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DATE: 6-30-02 STILL LOOKING FOR BEARS The four of us were up early. I wanted to see if there were any bears. Didn’t see a one but still the whales were feeding and the dolphins were puffing and the birds were chirping. What an amazing place. Bonnie had ice cream for breakfast. I guess my cooking isn't improving. MINOR REGRETS As we were leaving Glacier Bay Larry called in to the ranger station to tell them we were leaving a day early. They thanked us for calling in and hoped we had had a good time. We could hear “Freelance,” the sailboat from San Diego, call in right after to see if there were any cancellations so they could stay longer. The ranger said there was and they could have an additional day. So I guess “Freelance” got our left over day. My only regrets about our visit was not staying the night at Reid Glacier and hiking a bit on the glacier but then with the front coming we would have missed that wonderful stay in Fingers Cove. I also wished that we had brought kayaks on the trip to enjoy floating around in the cove and amongst all the wildlife. It was a wonderful experience but stressful because they aren’t dog friendly and we didn't enjoy having to sneak the Zig to shore. They should make some kind of allowances for that situation. I'm sure all of us boaters with dogs would abide by picking up after the dogs, keeping them on leashes and only taking them to certain areas on shore in the anchorages. I hope they become a little more flexible in the future for people like us. Larry let me take the boat out of Fingers Cove and as we left Glacier Bay we saw more whales and dolphin. They are everywhere. I guess they like it here just like us. CROSSING ICY STRAITS We crossed Icy Straits on our exit from the park and headed towards our next destination Elfin Cove. We came around the South Passage below Lemesurier Island. I looked up some information on the island and it was interesting to find that it has a reported population of one person. Imagine that! You wonder who that is and what's the story?
ENTRY SHALLOW, ROCKY AND SKINNY The entry was well marked on the charts but we arrived at low tide and the entrance was intimidatingly narrow and shallow with precarious looking rocks on each side. The edges were covered over with a thick mass of kelp which made the rocky edges seem even larger and well closer than what they actually were. Bill and I stood on the bow of the boat to watch for dangers. The dredged channel is only 6 feet wide and 60 feet long with no visibility as to where exactly it is. You just hope you are judging the channel correctly. Larry said he had a reading of 6 feet below the boat and we looked ahead at the second narrow area heading into the back harbor and it looked even narrower. The surface width of the first channel at low tide is 30’ with low rocks. With the current and skinny depth Larry did not want to chance taking the boat in any further. I agreed. Bill and I had disagreed earlier on the chart showing 1 fathom. Guess it was shallower than he thought.
RELEGATED TO WOMAN'S WORK We put out our fenders out and prepared to raft up to a fishing boat. Again, I could tell it was going to be a docking challenge with Bill being in charge. A fisherman jumped on board the empty fishing boat that we were planning to tie up to and helped to tie the center line. Bill did the rest and I stood by like a bimbo doing nothing but throwing a line. I started to tie up a line lying on the deck and Bill immediately says "I'll do it." Again, I wanted to say “What in the heck do you think I've been doing on this boat for 5 years?” but I stop myself and realize I should be so lucky to have someone helping out and sparing me the trouble. I take Ziggy for a walk to cool off and come to my senses. I know he’s trying to help and I shouldn’t take it personally but I really resent these guys that come aboard and take charge like you don’t know diddily twit. It's taken me a long time to learn to handle the lines and docking and I feel proud to be able to do it and resent being sent to the back room to fold napkins or some such woman's work.
Elfin Cove is a cute little place. There are cluster of little buildings including several fishing lodges, post office, a tiny little museum, a salmon smoke house, small grocery and laundry. Everything is connected by a good solid wood board walk. The buildings are plain wood structures, nothing charming but built into the rocky hillsides amongst the beautiful trees, craggy rocks and thick green moss. There are lots of planter boxes filled with flowers and just in case a few plastic flowers thrown in here and there. Kind of a comical combination. Wooden handmade signs are posted at intersections of boardwalks to direct you here and there throughout this tiny little hamlet much like street signs. The inner harbor is this amazing little protected slit of harbor nestled in the rugged landscape of Chichagof Island. It is totally snug and completely hidden from the vulnerable outside waters. Elfin Cove is positioned in the uppermost reaches of SE Alaska and close to a major opening to the wild Pacific Ocean. It harbors good protection and a close jumping off point for fisherman ready to head out into those northern open waters. It's cute like a place you'd see on a post card, filled mostly with rustic cottages, old fishing boats and a few old boats less fortunate now just sunken in the inner harbor waiting for nature's elements to take them back. There are absolutely no pleasure boaters inside. There are no boats anchored in the inner harbor either.
