The Animals Are Starting to Tolerate Us

When Pauline got up this morning she found this guy hanging out by our gangway.  She thought he might jump in the water when she got off the boat but he just kind of moved over.  Later in the morning Mark had to do some work on the dock and he was still there so he snapped a few shots.

It used to be when ever you got close they hit the water.  But either they are getting used to us or getting lazy.

The Shortest Day

We have probably mentioned more than once about how much daylight we get in the summer.  Well the flip side of that is the long nights in the winter.  Today was the shortest day of the year.  When we went to work this morning (7am for Pauline 8am for Mark) it was dark and about 28 degrees F and slightly cloudy.  At 9:30 Mark had to go out and run some errands for work.  It was pretty light out but the sun was not yet over the mountains but at 10am the tops of all the mountains both to the east and west had a beautiful orange glow as the sun was rising over the tops of the mountains in the east the sky was a bright blue, the mountains orange or white, and the bay was a nice blue.  There were some remnants of wisps of clouds toward the sun that were giving some orange streaks kind of like aurora lights except they were orange and to the southeast.  Of course the temp dropped once the clouds went away to a balmy 18 degrees F.  But a brisk chill was a small price for the show.  Did we get any pictures.  Nope sorry about that.

It's Getting Slushy

The post a few days ago said the harbour was getting ice near shore.  Well it is now slushy even past us.  Not that bad.  The sea otters are still able to pop through it.  As a matter of fact, one surprised both of us this morning as we got off the boat.  He was hanging out right under our dolphin striker.  However for the first time we are seeing otters on the docks.  There were about six of them this morning on the dock across from us.

Alaska really is amazing.  A week ago before the shush but with the snow on the dock we had two river otters playing on our dock.  They are much more shy than the normal sea otters.  But they were really fun to watch playing in the snow and jumping on and off the dock.

On the week of Thanksgiving we did two Anchorage runs.  On both of those we had the Dall Sheep grazing on the rocks just above Beluga Point.  These shy creatures are usually way high up but I guess in the winter time they come down lower because they were literally only about 150 feet up.  We saw some when we went to Denali and they were a long way up and far away.  We were told that was a great view of them, so I guess this one was super special.  For those not in the know, Denali National Park was created in a large part to prevent the Dall Sheep from extinction.

the view from the drive

on our way to Anchorage

Winter Wonderland

It has been a while since we updated our blog.  Well, that is what happens when you are working and not playing.

Mark finished and passed all his courses!

We had a quiet Thanksgiving this year with a baked ham and we surely missed the fun we had last year in Florida.

It is getting colder here in Seward, with occasional strong winds, bringing the wind chill to the minus temperatures, both in the Fahrenheit and Celsius scale.  The snow fall makes the place so pretty and the photos do not do it any justice.  The water in the boat harbor nearer shore is freezing.  The boat seems to be taking it in her stride and we are coping.  We have our wood stove going in the evening and 2 electric heaters going all the time, so we are keeping warm.

It was pretty cold, the surface water is slushy

snow covered Sari Timur, with a gorgeous background

view of the boat harbor with snow-covered mountains in the background

Pauline built a mini snowman.  He didn't last very long, fell over with the falling snow during the night

Happy Halloween

Mark finished his RFPNW assessment which was a bunch of exercises on the simulator.  He now has the official paperwork to stand as part of a navigational watch.  He goes for his physical tomorrow.  Then one more class and he gets to file a bunch of paperwork with the Coast Guard.  That will lay all the ground work to keep earning sea time on the Chahunta towards his 500 ton license.

While Mark was testing Pauline stayed home and made a bunch of pies for the Halloween Carnival.  We think all of Seward was there.  Nice to see everyone all dressed up and having a good time.

Second One Down

Well Mark just finished his second course and passed.  Two more to go.  The third one is only a one day evaluation so that should be done Monday.  The last course doesn't start until the middle of November but once they are done and he gets his medical he is on his way towards his 500 ton.

Today he went out on his first tow job.  He thought it was pretty cool and he learned a lot.  Of course it also drove home how much he still has to learn and how much fun it is going to be learning.

