Oh god…what day is it? When was my last post? I actually had to check! Last time I was in Haines waiting to get on the ferry to Juneau. That was two weeks ago, a decade ago in Alaska time.
**Pictures are at the end this time.
I am dying to tell you all about the more recent drama, but my methodological mind demands that I go in chronological order. BOO!
Getting on the ferry to Juneau from Haines felt pretty exciting. Cramming cars and RV’s, mostly backwards, into the hull of a boat, makes for an intense but fascinating experience. As I pulled up to the ramp, the RV in front of me was having to back all the way down into the boat. When the docking staff told me to proceed forward down the ramp I said, “Oh good! I am so glad I am not the one having to go down backwards!” They gave me an oddly confused look and I wondered why. That’s until I got to the bottom of the ramp inside the hull and the staff there told me to back Rosie in a narrow row all the way to the back of the boat. Aw, dang. It ended up being easier than I imagined but definitely a bit nerve-wracking.
It rained and was foggy for most of the ferry ride, so I didn’t get to see much. I did have a nice chat with a man from Haines who was heading to Juneau for some kind of medical appointment. I got the impression from his tone and demeanor that it was something major and possibly serious, but he didn’t share and I certainly would never ask a stranger to share something so personal. He did tell me lots about life in Alaska and I learned about subsistence hunting. Many people who live in Alaska use hunting and fishing as a primary food source and there are lots of state laws to permit, protect, and regulate this important practice. Definitely not something we have in California – most of us just go to Costco.
I enjoyed Juneau, mostly because of Mendenhal Glacier and the campgound at Mendenhal lake. My campsite was about 20ft. from the lake and I could clearly see the glacier on the other side of the lake. My first morning was spent in my camp chair on the lakeshore drinking coffee and watching the morning light change over the surface of the glacier. My husband arrived the next day and we spent time exploring hikes around the glacier and made one trip into downtown Juneau. We had so many things on our list of things to do…but we ended up spending one entire day just lazing around the van reading books. We were tired and we knew we had some serious stuff ahead where resting wouldn’t be an option. We figured we should rest while we could!
We did do a day trip by float plane to Pack Creek. Oh yes, I did say floatplane! For people here, it’s kind of been-there-done-that, but for us it was a special experience. I had never been in a small non-comercial plane, much less an actual float plane that takes off and lands on water! I was a bit scared, but mostly excited. The plane was tiny, it had just 5 small seats (including the pilot seat), one propeller in front and the two floats on bottom instead of wheels. It flew low and we got a great view of the landscape as we passed over. Once I got over the “I’m gonna die!” stage, I loved every second of the trip. We were going to Pack Creek to see brown bears (Alaska’s grizzly). We spent the entire day there, which turned out to be blessed with beautiful weather, and managed to see two bears. Ok, so I was hoping to see lots of bears and hoping to see them fishing for salmon…but the salmon weren’t quite running in the creek yet. Bastien and I agreed that the day was totally worth it, even though the bears were elusive.
After Juneau, it was finally time for the BIG SPLURGE of the trip. We had signed up for a 7-day guided kayak and camping trip in Glacier Bay National Park with Spirit Walker Expeditions. This was a bit expensive for us, but it sounded so amazing and special that we decided to go for it.
We flew into Gustavus, the only town near the park, and were met at the airport by our guides. Hm, by “airport” I mean a landing strip with two small buidings, no bigger than the average house. One building was the Alaska Airlines building, and the other was for Alaska Seaplanes. The baggage claim was a bin outside where they place bags for people to grab. It was my first time at a tiny airport like this and I found it pretty intertesting. I noticed that lots of people had checked “bags” that were cases of soda, beer, or Red Bull. One after another, cases of drinks would slide down with a baggage sticker attached. I found out most people coming into Gustavus are doing all inclusive fishing trips, but I guess it is byob.
We met our two guides and two other women who were going on the trip with us at the airport. We loaded up into their van and went to the office for a trip orientation, getting ready to head out the next day. At the time, I got a little worried because our guides seemed really young and inexperienced, especially compared to what I had imagined for this trip. Combine that with my pre-existing nervousness about bears, and I was having serious second thoughts. Let me say now, our guides were GREAT! They knew what they were doing, they took great care of all of us, and they worked their asses off the entire time! I would recommend them without hesitation and I would go out with them again knowing that we can trust them to keep us safe.
Our orientation was mostly getting outfitted with raingear, rubber boots, and dry bags for our stuff. They told us about the “Smellies” can, a bear can where everyone would keep their scented toiletry items. If you have never camped in bear country, then you may not know that you can’t keep anything with a smell in your tent or the bears could find it “interesting” enough to invade your tent in the night. I have to admit that after 7 days without bathing, I was worried that MY smell would be “interesting” enough for a bear to explore, but I guess that kind of smelly doesn’t count.
