Sweater Bay

It was still gloomy as we motored towards Chignik however the brightening of the sky on our horizon gave promise to a weather change and the rain and fog began clearing to provide glimpses of blue sky. While still gloomy it wasn’t impossibly cold and we didn’t need the many layers we had been wearing.

We had seen a boat on AIS behind us and when it was only a couple of miles away they called us up on the radio. They said they rarely saw yachts here and wanted to know our story. M&M is a tender in the Bering Sea and Alaskan Coast over summer then returns to Seattle for winter. They asked if they could come along side and take a photo of us, which was nice. We had a mainsail up even if it wasn’t doing much, so at least we looked like a yacht!

They offered to give us supplies if we needed anything but we were stocked up from Dutch and also weren’t too keen on a boat that size coming in that close! But hopefully we will catch up with them to meet in person because they sounded really lovely.

The thing is we have found the fishing boats in Alaska to be so friendly. I am not sure if because they know what conditions can be like they respect us or maybe just think we are crazy. But they certainly treat us nicely and seem genuinely interested in what we are doing.

The beauty of cruising is we can change our plans. A headwind developed which meant another 5 hours of bashing into the wind to Chignik or less than 2 hours to be blown into Sweater Bay. Sweater Bay it was. It was a bit of a detour but had the promise of maybe something nice.

It was lovely being blown down the coast. It was moody with lots of low clouds but there was enough mountain visible that we could see lots of waterfalls cascading down, often straight into the water. A look through the binoculars showed them all over the place cascading down the mountain sides.

This landscape was quite different to the volcanic islands we had been getting used to. Towering cliffs of rock in a plenitude of colours. There were lots of screes with loose shale like rock and caves along the shore. I am not sure how deep they went but lots of birds were hanging around them.

We also spotted dolphins or porpoises as we got into the protected waters. However they weren’t of the social kind and soon disappeared.

Although it was the mainland we were contemplating if it was bear country or not because it was so rocky and thought perhaps it might be too steep for bears. And I would love to go ashore and stalk puffins. As we actually entered Sweater Bay Dean commented that there were game trails along the mountainside so either there were bears or some other larger game like deer making them. In the photo below you can see the trails winding up the mountain.

But look carefully at what is standing beside the rock on the beach. It is bear country. I just managed to take a snap and when I took the next one he had just vanished. That was our bear sighting number 10.

We were scoping out our anchorage and I spotted bear number 11. It too bolted when it saw us and was swallowed up in seconds amongst the bushes. I just managed to snap the top of his head. Can you see him?

They say when you are walking here, unlike in Australia where we are quiet so you can see the wildlife, here you are noisy to scare bears away so they aren’t surprised and startled by you. These bears are certainly scaredy bears because we are nowhere near them out on the water and they still run a mile.

Bears can be hunted here. I found the following online: Depending on where you hunt, brown/grizzly bear bag limits are either one bear every four regulatory years, one bear every regulatory year, or two bears every regulatory year, and the season dates vary. Black bears vary from one to multiple. Hunters may not take any bear cubs or sows with cubs. (https://www.adfg.alaska.gov accessed 2/8/23)

After checking out the bay we dropped anchor. This was the deepest we have dropped in for a long time at about 20m. There was a sudden shelving near the head of the bay where two creeks popped out so we weren’t sure if it was rock or silt. But where we were was good muddy holding and we were set for the night. For the first time though Dean set both the drift alarm and a depth alarm.

We’ve been hearing stories of people catching Halibut so Dean thought he’d give it a go. Atsushi caught one and Mike off Galactic caught a 5ft one in Kupreanof Harbour. They tell me they are enormous, they are bottom dwellers and they taste like chicken. So out in the cold drizzle he went to try for a Halibut. I was on standby to provide support should he get a bite. I also had chicken and dumplings waiting in case plans didn’t eventuate…..the chicken and dumplings were very tasty…..

Just for something different it was a cold and drizzly morning when we awoke. As we left harbour we decided to put the sails up and coast slowly up the shore in the hope of seeing a bear and actually not scaring it away.

We were in luck and it only took a few minutes to spot one. It looked like a big male grizzly and although he certainly saw us and kept a watchful eye he didn’t appear too concerned. The water is very deep so Dean steered as close to the shore as he could while we watched this big fella. He just continued his foraging, reaching up into the bushes to get his berries. We left him to it, thrilled we had got to watch a big scary creature like this up close just going about his day.

Travelling close to the shore we got to see the beautiful waterfall in our bay. This one you can anchor next to and collect water if you have a hose long enough. The morning was getting colder and colder so I went down stairs to make us blueberry pancakes for brunch while Dean kept us moving forward.

Two weather models had given us two widely different predictions for today. One was for favourable wind to push us to Chignik. The other was no wind. For a while it seemed like we might get the wind model, but unfortunately the no wind won out.