As we walked around the village we noticed a couple homemade outdoor telephone booths with nothing more than a few old boards nailed up to house the phone. Of course at the time we didn't realize how soon these would be obsolete in this new world of instant communication with cell phones and Wi-Fi. These phone booths were the only mode of communication with folks on the mainland and folks back home where ever that might be. Many a weary fisherman or boater must have used these phones. The only other source of course is the reliable marine radio for local communication and the single side band for the boaters net. Those days sadly soon to be gone I guess. Someone we noticed had thoughtfully provided dilapidated chair to sit on (like an old drafting chair) all broken down and crooked, but still it was a place to sit while you made that important call. The village looks kind of like a hodge podge put together with of bits and pieces of whatever they have salvaged over the years, to make a storage shelter, a home, a store or whatever, and to what many of us on first impression might seem a bit junky but imagine how difficult it must be to get anything here in this remote and almost inaccessible place. Building materials, furniture, food, clothing all must come by small boat or float plane. It wouldn't make sense to throw anything out because someday it might be useful and where the heck would you throw it anyway? There are no land fills here; you know those things that we all so carelessly throw anything and everything into on a daily basis? So some of the cottages are creative out of necessary and many can't help themselves but to become a whimsical creation and soon you see that this place is charming and so are the people that live here. One place we passed on the boardwalk trail around the inner harbor is so full of junk you wondered how anyone found room to live in there but maybe here they were considered prosperous, like a hardware store of sorts full of goodies and lots of inventory. You could tell the building had been here a long time as the glass in the windows was actually antique with the tell tale small air bubbles and wavy patterns. The wood of many of the buildings is rotting and falling apart but still serviceable.
SALMON LADY The exterior of the cottage owned by the lady that makes smoked salmon was so cluttered up with stuff that it was quite a novelty to see. She had decorated the front porch with moose antlers and skulls, several Japanese glass float balls, and well whatever she has managed to find, no matter what it was. Some of it was flotsam from some far off shore. Across the boardwalk from her cottage is her little “salmon store” (no bigger than a small storage shed) where she cuts and smokes the salmon and where she sells it. She offered us a couple samples to try. I'm not much for smoked salmon so I passed on it but Bill tried some and then went back in and got another sample for Ziggy. I'm not sure what the lady thought about giving a dog one of her samples but Ziggy sure liked it. She also had funny little signs out front saying things like "A crabby lady lives inside". She didn't seem too crabby though.
A little further down path are some fishing lodges with little decks overlooking the harbor and docks. I imagine today there are many more of these fishing/hunting lodges here as it's become so popular in places like this in Alaska. We passed remnants of old rustic smoke houses from days long gone by. Towards the inner harbor was a grouping of three old shacks, very broken down. They were weathered and falling apart. The berry bushes and other vines were growing up over and around them. It was like the forest was gradually taking them back but people still lived in them. Ragged piles of old ropes, fishing buoys and rusty tanks and parts were laying everywhere and if you chanced a glance through the windows as you passed by you were rewarded with a glimpse of more fascinating piles of junk inside. It was quite a menagerie of things. There's no privacy here as the boardwalk takes you right up close and personal to the lodges and cottages.
