Passagemaking with a Nordhavn

Book Published - Great Siberian Sushi Run

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Greetings!

I'm very happy to report that my book about the Great Siberian Sushi Run has been released!

The book turned out amazingly well. To see a sneak preview, click this link:

http://tinyurl.com/nordhavn

It should be on Amazon within the next few weeks, or it can be bought now, at:

http://www.tinyurl.com/GSSRbook Note: The PDF is only $4.95!

The book includes all of my blog entries, all of the photos, and most of the emails that I received during the trip.

As to the GSSR itself. We've been busy planning our 2010 trip. While not on the boat, I am still doing a bit of a blog. If you'd like to see what is happening with our trip planning, check out: http://www.kensOtherBlog.com

Thank you,

Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

Start your own blog now! Free!

GSSR#42 - The End Of The Road

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 00:00:00 GMT

At the end of my last blog entry, we were sitting in Katsuura, hiding from an approaching typhoon. Luckily, the typhoon missed us. It turned, heading north along the coast of Japan, harmlessly.

We were all eager to reach Osaka, and wanted to get moving, but the typhoon had stirred up the ocean. We needed to give the seas a day or two to calm before we could get moving.

This gave us another day just to relax in Katsuura. I was bored and decided I wanted to jump on the train, just to see what other cities were around us. Roberta wanted to do some writing on her book about the Irish immigration, told through the story of her ancestors, so I talked Steven and Carol (Seabird) into tagging along with me. Katsuura is a small Japanese town that rarely sees foreign tourists. I was hoping that a bigger city might have at least ONE restaurant with a menu in English. We took the train for a couple stops to a town called 'Shingu,' and started exploring. Within a few blocks we found a restaurant, with a Japanese name, but a clear 'Dennys' look about it. We looked at the menu and there was no English, but at least it had pictures. I took a chance on what appeared to be fried chicken nuggets, but what they brought me was fried chicken feet. I let them sit and ordered some spaghetti that looked safe.

After lunch, we looked at our map, which was in Japanese, and noticed that the beach was only a few blocks away. We headed for the beach, but after walking several blocks noticed that the map didn’t seem to match our surroundings. After about 45 minutes of wandering through residential districts, Carol pointed out how funny it was that we had managed to find Japan coming all the way from the United States, but couldn’t find the beach from a few blocks away. We were receiving lots of strange looks from the people around us. This was a part of Japan few foreigners visit, and here we were wandering aimlessly through back streets. We finally found a 7-11 store, and showed the clerk our map. She pointed at our location, which was only a block from the beach. We started hiking again, and upon arriving at the beach we discovered a giant wall stretching for miles . On the other side we could hear waves. We made a half-hearted attempt to find a way to cross the wall, which didn’t work.

I saw a huge casino in the distance, surrounded by nothing but open fields. I wasn’t positive it was a casino, because the signs were in Japanese, but, it had that look. It had bright lights going in the middle of the day, and a packed parking lot, even though there was nothing else around and we were deep in the boondocks.

There was no taxi stand outside, so we needed to enter, to find someone to call us a cab. Inside, there were no blackjack, or craps tables, but there were acres of Pachinko and Slot Machines, with hundreds of Japanese captivated by them, even though this was mid-day, mid-week. The noise was unbelievably loud! Las Vegas casinos aren’t even in the same category noise-wise. We found a change-girl, and I tried to scream the word "TAXI" but with all the noise she couldn’t understand me. After a bit, she finally got the concept, and found a manager, who took us to a small room, where he had to look up a cab company number in the phone book. I then pantomimed that he should make the call. I wouldn’t have had the vaguest idea how to tell a cab driver where to find us, assuming he spoke English, which would be a bad assumption.

From Katsuura we were only 120 miles from the finish line for the GSSR. This works out to roughly 15 hours of running, at 8.5 knots. It was more than we could do in a day without running at night. Our Japan agent found a marina that would accept our boats, only 95 miles away, which would allow us to break-up the final run into a 12 hour day, followed by a four hour day. We liked the idea of arriving at our final marina in Osaka nice and rested.

We departed Katsuura at 5:30am, although I had to get up much earlier, We had tied up with a typhoon in mind, and it took me 45 minutes just to remove all the fenders and lines.

Our run went smoothly, although it was a relatively rough ride. We had consistent 25 knot head winds. Both of our weather routers had predicted a smooth run, but the weather gods had other ideas. To my surprise, the ride really wasn’t uncomfortable, and there was almost no pitching from the boats, although there was a lot of spray.

