Port Houghton and Frederick Sound
Our last day in Southeast Alaska and as full of atmosphere as any. At first light we find sheltered waters in Port Houghton, a remote but safe haven from the strong winds out in the main channels. This is our last chance to go ashore in the wilds and we take it. Larry finds a freshly cast eagle feather on the cobble beach and there is an emotional moment as Sharon offers up an Indian blessing for us, and casts it back into the swirling waters. Alert now, we walk single file up into the lee of a young stand of spruce: we can see this is a bear’s vegetable patch: he has been cropping juicy nagoon berries, digging up wild celery tubers and snacking on chocolate lily rice roots. We track him cautiously across wild barley meadows and skirt the mature forest. Pushing through a prickly screen of young spruce we follow fresh moose prints until we are suddenly under soaring, mature trees. Here we find a trampled couch where a bear has sprawled in a bark-lined dell. 100 yards on we are relieved to intercept a moose track and emerge out into the tidal saltmarsh again. New sounds: a loon overhead, the bugling clamor of migrating geese flighting in, a gang of wigeon springing from the tidal creek. We explore the strandline where jellyfish and tiny crab cases have been flung among the grasses, then finally come full circle to gaze upon a toppled giant: the root stump of an ancient tree, now a lowly eagle perch, stark on the tidal flats. This is the circle of life: the snaking river scythes a swathe through the forest, casting trees aside like toothpicks. In the calm creeks so created, mud settles, crabs and seaweed rot, the land, freed from ice, rises inexorably and becomes a seed bed for a young forest once again.
Back to Sea Lion, waiting patiently at anchor, and head out into Frederick Sound. A final 21-gun salute from feeding humpbacks, a racing escort of Dall’s porpoise, and we are out into the big swells. The wind rises to an impressive Force 7, but as we turn north into Chatham Strait, Captain Graves can relax: we are surfing home to Sitka.
Our last day in Southeast Alaska and as full of atmosphere as any. At first light we find sheltered waters in Port Houghton, a remote but safe haven from the strong winds out in the main channels. This is our last chance to go ashore in the wilds and we take it. Larry finds a freshly cast eagle feather on the cobble beach and there is an emotional moment as Sharon offers up an Indian blessing for us, and casts it back into the swirling waters. Alert now, we walk single file up into the lee of a young stand of spruce: we can see this is a bear’s vegetable patch: he has been cropping juicy nagoon berries, digging up wild celery tubers and snacking on chocolate lily rice roots. We track him cautiously across wild barley meadows and skirt the mature forest. Pushing through a prickly screen of young spruce we follow fresh moose prints until we are suddenly under soaring, mature trees. Here we find a trampled couch where a bear has sprawled in a bark-lined dell. 100 yards on we are relieved to intercept a moose track and emerge out into the tidal saltmarsh again. New sounds: a loon overhead, the bugling clamor of migrating geese flighting in, a gang of wigeon springing from the tidal creek. We explore the strandline where jellyfish and tiny crab cases have been flung among the grasses, then finally come full circle to gaze upon a toppled giant: the root stump of an ancient tree, now a lowly eagle perch, stark on the tidal flats. This is the circle of life: the snaking river scythes a swathe through the forest, casting trees aside like toothpicks. In the calm creeks so created, mud settles, crabs and seaweed rot, the land, freed from ice, rises inexorably and becomes a seed bed for a young forest once again.
Back to Sea Lion, waiting patiently at anchor, and head out into Frederick Sound. A final 21-gun salute from feeding humpbacks, a racing escort of Dall’s porpoise, and we are out into the big swells. The wind rises to an impressive Force 7, but as we turn north into Chatham Strait, Captain Graves can relax: we are surfing home to Sitka.
