August 15, 2022 Monday Day 80: Fury Cove to Blind Channel
We wanted to get up with the sun and being in Alaska during the longest day of the year, we set our alarm for 3:30 AM. It was still dark. We set it for 4:30 AM, still dark. Finally around 6:30 it was light enough to go.
The water conditions were perfect. We did have fog off and on and there were a lot of logs. Chris did have to be on high alert for all the logs. Luckily there was nothing too exciting while crossing.
We stopped at Staple cut, where there is an anchorage. It was so beautiful going through this small islands that are tightly packed in a small area. The fog was lifting as we were going through and it felt other worldly. So stunning.
We made it for Port Hardy for gas and timed it for lunch as well. We got some food and went back to the boat. Chris wasn’t feeling great and decided he would take a nap with Ellen while we were tied up at Port Hardy.
Near Port McNeill we saw some White Sided Pacific Dolphins. A big whale watching boat came up and intercepted the dolphins so the dolphins swam with that boat instead of ours. We hung around until that boat passed and finally the dolphins swam with our boat.
While we were hanging around the dolphins there were quite a few currents/rapids. There was also a research boat watching a humpback whale and her calf. We did get pulled into some currents with this research boat and we spun around each other. There were also logs in there with us. Finally the logs cleared out of our way and we were able to go and get out of the whirl pool we were in with the research boat. We weren’t in any danger, but it did feel weird being spun around with logs and another boat.
After playing with the dolphins we headed part way down Johnstone Strait. The tides were with us here and we made great time and had great gas mileage.
We didn’t have quite enough time to make it through Seymour Narrows, so we ducked into Blind Channel and stayed at the boating resort there. They were very friendly there and came out to catch our lines. It looked like a great place to spend quite a bit of time.
Ryan’s Thoughts: I ate lunch and got chocolate cake. Dolphins followed our boat and whales and baby whales.
Lillian’s Thoughts: Woke up early like 5:30 AM! Then we saw dolphins and a whale with a baby! And a whirlpool!