Summer is Over

Our first snow in Seward, at ground level, happened on Sunday and Monday.  It was all but gone on Tuesday except it has left a beautiful dusting on the mountains that surround Ressurection Bay.  It is hard to believe but Seward is even prettier with the mountains slightly covered like this.  When we came back in early May the mountains had significant snow still on them and though we marveled at how pretty it was, we think this light dusting where there is no permanent snow might be even prettier.

Even though Seward is pretty much closed down for the winter there are still lots of tourists coming in.  Seward is basically an ice free port so the harbour is full of boats.  Most of the locals believe it is better to keep the boat in the water for the winter than it is to put it on the hard where systems are sure to freeze up.  This makes a day like today with little wind kind of an inspiring place to walk around.  All the reflections in the water as we watch the ever hungry sea otters munching away and frolicking around the harbour amongst the quiet boats.  Not sure if it will still be this romantic in April after five months of it but for now it sure is pretty.

One Down Three to Go

Mark passed his Proficiency in Survival Craft.  He has three more courses booked before he renews his Captain's license.  Which will give him the qualifications he needs for his present job as well as setting him up to upgrade his license when he gains sea time.

Back in Seward

Well we made it back to Seward.  The car passed its road check tests fine and Nissan reset the alarms we got mid trip and changed the oil etc.  We had dinner last night with Father Bill at Chinooks.  Mark started working at his new job today.  Pauline finished unpacking the car and stowing as much as she could.  She has to go back to work tomorrow.  So does Mark as the Tug Chahunta has some last minute jobs that need doing before the weather turns and Mark has courses Monday through Friday for the next two weeks.  But he is happy to be employed again and accumulating time on a big boat which will help him upgrade his license.

Road Trip Day 9

Wow, what happened to Tok?  We didn't stop in Tok.  We got there a bit early and decided to try to get a bit closer to Anchorage.  We were hoping to get an appointment to get the car serviced so we figured the closer we got the better.  In the end we could only get a morning appointment so we drove nearly 14 hours non stop and made it to Anchorage.  So we will be home tomorrow.

We saw a couple of foxes today, one had a Canadian passport and the second one we saw was just after we crossed into the USA so unless it was an illegal immigrant it had a U.S. Passport.  We got close to both of them but the camera was in the wrong place both times, whoops.

Again today the trip was interesting, the scenery varied a lot as we drove.  Some of the more interesting were the trip around Lake Kluane and its Destruction Bay, Matanuska Glacier which is called a valley glacier and looks like a river of ice, several of the mountains including one we think was Mount St. Elias, which is the second highest mountain in N. America.

Road Trip Day 8

We made it to Whitehorse.  No animal sitings today other than squirrels, crows and eagles.  But the scenery was very pretty.  We had some snow shortly after leaving Watson Lake but the weather cleared about mid morning and we had a great ride.  Lots of lakes and rivers.  The Yukon River played a major part in the mode of transport for this part of the world during the gold rush and settlement of this area and Alaska.

We head for Tok tomorrow which will put us back in Alaska.

Road Trip Days 6 & 7

We stayed in the Northern Rockies Lodge, Muncho Lake last night.  We were told if our pocket book could afford it this was a great stop.  Our pocketbook isn't doing very well but hey this is probably the only time we will make this trip so we hit it.  The drive from Fort Nelson was quite nice and we even had a wolf trotting down the opposite side of the road.  At first we though it was a dog, then a fox and when we got close we realised it was a wolf.

Muncho Lake and Lake Louise further south are considered the two prettiest lakes in the Rockies.  We don't know which is better but since we saw this literature at Lake Muncho it probably means it is number two.  But no matter it is pretty.  The lodge is a giant log cabin and the only downside is the Internet was so slow no posting could be achieved.

view from our room at the Lodge

view of Muncho Lake

Northern Rockies Lodge at Muncho Lake

on our way to Muncho Lake, stunning scenery

Today's run was also designed to be short.  We had some small flurries and didn't want to be stuck having a long drive if the weather turned bad.  We also wanted to stop at Laird River Hot Springs and have our first hot spring experience since leaving Japan.  On the way to Laird we spotted a bear crossing the road.  There was a car coming from the other direction as well so before either of us got close to him he turned around and scampered back into the trees.

