Kiska

Kiska is part of the Aleutian Islands, Alaska, located in the Bering Sea. Nobody lives here anymore. It is the wilderness! It is as wilderness as you get around here!! We let our contact “Friendly George” in US Customs know we had arrived.

Kiska Island was important to us on our journey to Dutch Harbour because it provided an emergency anchorage if required. It is large, about 22 miles long and 1.5-6 miles wide. The North end of the island is dominated by Kiska Volcano (when you can see it), of which the highest point is 4004 feet high.

In winter the island will be covered in snow to the shore, however now only patches remain in the valleys and up high. Tundra grass populates the lower areas and up high is strewn with boulders, courtesy of our resident volcano I would say.

It took us a few attempts to anchor. Each time Dean dropped it, it hit rock. Finally it grabbed and we crossed our fingers it was into sand and not something nasty on the bottom. We like our anchor and didn’t want to leave it behind in Kiska Harbour. The harbour is strewn with wrecks that are all well marked but who knows what other debris lies down there.

The harbour is huge, about 1.3 mile diameter and extremely protected by Little Kiska Island and the surrounding mountains. We are anchored with about 11m under the keel. All of our attempts to anchor in closer were met by rock, and we didn’t wish to get any closer to those kelp beds, which grows abundantly around the whole island.

To one side of us is the remnants of an old ship pier. Kiska Island was fought over in WWII and although it is no longer inhabited, there is plenty of evidence from the past. The US had stations here extending throughout the Cold War and as well as the pier there are roads, power poles and bunkers. You can also see craters on the mountainsides from bombings. Live ammunition still exists so care must be taken going ashore. If you can get ashore that is. Many people come here and are never able to land.

By the time the US troops had arrived the Japanese had actually already withdrawn without being detected in the fog. Despite this there were still casualties including when the US and Canadians engaged by accident against each other and 28 US troops and 4 Canadian troops were killed. There is still a Japanese midget sub on the island.

For our first night we had a comfort dinner snugged downstairs, turned the clock to local time and had an early night. Well actually no, it isn’t an early night now. It is now 2330 the day before and still light outside! So bizarre. This is a photo I took before I went to bed.

When we awoke it was light, but now we have changed the time it doesn’t get light until much later in the morning. The gale we had come here to avoid had arrived and outside the wind was howling through the rigging. As I got out the shower and warmed up in the drying room, my view outside was of the Kiska volcano. The first time it had emerged from the cloud for us. You can see it below. Covered in snow, the wind has blown away the cloud to expose it in all of its magnificence. The saying is, if you can see the volcano it is too windy to leave the anchorage.

Dean braved the elements to get a better photo from upstairs for me. I feel we were lucky to see the volcano at all. I suspect it isn’t visible very often this time of year!

The volcano erupted in 1962 and 1964. Since that time, it has just been ash, steam and small lava flows.

It is unlikely we will be able to go ashore today with the gale blowing for an expected 6 hours. So it will be a day of boat jobs. After 2 weeks at sea the inside needs a good clean. Dean needs to check out our steering wheel that has developed a terrible squeak. And he also needs to do a better job of sealing our exhaust port. While his quick job at sea did the trick, it is unlikely to last, so he is going to do another temporary job here that will last until he is able to fix it properly.

I hope Ayametta who are still at sea got far enough south to avoid it. Dean checked their course and it looks like it. I am so relieved we are not out there.

The wind continued to howl all day. There is no way we can go to land. I braved the elements to take this video and nearly got blown overboard. Even our poor wind generator has gone on a go slow in the strong wind. As Dean said, although we are secure we sure aren’t snugged in here! Listen to that wind!!

Click to watch video of Kiska Harbour

This is looking into Kiska harbour during the gale.

And this is looking out towards the North pass.

And here is our poor American courtesy flag. Already damaged from Guam, it has not weathered well. We will need to invest in a new one!!

After reviewing the weather GRIBS we had to leave otherwise we may not have another window to leave for 5 days. We could easily have spent 5 days exploring but for one we aren’t actually cleared into the US yet, and second we have to consider the whole of our journey. However it was still blowing up to 30kn in the anchorage, yet the weather models said it was only 10-15kn out to sea.

The day was extremely foggy and at first we couldn’t even see the island. As time went on the fog cleared slightly but was still quite heavy. With a bit of apprehension we up anchored. The anchor had grabbed marvellously. So well in fact we actually thought we could be snagged on some debris. But no, it is actually really good holding and there was no problem retrieving it.

I was a bit sad not to have gone ashore. I am certain I will never visit the Aleutians again. But that is part and parcel here and safety is paramount. In the strong wind if our outboard had failed we would have been blown out to sea and if we had breached while landing I think we would have got hypothermia!

We left via the North pass, which is huge and has no obstacles such as weed beds. And we were away. At the moment to Adak but timing of arrival and weather could dictate if we decide to have another night in a nearby bay.