunset, seeing SOG velocities as high as 23 knots. Oddly enough the passing world didn’t look a bit different. Having a bit of a background in the GPS development business I concluded that there must a be a brief satellite constellation or control system anomaly, but the event was a reminder that GPS navigation isn’t always the panacea we’d all like to believe it to be. Along the way we also spotted 3 whales tooling along, one of them close enough that we altered course to show respect and enhance everyone’s safety.
Various areas in Appleton Cove were heavily populated with crab trap buoys, so obviously commercial crabbing season had opened in the area. We optimistically launched the dinghy and deployed our own poxy crab traps then toured around the anchorage a bit looking for bears. None to be seen at the moment but we did have a bit of excitement when the dinghy began to cough and splutter and actually stopped running a couple of times. We had just blasted around the bay at Sitka the day before and it ran great; naturally in a place where if we did have a problem parts and services were available to address the problem. Go figure. Anyway, I nursed her along and we got back to Sunset where a brief examination under the cowling and of the fuel system revealed nothing amiss. After discussing proper crabbing techniques with our old fishing guru Trevor Griffiths, we returned to our crab pots about 3 hours later for an inspection. One had no visitors so we relocated it to a different location and shallower depth. The other had 3 crabby occupants peaking our excitement, but 1 was too little and another was a female, but finally our luck was improving! We re-deployed the pot in the same area and depth before returning to Sunset with our single keeper crab, Isabel announcing that if we didn’t catch more she could still crank out crab cakes.
This was also a chilly enough day that we decided to fire up our little Buddy propane heater on the fly bridge. Naturally it wouldn’t stay lit, and after warming the propane tank in the cabin a bit and achieving no success I elected to sort the darn thing out. Dismantling the case and decoupling some of the fuel tubing revealed that the unit had been assembled with some sort of machine oil still in the valve and fuel lines, preventing propane from flowing properly to the pilot light and burner. Aha, a job for my trusty compressor! Blowing out the tubing then allowing gravity to help drain the dregs, I heeded the call to supper where Isabel had whipped up an amazing Thai curry using smaller bits of halibut. Afterwards as she tidied up the galley I reassembled the heater up on the fly bridge then she joined me for the inaugural lighting ceremony. Success!
Somewhere along that time I spied a large brown bear trundling along in the meadow just East of us. Quickly alerting Isabel, we enjoyed the show for a few minutes noting that other boats in the area had also noted the action. Isabel loves watching bears.
We elected to leave the crab pots out overnight to maximize our chances for more crab cakes, and retired to watch the last episode in the Netflix Peaky Blinders series. Sometimes I feel like I should be studying for my 100 ton Captain’s license all the time, but we both enjoy the cinema art form and Netflix has offered some spectacular content since our return from French Polynesia. Having been away from all that for a couple of years it’s fun to catch up a bit and since it’s free with our T-Mobile cell phone plan anyway, well why not?
Our Iridium Go unlimited data plan costs $140/month and the bandwidth is barely enough for email and text. Our friends Allan and Alison recently tested Starlink on their Seawind 1160 down in the Sea of Cortez and Pacific Mainland Mexico, and they’ve been delighted with the results. The hardware is cheaper than Iridium Go, and the monthly service is about the same cost. Given that the bandwidth provided will allow Netflix downloads and excellent connectivity with the internet world, it would seem that cruising is about to change forever. Yachts will no longer be limited to hunting down cafes with complimentary wifi or being bound to cell coverage areas where a decent voice and data signal is available. This new technology is already opening up remote destination cruising to remote workers, so lookout for newbies with poor anchoring techniques dropping the hook near you!
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