Another town and another whirlwind! We arrived around 5pm and headed for pizza, afterwards Fynn and Opa reeled in some herring.

The first day was devoured by the forestay replacement. Dad was a huge help in the morning, working right up till he left to catch their flight. Then came Tor and Jess and soon  enough the whole job was done- amazing! Jess and I went crazy inside all day with the four kids.  The  weather was  dreary and we felt stuck, waiting to be called ‘on deck’ to lend a  hand. It was draining. Of course the men were tired too, with the physical labour and such, but they at least have a huge accomplishment to show for it. Us mom have little more then mess and dishes and kids wanting more from us. The kid were literally bouncing off the walls in the boat so we planned a swim day for tomorrow. The highlight was the pizza dinner. Called the Kitchen sink, it came with about 2 inches of toppings and a plastic kitchen sink on top. The kids loved that.

“Do you ever feel like you cram too much into one day?” Jess asks me as she finds me at the laundry mat.  I am wrestling with the clothes in the dryer, always tricky with a baby on the front. Jess immediately lends a hand and pulls out my clothes. Grateful,  I step back and bounce Bowen, cranky from hanging sideways before Jess came to  my aid. “Yes, yes I do.” It was 11am and already I done 6 loads of laundry, walked to town to find more laundry quarters, gone shopping, and Kolby had cleaned up from the forestay job and washed the boat. “Meet you in  20 minutes to go to the pool?” “Yep” We were at the pool for just over an hour, then it was time to go. We had to fuel up and hit Wrangall Narrows at slack water by 2 pm. Going through the narrows the beauty was lost on us. We were all exhausted. Fynn fell asleep in Kolby’s lap  and we were snarling at each other. By the time we rafted with Yare we had settled and took in a lovely evening, with only one mishap. Just as we had set the outside table, Fynn leaned her weight on the folding leaf and it collapsed, sending plates and child smashing to the cockpit floor. Although bleeding from several small cuts, it didn’t take much to clean her up and we enjoyed our Baha style fish tacos on the more secure indoor table after that.

Interesting name right? Apparently it was named after a guy entered at slack water then was stuck in the inlet until next slack water, which I guess he found pretty terrifying. Not sure what is so scary here though. Rather it is exceptionally beautiful – as Jess said it is like driving your boat into Yosemite. The entrance is very narrow and can only be navigated at slack water or it becomes a torrent of whorls and overfalls.

The inlet is all sheer granite cliffs and tumbling waterfalls. We remarked how there is no mark of mankind here. No garbage, no old settlements, no history of logging. The only thing to mark the passage of time here would be the retreat of the glaciers, scouring the cliffs as they left. The remoteness felt endless. Despite the constricted entrance the inlet had a plethora of sea life, we saw seals and porpoise in the water, herons and eagles ashore and evidence of bear, but no furry friend sightings here.  The water was a interesting shade of emerald. We tried to go for a walk but only made it half a mile before the slippery rocks and bugs pushed us back to the dinghy.

The bugs swarmed up by the hundred in the cockpit, so we mostly had to stay tucked inside. I don’t think they were biting, but they were extremely annoying, flying in my face and mouth and eyes. We left at slack water at 1 pm today and ran a good 50 miles to our next anchorage. We have been doing a crazy amount of motoring in SE Alaska. I remember back when a 20 mile day seemed far. Now that is ‘only 20 miles’!! We have done almost 1000 nm so far in SE Alaska. That is the distance from Ketchikan to Vancouver!

The main todo with Gloria and Micheal was Tracy Arm, and it didn’t disappoint. We anchored at Tracy Arm Cove and rafted up with Yare. After cruising together in Mexico and Hawaii it was great to have our first raft up. The kids were so happy to see it other it was a dance party late into the night. The bay was so peaceful that we never once heard the boats bump in the night.

Boat love

Dance Party

The next morning it was hard to separate the kids so we took Lars and Odin aboard Asunto. It was a full and noisy ride! Tracy Arm splits to North and South Sawyer Glacier. We had heard a report from an aluminum charter cat that the South Sawyer Glacier access was a full of ice. He had pushed through the ice for 25 minutes to see it. It was also calving huge icebergs. We saw a few that were easily 200 feet long and 100 feet wide- on the surface.  They must have been beasts underwater. Kolby was pretty busy at the helm playing huge the icebergs, and Yare marked a few as their own, leaving bottom paint behind.

 Much like the vista at John Hopkins Glacier, Tracy Arm is sweeping granite cliffs, scalloped by the receding glaciers, waterfalls tumbling 1000s of feet and icy blue water. We found one iceberg that had rolled revealing it’s glassy undersides. We crept right up to it until the anchor nudged the ice, awed by it’s beauty. It is hard to find the words to describe the undersides of icebergs. They are endlessly complex and impossible to turn away from. The smoothness, like glass, the perfect hue of blue, the resounding hardness of the surface. Just amazing.  Further down the arm we found a waterfall tumbling into the sea and nudge the bow in, giving Asunto her Alaskan christening.

Odin watches as we approach

We dropped Otto at the glacier and zoomed around, visiting more icebergs, and scooping up ice from the sea to make ice cream (that idea didn’t work!).  A huge hunk of ice fell while we were there, it landed on the face of the glacier, shattered into a million pieces and fell into the sea with a noise that echoed like thunder. A full up of glaciers we started the 25 nm back to our cove where Asunto and Yare rafted again and shared a crab feast followed by pho lasagna. That was a day well lived.