OK, we're back online, at least for a while, and boy, have we seen some stuff!
Some more pictures from Wrangell, a very interesting town.

Boats on the grid

Elephant Nose

 Petroglyph Beach

 And I love this!  Moving to another place in the harbor?

Once we left Wrangell we headed up Wrangell Narrows to Petersburg.  That brought back memories of the ICW.  Follow the markers!  We tried to time it for favorable tides and were successful, so we saved on fuel (a little bit helps).  We spent a couple of days in Petersburg which is a nice town, but not much happening.  Everyone told us about the norwegian influence, which is there, but I guess I expected more of it.  Maybe it's decreased over the years.  Several of the boats that we had met along the way, all showed up in Petersburg over the few days we were there.  Here's Molly on bow watch in Petersburg.

We left Petersburg and headed out into Frederick Sound and then the fun starts.  We had a beautiful day so we went further than we had planned.  We anchored that night in Cannery Cove, which is beautiful.  There were eagles everywhere and as we left the next day we realized why.   The fishing lodge at the entrance to the cove puts all their scraps out for the eagles to eat.  As we left there were dozens of eagles chomping down on the beach in front of the lodge.

Here are some pictures of Cannery Cove.  Absolutely beautiful anchorage!

We left Cannery Cove on a beautiful calm morning and started to make out way to Tracy Arm and Sawyer Glacier.  However, along the way, just outside Gambier Bay we had to take a rest.  We were surrounded by whales.  They were all around the boat so we just stopped, turned off the engine and watched and listened.  We found our heads turning in every direction as we heard a whale come up.  They were so close to the boat.  Then two passed about 40 ft off the stern of the boat.  We sat there for probably 45 minutes and marveled at the whales.  We saw one jump completely out of the water (couldn't get a picture of that) and we tried to get as many pictures as we could.  Below are a few of the pictures.

After that wonderful experience we continued on to Tracy Arm.  We anchored in Tracy Arm Cove and the next day ventured up Tracy Arm toward Sawyer Glacier.  We cruised through the ice floes as far as we could and made it to about the 2nd to last turn before the glacier.  Tracy Arm is just beautiful.  Here are some pics of that.

Then we went back and anchored in Tracy Arm Cove the next night so we could venture up Endicott Arm the next day.  A few iceburgs make their way into the cove.  There is a shoal at the entrance that keeps the big burgs out but Tracy Arm Cove has a nice view also.

Our friends on Buster joined us that evening in Tracy Arm Cove and we headed up Endicott Arm together the next day.  Again the ice got too thick and we didn't make it all the way to the glacier.  Even the tour boats were complaining about the ice but they go a lot further than we were comfortable doing.

After Endicott arm we headed to Taku Harbor.  Another great place.  Alaska has a lot of public docks in many of their coves that are free and very well maintained.  Taku Harbor is one of those places.  So we tied up to the dock and sat there for two days in the pouring rain.  It was hard to even walk around the old cannery there because it was so wet.  So Buster and Dixie left and headed to Juneau.  Which is where we are now.  We finally found Molly a dog park so she could run to her hearts content.  It's been a little difficult for her to run much because I think she can smell the bears.  She goes off the dinghy to shore but doesn't want to stay very long.  She hears things rustling in the bushes and doesn't like the unfamiliar smells.  So she's a happy camper now and we ran her til she gave up this morning, TWICE!

We will be here for several days and my sister is coming on Sunday.  So then we will head over to Hoonah and Glacier Bay and we'll see where we go from there.  See you soon!