9/1 - Jean and I caught
the opening for 10:30 tunnel to Whittier.
Several sunny days are forecast at the end of the cloudy rainy summer
and we want to make the most of them. We haven't been to Blackstone Bay in ages
and plan to check it out. We depart at the Lazy Otter parking lot and launched
from their beach. It was calm and
sunny all the way to Decision Point.
Here we saw our first paddlers camping. We took a break then headed for
the beach in front of Tebenkof glacier.
The west side of the beach has a gravel island that is fine for camping
in the 11 foot tide range we have today.
Most of the huge beach in front of the glacier is marshland. Crossing to
the glacier was calm with 1 foot seas, the highest of the day. Salmon are spawing in the streams
nearby so there are many dead and dying salmon. The salmon added to the smells of the marshland. Before sundown we saw a black bear
feeding in the slough nearby. This
place is also alive with birds, especially gulls but surprisingly no eagles. Only a few gnats. With so many fish I doubt the bear will
bother us tonight. There is no place to hang food tonight.
9/2 - It was a cool clear
night. Since there was nowhere to hang the food, I buried the dry bag with the
food so the bear could not see it.
The black bear patroled the stream all morning and ignored us. The stream is full of dead and dying
salmon. The beach goes out along way at low tide but it is good frim footing. A
breeze from the south came up and stayed all day. It was sunny and we paddled
into 1 to 2 foot seas. Camped at the beach in front of the Lawrence glacier. A
nice and high beach but a rocky landing.
We set up camp and paddled to the Beloit glacier. The wind increased as
we approached. It was windy and cold in fromt of the glacier and it was was not
calving. There was a lot of ice in
the bay so it must be active. Sure enough, shortly after we left it calved. Our luck. Saw two seals all day. No
eagles in spite of all the salmon. Saw two groups all day. One group of 4
kayaks and a second group with 2 sailing kayaks. There are three places to camp
here about 100 yards apart. When we arrived, a water taxi was picking up a
group on one beach and a small group was camped on another beach but I don't
see any boats. A good workout
today. Pleasant evening. A few
gnats.
9/3 - A cool night. Forty-five in the tent but clear and
calm. The sun got to our beach by
9:00 but it was still cool. This
is a busy place. This morning a water taxi dropped off a group and picked up
another group. We got going about
noon and paddled to the south end of Willard Island then to the western side of
the bay and on to Decision point.
It was sunny and calm but cool. Didn't see any paddlers. There were
ample beaches to take breaks on. On the crossing from Willard Island we saw a
black bear swimming to the mainland.
It looked like a medium-size bear based on the amount of its back that
was out of the water. When it got
to the shore it was huge. It did
not shake off the water. When it
heard us, it looked back at us, huffed, and headed into the woods and up the
steep hillside crashing through the brush. Later we saw a seal. So far very few
animals or otters. We saw an
eagle, the second of the trip, that was also surprising considering all the
dead salmon around. Saw one jellyfish and no starfish. No one was camping at
Decision Point. This is Labor Day,
so most people need to be at work tomorrow. We watched a seal catch a fish in front of our camp and eat
it by shaking it apart. Cool clear
calm evening. We haven't been to
Decision Bay in ages and I've forgotten how beautiful the ring of glaciers is
at the end of the bay. A beautiful place but too crowded in the summer because
it is so close to Whittier.
9/4 - The next day was
clear and we had a following sea into Whittier except for the last 10 minutes
when a strong headwind began. The
wind continued and grew in strength and I was glad we were off the water. While paddling we saw two sea lions,
eagles, and an eagles nest near the camp site at Trinity Point. It was a great way to end the paddling
season in the Sound.
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