Justine’s Blog

This morning was tough psychologically. We were up at 7am after only 6 hours sleep. I somehow expected that we’d done the hard work by paddling 14 hours yesterday and our 15 miles today would be easier. In fact the headwind combined with a messy 3-4 foot sea state and some unhelpful current meant it took us 3 and a half hours to cross a 6 mile Bay. We were both feeling tired and a bit sore around the edges. Only the knowledge that the weather is due to be stormy tomorrow and the thought of hot showers, “real food”, company and the chance to see bears up close with a guide spurred us on to keep paddling. We finally pulled up at the beach in front of the camp at 5.30 and were excited to see camp manager Brad appear through the undergrowth. Our kayaks and kit were carried up to camp and we had a wonderful hot shower followed by roast beef, salad, blueberry pie and cookies! It was great to chat to the guides and some of the other people here including a BBC film crew who said thi s is
the best place to come and film grizzly bears as they have never been hunted by man and they don’t associate man with food so they don’t mind people watching them. So we are really excited to get the chance to go out tomorrow and hopefully see some bears at close range catching Salmon or going about their other daily business. People can fly here from Homer for the day or several days. We’re staying in one of several weather ports, a cosy PVC pod on a metal frame which gets striped down in the winter. It’s time for bed as breakfast is at 7am! How exciting.

Today’s headwind was only 5-10 knots so we made the most of our best conditions for a while and pulled off a 19 hour day. “Only” 14 hours of that was paddling, the rest was breaking or making camp or stopping for lunch and an evening meal. We were up before sunrise and landed after sunset, covering about 35 miles to near Cape Nukshsk. We crossed between many small fingers of land, gradually curving a course to the North and enjoying a new view every 4 miles or so. The mountains continue to amaze, the scenery is amazing and we see whales and otters every day.

We’re now in the tent and are pretty pooped. The reason for our over keenness is partly because my flight home is on 16 August and I’d like to make sure we reach Homer in time to enjoy a few beers plus get organised. A more imminent reason is that Hallo Bay Bear Camp is now only 13 miles away up the coast. We hope we’ll be able to paddle there tomorrow whatever strength headwind is likely to be thrown at us. Last we saw tomorrows forecast was 15 knots and Sunday’s was 25 knots. As we’ve experienced, 15 knots can turn into 5 (rarely) or 35 in reality.

We’re excited to visit Hallo Bay camp which specialises in taking people to see bears and other wildlife safely. We’ll most likely have a day off there on Sunday and sleep in!

I’m sure once I tell you that Sarah was naked washing in a stream when a bear wandered up the river 50 yards away from her that you won’t really want to know about our nasty headwind that picked up 2 hours into a 10 mile crossing, or that that crossing took over 10 hours. Maybe the floating rafts of pumice from Katmai volcano would be of passing interest? Or the stunning mountains and golden beaches, or the lovely bivvy we had last night in our waterproof sleeping bags under the stars but ok I’ll get to the point.

We landed on a rocky beach in an onshore wind. Not ideal but our speed of less than 2 knots didn’t encourage us to continue. Once ashore we discovered a stream flowing behind a grassy bank. We checked there were no Salmon in it as we didn’t want to meet a bear protecting his food source. No Salmon but it had a lovely deep pool in it and the sun was out so we decided to wash. I washed my hair viewing to return and wash the rest of me once my hair was dry. Sarah striped off, stood in the pool and washed. Pulling her head up from the water she saw a young bear walking towards her 50 yards away. I heard a shout of “bear” shortly followed by a naked Sarah streaking through the grass back to the beach at rapid speed. I clambered up the bank to see the bear sniffing Sarahs thermals then walking towards me quickly, probably 20 yards away. We both stated shouting which didn’t seen to deter it much but Sarah then threw rocks towards it which made him run off.

Later this evening as we were sat by the fire eating dinner Sarah spotted a bear, probably the same one, foraging in the seaweed 200 metres down the beach. We hollared and banged pans but I don’t think he heard us with the noise of the waves crashing onto the rocks. After a while he came closer and finally heard us. He ambled away into the grass, not in a particular hurry. Hopefully he won’t come back.

An unexpected tail wind had us whooping this morning as we flew along for our first 3 miles. Round the corner we had a10 mile crossing to the NE and the wind died for a couple of miles but then turned into a feisty offshore side wind once we came level with a valley. We paddled into the bay against the wind to avoid being blown too far east out of the bay. This slow safe progress was rewarded once we’d paddled into the wind enough and turned north, and we were blown in the right direction at a decent pace. Hurrah, I thought, we’ll be across in no time and have lunch on the other side. Then without so much as a 30 second lull the wind switched from NW 20 knots to NE 20 knots. We’d evidently crossed the valley where the predominant wind had been overpowered by a local effect. We limped to a waterfall half way across the bay we’d hoped to cross and decided that 11.30am wasn’t too early for lunch. The stove was busted out and Noddle soup made a great treat. We are both hungr y
nearly all the time now. One of Sarah’s most common expressions is “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse”, or occasionally “I’m so hungry I could eat a bear”.

After rinsing our salty drysuits by standing under the power wash torrent from the waterfall, we headed on. Progress into a strengthening wind was so slow that we stopped on a golden sandy beach only about 3 miles further on. We are optimistically waiting before setting up camp, hoping the wind will drop off like it did last night. If so we’ll jump back on the water. It’s 6pm as I write this and there’s no sign of that happening yet. Sarah is having a snooze in the sun on a flat slab of sandy rock which had bizarre canon balls of the same rock within it. I’ve been looking ahead to where we might cross the Shelikov strait to the Kodiak archipelago or the Barren Islands. I have a feeling we’ll be camping here tonight but we remain hopeful for a weather change.