The Fluke

  Sunday June 24th 2012

Another beautiful, early morning, sat on the flybridge in a T shirt in the sunshine, I could see and hear a whale breaching at the entrance to the cove about a mile away. First I would see the spume and his back rising out of the water, then, long seconds later , hear the whoosh of his breath. While you see myriad seabirds over the water and islands, I hadn’t realized how many other birds were in the trees and bushes on shore. Sitting here quietly I could hear the constant chirping and warbling of untold shorebirds as well.
Suddenly, I thought I heard a voice, first a male voice then a female voice and shortly thereafter a huge cruise ship came into sight around the headland. The ship was over 3 nautical miles away according to its’ AIS signal and although I couldn’t decipher individual words it was obviously a lecture or tour description that I was hearing. It was the 780 foot “Vollendam” en route to the glaciers at Tarr Inlet, sure glad that we saw them yesterday with no other boats around at the time. An almost 800 foot ship would kind of spoil the view!!
It was still flat calm and sunny when we left the anchorage a couple of hours later and on the way out of the bay we had our closest ever encounter with a whale, he spumed then fluked within 30 or 40 feet of the boat. An experience of a lifetime!!

Close encounter

and closer

Waving goodbye

We then cruised slowly back down the inlet , saw more whales, seals and sea otters and visited the Stellar sea lions again at South Marble Island for an hour .

It was hot sitting at anchor in Blue Mouse Cove, but it gets chilly fast when you start moving

Entering South Sandy Cove anchorage

View from our anchorage

Exit South Sandy cove

 We even saw the cutest Puffins for the first time before anchoring for the night in North Sandy Cove. By dinner time the weather had changed, it clouded over and the wind came up. The forecast now calls for windy and rain for the next 3 or 4 days so I guess we have experienced the Alaska summer time. It was nice while it lasted.
We have decided that we have lost too much time to return to Juneau and Skagway (and this latest forecast reinforces the decision) so will now turn south and follow the original plan from here to Hoonah and Sitka thence back to Ketchikan and Prince Rupert. We need to ration our US time and , depending on weather delays, it could take 1 to 2 weeks to return to Skagway then back to Hoonah to start south.
Maybe when we are old we will take a cruise ship to Skagway! NOT BLOODY LIKELY!!