Down by the water, as I mentioned, are the remains of old fishing boats that have perhaps outlived their usefulness. It is the most natural thing in Alaska and the BC waters to just abandon things that aren't needed anymore because up here there is just no place to dispose of anything and if there were it would be too expensive to haul it out. Looking down at those old boats, it seemed sad to seem them rotting away like that. I like to imagine their life out on these rough Alaskan waters. We passed a wood shed filled with more than a winter's supply of firewood. A pretty tough looking cat peered out at us through a crusty window and I’m sure he lives in that shed, these cats make due where they can here. BEYOND THE BOARDWALK On down the path the boardwalk ends and you can hike further into the woods leaving the village. You'll pass a couple beautiful rocky streams. The hill is pretty steep. We came to an opening where in the not to distant past you could see there had been an avalanche or hill slide here Big rocks and sharp boulders had sheared off the treed mountain side and left it bare and rocky all the way from the very top and down into the cove. Off to the edge were the partial remains of a previous structure that must have been demolished in the slide. You can see though as time went on the path was slowly re established over the slide and a new structure was in the process of being constructed just a few yards from the crushed building. END OF THE LINE We’ve hiked deep into the woods now and the trail is becoming just mud and grass. There’s a little clearing ahead and a target board nailed to a tree where someone has been practicing with bows and arrows. At the end of the inlet here there are a couple more cottages and a very firm sign that says “Absolutely No Trespassers Beyond This Point.” We obliged and turned to walk back. Ziggy by now was totally out of pee having marked every possible location he could and after several days of sneaking to shore in Glacier Bay he was a little rusty on managing his supply of markings. I guess he has no idea how to gauge the distance and length of time of our walks these days. One day we're sneaking him ashore for a brief moment and the next we're doing an hour walk.
When we got back to the village we took the fork in the boardwalk to explore the path that wraps around the other side of the little mountain knoll that divides the village and which follows the inner channel that the boats take to the inner harbor. We passed a cottage and a couple shops for sale. They're not much but could be cute if fixed up. We come to a little cottage that serves as a little "grocery store" and walked in. The lady that owns says she was born in Juneau and has lived most of her life in Elfin. She said she also owns the laundry mat. She has a pretty darn good selection of items for an extremely small store. She said she mainly provides supplies for the local fisherman. I was able to pick up several items that we were getting low on. She had fresh milk, sour cream, tomatoes, some select canned goods, a few boxed goods, magazines, fishing gear, etc. I bought a couple children’s books on Alaska written and illustrated by a friend of hers and another by someone who wrote about Elfin Cove and its nearby fishing. Bill bought a cute t-shirt with a sea otter on the front saying “Elfin Cove”. I also found a mug to match my new collection. She was helpful and friendly with information on the area. She said she gets pretty busy at this hour when the very small cruise ship comes and lets the tourists off for a short visit. We had noticed them arriving by a small boat that shuttled them to shore. The boardwalks were filled with some very nice and happy older tourists that had come for a short one hour walk through Elfin Cove before they piled back in their small ship and on to the next stop on their itinerary. Their ship was not like the rest of the cruise ships you see up here. It was small enough to not disrupt the town to much when they unloaded their people and the town was probably very grateful for the little business it brought in. It must be a hard to scrape a living here.