The board walk into the hot springs was covered with snow so we looked at each other carrying our bathing suits and said lets go look.  We can always decide not to go in when we get there.  The walk in is about 800 meters.  Once we got there we found a very well built facility with several people enjoying the water.  So we braved changing into our suits and hit the water.  Great!!!  Most of the visitors there were heading the opposite direction as us, but we chatted with several people and we soon realised we had been in for an hour already.  We only stayed in the lower pools, there is an upper pool about 300 meters further up but we had read that it was closed due to bear sightings.  Others said you could go at your own risk but we were comfortable where we were.

After leaving Laird we really got into the wildlife.  We had been seeing moose and bison crossing signs for miles but hadn't seen any.  Just outside of the hot springs we came upon our first herd of wood bison.  They were right by the roadside so we pulled over and snapped several pictures.  We noticed the cars from the other direction just kept going past.  After we had snapped a few shots and continued on we started to see why the cars were not stopping.  Every few kilometers we went we would see at least one or two if not a small herd.  And one place we had a very large herd on both sides of the road around a big curve.  We also saw some road kills.  One killed the vehicle as well.  We saw the smashed up vehicle first and knew it had to be several hours old at least as there was snow all over it.  A few feet further we saw the carcus of the animal.  Not sure if it was a moose or a bison.  Several miles after we saw a car from the other direction pulled off the side of the road.  Just as we got close a moose cow scampered off into the woods.  So the crash could have been either.

a herd of wood bison by the highway

We are at Watson Lake for tonight and will head for Whitehorse tomorrow.  That should be our last night in Canada as we plan to then cross into Alaska the day after.

the Signpost Forest in Watson Lake

Road Trip a Day 5

Wow, what a difference a day makes!  Yesterday it was close to or did touch 80 degrees F.  This morning we left Whitecourt with rain and 47 degrees at 07:30.  By 10:30 we hit Hythe and already about 3 inches on the ground and 25 degrees.  I asked the girl at the petrol station how long it had been snowing and she said it had started sometime after 7:00.  By noon it looked like about 6 inches and they were just starting to get the plows and sanders out.  Lots of cars and trucks in the ditches some of them completely upside down including one tractor trailer.  Needless to say it was a very slow ride today but we still managed to get 537 miles under our belt.  We are currently in Fort Nelson and there is only a small amount of snow on the ground here.  The last hour and a half we were able to maintain the speed limit.  One funny thing as we were coming into Fort Nelson there was a police check.  Stopping every car to check for sobriety.  We told him we don't think we would have made it through all the snow if we were driving impaired.  Our car was very iced up as well so he knew we were telling the truth.

beginning of the day, where the road was a little slushy

later on, after the snow plows went to work

Road Trip Day 4

We are in Whitecourt, Alberta.  Today we crossed the halfway point as far as miles go.  Of course the roads are a little quicker in the first half so we still figure we have not made the half way point yet.  We really enjoyed Saskatoon last night and we waited until 10 for Costco to open this morning before heading out.  Things went fairly smoothly a bit of a slowdown prior to and through Edmondton but not too bad.

Road Trip Day 3

We are in Saskatoon.  Rather long drive today but we made it in pretty good time.  This was our first drive across the prairies and, well, ah, it tends to get monotonous after a while.  But Saskatoon seems very nice.  Pauline decided to put on her charms and get us a room at the Delta Bessborough Hotel which is a historical landmark on the river.  We not only got a great rate we got a river view upgrade! We are off now to explore the waterfront.  Note the weather has been great today hitting 80 degrees F which is almost 27 C.  So we want to head out and enjoy it before the evening cool sets in.

view from our room

view of the hotel from the river

view of the front of the hotel

Road Trip Day 2

We made it as far as Devil's Lake, North Dakota.  We drove into Superior, Wisconsin and Duluth, Minnesota but didn't find much worth stopping for so we kept heading west and made it past Grand Forks.  The drive today not as pretty nor much wildlife but there was very little rain and literally no wind.

We head foreign tomorrow as we cross into Canada.  Will hit duty free and money changer as we cross the border.  Not much room in the car for duty free but we can always carry a bottle or two on our laps!

Road Trip Day 1

We left Grand Haven this morning and made it as far as Ironwood.  We stopped in Sleeping Bear Dunes and Petoskey.  We were going to Picture Rocks but it was raining pretty hard when we hit Munsing so we continued on.  We did see a deer, lots of pheasants, and a few eagles.  The colors are starting to change but only just.  It still made a pretty trip so far even with the off and on rain.  It was really blowing at the dunes and crossing the bridge.  But safe travel so far.

