|
|
Winter Cruising "Alaska Style"Story and photos by Ted Mattson |
|
Report from 2005 Winter Cruise
It happened again. With the days getting so short, even without a calendar we would have known that the year’s end holiday season was getting close at hand. Cindy and I returned from the wilds a day or so ago after spending a rain and wind filled month (interspersed with spectacular snow falls) of cruising through some of the most incredible country in the world. Are we biased or what?
Actually, we had several missions on this winter cruise. We had a load of “stuff” to take to our friends Rick and Jen who were baby sitting Baranof Wilderness Lodge (BWL) on the other side of the island. We also planned on joining them for Thanksgiving dinner. And since we missed tasting any venison last season because of our trip around the lower 48, we were determined to remedy that no matter what. Other than that, we had no plans. Oh yes, we did have the little matter of testing Skookumchuck’s new propeller shaft, bearing project and engine alignment that was finally completed in early November. The boat had been essentially out of commission from late August until then.
Wow! Ted felt like a duck out of water, Cindy was anxious to get back out into the wilderness and I’m sure Skookumchuck felt even more pressure to get out and do what it likes to do best. But not now! At least two of us are glad to be once again safely tied to the dock. At least for the holidays. There is only so much wind and rain a person can take in a month. Rick (the weather man at BWL) said we had 11 inches in the 7 days it took us to get there. We also had 40, 45 and 50 knot winds consecutively for three of those days! But, as soon as Santa delivers his gifts and things settle down a bit, Skookumchuck and Ted will be going back out with Cindy’s brother in law and nephew while Cindy and her twin sister Phyllis are entertaining and visiting with their 85 year old mom who is coming to Sitka for Christmas this year. We had Katie on a cruise last spring. If only we all could be that energetic at that age!
Cindy got “buck fever” while we were on our cruise. Or at least as close as you can come to it when you claim you are not a hunter. We were sitting on a snowy mountain side early one morning (if you call 10 AM early) when this blacktail doe walked by close enough to be spooked either by our presence or something else her nose detected. At any rate, she headed up the mountain. Ted, in the meanwhile was pulling on the string that held his deer call and trying to get it to his lips. When he finally did blow the call, the doestopped cold in her tracks and turned to look back down the mountain. When he blew again, the doe bolted back down the mountain right toward us. Cindy gasped and her jaw was on her chest. She’d never seen anything like it in her life! Of course, the deer eventually circled down wind of us and then snorted before departing the country. The time a buck walked up the same trail we had used minutes before wasn’t as smart. Of course, he had other things on his mind then. Cindy was hooked. For the rest of the trip, she was the one saying, “Let’s go. It’s almost daylight.” And so it went. Eventually, we added 11 gallons of shrimp to the larder and brought 10 live Dungeness crabs home with us for the Christmas feasts to follow. Whales, seals, eagles, ducks, geese, martin, land otters that took the salted herring we threw to them and even a pair of minks fighting on shore, kept us entertained throughout our cruise. Of course, there is a certain amount of entertainment value derived from hanging on to a half inch cable connected to an anchor that might pull loose at any moment in winds that are gusting to 50 knots at 2 in the morning. Maybe that’s why we slept until the sun came above the mountain the first night we were back at the dock. Winter Cruising l
Starting Out l
We Get Visitors l
Winter Comes l
A Windy Night l
A Special Day Skipper Ted Mattson is an Alaska sailor with broad experience in Bristol Bay and especially his home, the Alexander Archipelago, Alaska's panhandle. Ted operates popular adventure sailing cruises with guests in the summer months aboard the Skookumchuck.
Where next on www.outdoorsdirectory.com?
|
