Newsletter
The Results Are In!
Success Aboard the David B in 2020
This year has been quite the roller coaster ride for everyone and running a small business in the middle of a global pandemic hasn’t been especially easy either. To pull off this season we ducked and dodged, pivoted, changed, rescheduled, and repositioned. We stayed up late running scenarios and talking about “what-ifs.” We made plans, submitted documents, made decisions, and phoned, emailed and texted with guests. We rescheduled, pushed dates back, and did more rescheduling. At times it felt like a never-ending juggling act. It has been exhausting with all the concerns and the fears of the unknown. However, exhaustion and fear haven’t stopped us. With a lot of thought, planning, and care (especially from our guests) we were able to conduct an abbreviated season in Alaska. It felt like a HUGE win.
Here’s why our season worked:
- Testing – Alaska’s Health Mandates required people traveling to Alaska to present a negative test result within 72 hours prior to arrival. While this is not required in the state of Washington, we are requiring this same testing for our San Juan Islands cruises.
- Masks – Wearing masks during travel to the boat was key to us being able to run trips. This kept guests safe after their tests while they made their way to the boat.
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Black bear at Fords Terror Pre-trip preparations – Besides being tested and wearing masks during travel, all of our guests practiced pre-trip isolation and kept a log of their temperature for 14-days prior to travel.
Jeffrey and I also kept to ourselves and limited our contacts and stayed out of restaurants, bars. We also tested before each trip. We needed to make sure that we were also being conscientious and safe.
The reward for all the planning and preparations this year was having Alaska essentially to ourselves. There were few other boats and no cruise ships. This year gave our guests (and us) the chance to escape from the stress of a frightening global pandemic and some time to recharge. It was a truly amazing experience. I felt like we saw more of the wild part of the wilderness. It was more visible as a habitat and ecosystem and not just a playground for human beings. The solitude could be eerie, but then a sense of peace would overcome that eerie feeling with the notion that the silver lining of the pandemic is a chance to be still and reevaluate our priorities.
For me, I see travel as a priority that is essential to human hearts and souls. As curious animals, most of us desire to see new places and to meet new people. It’s because when we explore or take on an adventure that we learn and the world becomes more alive. During this time of restriction and isolation, I have realized just how much travel means to me, and not as a tour operator, but as someone who desires to grow and be shaped by the experiences gained from my travels. Maintaining travel as a priority has become even more important to me.
Each one of us has our own level of acceptable risk. And each one of us will return to travel when the time is right. As we celebrate that we safely conducted our Alaska season, we recognize that we can’t let up. We are committed to the same level of care and concern in 2021 and beyond. You can be assured that we will continue to offer the opportunity to reschedule trips due to issues related to coronavirus and we will continue our best practices to provide you with the safest possible way to visit Alaska, the Inside Passage, or the San Juan Islands.
I also need to say, I am extremely grateful to all of our guests who came to Alaska with us this year. You helped us gain the experience to successfully operate in ways that other types of cruises cannot. Your willingness to undergo a stringent preparation to travel set a good example for our small niche market to succeed. You helped not just us and the David B, but our whole niche to recover through your careful actions. At this time, it looks like all of our owner/operator boat friends who went north this year were also successful with their abbreviated seasons. This reinforces my feelings that our style of small independent travel attracts the most conscientious and respectful people. For that, thank you!
We are also grateful to all of our guests who worked with us to reschedule for 2021 and 2022. While we missed you, we look forward to seeing you and we are deeply grateful for your flexibility in a difficult time.
We have one San Juan Islands trip and a couple of opportunities for whole boat charters in the San Juans before we exit the turbulent waters of 2020 and focus on 2021 and beyond. If you are interested in any of our remaining trips, this year, next year, or in 2022, please feel free to contact us.
Stay well, be safe,
Christine
PS – If you have any questions about testing or PPE in regards to travel to the David B, Sarah is more than happy to talk with you. She can be reached at her email or at 360-474-7218
Epic Glacier Day
I keep a little journal and I thought you might like to see what I wrote about. I titled it Epic Glacier Day
May 26 – 0544 Epic Glacier Day:
woke up in front of Reid Glacier.