Sand dunes with Lake Michigan

Grand Haven Happenings

Well we made it to GH.  We swear every time we fly United it gets a bit worse, and the overnight flight from Anchorage to Chicago was the worst one yet.  Even the African airlines and Asian budget carriers are now superior to United.  It was a brand new plane, completely full, the seats are now closer together so everyone was on top of one another.  You now pay for luggage so everyone loads up with cabin luggage.  On a crowded overnight where everyone is so bunched together you figure well we can watch the movies.  Not any more they are pay for view, and would not be available until two hours outside of Chicago so just hang out with a book.  Oh did I mention that there are only two toilets in economy and one of them was malfunctioning.  Or there is no meal on United flights anymore, there is a packaged snack for purchase!  So the next time someone uses that phrase it is easier to fly then sail I will retort not on US airlines!

But everything is not all bad.  Since arriving the weather has been great.  The wedding was really nice, we have been to Wei Wei's and Fricano's.  The car has been serviced and most things packed for the trip north.  We hope to hit the Tip a Few tonight or tomorrow for a burrito.  We have been delayed at least six hours in our departure as FedEx didn't get our chains to us Saturday.  We will probably just hold off and leave early Tuesday instead, but figure we can make up time enroute.

So keep watching we will post our progress as we go along.

Status

Well we got all the sails off and the gear on deck tied down.  The low has hit, it has only reached 44 knots up until now, but our new spot is much more protected.  It is supposed to get worse before we leave tomorrow.

We tried to get a leak fixed before we depart tomorrow.  This meant a few days of digging and grinding out a bunch of dry rot underneath  the deck and around the starboard aft laz.  We rebuilt it with synthetic materials although Mark didn't finish glassing as much as he wanted.  But he thought he got it.  Of course with all this rain we see we didn't get it all.  We did manage to turn that crappy brown water that usually indicates rot ito nice clean water and the leak is very tiny now so hopefully when we get back we can trace it and stop it with some gunk until spring.  Of course the leak being tiny Means it will be hard to trace.  But it should be fun.

 We do not have much to do, a bit of laundry and some final packing and we will head to Anchorage.

Whoops we moved

Hey everyone.  We are no longer at the end of H dock.  The marina advised us to move to E32 for the winter.  Their statement said it is a long rough walk during winter storms to or from our boat.  We agree so since it has become available we moved to E32.  This is a lot closer to the winter showers, and shoreline, plus we have some protection from those storms that roar out of the NW, so we have changed our scenery for the winter, not many houses can do that!

21 Years Ago, Partners

Wow, 21 years Mark and Pauline met and they have been taking care of me since.  Of course I take care of them too doing things like carrying them to all these great destinations.  But thanks for the new varnish guys.  When we get to Mexico, new paint?

Another Cruise

We took a day off to go on another cruise.  This one with Major Marine Tours, part of the company Pauline works for and hence a perk trip for us.  When the Rileys were here, we did the cruise with Kenai Fjords Tours so this gave us a chance to compare.  Of course a little later in the season so some of the animals were a bit more scarce. We got our best surface show by a humpback we have ever seen.  We first spotted him doing a chin plunge and then he proceeded to do a tail flapping show for over five minutes so everyone got a multitude of tail shots.  We then watched some harbor seals sunning themselves and when we headed around to the glaciers we were notified of a pod of transient orcas feeding just outside of Holgate Glacier.  As we were speeding over to them, the male hit a Dall's Porpoise and supposedly threw him about 30 feet through the air.  We missed this but because they had just gorged, the orcas stayed around cruising for a while and we got a great chance to watch them.

We got to view Holgate Glacier this time, which was new for us.  A great day out.  Thanks Major Marine Tours.

Harbor seals sunning themselves

tail flapping show by the humpback whale

Holgate Glacier

male orca

male and female pair

Finished Varnishing for the Year

Actually this post is a bit premature.  As we have about an hour to go, or one last coat on a couple of areas and we can remove the last of the blue tape.