OPENING PUT A STRAIN ON WATER SUPPLY The path continued on around to make the loop back to the main harbor and there was a ramp that goes down to the fuel dock. We were told you can fill your boat up with good water here but apparently they were very low on water right now because the fishing fleet had just filled up getting ready to leave for the opening of ocean fishing. There is no electricity at the public docks. HAVEN FOR DOGS We passed what I guess you could call the "town dump" which is nothing more than a small burning pile that all the dogs in the village seem to hang out by so they can rummage around to see what scraps they can find. The dogs by the way are leash less and wander around town at will. ONLY BAR IN TOWN We had lunch at Cojo’s which is the only café in town except for the restaurants that are in the lodges that aren’t open to the public. Larry and I had a delicious homemade pizza, The way Bonnie savored over her BLT you'd think she thought it was the first good food she'd had in two weeks. Bill had salmon chowder and some homemade carrot cake. The lady that owned it ran everything by herself, serving the tables, cooking in the kitchen and ran the only bar in town. She has a pool hall in the upper room too. There’s a handmade sign outside the door saying hang you wet gear here. Kind of says it all about weather up here. INSPIRATION FOR A FAIRY TALE We checked out a little gift shop up on the knoll. Someone had cleverly placed some little plastic elves into the surrounding landscape. I understand why they named this place "Elfin Cove" from the unusual landscape here. The oversized craggy trees have these humongous roots that grow right out and over huge mammoth boulders, grasping them and pulling them into place, creating large crevices underneath and peaking into these strange crevices you can easily imagine little entrances or doorways, elf size, leading to another world of fantasy living beneath. Everything is covered in lush moss and ferns. It's really a wonderland. We went back to the boat and Bill went to work picking meat from the crabs we caught. It was a labor intensive project and took him about an hour and a half. I made crab cakes with what he picked for dinner that night. We had baked apples for desert. DOCKS IN THE EVENING ARE A GATHERING PLACE At night the docks become the local gathering place for the locals. They like to hang out here to evening hours trying to catch what they were calling Dolly Varden, a saltwater trout. They bring along a pack of beer, fishing rod and spent the evening until surprisingly late. DATE: 7-1-02 FINALLY A GOOD NIGHTS SLEEP
At the other end by the ramp on the docks right where everyone walks to get to shore and to the boats on the docks is a turquoise porta potty and surprisingly it has no door and what's shocking is the entrance and seat facing are facing right up the ramp that everyone takes. I guess in fishing season the guys must use it but it's gross. Another pleasure boat pulled into the dock next door to us. They just came over from Glacier Bay too. They are traveling with two large dogs. They too said they had to sneak their dogs ashore in Glacier Bay and thought the whole experience was very stressful because of it. They thought the park should be a little more dog friendly. MARTHA STEWART OF BOATERS The woman in this boat was amazing. Bonnie and I nick named her "the Martha Stewart" of boating. The duration of their stay she wore this cute little apron was constantly scrubbing and tidying up which included everything from the dinghy to pruning her amazing herb and salad garden on deck. She even had a traditional wicker garden basket with a handle that she carried slipped over her arm, with garden gloves and garden snippers. We watched in amazement as she came picked her fresh lettuces for dinner salad that night. The basket was bigger than her pot of greens, but she had one nevertheless. She never seized with her household chores the entire time we were there. We were amazed and in awe of her as we sat lazily in the salon doing nothing. OPENING DAY We had the docks to ourselves because the fisherman left for opening day of ocean fishing. The gal at the grocery store said in three days they will all be back and it will be crazy again because they bring their catch here to sell and then re-supply and go out all over again. TIME TO GO We were going to load up with water
but it got too busy at the dock and Larry decided he didn’t want to hassle
with it and we left. INIAN COVE We turned back by Gaff Rock into Port Althorp and up past Elfin entrance again past Point Lavinia and into the Middle Passage of the Inian Islands which is the first passage going N and S after the first island on the Pacific Coast side. On a clear day you have a magnificent view of Brady Glacier across Cross Sound from Elfin. As we came up Middle Passage (which is not marked on the chart) you turn right and head to Inian Cove. This area was just filled with sea lions. They seem to love the squirrelly waters here. The area is also filled with eagles and cormorants and of course the Alaska seagulls. It was a gloomy day, the seas were swelly and the clouds were hanging low over the islands like a fuzzy hat. We turned into Inian Cove for an anchorage. We could see a funny looking boat, 50’ or so long, anchored inside and another