After our orientation, they dropped us off at our lodge with instructions to be ready to go at 6:15 the next morning. All I could think was, “Am I really doing this? CAN I do this? Do I have what it takes to paddle a kayak and camp in what could be crappy conditions for 7 days in BEAR country????” I wasn’t sure, I really really wasn’t sure. But I was determined to give it a try.
Day 1: We arrived at the boat dock to discover that the day boat was broken and we might not have our ride to the drop-off point. We were supposed to load our 4 kayaks (3 double and 1 single), all our bear cans (13 cans total, 12 with food and 1 with our smellies), paddles, tents, sleeping mats, sleeping bags (in dry bags), lifejackets, spray skirts, and our personal dry bags all on this day boat which would take us from the dock at Bartlet Cove to our drop-off point on Sebree Island. But the toilet system on the day boat was broken and they were canceling their tour for the day. While the Kayak company tried to figure out what to do about the situation, our guide took us up a park trail to explore an impressive Whale skeleton exhibit and Tlingit lodge house. Looking back, I am actually glad that the boat issue gave us this opportunity. When we got back, the day boat decided that they couldn’t do the full day tour for regualr passengers but that they could do the hour-long run to drop us off as long as we didn’t need to use the restrooms. So, we all worked together to get our gear down to the dock and onto the boat. An hour later we were watching the boat crew back the boat up to the rocky “beach” on Sebree Island and lower a ladder down from the boat to the water. When I say ladder, I mean a regular metal ladder like what you get at the hardware store. Half our group climed down and half stayed on the boat to make a “fire line” to pass items down to the beach. It was pretty intense, but after several minutes we had a quite substantial pile of stuff on the beach. Once on the beach, we discussed the plans which were including some changes because the last person in our group was not coming until the next day. See, flights in/out of Gustavus are unpredictable at best, and her flight had been cancelled due to fog. The guides were looking at how the group could continue but still allow the last person to join up with us the next day. After a bit, we loaded up the kayaks. That was a challenge for sure! We had a lot of gear to cram into the limited storage on the kayaks, but we managed to get it all in. After a few last tips and pointers from our guides, we hopped in our kayaks and tried to head out. I say tried, because the waves were getting rough and the wind was picking up, and we needed to go around a point where we could see whitecaps in the distance. It wasn’t looking good at all. Our main guide told us to wait for a minute while he went around the point to check conditions. When he came back, it was bad news. It was getting worse and around the corner was looking very risky. We decided to go back to the beach and wait to see if things would improve. Back on the beach, we decided to leave the kayaks loaded up and have lunch while we wait to see if the weather cleared. After a couple hours of waiting, we decided to call it off for the day. We unloaded the kayaks and found a spot back in the woods to set up camp. The camp spot was downright magical – a deeply wooded area covered in ferns, wild strawberries, salmonberries, and tiny flowers poking up out of the mossy ground. We hauled the kayaks up past the high tide line and flipped them over to prevent rain water from filling up our kayaks. We hauled the bear cans and kitchen gear down the beach to be sure our food and bear attraction area was far enough from our sleeping area. Since we had time, we went for a walk/hike up the beach to a creek inlet and spent time exploring. Later, our guides made us Halibut tacos for dinner (which were yummy!) and we headed to bed. The good news was that we were at the drop-off site so the last person could joint us the next morning without any difficulty. The day did feel a little anti-climactic but, looking back, it was definitely the right call.
Since I know you are wondering….Bathroom: for pee you find a bush or tree up the the forest. To poop, you find a rock in the intertidal zone (between the low tide line and the high tide line). This way, your poo gets washed away with the next high tide. Not sure how I feel about that, but its the way it’s done here. You store your used TP in a paper bag and ziplock. Ziplock for being water and smell resistant, paper bag so you don’t have to see the brown schmears.
