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Hello and welcome
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to the travels of M.V. Shelyann
on the North Coast of British Columbia Canada.
Over fourteen
years she has carried us over 27,000 miles through the islands and passages
that stretch from Puget Sound in the South to the ice strewn waters of
Southeast Alaska.
These pages
contain images of our favorite places on the
North Coast... Wonderful, wild places that few people ever see.
We hope that
you will enjoy sharing them.
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2006 Trip Highlights
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After seven
years absence, we returned to Alaska. Originally intending to do a
'little' Alaska as far as Petersburg, we got carried away and ended up
continuing on past Glacier Bay into Cross Sound and Lisianski
Inlet.
From
Pelican we returned south via the west coast of Chichagof Island to Sitka
then down the west coast of Baranof Island to Coronation Island. We
returned 'inside' via the Spanish Islands and Sea Otter Sound visiting El
Capitan Caves and Point Baker on Prince of Wales Island. Two months and
2400 nautical miles in all.
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Serendipity:
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'Is the effect by which one
accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for
something else entirely.'
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We were anchored in the creek mouth in Swanson's Bay one evening
in 1998 after an afternoon of exploring the ruins when a blue and white
U.S. ketch 'Elske' came into the bay. We watched
as it trolled around for a while on the north side of the bay looking for
an anchorage, a young fellow on deck swatting horseflies with a towel, then
moved on. The next day the ketch tied behind
us at the fish plant / fuel dock in Klemtu. The skipper introduced himself
and we discovered that we both had 'mates' named Claudia.
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Later that
day we made arrangements for a beer in Shearwater, our next stop heading
south. We traveled home together that year and found that we became 'fast'
friends. Over the ensuing 8 or 9 years we have spent our summers together
and traveled many thousands of miles, around the island and into Alaska,
leading each other astray, enjoying many adventures, each spurring the other
to go where we might not have gone alone.
Thanks to
our good friends and trusted companions Dean, Claudia & sons in S.V. Elske.
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The North Coast
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A friend once said... This going North every year must be
getting a little repetitive...
The only answer I could give was... Not in a hundred years.
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Forward Harbour,
BC
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Anchor Watch
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You can see them
coming... violent gusts sweeping the surface of the bay as they approach...
hitting Shelyann with a thump, sending her
reeling at the end of her tether.
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Windblown drifts of
kelp climb the anchor rode and flail in tangles from the bowsprit rails...
flags chatter and snap.....
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Nearly two A.M. now and it is dark, at least as dark as it
gets this far north in summer. Our universe has been reduced to the cocoon
of the cabin lights and a black outline of forested shoreline against the
red glow of the northern sky.
Sitting quietly in the dark, worrying... anticipating the next
pummeling gust... is it getting better or worse... have we dragged... is
the rode chafing.....
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Bushy Island, Snow
Pass. Alaska
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Horseflies
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A personal droning
squadron of hungry HF-14 fighters surrounds each of us on our descent. The
warm, sunny, windless day is proving ideal for our attackers and they have
come in droves.
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The dogs, in their patrolling of the mountainside during our
climb, have collected every horsefly on the mountain and delivered them to
us. Wiping sweat from our chins the hand comes back red with
blood.
They too are suffering... each wearing what appears to be a
double-braid, black bead necklace... rows of tormentors burrowed into the
hair of their necks. They cannot be brushed off, the only solution is to
periodically crush them as they feed. Both are sporting bloody red necks
and chests.
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Climbing Mount
Pender
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McMicking Inlet, Campania Island B.C.
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Old Places
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Piles of two by fours, carefully stacked for drying, now a
sagging punky mass. Rotting wharf pilings topped with bonsai forests. Huge
riveted digesters tumbled drunkenly on their sides. A drying tower, its
blowers and conveyors forever corroded in place. The smokestack, once the
billowing driving force of this place, now mute but for dripping
rain.
These old places, like the people who once made their lives
here, are now reduced to dust and skeletons.
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Swanson Bay, B.C.
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BC Marina .com
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GE UPS for Sale
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