We also reached a new high for the number of freighters, 99% of which were coming straight at us. Our guess is that the typhoon had caused all the northbound freighters to hide in Osaka, and they were all leaving Osaka bay at the same time. Tina, on Grey Pearl, started counting the ones we could see out the window, and counted over fifty. These things are enormous and move fast. We decided our best chance to avoid them would be to move much closer to shore. Normally I like to run in deep water, at least a mile or two offshore, but that would be impossible. We ‘hugged the beach’ successfully to avoid the oncoming traffic.

Our proximity to shore did not shield us from the head wind. I asked Braun (Grey Pearl) on the radio if he remembered the last time he and I had slammed into a head wind, at the end of a major trip. He had no idea what I was talking about, so I explained. Five years ago, almost to the day, our two boats, Grey Pearl and Sans Souci, had participated in Nordhavn’s North Atlantic Rally. At the end of the rally, as we were coming from the Azores into Gibraltar, our boats had been side by side, pounding into much higher winds (50+ knots). I remember having the same feeling of accomplishment, and thinking it was fitting that the last ride should have a little excitement to it. My pictures, including the one of Grey Pearl above, from that ride have been featured in many ads, and on magazine covers. Once Braun understood the comparison, it brought back a lot of happy memories for both of us.

Arriving at the Suntopia Marina, our charts were very light on detail, but we had pictures from Google Earth telling us what to expect. I arrived first, and didn’t like what I saw. The marina entrance looked different than it looked on Google Earth. It was very tight, with an immediate turn to port just inside the entrance, and the sun was low, glaring straight into my eyes. As I entered through the opening in the breakwater, I would be making a blind entrance into the marina, in 20+ knot winds, while maneuvering to avoid rocks. Not my idea of a good time. I decided to back off and study the situation before entering. Seabird and Grey Pearl weren’t far behind, and Seabird agreed to be the brave one and try the entrance. Once inside they said it wasn’t bad, so Grey Pearl and I also entered.

Upon turning the corner, I immediately had a pond full of birthday-suited Japanese on my starboard side. This told me were still in Onsen/Rotenburo territory.

Seabird and Grey Pearl were positioning themselves to side-tie to the visitor dock (shown just inside the breakwater in the photo above), but a marina employee was running down the dock waving them off. We had been faxed the marina map, with the location where we should tie clearly identified. Instead, they now wanted us to enter the inner-harbor of the marina. A glance at their visitor dock offered the explanation. It had only a couple of pilings, and looked insubstantial. Together, the GSSR boats weigh 260 tons. The breakwater was very low. Our 260 tons pushing against a flimsy dock, in 20+ knot winds, was not going to work.

We now had three big boats, inside a very small marina, built for much smaller boats, being pushed around by the wind. Roberta had already put fenders and lines on the port side, and the end-cap I was being directed to required the fenders on the starboard side. When I’m driving the boat, Roberta is responsible for working the fenders and lines. Thus, either I had to spin the boat, in roughly its own length, or she had to move the fenders. She was not enthusiastic about moving the fenders, so I grumbled a lot, and spun the boat. Sans Souci is very maneuverable in tight quarters. I have twin engines, a bow and stern thruster, plus big rudders. It went better than I could have hoped and in minutes we were at the dock. Seabird had a reasonably accessible location. But, Grey Pearl, had a location that I wouldn’t have attempted. Braun did a masterful job of bringing the Pearl in, running only a few feet from dangerously shallow water. Overall, it could have been much worse. We were lucky the marina found a way to fit us in. Had they just said, “Sorry, but you have to leave,” after we had run 12 hours to get there, and with darkness imminent, it would have been a rough day.

The Suntopia Marina is in front of a huge hotel. Roberta and I decided to check out the restaurant, and were seated at a teppanyaki counter, where the chef cooks in front of you. Perhaps as an indication of the Japanese economy, we were the only ones in the restaurant. The menu was all in Japanese, but had only two options. The hotel concierge spoke a few words of English, and was able to explain that our choice was ‘beef’ or ‘beef and lobster.’ Roberta took the beef, and I decided to add the lobster.

To my shock, the chef appeared a few minutes later with a tiny shrimp-sized lobster on a plate. The lobster was alive, and not very happy about his impending fate. I couldn’t see killing him over his, at-most, one or two bites of meat. I indicated as best I could that I didn’t want him cooked, which seemed to upset the chef. He left looking somewhat disgusted, and returned with a plate of octopus legs! Argh. I’m not an octopus eater, which also didn’t go over well. I was afraid of what might appear next, so I started repeating “Beef only,” which made the chef and waiter think the waiter had incorrectly noted my order, leading to their having an uncomfortable discussion, and me feeling really bad. At some point in this conversation, I tried to say something to the chef, and he replied in French. He was Japanese, and didn’t seem to speak a word of English, but spoke French. Bizarre, but great news. I speak passable French, and Roberta speaks enough to get by. I was quickly able to clear all the confusion, and the chef was thrilled to be able to speak with us (and to have customers to serve). He supplemented the menu with garlic French fries, and even baguettes. We had a great time, and discovered he was just back from a couple years working in Paris.

