06/30/2024 We planned to anchor into Lowe Inlet for the night and take the Fournado to hunt bears (we’re going on a bear hung, we’re going to catch a big one, what a beautiful day, we weren’t scared!) as Lowe was known to have a beautiful waterfall where bears liked to fish for salmon. We set out in the Fournado and ran into rapids (not runnable in the dinghy, unfortunately. However, I made grand plans to come back and run the rapids in the kayak (until Paul squashed my dreams and made me promise not to). So no bears, no rapids, and rain chased us back to the boat – boo:( When we got back, we looked at the map to see how in the heck people got to the waterfall and discovered that we overshot Lowe Inlet by about 23 miles and were anchored in Kumealon Inlet – at least it was pretty!
It can’t all be sunshine and roses… until Ketchikan
07/01/2024 We had a big, looooong day. Paul had a big meeting, and Hannah and Kathryn were starting school. The morning started off promising; Andrew and I did a work out (spell out your name and birthday with burpees, sit-ups, push-ups and such). I then took out the kayak to find some bears and see how close to the rapid I could get (skirting the edges of Paul’s prohibition). I was joined by two cute otter (seal?) friends!
Good thing I took a peaceful kayak ride and did calming yoga (who’s kidding – yoga with four kids is anything but), because the afternoon was the antithesis of calm, with a frustrated husband and frustrated pre-teens trying to navigate a new online school platform. Might as well start motoring; at least we could make headway towards Ketchikan. We left around 2pm and headed towards Prince Rupert. We then discovered that our large 65kw generator (“big genie”, as opposed to the 20kw “genie” and 6.5kw “little genie”) was not starting and we could not use our thrusters (tied directly into the 65) to turn around. After anchoring, Paul checked filters and called an expert on the Northern Lights generator. He followed all recommendations with no success. We called it a night and went to bed, hoping for a brighter tomorrow.
I don’t have any pictures…not a very pretty anchorage, but I think it is time to break up the writing with a pretty picture. We thought the white stuff was ice and I was going to start the day with a cocktail made with glacier ice, but sadly, it was just foam.
07/02/2024 We pulled the anchor at 5a.m. and headed out. Because the generator was still not working, we altered plans to go to another anchorage and decided to motor a long day and go straight to Ketchikan to see if we could get the boat looked at. Paul called a friend who was in Ketchikan (the aforementioned Nordhavn guy who is also traveling north with his family) and asked if he could push us into a T dock with his dinghy. We also called the Ketchikan marina to see if they could fit us in; on the T dock please? (Unfortunately, none of the marinas in Alaska take reservations, so if you don’t get a place, you are SOL.) The harbor master said to call back when we were an hour out. Amazingly, about 1.5 hours before arrival, our generator started working! We weren’t taking the chance of turning it off, so we ran the dishwasher and two loads of laundry while we had big genie working. It is great that we could now use thrusters to dock because when we called the marina back they said the only place we could park was on the cruise ship dock. Only Kathryn could make it up the 50 foot old rusty, barnacle covered ladder. Thankfully, we called our friend, and he knew of a private marina (some guy bought a marina so he could have a place to park is 156 foot boat). We successfully docked (thank you, God!) and our friends came over in the dinghy to walk around town and get dinner. The kids got along great, which warmed my heart so much! We all had a great time (and delicious dinner of blackened halibut and salmon tacos!)
07/03/2024 Since we could not find any mention of 4th of July fireworks in Ketchikan, and maybe more importantly, since we cannot stay up until 11:30pm, when it actually gets dark enough for fireworks, we decided to re-provision and continue north. Andrew and I got in a nice hike at Tongass National Park, before I headed to the store (always fun shopping the day before a holiday), and now we are underway with all systems ago (please knock on wood!)
