Friday, July 14th, 2023
We left Ketchikan this morning at 7:00 am, bound for Pond Bay on Duke Island, AK. This is an excellent staging point for our return south tomorrow through Dickson Entrance to Prince Rupert. Unfortunately, Canada will not allow you to anchor for the night in Dundas Island before continuing on to Prince Rupert the following day. We have been told stories about people who anchored for the night in Dundas and then checked into Canadian customs the next day only to be faced with a $1,000.00 fine. This is really unfortunate for the safety of both Canadian and American boaters. There’s government bureaucracy for you. But back to Pond Bay.
This is a favorite bay of our friend Rob who has been to Alaska on his Nordic Tug for the past 10 years and is a “very experienced boater.” We can see why he likes it. This is a beautiful bay with plenty of room for lots of boats. So far, we are the only boat in the bay.
Now the rub about this bay is that the only detailed knowledge comes from the Douglass “Southeast Alaska” book. It’s a great resource. And while it is fresh off its Fourth Edition, the origins of the book date to times before software navigational apps like Navonics that provide extreme accuracy, plotting your course for you and telling you exactly how—and where—to enter an anchorage. If I only used the Douglass book as my source I would never have come into this bay. With phrases like “Pond Bay. . .affords good anchorage once inside, but is little used because of the dangerous approach…seek out local knowledge.” Paraphrase: if you don’t hit a rock, or land on a shelf, or poke a hole in your boat, it’s a lovely place to be. With the right navigational tools coming into this bay is fine. If you stay on course it is a reasonably straight forward anchorage. And there are very few places left in the Northwest where you can come into a beautiful bay where whales pass by your boat as you approach the entrance and then you sit in absolute silence as the only boat to be seen or heard. It simply doesn’t get any better.
Tomorrow we will rise at first light with a plan to leave on our Dixon Entrance cruise at 4:30 am. It will take us about 8 and a half hours. We are planning—and praying—for calm seas and trailing winds. Stay tuned.
hope you are experiencing calm for your journey today.