Farragut Bay
Jeff is out at 7 AM this morning to collect our crab traps as it is time to say goodbye to Ideal Cove and explore some more areas of South East Alaska. The anchorage is again productive with another six nice size crabs.
It is a beautiful morning as we exit the anchorage and enter Frederick Sound. The mountains peaks are still packed with snow.
We have a s short travel day of 38 miles down Frederick Sound to Farragut Bay. We see only one other fishing vessel out on the water. Our AIS picks up a Coast Guard boat about 10 miles ahead of us. It’s good to know they are around! As we pass by Petersburg, we have a few minutes of phone and internet service. We do donuts in the water as we try to download and send out a few emails. It will probably be several days before we have cell service again. We do carry aboard an InReach Satellite device that we can use if needed to send and receive text messages.
Reaching Grand Point we can spot the small entrance into Farragut Bay.
We carefully work our way into the bay while monitoring the depth sounders and navigation screens. It’s low tide and there are rocks on both sides of the entrance. Our anchorage is a small cove on Read Island about a mile up the bay. We are happy to find no other boats at anchor. There is really only room for one boat in this little cove. The guide books warn that the bottom here is rocky. We take extra care to make sure our anchor gets a good hold. We also set an anchor alarm that will notify us if we start to drag anchor.
This evening we hop in Time Out to explore more of Farragut Bay. We chart our way three miles to the head of the bay.
The head of Farragut Bay is an expanse of small meandering channels. The depths change rapidly from 70 feet to 3 feet. Although the wide grass flats are beautiful, it is not a place we would feel comfortable bringing Idyll Time. The charts of this area are full of incorrect information. At the head of the bay, we spot several buildings belonging to Farragut Farms. They supply Petersburg with wonderful fresh produce during the summer months.
On our return trip down the bay, we see a tall black fin rapidly approaching us. It’s an Orca! Several zoom past us in pursuit of an evening meal. We saw several seals near our turn around and suspect that is with the Orcas are after.
Later in the evening, we hear the noisy breath of the Orcas reverberating off the steep mountainsides as they are pursuing their prey just outside our anchorage. We watch in amazement as the pod of 12 Orcas work in an orchestrated fashion along the far shoreline. We consider hopping in the dinghy for a closer look, but that would probably scare them away. What a special experience!
We spend one day exploring the bay with our kayak and paddle board. There are lots of mussels along the shore. We don’t eat them for fear of Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP).
It makes a great addition to dinner when roasted with some parmesan cheese.
Our last night of anchor here in Farragut Bay was not pleasant. Around midnight, we were awaken by gusty winds and our anchor chain growling over the rocky bottom. The forecast had been for calm winds but here at the anchorage we are getting blasted with 30 knot winds pushing us close to shallow water. When we anchored, the depths were 35 feet. It is now low tide and we have stretched back on the anchor chain and are in 12 feet of water and a lot closer to the shoreline than we would like. Maybe these are ”Williwaw” winds coming off the high mountain peaks. We have a sleepless night with both of us up in the pilot house making sure our anchor does not drag. Things calm down around 4 AM and we can now relax.
Tomorrow we will continue down Frederick Sound to Pybus Bay for some halibut fishing. Thanks for following along.