The next morning, the GSSR slept in and didn’t depart until 10am. The winds had dropped completely, making our departure easy.

The last 32 miles of the GSSR were run on calm seas, in perfect weather. We dodged a few fishing boats, but overall it was a dream cruise.

Along the way, we witnessed this Discovery-channel moment, a mother freighter nursing one of her offspring. Quite touching.

The photo above shows our final turn into the Bellport Ashiya marina. As soon as we entered, the GSSR would be over.

L to R. Braun Jones, Steven Argosy, Ken Williams, Carol Argosy, Tina Jones, Roberta Williams, Shelby (official GSSR mascot)

Here we are registering into the marina a few minutes after arrival. We hadn’t planned to all wear our official GSSR clothing, it just worked out that way.

Our first few hours in our new home were quite confusing. I had requested a diagram of the marina, prior to our arrival, with our slips indicated. As we entered the marina, we were immediately flagged down from onshore and routed to completely different, and scattered, locations within the marina. An hour later, we were asked to move again, and then another hour later we were asked to move yet again. Our boats are the largest boats in the marina, and once the management saw us, they puzzled over where we could safely be put. We also hit power issues. The shore power in Japan is only 200 volts, and it is 50hz. At our request, we were moved to the same dock, but the voltage dropped under 190 volts, and then we started blowing the breaker for the entire dock every 15 minutes. Ultimately this was solved by moving Sans Souci to the other side of the marina.

It’s a beautiful, new marina, and the staff has been very helpful. One young lady that works for the Bellport Ashiya Marina speaks good English. The marina has a haul-out facility, and a maintenance yard. I was also pleased to see that they are set up to accept used oil. This is a great place to be for the next six months!

Our next challenge, which we’re still working on as I type this, is to resolve how we will take care of our boats during the six months that we fly home to the United States. Steven and Carol, from Seabird, will be on their boat for some portion of that time, but Roberta and I will not return to Japan until next April. If all goes well, our boats will sit here, happy, and alone, for six months without needing much attention, other than occasional washing.

However, there are some things that need tended to in our absence. There are likely to be times when the power goes out. Sometimes, this will be a breaker on the boat, sometimes on the shore power pedestal, and sometimes, it will be the whole dock. Recognizing when the power goes out, and then resetting the right breaker, needs to be done by someone. The boats need a good wash from time to time. The bottoms need cleaned, by a diver, since we won’t be here to move the boats to a haul-out facility, and since the water is warm this needs done every month until winter sets in. The engines and generators should be started from time to time. The toilets should be flushed, and the watermakers should be run. It’s not a lot of work, but someone has to do it. The marina does offer these services, but our boats, particularly my boat, are much larger than the marina is accustomed to. My sense is that most of the boats around us will be hauled out over the winter. Whereas, our boats can’t be hauled out, at least not here, because of their size. And, communications with the marina, should something go wrong, will be difficult.

I think we have it all under control. I spent a couple of days looking into hiring someone to come live in Japan and watch our boats. I also looked into finding a local management company. After getting an interpreter involved, I discovered that the marina offered more services than I first imagined, and would be willing to handle most of the work. I discovered, via Google, a local interpreter, who we all like, who agreed to be our point of contact with the marina. Through him we have someone here in Osaka, who speaks perfect English, and can monitor how our boats are doing, and give us a good channel of communications to the marina. He doesn’t know boats, but is smart, and we’ll train him on what he needs to know before we leave town.

Roberta and I fly home to Seattle in two weeks, where we’ll face a mountain-sized stack of unopened mail. Before we go, I’ll spend days going through the boat to identify any maintenance that needs done, and spare parts that are needed. I’ll then work through the interpreter to see what work can be done here, but expect I’ll need to send maintenance people from the U.S. Fortunately, this was an amazingly good year. Sans Souci is a complicated boat, and we ran it nearly 7,000 miles, a chunk of which was in rough seas. Impressively, nothing broke. Last year, on our Costa Rica run, the boat was new, and there were some warranty issues, but this year, the boat has run flawlessly. I’m sure I’ll find a few things, as I look around, but overall, not much will need to be done. Prior to our departure Roberta will clean the interior of the boat and make long lists of inventory items to be brought back next year.

