Thursday, May 30, 2013

Report from club member Marc in Alaska May 13-14

As said previously we spent Monday morning at the Squirrel Cove General Store to refuel, shower, etc.  

We first docked at the public dock failing to find a fuel dock. Somebody pointed out that fuel would be available at the general store when it would open at 9 am. So I walked over there to check things out and found a tiny dock with a single fuel hose leading to it. I peered into the water and saw it was deep enough for Mariposa. So we moved her to that tiny dock and eventually the store opened and we went at our business. 

A guy walked up to me and said he owned the same sailboat as I did and thought I was very "brave" for daring to dock there since at low tide the whole dock would be aground... Needless to say we moved Mariposa back to the public dock as soon as we were done!. 

It rained badly all day.  While we had lunch, safely moored to the public dock, with the little fuel dock now nearly hitting bottom, we were lashed by unbelievable downpoors of hate rain again. There was a continuous stream of water over the portholes as we were looking out, not rivulets but a thick uninterupted layer of water gushing down the entire side of the boat like a waterfall! We stopped eating and watched in amazement.

We would have toodled around Deception Sound before moseying on to cross the rapids, but with the rotten weather we just stayed put at the dock until about half past three when we had to leave to still make it to the rapids on time. 

We arrived at the Yukulta Rapids at 7:15 pm, 15 minutes earlier than planned and it looked calm enough to proceed. We'd have three knots of current against us *on average* at that point. Laszlo had piloted us through tiny vicious Malibu Rapids on the way out of Princess Louisa Inlet, at perfect slack without turbulences, and now it was time for him to measure himself against a big guy like Yukulta with current still flowing. He had read the cruising guide on how to tackle it and how to play the eddies, he had looked up the tides and currents, and I had shown him the general route on the chart.  All the homework was done so in we went. The two first eddies caught him by surprise and the boat got pivotted 90 degrees each time, but after that Laszlo held the tiller with a firm hand and quick reaction times. It was fun to see our progress on the chart plotter. Even though we were pointing in a certain direction, the actual direction in which we were progressing could be 90 degrees to one side and then a second later 90 degrees to the other side!  Worst speed over ground was around half a knot and Laszlo had to find another way amongst the eddies at that point. As time went by, the currents and eddies abated and we passed through the adjoining Dent Rapids at full slack at around 8 pm, which was the goal of taking an early start in Yukulta Rapids. 

Over an hour later, as we approached our dock for the night in Shoal Bay, one of our fenders was dropped over board. It was black and it was night but we managed to keep track of it and fish it up. Soon we were all safely docked and sound asleep. 

Tuesday we got up at 5:10 am to catch the slack at Green Rapids. Jenny took the helm to tackle this one but we encountered hardly any turbulence since we hit it right at slack. It's always weird to sail over a placid rapid that doesn't seem different than the rest of the channel yet to know that at full strength it has the power to swamp boats or to smash them against the rocks.  

We kept motoring on, all the way to the Johnstone Strait where we started sailing the wind that was forecasted to keep increasing.  At he end of our run with the current on the Strait, to avoid the coming counter-current of the flood, we turned back into the side channels where we first had to motor again against the now strong winds. (In the Havannah Channel). 

The depth sounder had been acting up and was now refusing to display our depth at all. Since we were headed towards the Chatham Channel, which is shallow and narrow, I wanted to check that thing out and simply started by wiggling the wires. To my surprise water just dripped out of the enclosure!  (Thank you so much, hate rain.) I took it apart and the thing isn't even caulked. It worked for a while again to get us through the Channel but then gave up on us and life and the universe. It stubornly displays two dashes, no depth. We'll see if its attitude changes after a night of drying. 

When we neared the Chatham Channel our ever intrepid Laszlo decided to unfurl the headsail to motorsail against over 25 knots of wind while I was inside. Needless to say that the result was a big roll while I held on to all our stuff inside, followed by lots of flogging of sail and sheets, and then a neetly furled headsail again after I had come out to lend a hand. Somewhat subdued by the events, Laszlo and Jenny then motored most of the way downwind in the Chatham Channel. I came back outside in the cockpit a while later and promptly fell asleep with Jenny at the helm. When I awoke we were in Knight Inlet and found there was good wind and lots of space.  The engine was shut off altogether and we sailed for nearly the remainder of the day. 

We even passed in between the islets located between Spring and Retreat Passages under sail, which required a lot of play with the ever shifting and dissapearing winds of those near landlocked areas, and good fun was had avoiding the shores and reefs under those conditions. Then we motored into Waddington Bay, our landlocked anchorage for the night, forecasted to be pretty stormy. 

No pictures were taken due to the weather again.

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