Iceberg Dead Ahead

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Cruising slowly through a maze of icebergs dotting the dark emerald, frigid, but flat, calm water. Sheer cliffs raise straight up out of the water, 3000 ft , on both our port and starboard, to the touch the grey clouds above. Waterfalls plummet down the granite faces into the water below.

When we returned to Seattle after our trip to BC with the owners of the yacht, we each had four days off. I took off to see Candace in Tampa on an overnight flight . Tampa was experiencing typical south Florida summer weather, with on and off thunder showers, so we didn’t make it to the beach until my last day. Even then, the clouds rolled in at warp speed and sent us running for the car after just a couple hours of sunshine. It was a nice weekend, from what I can remember.

Back to Seattle Monday night on another overnight flight…so I thought. US AIR sucks! Flight was canceled due to mechanical problems with the inbound aircraft from Las Vegas. They told me they couldn’t get me back to Seattle until Tuesday after 4pm. After two hours of talking to US AIR customer service reps in the Philippines!!!, I finally got them to arrange for me to fly with another airline.

Finally made it back to Seattle Tuesday morning and worked the rest of the week. We worked half the day on Saturday and took the remainder and Sunday off. With temps in the high 80’s and no clouds in sight, we were lucky to experience this rare weather for rainy Seattle . I took off on a mountain bike with Miranda, my roommate, down to a park called Golden Gardens on a big lake. There were so many people out enjoying the sunshine, barbequing and drinking, trying to soak up the uncommon, fantastic weather. We went to the lake to use Miranda’s trainer kite for learning to kiteboard. We each took turns with the 3 meter kite, being dragged across the sand by the 15 knot winds. We had a good time, and I want to learn to kitesurf, but surfing is still my passion right now.

That night a bunch of us headed out to a bar/bowling alley/pool hall. We played some pool and had some cocktails while we waited for a lane to open up. We were pretty loose by the time it was our turn to bowl. Bowling was great fun, as it always is.

Sunday, I cruised around town on my skateboard, and popped in to an Irish pub to watch Spain dominate Germany in the Euro final. I had planned to put all of the money that I had sitting in this online betting account on Spain, but I tried to log into the site 10 minutes before the game started and couldn’t remember my username and password….oh well.

We took off for Victoria July 3rd, so I had to spend Independence Day in Canada. Whats worse is that the French first officer put me and the American chef, Brent, on watch for the fourth, meaning we couldn’t leave the boat. Out of 4 Americans onboard, the two people on watch were 2 Americans on our country's big day. “The only thing wrong with France is that its full of French people.” -someone funny

We worked half of Saturday again and took the rest of the weekend off. Victoria was a great town to spend some time in. Went out for Chinese food and lots of sake with Brent(Arizona), Bertrand(France) and Pascal(South Africa). After dinner we had some cocktails at a jazz bar and then hit a place called the Social Club for the rest of the night. There’s a university in Victoria, so theres a ton of young people. We had a good time that night.

Got up in the morning and headed to a sports equipment rental place with Julianna from Germany and Miranda. We rented mountain bikes and started the hour long journey thru the southern tip of Vancouver Island to a mountain biking park called Hartland. We only had front suspension bikes and really needed full suspension, but we managed alright. The mountain had green, blue, black, and double black terrain, just like a ski hill. We stuck to the greens and blues as none of us were very experienced and we didn’t have the proper bikes for serious down-hilling. I had such a good time climbing over big rocks and flying down rocky hills, sliding the bike around turns. After a couple of hours we headed out of the park and just before exiting, I spotted a terrain park for mountain biking. It had a couple of dirt jumps and some obstacles made of wood such as a see-saw that you ride up and the weight makes the wood fall to the other side, so that you can ride down. One of the obstacles was an inclined, thin piece of wood that you ride up to the flat piece that juts out into the air so that you can catch some air on your bike. I tried it and didn’t have enough speed as I took off in the air to get the front of the bike higher than the back and ended up flying over the handle bars, head first, followed by my shoulder, which still kinda hurts. Glad I was wearing a helmet.

We had a charter lined up with a Russian family that was supposed to begin in Victoria on July 9th. However, the family didn’t get their visas in time and decided that it would be best if we took the boat to Ketchekan, Alaska, and they would meet us there. So off we went to the west out into the Pacific. As soon as we made the turn around Vancouver Island to head north, we got pounded, and I had not taken any seasickness medicine. After a couple hours of trying to keep myself from getting sick, I was loosing the battle, and hurled over the side of the bridge deck. I threw up a couple more times and then went to sleep in one of the aft guest cabins for about 15 hours..haha. then I took some Dramamine and got some food in my system and felt a lot better. I wasn’t the only one though, as there were quite a few of the crew in the same shape as me. Next time I’ll take the pills before we leave!

Arrived in Ketchekan, “Alaska’s first city” and “the gateway to the wild frontier”. What a crap town. The only establishments in town other than a couple of tourist knick-knack shops, are dirty bars that only accept cash. This place is like stepping back in time 20 or 30 years.
Luckily, the guests arrived, and we took off north thru the calm waters of SE Alaska’s inside passage.

Alaska is truly awe-inspiring. Its like no landscape I have ever seen. We have been thru narrow passages, where mountains are 50 yards away from each side of us, towering 3000 plus feet into the air. We have edged the boat up so close to rushing waterfalls that we can almost touch the spray. We have spotted countless humpback whales breaching the water’s surface to say hello with their gigantic, black bodies and back down with a roll of their huge tails to say goodbye. Today I went with the guests on the 40ft tender and got within 20 yards of a colony of sea lions laying on a pile of rocks. I think its illegal to get that close…ooops. Now we are getting into glacier territory and navigating thru a maze of icebergs, dotting the beautiful green water.

Its 9pm and I have anchor watch from 10pm to 6 am. We have been anchored every night, with the three of us deck guys rotating the anchor watch. With the boat to myself and everyone asleep in their cabins, I’ll be up all night checking the GPS every hour to make sure we aren’t dragging anchor, keeping an eye on the radar, and warning the captain if the winds pick up too high or icebergs come to close. Other than that, I'll be walking around pretending it's my boat.

This charter ends on the 27th and I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a big tip to pay off my student loan!!!

Happy 22nd Birthday to my brother Tylar on the 18th!

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