July 12 - Fords Arm to Flag Bay Chichagof Mine

July 12 – Fords Arm to Flag Bay Chichagof Mine

 

Before heading out for our long cruise today, we did an exploratory cruise over to the old cannery site.  No bear seen, but recent evidence of bear in the woods. 

The only evidence of the old cannery are the pilings and a bunch of old rusty metal pieces along the shoreline and in the woods.  Lots of ‘yard art’. 

 

 

A few of the guys went fishing by the river entrance where the ‘Pinks’ were jumping.  Several fish were caught as it was pretty easy.  I suspect that most will go into smokers.

 

Today’s cruise was short only about 1 ¼ hours of nice calm water.   We anchored out in front of the Chichagof mine. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Mt on the left is NOT covered with snow just gray and white rock.  There are two of these in this area, seems very odd.

We took another exploratory cruise this afternoon, this time over to ‘Sisters Lake’ which is not a lake at all but another bay around the corner.   In route we put down prawn pots.  Prawning has been dismal of late, and crabbing worse.  The Sea Otter population is high so the crab etc… population is gone.   We have been told that each Sea Otter eats about 30 lbs of crab etc. per day but they are sloppy eaters and drop much of what they catch so in order to eat 30 lbs, they gather closer to 80 lbs. 

 

We found the waterfall which fed the power plant for the mine many years ago.   Of course we went ashore and explored the ruins of the power plant, the waterfall, and the tidelands.  Evidence of bear, dear, and maybe wolf (or large dog) recently in the area.   We found a lot of rusty old machinery, the remains of a cabin, broken china and a small blue medicine bottle in the river.  The waterfall is beautiful.  Great photo op spot.

 

Michelle and Elise

 

 

Elise wins the prize for best ‘yard art’ today, likely for the entire trip.  She found an intact upper half of a bear scull, complete with two large fang teeth and even some molars.  Based on the size it was likely a young bear.  An amazing find!  

A picture perfect day of exploring. 

 

The group split into 4 groups for dinner; doing dinners for 22 together can be a bit much every night.  After dinner Sea Life became the ‘Starlight Lounge’ with Karaoke.  At some point during the evening it had a name change to the ‘Fireweed Lounge’ because we are in Alaska.   Hopefully there aren’t photos of the evening, but I will say that Steve N. is quite the ‘Tambourine man’.   There was a reminder of the rule ‘What happens in Alaska stays in Alaska’.