Jagged cliffs 100 metres away were disconcertingly hidden from view. The world was grey. It was hard to see where the sea ended and the fog began. As we discussed whether to make a 12 mile crossing to Akutan island, the low hum of fishing boats carried clearly through the murk. Sarah wasn’t keen and we turned and headed East along Unalaska island. Plan B involved island hopping; shorter crossings but stronger tides and more chance of rough water. The 3 mile Unalga pass was predicted to be flooding at 5.6 knots. We approached half an hour before slack and tentatively nudged out into the ruffled water. Land soon faded to grey behind us and we hoped no boats had waited for slack to travel through the pass. A few white caps livened things up a bit but the crossing went well. We spotted the pinnacles off a headland when we were almost upon it.

“Pfffff”, the unmistakable exhalation of a whale was really close. And again. “11o’clock, 100 metres away”, I called to Sarah. The small humpback rose to the surface through the mist six more times before diving deeper with a glorious flick of his tail. It amused me that our best whale sighting so far was in a near white out.

We decided to make the most of the east going ebb tide and cross to Akutan island. This worked great and we reached 6 knots in the strongest current. A mile from Akutan, the faint outline of a high mountain emerged in monochrome. Within seconds it took on colour as we burst out of the low band of fog that had trapped us all day. How great to see the vibrant green of the hillsides and the deep blue of the sea and sky. We enjoyed a few hours of sunshine and pretty views until we landed on a steep pebble beach after a varied and enjoyable day of 26 miles. The downside of not having much wind is there are thousands of flies swarming around dead seaweed, but they haven’t bothered us much beyond committing suicide in our drinks and food.

Being the summer solstice we enjoyed a tipple of homemade mead kindly given to us by Josh and Missy in Unalaska. Yum! Tomorrow we hope to make it to the community of Akutan which is about 15 miles away.