Images of the North Coast of British Columbia, Canada

 

 

Hello and welcome  

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.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 2006 Trip Highlights

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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News Updated Dec 30 2017

 

ROPOS Science Submersible

 

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Serendipity:

'Is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely.'

 

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.

 

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.

 

 

 

The North Coast

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.

Forward Harbour, BC

Anchor Watch

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. 

 

Windblown drifts of kelp climb the anchor rode and flail in tangles from the bowsprit rails... flags chatter and snap.....

 

  

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.....

 

Bushy Island, Snow Pass. Alaska

Horseflies

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. 

 

 

 

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.  

Climbing Mount Pender

McMicking Inlet, Campania Island B.C.

 

 

Old Places

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. 

Swanson Bay, B.C.

 

    

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