Skagway

The weather had picked up on our way through northern Lynn Canal. We called the harbor master over the VHF radio and got our berth assignment. The marina was a tight cluster of fishing and tour boats and with the wind blowing hard we practically skidded into place. The marina itself looked brand new and was one of the cleanest and nicest marinas we had sampled so far, somehow, also one of the cheapest.

The town of Skagway survives year to year off the summer swarms of cruise ships that flock to its historic buildings, gold rush museums and jewelry stores offering the best tanzanite you could ever hope to find this far from Tanzania.

Miners who wished to cross the pass from this popular port to the gold fields beyond were required to take with them a years worth of supplies, as a precaution against famine. Supposedly, your shopping list for that adventure might look something like this...

The first item is bacon.

The downtown streets were very touristy but also plush with the trinkets of history and we enjoyed taking the self-guided tour and soaking up the quirky sights. 

We wandered the streets appreciating the hardships of past generations until we got tired and stopped in at the local brewery.

Cristina made an awesome chili that was delicious and would be well remembered for at least two days.

The weather was still rough the next day with a small craft advisory so we ended up spending an additional day here. 

We hiked a short trail out to Smugglers cove, caught the only remaining video at the local museum that we had missed the day before and spent some time online at the local library. 

We would have loved to take the famous narrow gauge train up to White Pass but it cost one million dollars each. Instead, we settled for a drink at the infamous Red Onion, which gives tours of its seedy brothel past, also for one million dollars, then ate at a Thai place. 

Having exhausted the supply of ways to amuse one's self we headed back to the boat for some trivial pursuit and a movie.

The weather the next day was still bad with winds regularly 20 knots and gusting to 30. We left anyway. We ended up encountering our largest waves so far on the trip. We found a few new leaks that all the rain in Seattle hadn't been able to find. Waves were coming hard over the bow and port side and slapping hard against the canvas door in the breezeway, pushing it open and sloshing into the lower helm. With wet socks and sleeves we wrestled all the snaps back into place and reinforced it with a paddle and some life jackets.

Haines was a small town with a coffee shop and a grocery store. We spent just enough time there to let the weather die down then motored to our anchorage for the night.