I used to transit Peril Strait a lot. When I was chair of the Alaska Public Radio Network, I went back and forth to Juneau to lobby the state legislature frequently. I loved sitting in the solarium of the ferry, … Continue reading Noting Changes on a Dynamic Coastline.
The Chichagof Dream started its life in Jeffersonville Indiana in 1984, launched as the Spirit of Nantucket for Clipper Cruise Lines. She cruised the Canadian Maritimes, the East Coast’s Intercoastal Waterway, and the Great Lakes. Cruise West bought her and … Continue reading Chichagof Dream
I must be getting older. It is mid-June, and I am exhausted. May and June have always been the big social season in Sitka with the Music Festival, Art Shares from the Fine Arts Camp, wildlife cruises and all sorts … Continue reading Music in the Mist.
You are a new naturalist on an Alaskan excursion boat. You just came up from Outside, you’ve narrated a few wildlife tours and are beginning to feel a little confident and then… You are on a wildlife tour filled with … Continue reading Critters.
Right now it is snowing, but it’s too warm for it to stick. Before that it was rain, hard rain and before that drizzle. It’s overcast with occasional bursts of sun through the clouds. It is 40 degrees but feels … Continue reading Herring Weather
An Arctic air mass sits over Southeast Alaska. It is cold, colder than usual in November. It is acting like late December or January. If I lived on the inside, closer to the mainland, I could have horrific winds as … Continue reading Whalefest Cruise, 2022.
It wasn’t raining. In mid August that’s a good thing if you are going out on a wildlife cruise. The last week has had the feeling of autumn, as the fireweed tops out and the leaves on the ground bush … Continue reading Late Summer Break
This is the hardest post to write. I mentioned COVID fogged brain in my last post. I missed the final dinner, although they brought a delicious Beef Wellington to my stateroom. I also missed the final slide show and farewell … Continue reading The COVID Coda
After leaving Kake we headed home toward Sitka. We turned from Fredrick Sound into Chatham Strait and then into Peril Strait. Peril Strait was not named for any navigational hazard but because it is where many people died of paralytic … Continue reading A Coda With Whales.
Raven Radio’s first remote transmitter was in Kake, and it had been several years since I had visited the town. We listened to a talk by Native carver Michael Jackson and stories by 88-year-old elder Marvin Kadake, a proud Korean … Continue reading Tall Tales and a Taller Totem
In Petersburg the sun came out just before we sailed out of the harbor and that gives me the excuse for another post, showing the final few minutes in Petersburg and the sunny sail out. As we sailed into Fredrick … Continue reading Petersburg to Thomas Bay.
After an evening anchored up in Scow Bay we pulled into Petersburg. Petersburg was settled by Norwegian Fishermen and is located not far from the active tidewater LeConte Glacier that provided ice to pack fish for shipment south. We all … Continue reading Alaska’s Little Norway
In the afternoon we toured Wrangell, drove by Chief Shakes house and made stops at the museum and Petroglyph Beach. The petroglyphs along the beach are a mystery. No one knows why they are there, who put them there or … Continue reading Aye, There’s the Rub, and Running the Ditch
Our cruise left on Sunday, so we flew over to Juneau on Saturday night. The plane was late as clouds and fog rolled into and out of Southeast’s mountains, bays and passes. Before GPS and Fog Busters I used to … Continue reading Alaska’s Brigadoon, Juneau
I’ve wanted to take one of these cruises for a decade. The timing never worked out. For the first several years we were overseas. Then other travel, and then the COVID epidemic intervened. Allen has been part of our lives … Continue reading 2021 Alaska Dream Cruise.
Saturday Sitka’s Rotary sponsored a wildlife cruise. On the preceding blog post you can read my comments on the day and the viewing. This page is all about scenery, including a picture on one of the fresh landslides we saw … Continue reading Rotary Scenery
Rotary lucked out. Planning a fundraising cruise in October is an iffy thing when you consider the weather. Rotary’s cruise on Saturday had interesting weather in that it was sunny with fog beginning to settle in. You looked one way … Continue reading Rotary Wildlife
This weekend we were out on the water with the Sitka Whalefest. When we got off the Allen Marine boat on Saturday we wondered if it could get any better, with lunge feeding, bubble nets, a breach and whale bows … Continue reading Whales, Whales, Whales!
Monday was a nice nice for a cruise as a weather front moved in. We went out with the Sitka Conservation Society for their salmon cruise. We went to Redoubt Falls to watch the salmon jump the falls into the … Continue reading Monday Evening Cruise
It was like stepping off the boat into a salad. That’s what it was like at Point Brown when Allen Marine dropped a group from the Sitka Conservation Society on the east side of Kruzof Island. Sunday morning saw the … Continue reading Stepping into a Salad, Low tide at Point Brown.
Sitka has no highway connection anywhere. We have a 14 mile road system on an island the size of Delaware. We are not on the inside passage so a lot of ferries do not stop. When a ferry does stop … Continue reading A Day in June, Sitka, Alaska
Friday night SAFV (Sitkans Against Family Violence) held a fundraiser dinner cruise aboard one of Allen Marine’s (Alaska Dream Cruises) pocket cruise ships, Chichagof Dream. I had wanted to get aboard for some time to see how they refitted her. … Continue reading Chichagof Dream