Actually, Epic Glacier Day (EGD) really started the day before when we dropped anchor and spent several hours ashore at Reid glacier’s snout taking pictures as part of our photography workshop cruise. EGD started by waking up anchored face to face with a massive glacier. As I prepared coffee and breakfast, I occasionally walked outside to stare at the glacier and to listen to the sounds of the glacier’s rushing meltwater streams and waterfalls. The water sounds would occasionally be interrupted by the calls of some of my favorite birds – black oystercatchers. Although small bits of ice floated in the inlet, this glacier no longer calves big icebergs into the water. It has retreated to rest on a mudflat, and high tides now only kiss Reid’s wide icy snout.
went to Johns Hopkins then Margerie
We made a stop at Lamplough Glacier, which sits like a watchdog to the entrance of Johns Hopkins Inlet. The sky had cleared to a bright blue. We paid our respects to Lamplough and entered Johns Hopkins Inlet for a view of Johns Hopkins Glacier as it spilled into the inlet from the impossibly high and jagged Fairweather Mountains. After witnessing an enormous avalanche spill onto the glacier, we turned to continue EGD with our fourth and fifth glaciers – Margerie and the Grand Pacific.
spent a couple hours at Margerie in the skiff
We anchored in Tarr Inlet about a mile away from Margerie. It had recently been active. Small bergs and brash ice floated past our anchorage. Hundreds of black-legged kittiwakes were nesting about a half-mile away. Margerie glacier is beautifully showy with the whitest ice and actively calving. The Grand Pacific seems shy and more sedentary. It’s covered in a blanket of dirt and rock, and seldom calves. It seems content to let Margerie have all the attention.
We lowered the skiff for the best part of EGD — a ride to the face of an active tidewater glacier.
a humpback surfaced next to the David B at anchor
Not long after we got the skiff in the water a humpback whale entered Tarr Inlet. I surfaced twice nearby the David B, and one of the surfacings was really close to the skiff.
-6-10 sea otters on icebergs
We kept our cameras and our focus on Margerie. We waited to capture the moment that a tower of ice would fall into the water. We made bets on where ice would fall from, and we held hopes that a big one would let loose.
While watching the glacier, a group of sea otters swam along the floating ice, and an eagle landed on the great face of the glacier. No visible part of Margerie was left unphotographed. Every peak, every icy spire, every kittiwake, and every iceberg was part of this magical landscape. I felt the need to absorb it all. To capture every sight, every sound, every emotion. To hold on to this moment for as long as possible. I wanted
to wrap it all up, take it home, and share it with anyone who needed a good dose of Mother Nature.
I didn’t write anymore but we remained anchored in Tarr Inlet that night. I remember that from time-to-time we could hear the boom of ice calving off Margerie, the sounds of the kittiwake colony, and the silence of nature. Magnificent mountains surrounded us. The sun dipped behind the peaks, and again another boom and more ice would be spilled.
It was the perfect Epic Glacier Day.
-Christine
Skiffy-a-saurus Wins Again!
Skiffy-a-saurus Wins Again!
We built a new skiff for this season and we’ve been really loving how much it’s changed things.
It was kind of a last minute decision, and the builders really rushed to get it done for us. We only loaded it on board the day before our season started, It’s huge by comparison to our old skiff (which by an interesting requirement at the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, had been known as Skiffy.) The new one is so big (to us) that we named it Skiffy-a-saurus.
We use it for all the things we used to do. It’s really good and stable (people can stand up and move around while we’re moving) and it easy to climb in and out of at the beach. We’re using it for getting into kayaks too, but but now we’ve added a couple other activities to our skiff repertoire. The best one– skiff exploring.
We didn’t use Skiffy much for exploring, because it’s capacity was so limited, usually only half the group, but now, everyone can go at once. Now when we get to a new cove or harbor and drop the anchor, we all pile in Skiffy-a-saurus and head out to explore the shoreline. We putt along at 3 or 4 knots, sometimes shutting down the motor to drift and listen, and really get to see what’s there. On this last trip alone, we watched eagles and gulls, saw deer feeding at the water’s edge, spied on crab crawling across the bottom, even drifted while harbor porpoises and icebergs circled the boat. But the best one yet… We watched a brown bear right up close!