Shelby will be the most complicated part of our departure. She has been officially imported into Japan, and will now need to be exported to the United States. We need an export permit for her, and we need to have her change planes in Hawaii. There’s a lot of paperwork, and bureaucracy to be worked through.

Complicating the process, next week is ‘Silver Week’ here in Japan. Virtually all business will grind to a halt, as the government imposes a five-day vacation for everyone. The newly elected government is on a mission to reduce productivity in the hopes that it might cut unemployment. Think I’m joking? Read this article: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aktJRPqjCvmo Our interpreter made an interesting comment when he mentioned that the Japanese mentality is, “Live to work, Work to live.” There is a very strong work ethic here, which I have tremendous respect for, although the Japanese government sees it differently. Perhaps they should Google the French experiment with a 35 hour work week?

And, with that the GSSR has come to an end…

Actually, to be technically accurate, only the first leg of the GSSR has come to an end. At our ‘victory dinner’ we talked about the future of our group. Whereas at the beginning of our cruise no one wanted to commit to our group hanging together when we reached Japan, now, no one wants to think about cruising in this part of the world alone. There is a lot of complexity, and together we can accomplish things that would be much harder alone. It was unanimously agreed that we would keep cruising together.

It was also agreed that we would continue to call our group, and our voyage, the GSSR. This makes no sense, given that GSSR stands for Great Siberian Sushi Run, but we decided that we don’t care. We all own lots of clothing that says “GSSR” and we don’t want to buy new clothes! Plus, we all love the little polar bear logo, and don’t want to give it up. We are henceforth going to pretend that GSSR stands for (G)rey Pearl, (S)eabird, (S)ans Souci (R)un.

We discussed our next year’s route a bit, and still haven’t arrived at any conclusions. We suspect that China, Okinawa, Taiwan, Japan and Korea are on the agenda, but no decisions have been made. There are many topics which need researched:

1) What countries can Shelby get into without quarantine?

2) When is the best cruising season in each country?

3) We will need some work done on the boats sometime next year. Which country has a good haul-out and maintenance facility?

4) Where is the safest place to leave our boats at the end of the next cruising season?

Our current plan is to finish up next year's cruising in Hong Kong, and have all the boat maintenance done there. There has also been discussion of Singapore instead of Hong Kong. We are also talking to the Nordhavn factory (Ta Shing) in Taiwan to see if they have any ability to do maintenance, or could refer us to someone in Taiwan. We have six months to build a plan, and a lot of research to do.

Here’s a brief look at some stats from the trip:

- Distance: 5938 nm
- Fuel consumed by Sans Souci: 10,751 gallons
- Average Speed: Not tracked, estimated at 8.9 knots
- Stops made (to anchor, or moor): 45
- Hours underway: Not tracked, estimated at 667
- Hours of seriously heavy seas (Force 7 or greater): 0
- Hours of heavy seas: (Force 5 or greater): Under 24
- Hours of serious fog with under 100 yard visibility: 0
- Hours of fighting adverse current: Not tracked, but we seemed to get a push as often as we were held back. Overall, we think our nickname as the ‘wrong way gang’ is unearned.

- Days of fog: Estimated at 14. However, the fog usually only lasted a couple hours, and I don't remember any days when it was so thick I couldn't see the bow.
- Marinas or anchorages with Internet WiFi after we left the Alaskan Inside Passage: 0

These statistics need some explaining….

If you do some math with the numbers above it appears that Sans Souci achieved only about .55 nautical miles per gallon. We carry 3,000 gallons, so this implies a range of only about 1,600 nautical miles. However, this is not the whole story. We ran the generator almost non-stop for nearly four months. There has been no shore power at most of the places we have stopped. If you subtract out our 2,200 hours of generator run time, at an average of 1.25 gallons per hour, then fuel consumed by the main engines was only 8,001 gallons. This puts my nautical miles per gallon at .74, which yields a range of 2,250 miles. Trawlers, such as Sans Souci, are very efficient at slow speeds, and become fuel hogs at higher speeds. At 7 knots, I could easily run 3,000 miles, but as the speed increases Sans Souci’s fuel efficiency goes down. One of the best things about our unique approach to crossing the Pacific, was that we could run fast when we wanted to, without worrying about range. I should also note that Grey Pearl and Seabird consumed half as much fuel, partially because of their lighter boats, and partially because they did not run their generators non-stop.