smallish fishing boat tied to what looked like a buoy line. There were what looked like several fish net markers in the cove. The wind was blowing and had picked up to about 15-20 knots. It began to rain of course right when you're trying to do something. On shore was a small rocky beach strewn with clumps of tree roots. It was not a very picturesque place in this gloomy weather. Guess it would be a nice place to stay in good weather and would be a good home base to stay while you explored the abundant natural wild life in the area by dinghy. We had also heard there were areas nearby where the sea otters gathered in groups. We did not see any though. Even though we have only scene otters by themselves, always just a lonely single, it's not always the case and we were told they do hang in groups. A local said he had seen 50 or so rafting together one time. He said it looked like they had linked their arms and were floating together. They look very comical and have very human like characteristics. He said he also has seen a sleeping baby otter floating by itself, carefully wrapped in sea kelp by the mother so it would stay protected and in one place while she went to get food. He said he did not disturb it. NOT A GOOD ANCHORAGE We dropped an anchor in the cove but as we backed down we were within fifty feet of the rocky shore and still not secure. We pulled up the anchor. Bill suggested trying to drop it by the fishing nets. As we were doing that the guy in the strange looking boat called us on the radio to tell us that what we were doing was very dangerous dropping an anchor in that location. Apparently the fish nets were marking oyster beds and they were all linked together and we were getting too close to where the ropes and weights were. Each line goes down to a 150 pound weight and the line goes under and links up to the other little boat down the way. We thanked him for the warning and ended our anchoring procedure. I said "Lets get out of here anyway as it's not a fun place with all this rain and wind". So, we decided to go all the way to Hoonah. HEADING TO THE INDIAN VILLAGE OF HOONAH By now I had made some Corn and Crab Chowder with the rest of the crab that Bill had picked. I think I'm going to call it Inian Chowda'. Larry made homemade bread in the bread machine and we had a good lunch. After clean up, most of us took a nap as we chugged along Icy Strait most of the day heading towards Hoonah. About two hours later I woke up and fixed some hot tea for us. It still was a crummy day, overcast, misty and rainy. Everything is grey. Bill said the seas were pretty calm the whole day. As we passed Point Adolphus the shore was lined with campers and tents. We saw several whales along this whole stretch between Point Adolphus and Eagle Point. As we approached the entrance to Hoonah there is a picturesque cannery off to the port. The cannery buildings are painted red with crisp white trim. It probably looks like it has for many years. Off to starboard is a logging area littered with free saw cuttings. Hoonah is an old Indian village and has with a well protected harbor with a stone break water. The harbor master assigned us a slip and came down the dock to help us in. The slip was the shortest we’ve been in yet. We tied up the best we could with much of the boat hanging out into the harbor. I took Ziggy to shore as soon as we got tied up. There huge field there for Ziggy to run around in near the marina. The field was filled with beautiful wild flowers and I picked a bunch of to bring back to the boat. I checked on the ferry to Juneau and found out that it doesn’t come everyday like we thought but only two days a week. Bill got his days mixed up and they now will have an extra day in Hoonah. They’ve decided to just take the small commuter plane to Juneau tomorrow. We’re going to take the Wednesday ferry to Juneau and come back Friday. Bill and Bonnie took a long walk around town and didn’t come back to the boat until after 7:00. I purchased some groceries in a little old grocery store built in 1893. It was very old fashioned. The shelves were lined with minimal groceries, and boxes of onions and whatever produce they were able to get. I bought some mushrooms and red bell peppers. We walked across the street to check out Mimi’s the local restaurant. We walked in and it was a pretty junky looking restaurant with only a counter and stool seating. They had a chalk board on the walk with tonight's special, roasted pork loin. "HALF BREED" The Harbor Master said he was a “half breed”, in his words, and said there were only two places in town that you would want to eat in. One was Totem Lodge and the other was Mimi's. He tried to call Totem Lodge for us to see if they were open but he said since they have a new answering system their phone never works. He also tried to call Mimi’s to see what the specials were for the evening (even though we already knew) but they didn’t answer either. I don't remember what we finally did for dinner that night. DIRTIEST GUY I'D EVER SEEN The guy in the next slip over is from Bellingham and they are going to leave their boat there while they go back home for 6 weeks. He said the Harbor Master recommended a local worker to watch his boat while he was gone. When the worker came by he was about the dirtiest guy I’ve ever seen. I don’t think Larry would even let him on our boat. DATE:7-2-02
