Kevin and I flew home for a few days for some family business, then returned to Juneau on the fourth of July. But we were so tired that we slept through the midnight fireworks completely. Oh well.
On Sunday we had a down day…did some shopping, met friends Dan and Eileen for dinner, and thought about coming up with a rough plan for our route home (but still haven’t yet…I think we’re winging it!). It’s kinda nice after six weeks of specific plans to just figure it out day by day, so that might me what we do for a bit (except for planning Dixon Entrance and Cape Caution, of course).
On Monday morning, we fueled up and headed south from Juneau.
At first we thought we might detour into Endicott Arm and go back to Ford’s Terror one last time. Brian and Adrianne and their guest Tina were there on Evenstar, and it was so tempting and would be wonderful to see them again, but we decided we’d continue on and make a few more miles.
We dropped the hook just inside Windham Bay for the night. There was a humpback breaching further inside the bay when we arrived, but too far away for any decent photos.
Low clouds and some rain for the rest of the evening, but in the morning things were looking a little brighter. We even got a cool rainbow as we left Windham Bay.
We decided we’d head over to Pybus Bay for another stop in Cannery Cove. We were hopeful for a few more mountain views, since the clouds seemed to be clearing fast. And bonus! Brian and Adrianne and Tina were also going to Cannery Cove, so we’d get another visit with them after all!
On our way across Stephens Passage we saw SO MANY HUMPBACKS! We had to stop the boat multiple times to wait for them…it was pretty great!
I was able to identify three of the whales from fluke photos. This one below is SEAK-2433, first spotted in Hawaii in February 2001, and last spotted also in Hawaii in January of 2026, so this is its first sighting in AK this year.
The other two I was able to get an ID on were SEAK-5433 and SEAK-5458.
We passed Zuckerberg’s megayacht Launchpad and its “support vessel” Wingman, anchored out near the Brothers Islands.
If you want to know more about these ridiculously expensive, behemoth boats, here’s an article (with more photos) you can check out.
We anchored in Cannery Cove, put out some crab traps, and Kevin went to try for a halibut, but no luck on either. Luckily, we have this view for the afternoon/evening.
We went over to Evenstar for a really nice happy hour visit last night. We’re the only two boats in Cannery Cove, which is rare.
We briefly discussed staying another night (more crab, more fishing, more visiting) but the weather has turned to fully gray and rainy and a little windy, so with the gorgeous view gone we pulled our anchors and headed out. Little did we know how crappy it was going to be (20-25kt winds and 4-6ft chop) or we’d have likely changed our minds and stayed that extra night. Oh well. Making miles.
It’s relatively calm now as we make our way toward Portage Bay.
There’s even a little blue sky ahead!
The view we’re leaving behind:
We were hoping to get into the many many humpbacks our friends saw yesterday down here bubblenet feeding, but they’ve apparently moved on. We’ll pop into Portage and spend the night, and go on further tomorrow.