I should also point out that no one should be lured into thinking that because our statistics are so pretty, that this is an easy trip, and that they should jump into whatever boat they might own and head west. This trip is a big-league adventure, and one that should only be attempted by certain people and certain boats. We had highly-skilled crews, on true blue-water-capable boats, with months of careful advance planning, top quality weather routers, crew who had local knowledge of the Bering Sea, the patience to sit still when we didn’t like the weather, and a fair dose of good fortune. This trip must not be underestimated. We did a lot of things right, and have a good trip to show for it. If others decide to try this, my advice would be to really think it through, study what worked well for us, and hope for the same luck we had.

When I asked at our victory dinner what the best thing about the trip was, everyone agreed immediately that it was the people. By this I mean all of the people, the boat owners, the crews, the mechanics, the weather routers and more. A lot of people, and companies, contributed to make this a successful trip.

Here’s a look at the people who crewed on the various boats:

Sans Souci

L to R: Jeff Sanson, Kirt Ahlquist, Roberta Williams, Ken Williams, Shelby, Bill Harrington

John and Nova Heuer

Chris Williams

Ray and Karen Hoffman

Sandra Williams

Seabird

Steven and Carol Argosy

Carol and Wayne Watjus

Diane and Mike Simmons

Grey Pearl

Braun and Tina Jones

Kell Achenbach, Wayne Davis, Pat Davis

Mort and Allyson Taubman

Grandson Will

Sake San

Invaders from space

As I mentioned, I owe a huge thank you to all of the people who did the excellent work on Sans Souci.

Sans Souci had major upgrades and repairs done during the off-season. Jeff Sanson, who also crewed on Sans Souci, led the effort. Anyone needing work done on their boat, in the Pacific NW, who needs their boat delivered anywhere, project management or boat management should contact Jeff (Jeff Sanson, Pacific Yacht Management, Seatle, Wa, 206-855-7960). Pacific Yacht Management is incredible. In addition to his own staff, Jeff managed several local subcontractors in Seattle, including Delta Marine, S3 Systems, Hatton Marine, and Emerald Harbor Marine. Major electronics upgrades, including my absolutely amazing Internet system, were done by Ed Harvey, Harbor Tech systems of Vancouver.

I must also call attention to some real heroes who took calls 24 hours a day during the trip. Steve Bradburn from Furuno was my expert on everything Furuno. He personally trained me on the use of Sonar, and Navnet 3d. Greg Mallory of Hatton Marine took questions on anything electrical. Brett Jenes from Emerald Harbor answered all my a/c questions. And, David Wright of American Bow Thruster answered many questions about my hydraulics.

In Russia, and in Japan, we used 'agents' to do our ground work. Our Russian agent was Sergey Frolov, from http://www.siberianadventures.com, and in Japan, we used Kazuo Furuno, at Interocean Shipping (http://www.interocean.co.jp). Both were excellent and made customs clearing and immigration as easy as could be, plus took care of our moorage needs.

Anyone going to the Aleutians should seek out Bill Harrington. Having him along was one of the smartest decisions we made. It made a huge difference having him along to guide us to the anchorages, and WWII artifacts. It also helped that we were able to look him in the eye, when the seas were roughest, and say, "You've seen worse than this and survived. Haven't you Bill?" And, of course, having Bill along in the Aleutians, where he has a lot of friends, made us 'golden' in places like Sand Point and Adak (where I should also thank Cynthia and Joe Galaktionoff who were exremely helpful.)

I must also call attention our weather routers, 'Weather Bob' and 'Weather Rich. 'We had two going at all times, and these guys deserve awards for the work they did. Bob Jones at Ocean Marine (www.oceanmarinenav.com) and Rich Courtney who isn’t really a weather router, although he is a professional weathercaster, who works for NOAA. Rich’s familiarity with the Aleutians was a big help. Both Bob and Rich took our calls and emails 24 hours a day, and I can’t thank these guys enough.

And, I can't forget to thank our friends John and Gloria Buchan, and Kent and Pam Williams, who threw a huge party for us in Hoonah Alaska!

And of course, there is all of you. Whereas technically, it could be argued that the trip would be the same with or without the blog, I would argue that the blog does make a huge difference. In addition to the morale boost we all get from reading your questions and comments, there are some very real positives. All of us have noticed that because our blogs are so widely read, when we call a mechanic, a marina, or anyone that offers marine services, our calls get answered much faster. I’m sure we would get good service one way or the other, but vendors knowing how visible the GSSR is certainly helps. Also important: Many of you have pitched in with good ideas and reference information for us, both as comments to blog entries and in private emails.

Lastly, this really does mark my last blog entry for a while. I might post something from time to time on the website, but unless something interesting is happening, I won’t be sending emails. You are encouraged to check my website (http://www.kensblog.com) from time to time to see if I’ve posted anything. Also, if you find yourself missing the blog, you can always buy my two books: http://www.lulu.com/kenw

We’ll be back on Sans Souci in April 2010. Until then, thank you all! And, see you next year.