We were all up about 7:00 AM. Bill and Bonnie are leaving on the 2:40 PM commuter plane to Juneau. Someone will be by to pick them up at the Harbor Masters office at 12:00 to take them to the air strip. DANGEROUS SITUATION One of the pleasure boaters we docked next to in Elfin Cove also came in to Hoonah a few hours after we got settled in. They docked in the next slip over. It was the boat with the woman Bonnie and I like to call the "Martha Stewart of Boaters". Her husband, the captain, is a commercial airline pilot. When they pulled in her husband looked like he had seen a ghost. They said they just had a very dangerous experience. "Martha Stewart" even brought scotch drink to him on the dock to drink to calm him down, though still early in the day. (Not surprisingly she served it with her apron on and in a cut crystal cocktail glass. This woman is amazing.) Apparently they went to Gustavus (near the entrance to Glacier Bay) to drop off their son and daughter-in-law off to catch a plane. They said the winds were blowing really strong and the waves and seas were building. He said the docks at Gustavus are interlocking docks, very rickety and they were rocking and rolling with the storm serge. They barely managed to get their son off the boat and onto the dock. They soon realized it was becoming too dangerous to get their daughter-in-law off the same way so they decided to get their dinghy down and try to take her to shore on the dinghy. While they were trying to get the dinghy down they somehow got the propeller of the main ship wrapped around a buoy line. The buoy line was hooked to two other boats and they all becoming intertwined on the line. In the midst of all the entanglement they were being drawn into shallow water, only 4 feet deep. One of the other boaters did some quick thinking and managed to get over to the lines quickly in his dinghy and cut the line to free them all. They said it was a horrible experience and they came very close to losing their boat.
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We then passed Inian Islands and
turned by the tip of Chichagof Island to Elfin Cove. The landscape on the
upper reaches of Chichagof Island is much different from Glacier Bay.
It's much more severe looking with huge chunks of rocks covered with thick
unworldly looking carpets of moss and behind a forest of lush fur trees.
Guess that’s why they call it Elfin Cove. It looks like a fairy land.
Larry
quickly turned her around and out. We decided to try for a space on the
public floats which had more depth. As we rounded the outer island and
headed towards the harbor to the public docks we passed two larger boats
that were anchored out. A small cruise ship was anchored at the front of
the harbor entrance. The public floats were loaded with fishing boats all
rafted together. 
ELFIN
COVE
BEFORE
WI-FI
Berry
bushes are everywhere and are so thick and healthy looking. They grow
prolifically up and over the railings of the boardwalk. You can literally
pick and eat delicious berries as you walk around the village. In fact
all the foliage and trees here seem to grow prolifically as if there was
some magical Miracle Grow fertilizer that made things grow giant size. I
guess that's why they call it Elfin Cove.
A
bit farther down the boardwalk lived a calico cat that looked like he
found permanent shelter under the crawl space of a house. He watches
everyone with a keen eye that walks by from a hole underneath the house.
Surrounding the base of the house is beautiful garden filled with gorgeous
wild Alaskan flowers and intermixed with them are more flowers planted in
crazy things like old pots and pans. Also salvaged and made useful were
some old rotting row boats that had been made useful in the garden to
plant vegetable beds. Everything was growing beautifully. 
FINAL
RUINS
OTHER
SIDE OF TRACKS
A
quiet night at Elfin provides good sleeping but about 7:30 AM we were
definitely awakened by the loud roar of a seaplane taking off at the end
of the dock. It was taking some sports fishermen back to Juneau. At the
end of the pier was the very small little float plane shack or office. At
first I thought it was the harbor master’s office but Larry said it the
airline office for charter planes. 
We headed South towards Port Althorp to Point Lucan and then on to the
outer side of Three Hill Island. The locals had told us that the area was
loaded with Puffins. That's been my dream to see a puffin for a long time
but not today there was not one Puffin to be seen. We did see several of
the little skiffs from Elfin Cove's fishing lodge in that area though.
They
said they think their prop is still tangled with the line as they had to
hobble their way across Icy Straits all the way to Hoonah. The engines
weren't working normal and making a loud sound. The Harbor Master was
able to connect them to a diver to go under their boat to check their
prop. Apparently the line had choked the prop and shut one of their
engines off. They were able to limp over to Hoonah but not without
enduring a very loud banging noise the whole way. The diver brought up a
huge wad of frayed rope that he untangled from the props. It was truly
amazing to see the size of it. We all thought it was amazing that they
were able to make it to the docks of Hoonah safely.