July 2024 – Caro Babbo

Cordova,AK, 14-JUL-2024 – We’re still above 60º. We still haven’t officially left Prince William Sound. We’ve had a wonderful week or so in the many places in PWS. There was no wind and we didn’t even put up the mainsail to keep us from rocking: the water was generally like glass.

We motored a few hours each day, after our initial 10-hour day, when we left Valdez, and then anchor, read, sometimes row in our dinghy and do the same thing the next day.

Valdez was a very nice town. Quiet. We spent one night, went out to eat, drank beer. We arrived around noon and left the next afternoon about 2pm. OpenCPN and Navionics disagree on the tidal currents by hours. We found that it doesn’t matter, the water flows south from Port of Valdez all the time. We looked for back eddies, anything to explain it. It just does or did so on the two days we were there.

Granite Bay, Prince William Sound, 29-Jun-2024 – It’s ten after eight in the evening. The sun is at 35-degrees, and the temperature is in the 70s. I’m wearing a black T-shirt, a pair of Carharts without Long Johns, and no socks. I’m sitting in the cockpit writing, while Jennifer sits across from me navigating.

For the past few years, Jennifer has taken us into places that were horizontally skinny. This year they will be vertically skinny. This means that we need to arrive within a specific time window. Tomorrow is easy, we can leave anytime and still be good leaving Granite Bay; we must arrive within a specific time window. Not too tough.

The next day we must leave within a specific time window and enter the next site also within a time window. I trust Jennifer: she counts on her fingers, but has gotten quite good at it.

Month: July 2024

Valdez/Cordova

Granite Bay