I’ve never published correspondence before. This letter to Ray Penson discusses things that are interesting to two sailors.
Ray, as you may know, holds a Type One captain’s license: any boat any ocean. He is a master seaman in the sense that the term conjures. You can search for Ray in the blog.
We met Ray in Secret Cove, a small cove in BC. The island defining one side of the cove was rumored to have been given to Marilyn Monroe by a secret lover.
Ray’s and our paths crossed throughout the summer culminating in a collision course heading into Prince Rupert after not seeing each other for weeks.
Ray, like Erwin, has been one of our guardian angels, watching over us and giving us advice.
August 7th, 2020
Ray,
I guess you know we’re in Chignik.
With COVID and Alaska’s halving its ferry service, these little towns are having a tough time surviving.
The cannery is open, but, like everywhere, the workers are sequestered and invisible.
Here, sailboats are uncommon, though the harbor master tells me lots of them come through every year. There were ten last year alone. Though, the winter harbor master tells us there have only been three this year, including us.
The fishermen all come by to say hello, ask where we are from (meaning where we have sailed from), take pictures and ask questions. Jennifer and I are always impressed by how smart and well spoken the fishermen are.
There are some lows passing by. It is blowing in the 20’s here in the boat basin, gusting into the 30’s, but it is difficult to understand what is happening outside the bay. Though the GRIBs say it should be okay weather, the harbor master tells us that the wind compresses as it comes up the coast and that the sixteen-foot wind waves forecasted by the weather service will not be miles off shore but right outside the bay, so we’re staying put.
Like everywhere, it is all about local knowledge.
King Cove, where we were a few days ago, had seventy knots blowing through the harbor yesterday because the winds aligned with a valley that runs through to the Bering Sea side. The harbor master, who has been fishing here for 60 years, laid out which coves ahead of us are usable in which winds. The topology on the NOAA charts are indicative but not decisive.
The advice we’re given varies on where we need to be when. The common advice we were receiving was to be where we need to be by early September. We’re sticking to that advice, which means we need to keep moving.
One low passed south of us recently; we’re feeling the effects of another right now, though it should be through later today, and then plan to move tomorrow. We’re finding the path of the lows varies by the day.
The price of fish is 60% of last year because there is no restaurant demand — I had no idea so much of the economy was driven by people eating out. I somehow thought the quantity of food consumed would remain the same. There are the same number of people eating, right? But it is not true. People apparently eat much less when they eat at home.
I wonder what this portends for the future as people change their habits and have much more money in their pockets from not eating out.
People in Chignik and these towns still do a lot of subsistence living taking a moose and a caribou each year and many hundreds of pounds of fish that they can, salt, freeze, can and kipper. It is a very different life than we live.
We see them when they are not working, so they want to *talk* and will spend hours at it. For us, in port is when we need to get things done, so today, I have to put people off so I can get things done. Nothing major, but minor leaks and small maintenance issues, fueling and watering.
There is no internet here that we can find. There is cell phone service, but voice only. My laptop has failed so I can’t see what bills I have paid in my accounting books, nor can I get on line to look at the accounts at each vendor.
We’ve learned of a woman who makes the world’s best donuts. We visited her house and it is not just local pride. These may be the best Jennifer and I have eaten. The woman, Janice, is from Woodinville just outside of Seattle. She comes up each season when her husband fishes.
I’ll buy fifteen or so US gallons of diesel from the fisherman docked next to us and we’ll be ready to leave tomorrow after filling with water.
I did the arithmetic on fuel consumption. At 2000 rpm, motoring, we use 0.375 US gallons per hour. Which is 1.5 US quarts. I think there are .9455 litres per quart so 1.5 qts is 1.41 litres per hour, slightly more that you were using, within 5%.
In Homer, over the winter, I’ll have the prop shaft seal replaced, and the prop balanced and, if necessary, repitched. I suspect the pitch is wrong given the RPMs we need to for five knots — 2K. 2200 gives us 5.5kn, so it is linear.
Thanks for following us and being our guardian angel.
Best,
–john
Ray did respond giving me advice on prop pitch. Telling me there have been no new community COVID cases in New Zealand, where he lives, in 100 days. Also telling me of the hundreds of boats stuck in foreign ports unable to leave because no other country will take them.
It turned out the harbor master here in Chignik did have internet on his phone and like King Cove, told he did not have the password. Unlike King Cove, he offered use of his internet-connected laptop — Mine is kaput, otherwise I would have connected to his connection.
My bank and some other sites are unusable because they must send verification info to my phone, which has no service in this part of AK and the sites’ customer service is closed on weekends.
But, I was able to get all the necessary bills paid.
Jennifer and I are currently (9-AUG-2020 13.00 Alaska Daylight Savings Time) in Port Wrangell, a tiny undeveloped harbor, with a water fall at one end. Except for being easy fifty times the size we see in SE Alaska and BC, it is one of those refuges with a goose neck entrance that provides total relief from waves (and potentially from wind) and is not only invisible from the outside but seems exitless from the inside.
A few more posts may follow today. Last night was an overnighter. We’ll relax today and look at weather. Our friends on Crystal encountered their first Alaskan tour boat east of here as they prepare to make the jump over to Kodiak. We are getting far enough east that tour boats coming west intersect with us.
john
Sent from Iridium Mail & Web.
