Thomas Bay, Cannery Cove, Tracy Arm, Taku Harbor

6/8/2024 We left Petersburg at 7:30am in super calm conditions with almost sunny skies. Thomas Bay, just 11 miles north of Petersburg, was our destination. Along the way we had an opportunity to have our boat pictures taken with the Glacier in the background. So thankful that the sun came out for this.

St. Florian with glacier

Second Verse with glacier

Kinship with glacier

6/8/2024 Thomas Bay is a big, beautiful bay with several coves and bights. We anchored behind Ruth Island in a sandy bottom bay that had room for the three of us and half a dozen other boats. We also decided to spend an extra day here to explore and try for some crabs.

Cascade Falls is a Forest Service park behind Spray Island in Thomas Bay. There is a lovely waterfall with a well maintained path to the falls. We beached dinghies near a Forest Service cabin that is available for rental. We met some nice folks who were camping in the cabin for a week and using it as a base for fishing.

Our dinghies beached near Cascade Creek Falls

Forest Service cabin at Cascade Creek

These folks renting the cabin use the bridge nearby as a work bench and use the stream to keep their halibut cold

Pretty trail near the Cascade Creek cabin - but it doesn’t go all the way to the falls

Mike and Bill “off-roaded” across the rock beach to get over to the falls

Cascade Creek Falls in Thomas Bay

Phil found a short-cut from the falls trail back to the dinghy

Mike and Bill had good success with Dungeness crab in Thomas Bay

6/10/2024 Cannery Cove, Pybus Bay was our next stop. The rain is back and the evening was quite heavy rain. I was not feeling great, so we opted to keep our germs to ourselves and did not join the crew for dinner. Second Verse crew had great success with crabs in Thomas Bay, and St. Florian managed to get two nice “keepers”.

Very rainy in Cannery Cove

Open hatch to the engine room allows us to capture some of that “free” heat after anchoring in Cannery Cove

Phil needed some help with his float coat zipper after crab dinner on Second Verse

Luckily the sun came out the next morning. This is the same view as previous picture notice how low the snow line is.

Phil and Annette did not catch any crabs in Cannery Cove, but something there very thoroughly cleaned the bait

6/11/2024 Today we moved to a spot informally called Tracy Arm Cove to stage for a trip up Tracy Arm to the South Sawyer Glacier. It isn’t much of a cove but there were six boats anchored there for the night. There were numerous large ice bergs that float around in this area, a teaser for what is up Tracy Arm.

St. Florian anchored in Tracy Arm cove

This berg was floating outside the Tracy Arm Cove

We took the dinghy to get a closer look at one of the bergs floating just outside the cove

After dinner we saw one of the brightest rainbows I have ever seen

6/12/2024 South Sawyer Glacier trip. We set off at 7am this morning to take a run up Tracy Arm to see if we could reach the glacier. Early start was recommended to avoid cruise ships and other tours. We fell into our three ducks in a row order of Kinship, then St. Florian, and Second Verse in the rear. We aren’t doing this to be mean. Second Verse actually appreciates following us as we have better visibility of obstacles due to our higher pilot houses, and we sort of push things out of their way. This worked well for us as we took the twenty five nautical mile trip up to the face of the glacier. There was a lot of ice in the water and we wanted to avoid hitting as much as possible. The large icebergs were easy to avoid. The smaller bits are harder to see.

The cold vapor rising off the iceberg distorts the air.

You can see the atmospheric distortion in this image. This is not just poor image resolution.

We made it to about a mile from the glacier face

St. Florian in front of the South Sawyer Glacier in Tracy Arm

Kinship in front of the South Sawyer Glacier in Tracy Arm

Second Verse in front of the South Sawyer glacier in Tracy Arm

A great shot of Sally

Another Christmas card option? Great pic.

Maybe I need to send Christmas cards this year

There are seals with pups on most of the floating ice. We tried not to disturb them too much.

Second Verse for scale - these are very tall, steep sheer walls

After our wonderful trip up Tracy Arm, we headed to Taku Harbor and spent the night tied up to a very nice government dock. There was no power or water on the dock, but it was spacious and sturdy. It included a ramp that allowed us to take a walk on land. Second Verse decided to head into Juneau Thursday morning so that they could receive a shipment of items that had been pre-arranged. Most importantly, their new Starlink antenna was waiting for them in Juneau. The existing antenna has a malfunctioning GPS receiver and caused all sorts of problems. Hopefully this replacement will fix that problem.

St. Florian and Kinship decided to linger in Taku Harbor for another day. We spent the day crabbing, fishing, relaxing, and enjoying a beautiful rain-free day. We caught a ton of spider crabs and female Dungeness crab, but only one male keeper Dungeness . No fish were caught. We are still early in the season for salmon and apparently not very good at halibut, but I think fun was still had.

Second Verse leaving Taku Harbor

Taku Harbor government float

Another public use cabin can be rented

The cabin is basic, but dry. We saw a father/son team move in for a week while we were there.

I could not convince Annette to try this swing

I think these are salmon berries, one of the local bear favorite foods. We saw no bear on our walk.

Routing from Thomas Bay, Cannery Cove, Tracy Arm Cove, Tracy Arm, and Taku Harbor