Thank you,

Ken Williams

www.kensblog.com

Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

PS I asked Seabird and Grey Pearl for any pictures they wanted to contribute to this final blog. You can see the pictures they sent, by clicking the links below:

Grey Pearl – http://www.kensblog.com/aspx/m/569850

Seabird – http://www.kensblog.com/aspx/m/569847

GSSR#41 - We did it!!!!

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 00:00:00 GMT

We did it!!!

The GSSR has arrived in Osaka Japan.

I have much to say about the end of the trip, but we’re all tired and in the mood to have a nice dinner, and then catch up on some SLEEP. I’ll send out a final recap sometime in the next few days.

Our final distance traveled was 5,938 nautical miles. A nautical mile is slightly longer than a normal mile, so we actually covered 6,833 miles.

We are very happy to be here…

I have a lot of people to thank, including all of you who have vicariously been along for the ride, and some fun stories to tell about our final trip. But, all of that will have to wait until my next blog. For now, I just want to go celebrate our arrival.

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

GSSR#40 - A picture I forgot to include

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:00:00 GMT

In my last blog entry (#39) I forgot to include the following picture:

It shows Sans Souci anchored at Hamajima, with a full-moon in the background. It was one of my favorite pictures of the trip, and I can't imagine how I let it fall through the cracks. Oops!

A couple things to point out from this picture...

1) The barbecue is open. That's a sure-fire indicator that I'm enjoying life.
2) The lower deck lights are on. We were anchored in front of a busy fishing port. When lots of other boats are around, we try to keep the boat well lit. I don't want a fisherman leaving the port in the dark to be bouncing off our boat.

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

GSSR#39 - Hiding from a typhoon, again

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Our run from Shimoda to the port of Omaezaki couldn’t have gone smoother. After a couple hours of 20-25 knot winds, the seas calmed completely. It was almost spooky. We were chatting on the radio, while watching the wind gauges, and could see the wind dropping about a knot every minute. Nothing on shore seemed to be causing the wind to drop. We were just in the right place at the right time.

Omaezaki is a port, not a marina. Ports are giant concrete complexes, meant to accept commercial traffic. Big freighters use the ports, and commercial fishing fleets, not boats such as ours. There are no floating docks. Ports have only concrete walls that you can tie to. The walls, especially when the winds push you into them are hard on your fenders. There is no shore power, and no water. Ports will occasionally accept private boats, but it is not really the business they are in.

We entered one other port on this trip; Hachinohe. You may recall from my blog that, at Hachinohe, we tied to a wall where a freighter had recently unloaded cattle. Yuck. In spite of all this, we paid one of the highest per night costs I have yet experienced anywhere in the world.

I’m not complaining, and am in fact thrilled to be able to get into a port, when we need access. Normally, we would just run around the clock when moving long distances. However, the waters in Japan have a lot of fishing gear that makes running at night hazardous. Plus, each of our three boats now only has two persons. We could run at night if need be, but why do so, if we don’t have to? In the absence of a marina, or a suitable anchorage, a port is our best option. Our options for marinas are very limited due to the size and number of our boats. There are stretches of hundreds of miles where there are no marinas that can take us.

And anchoring is a struggle. Japan has many places to anchor, but we don’t know where they are. None are indicated on either our electronic or paper charts.

I had thought I might get some great information on anchorages at a party held in our honor, at the Yokohama Bay Marina, by a groups of local yacht clubs. However, few people had ever cruised beyond Tokyo Bay, and I received very little information on anchoring. My sense is that Japan doesn't seem to have the same 'anchoring out' culture that we have elsewhere. Some of our books do indicate anchorages, but they seem more relevant to freighters hiding from storms than recreational cruisers in small boats.

In fact, I’ve been very reluctant to go anywhere near shallow water in Japan. I have no depth information on my charts for much of the Japan coast! I have two navigation charting systems on Sans Souci, and I’m disappointed in both. One of them, Furuno’s Navnet 3D, has no chart availability in Japan. I’ve tried, both in the U.S., and Japan, to buy charts, and it is impossible. For Nobeltec, I did buy the Japanese charts, but there are few ‘close-in’ charts. Seabird and Grey Pearl are also running Nobeltec as their primary charting system, and have the same problem. They are slightly better off than me, in that their backup chart plotting system is the older Navnet II, which has slightly better chart coverage in Japan than Nobeltec.