We didn't get everything done this year.  We had planned to do the rubbing streak and the companionway boards as well.  The rubbing streak was mostly scraped back but was not varnished and only the bottom two boards were varnished for the campanionway.  Instead we made a replacement board for the top two drop boards with two pieces of acrylic separated by a wood frame as this allows so much more light in and we figure will be nice as the shorter days of an Alaskan winter come on us.

What we did achieve is all the trim, cap rails, taff rails, and forward sign boards.  All the windows have been done, and the grab rails.  We didn't even attempt the bowsprit and the rubbing streak will wait until next year.  We also didn't do the hatch trim but most of those look ok and hopefully will last another year.

Just as we were finishing off the varnishing, we were wondering how to get new name decals when all of a sudden we were remotely introduced to Sasha and Gretchen via our friends Chris and Kerry from Guam.  Sasha works in the Anchorage office of the company Pauline worked for in Guam.  He volunteered to take on designing, ordering and delivering for us.  Mucho thanks go to him.  You can zoom in on the pictures and check out his artwork.

Tickets Booked

We have booked our tickets to Michigan for Greg and Hayden's wedding near the end of Sept.  After that we will drive the Rogue back here to Seward for the winter.  We are looking forward to our winter in Alaska and having the car will allow us to make road trips when we have time off.

Varnishing

With Pauline now working, Mark is taking advantage of the good weather and tackling the exterior varnish.  Very slow scraping and sanding  8 year old varnish off but we are turning the corner and some is going back on while trying to prep the rest of it.  Oh Pauline got her first two days off starting today.  Guess what she was conned into doing.  Yep scraping and sanding.  How relaxing Lah!

Pauline has got a job!

Well just before the Rileys arrived we had decided this is too nice of an area to rush through and we were going to spend another year here.  We also kind of felt it would be better for Sari Timur if we stayed on board through the winter so she wouldn't be such a wreck when we got back.  That meant put out the word we were looking for work.  Well it seems like people have been waiting for that.  We both had interviews on Tuesday.  Mark has a possibility but Pauline landed a job.  She has to start right away in order to get the time off for the trip to Michigan in September for Greg's wedding and to pick up our car.  And Mark is just waiting until the 19th to see if his possibility is going anywhere.

4th of July in Seward

We spent 4th of July in Seward.  Nothing special, you think.  Well, the population of Seward in winter is about 3,500 but during 4th of July, there are about 30,000 people here.  The reason is the Mt. Marathon Race.  It is a race from the town, up Mt. Marathon to a marker 3,022 feet abovet sea level and back down to town.  And you have to be invited to participate or win a lottery to do so.  This year, the last two places were auctioned at $4,500!

The local catholic church puts on a chicken BBQ every year and it's very popular and we decided to help out; setting up the tables, serving chicken, cleaning tables and packing up.  In between, we got to see the start of the kids race, the men's race, the women's race and the parade.

It was a nice 4th of July!

Train ride

We left Denali National Park and took the Alaska Railroad back to Anchorage.  Chris booked us on the Wilderness Express, two special cars run by a private company.  Pretty luxurious, with the passengers seated in a dome upstairs car with the dinning area below, complete with a guide, who pointed out all the sights to us.

Alaska Railroad train engine

the Wilderness Express car

trees, mountains, river, sky, clouds

another great view

the conductor, the bartender and the guide

us, waiting to order our lunch

meandering river

more river view

passing over Hurricane Gulgh

Denali National Park

This place is surreal!  It is 6 million acres of wilderness and the centerpiece is the 20,310 feet high Denali, the highest mountain in North America.  There is only one unpaved road into the center of the park and there you will find 4 lodges in Kantishna, one of which is the Backcountry Lodge, where we stayed the night. As part of the package, we got to ride a bus tour into and out of the lodge with a very knowledgeable guide.

We have seen moose, caribou, arctic ground squirrels, Dall sheep, grizzly bears, swans, a golden eagle, bald eagles, as well as flowers and plants.

Mama moose with her babies

male moose

a large herd of caribou, mostly females and youngs

male caribou mostly on their own

the girls panning for gold!

Tom decided to fly fish

so did Brendan

Dall Sheep

more caribous

the Kantishna Backcountry Lodge

this bear was hovering over a caribou carcass

this bear was wandering around the visitor center

the kids clowning about at the visitor center

the park ranger, with the bear-safe container