Day 2: The day my arms fell off. No, not really, but they hurt really bad. We had a relaxed morning drinking coffee and having breakfast before breaking camp and loading the kayaks. We had time because we decided to wait for the boat to drop our last person off before we headed out. Then, we were off! Paddling, and paddling, and paddling, and paddling. We definitely made up for our lack of paddling the day before! We paddled for about 2.5 hours and then stopped for lunch where we enjoyed hot tea and bagles with cream cheese and smoked salmon. After everyone took a pee break, we got back into the kayaks and paddled for a couple more hours. The farther back we got into the bay (the east arm of Glacier Bay), the more wildlife we began to see. Sea otters, seals, and porpoises made their appearances and we took time to pause and enjoy them. Then, we spotted our first Brown Bear walking along the shoreline looking for snacks. We stopped to watch him until it was time to move on. We paddled into Hunter’s Cove to find a spot to camp and came upon a raft of Sea Otters (raft = what you call a group of otters). There had to be no less than 50 otters, some with young, hanging out in this cove. We came in slow and gave them distance, but some of them got very curious and actually would approach and follow us a bit, raising themselves up out of the water, trying to get a better look at us. I love how cute these otters look when they raise their faces up and check us out. After some time, the otters moved away and we began to move towards shore. That’s when we spotted out first Humpback Whale! It spouted a few times in the bay behind us (of course we turned around to look!) and then it really arched its back up out of the water to dive and we saw a fluke! I about peed myself in excitement. We were close enough to see the grey and white pattern on its tail. Wow, just wow. When the whale was gone, we pulled into the beach and began the nightly process: 1. Get out of kayak (harder when your arms don’t work after a day of paddling and your fingers are curled into a claw shape). 2. Strip off spray skirt and lifejacket. 3. Unload all gear out of kayaks onto the beach. 4. Haul kayaks up above tideline. 5. Haul camp gear to where we will set up camp. 6. Haul all bear cans and kitchen stuff to another location. 7. Set up camp 8. Enjoy a little rest and some wine while the guides make dinner. 9. Enjoy dinner. 10. Do a last pee. 11. Go to bed. In all of that, our group did a great job of working together and our guides literally never stopped working until after we all went to bed. I must say – it was a rough night. My arms HURT, ached all night. I woke up every hour or two with my arms hurting and needing to change positions. I was just sure that paddling the next day would be impossible.
Day 3: Day of YUCK, MUCK, and SUCK! We woke up to a steady rain on the tent, so much that we had to try and get rain gear on as we left the tent or we would be wet all day. I got up needing to poo. So, I walked the shore in the rain until I found a spot where I would not be seen, and I pooped in the rain. Then I walked back in the rain and stood in the rain while the guides made coffee in the rain. We had coffee and breakfast in the rain, we packed up and loaded kayaks in the rain and we set off to paddle in the rain. Miraculously, despite having arms I could barely move in the night, they seemed to still be functional that morning. We paddled in the rain for maybe 3 hours or so, then we stopped for lunch in the rain. We had the extra bonus of being on a muddy “boot-sucking” beach where the mud was like quicksand and our boots quickly sank into it. Once, while trying to get out of the mud, I fell backwards into it and ended up with my entire backside covered in sticky mud. Our guides prepared lunch (Greek Salad and Pita bread) in the rain and we all stood with our bowls of salad and increasingly wet pitas…in the rain. We got back in the Kayaks…yep, you guessed it, in the rain. We paddled for a couple more hours…in the rain. We did get to see more whales and otters, a couple a brown bears (one was REALLY close), and other interesting things. The scenery was wild and wonderful and unforgettable. But the rain sure did SUCK. We reached our planned camp spot and it was still raining but it was easing up to more of a sprinkle. By the time we needed to set up tents, it had stopped raining and we all celebrated! At least we could get our tents set up without everything getting wet. Our guides made dinner while we settled in, and then we all realized the tide was coming in much higher than expected. It was cutting off the kitchen area from the camp area where the water was covering the beach completely. We had to scramble fast to move all the kitchen stuff and gear right in the middle of cooking dinner before the tide made it all inaccessible. By then end we were all laughing at how the day had gone. After all that, we enjoyed pesto pasta with veggies and smoked salmon. While we ate dinner, just on the other side of our little cove, a brown bear popped out of the trees and began to walk the shore moving in a direction that would eventually bring him into our camp if he kept going. We watched him, he clearly looked over at us, and then he just went about his business. I felt the tone change with our guides and saw them make sure the bear spray was handy as they closely monitored the bear’s behavior and trajectory. He seemed pretty disinterested in us and eventually moved back into the trees rather than continue in our direction. I saw the guides relax some and realized the situation was deemed less dangerous. After dinner, our guides had to perform some feats to get the the kitchen/food stuff far enough away from the tents because the tide had kind of closed us in and boxed us into a corner. After a long rainy day, we had a thankfully dry evening to make camp, enjoy dinner, and head to bed. I had an even rougher night with my arms hurting and aching so bad it was hard to get any sleep. Again, I couldn’t imagine being capable of lifting my arms the next day, much less paddle a kayak.
To be continued in the next post….
Karen`s trips, travels, insane stories, and not-so-insane thoughts(I hope!) 