I always say that I’m happiest when at anchor, however, without cruising guides to tell us where the anchorages are, we are stuck trying to ‘find them’ by studying the charts. I assume that cruising guides do exist, but are in Japanese. I have bought everything I can find that is in English, including the Japan Coast Pilot, the British Admiralty Coast Pilot for Japan, and paper charts, with which to find anchorages. I am supplementing this with Google Earth. We are finding places that we think might be an anchorage, but it is very difficult. And, even once we identify an anchorage, it isn’t clear what we’ll find when we arrive. Entire bays can be blanketed with fishing gear, and anchorages can be dozens of miles apart from each other.

To make a long story short, we only had two options after Shimoda: 1) stop at the port of Omaezaki, or 2) run 130nm non-stop. As I said, we are certainly capable of a 130nm passage, but prefer to avoid anything that has us running at night. Thus, we asked the port for permission to enter. Through our agent we heard back that we could not enter the port. We mentioned this to a Japanese friend in Shimoda, who called a fisherman he knew in Omaezaki, who said he would arrange for us to visit, at no cost!

Once tied up, we went to thank the fisherman who had gotten us in, but because he was a ‘friend of a friend,’ we realized we didn’t know his name. While asking around, we accidentally stumbled into some port authorities. This resulted in a long discussion with port bureaucracy, and the Japanese customs agents. The port authorities did not understand why we were in their port, and because of the language barrier, we could not explain. They were very nice about it, and actually wanted to help us. But, one thing you learn quickly in Japan is that ‘rules are rules.’ Fortunately, they mentioned to us that the only way we could enter the port was if we were hiding from a typhoon, or had a mechanical emergency. This was good news. We explained that we were in fact hiding from a typhoon, and that we should be allowed to stay. They agreed, and we started on the paperwork. Of course, what takes a sentence to tell in a blog takes an hour or more, inside a port office, especially when it spans two languages. Our brush with bureaucracy also brought us to the attention of the customs agents, who had a bunch more paperwork. Once again, it felt like everyone was on our team, and wanted to do everything in their power to help us, but, since we had entered the port, a certain level of paperwork had to occur.

The experience was complicated enough, that when I mentioned that perhaps we should push harder to make anchoring work, no one fought me. We studied the charts, Coast Pilot, etc., and identified two places to drop anchor. These, with a couple of 12 hour days at the helm, would get us to Osaka, and the end of the GSSR. Complicating our quest to find suitable places to drop anchor, we needed to find alternative destinations, in case what appeared to be a great anchoring location was, upon arrival, flawed in some way.

Our first stop after Omaezaki, was to run 80 nm to an anchorage at Hamajima.

The weather was perfect; light winds at our back. However, freighter traffic was thick. I’ve always said that my ‘rule of thumb’ is to never let a freighter get within one mile of me. Or, at least that was my rule of thumb prior to this trip. That rule is completely impossible to maintain here in Japan, and I’ve revised it to be .2 nm. If I can keep the freighters two tenths of a mile away, I am happy. In the picture above you can see Seabird, Grey Pearl, and three freighters all converging on the same square inch of water. Whenever we turn to dodge one, we are turning closer to another. Running the boat in Japan is not a relaxing experience.

Here’s a look at a giant freighter that we had to avoid. In this photo Seabird is running at 9 knots, and the freighter at 18 knots. They are within a third of a mile of each other! That sounds like a lot, but only when you aren’t the one looking out the window at something that looks larger than the state of Texas bearing down on you!

This was to be our first attempt to anchor in Japan. Tina (Grey Pearl) pointed this out by getting on the radio and asking, “Who can remember the last time we dropped anchor?” Steven on Seabird was faster on the microphone and shouted, “Attu!” That was over a thousand miles ago!

We had a very nice night at anchor, in a great location (Hamajima Ko) however, getting to where we dropped the hook was not without excitement. I had given the latitude and longitude of where we wanted to drop anchor to our Japanese agent. He responded by saying, “That is too small for your boats.” I suggested an alternate destination, and he responded, “I spoke with the Coast Guard again, and they say that this location is too small for your boats.” I asked him to ask the Coast Guard where they would suggest. He responded with a location which seemed wrong to us. It was completely open to the sea, which would be fine for a giant freigher, but not our little boats. Braun (Grey Pearl) had found one location in a book that seemed, looking at the charts, to be viable. I was nervous about it, because it would require zig-zagging through some narrow, shallow passages without electronic charts. We decided to go for it, with the caveat that if it felt too dangerous, we’d back off to the Coast Guard suggested location, or wherever else we could find.