It was morning, just before breakfast. The sun was lighting up one side of the little fjord we were anchored in. The other side was still in the shade. A brown bear swam across from the sunny side into the shadows on the other side. It was probably a half a mile down the shore. We watched it for 15 or 20 minutes, then Christine suggested we go take a look with Skiffy-a-saurus. Everyone got their cameras, and we all quietly climbed in.
.
I headed us over to the shore, then hugged the shore as I idled us close to where he was. At about a hundred feet from the bear, I shut down and let the tide carry us along the shore. We were just feet from the rocky edge. Slowly we got closer and closer, The grizzly didn’t seem to notice (or care) that we were there. No one made a sound. When we were even with him on the beach we were probably only 30 feet away! About 15 of that was deep water, so we calmly took pictures and watched as he poked among the rocks, eating barnacles and mussels. Then we followed him back down the beach for almost another 10 minutes. It was fantastic. Chalk another one up for Skiffy-a-saurus because this moment was only possible because of it.
Skiffy-a-saurus wins again.
Trip #295 Recap – Glacier Bay Photography Class – May 22-29, 2017
Trip #295 Glacier Bay Photography Class – Trip Recap
When we left for “the Bay” a week ago, I had this feeling that I always have as we depart — what will we find on this adventure? It’s not about the things that we see on almost every trip, like the whales or the glaciers. It’s the new things: the places we haven’t seen before, the wildlife we find that isn’t on our other trips, and the guests, many of whom we’ve never met before.
The best part is, we found lots of new things. We got a great tip from the rangers at Bartlett Cove who suggested we anchor near the McBride Glacier and walk the beach at low tide amongst the grounded icebergs. It was beautiful. It was a sculpture garden of ice, pieces as small as a baseball to pieces as large as a truck. The photography possibilities were absolutely endless, and it was a photography trip, of course.
The McBride glacier calves bergs into a narrow river that flows out to Muir inlet, but just at the confluence, the river narrows and shallows and the bergs get stuck. More and more come down the river and crash into the already grounded ones. Then, as the tide goes out, you can walk around them on the beach as they lay at all sorts of crazy angles, waiting for the next tide to float them free again. One of the photography experts and trip leaders, John D’Onofrio, thought it was the most beautiful place he’d ever been.
A few days later, having spent the night in front of a receding glacier, we went to the entrance to Johns Hopkins Inlet and stepped up the amazement level again. The glacier is tucked back into the Fairweather range and has almost vertical snow covered sides extending 5 miles back to the glacier front, and the valley goes miles beyond, as the glacier swoops out of sight into the mountains. We even witnessed a thousand foot avalanche beside the glacier.
This was almost too much, and even John had to call for a mid-day break. Everyone need some time to absorb the amazement and the wonder of the place. It was indescribable. Of course, never wanting to back off the pace for a moment, when people awoke I loaded them in the skiff and we went for a 2 hour ride (in the sun) to watch another glacier, the Margerie glacier calve.
It was just amazing, And it really was “almost too much…”
Trip #293 Recap – April 27-30, 2017 – San Juan Islands
Trip #294 – San Juan Islands Trip Recap
Day 1) 26 April – Bellingham to Sucia Island – Echo Bay anchorage
- Nature hike to Fossil Bay with Christine
- Saw Bald Eagles, Camus in bloom, Banana Slugs, Pigeon Guillemots, Harlequin Ducks, Saskatoon Berries in Bloom
- Baked Sockeye salmon with a honey balsamic finishing sauce for dinner with homemade ice cream for dessert
- Lots of Eagles, pigeon guillemots and geese
- Creamy Scallop Risotto with Carnaroli Rice, over a bed of spinach, with oyster and shiitake mushrooms and brownies with ice cream for dessert
- A leisurely morning, spent reading and chatting on the boat and in the new Saloon
- Then Hiking at Bell Point and English Camp
- Pork tenderloin with black truffle and mushroom pan sauce.
- Christine’s amazing Croissants and Pain au Chocolat
- Exploring Rosario Historical Museum in the main mansion.
- Whisky crab soup for lunch
- Disembarking and fond farewells
Experience the San Juan Islands in person! We still have plenty of spots available once the David B returns from Alaska in August. Just look at our Schedule and then email Sarah@northwestnavigation.com to reserve your spot today!