Within an hour of dropping anchor, the Japan Coast Guard approached my boat. They wanted to tell me something, but I had no idea what. I invited them on board, and we had a frustrating 15 minutes of inability to communicate. Finally, I phoned my Japanese-speaking son, Chris, in the U.S. He spoke to them and then explained to me what they wanted. They were concerned for our safety. They wanted to make sure that we knew about an approaching typhoon, and that we knew we were surrounded by fishing gear. If we were going to move, we must do so very carefully, and wherever we go, it must be a place safe from typhoons. They were greatly relieved when I said that we were aware of the typhoon, and that we had a plan for staying safe.

We’ve known for several days that a typhoon was brewing, and figured we would easily be into Osaka before it was a factor. We had planned departure from our anchorage at Hamajima at 4:30am, in the dark, and had ‘dropped tracks’ on Nobeltec, so that we could weave our way through the fishing gear in the dark.

However, when we woke at 3:30am, for our 110 nm passage, I opened my email and our day was to go differently than planned.

Here is an excerpt from an email we received from our weather router, Bob:

To: Captains Ken, Steve, Braun - G.S.S.R. Group
Fm: O.M.N.I./USA www.oceanmarinenav.com
1120Z 05 SEP 2009

TS [Tropical Storm] Dujuan is expected to continue strengthening to a Typhoon and should move along a more NE-NNE course over the next 24-48hrs. […]

The primary period of concern will be between 06/1200Z and 07/2100Z when the pressure gradients along the coast are expected to be their strongest. NE-ly winds ranging 22-35kts with intervals/gusts of 40kts along the coast of Japan are expected. […]

Therefore, based on the worsening trend for winds along the coast of Japan and your location being the furthest north/west you can get from TS/Typ Dujuan, we suggest you remain in port for at least 48hrs (possibly longer) and allow Dujuan to pass to your south/east and allow for easier wind/seas to develop. […]

Please keep us advised of your intentions. B/Rgds, Bob/OMNI

A quick look at the Japan Typhoon Warning website showed us that the typhoon was approaching faster than we had previously thought. We had one day to get somewhere safe.

We discussed staying where we were, at Hamajima. There was a nearby commercial fishing port, but it was full, and not typhoon safe. We thought we were well protected at anchor, but weren’t positive. It was a tight anchorage. We had put out only 3 to 1 scope (three times the depth in chain). This was fine in normal circumstances, but would not stand up to a typhoon. We couldn’t put out more chain without running into each other and all the fishing gear. It was time to move.

This meant a 4am emergency call to our Japanese agent. Inpressively, he was already up and working on our behalf. He was working on trying to get us into a port called Katsuura, only 60 nm away, but the port wasn’t open yet. There were no closer typhoon-safe marinas within range we could go to. Unfortunately, at 4am, there aren’t a lot of people you can call, and we didn’t really want to leave a anchorage, where we thought we might be safe, for the uncertainty of a port we didn’t know we could enter. After evaluating the situation, we decided that we had to move, and informed our agent that we were moving. He needed to ‘make it happen’ for us at Katsuura.

As a side note, and because my blog will be read by future cruisers traveling to Japan, I should plug the agent we've been using: He has been incredible to work with, and I don't' know how we could have cruised Japan without his help: Kazuo Furuno, Interocean Shipping Corporation, http://www.interocean.co.jp/

In an effort to ‘hedge our bets,’ we also called the Japan Coast Guard on the radio, and said we needed to move, and could they suggest a place. We were lucky and found an English speaking radio operator. The Coast Guard also recommended Katsuura. When we asked them if there was space at Katsuura, they said there was no way to know as the port office would not open for an hour or two.

We decided it was time to move, and that we would head towards Katsuura. If for some reason, we received word that there was no space for us, we could always return to our anchorage at Hamajima.

Within minutes of departing Hamajima, we received the great news that our agent had phoned, and almost certainly woke up, the person responsible for the commercial fishing portion of Katsuura. They did have space for us!

Our run to Katsuura was in dead-calm seas. I would have thought that if I were ever running from a typhoon, I’d be doing it in horrendous conditions, but it wasn’t like that at all. We had flat seas, and blue skies. It was one of our better passages. I even saw a shark! At first I thought it might be a dolphin, which we see often, but this was moving slow through the water. Shark sightings are rare for us, and although it didn’t hang out long enough that I could take its picture, I was able to see it swim along side, which I thought was fairly cool.

On arrival at Katsuura I immediately realized we were in a very special place. The port and city are protected on all sides by very interesting looking hills.

We are also surrounded by immense hotels. After a bit of googling, The hotel shown above spans five buildings. I discovered that Katsuura (or, is it Nachikatsuura?) is an 'Onsen town.' All of the hotels have Japanese-style 'Ryokan' rooms. Tourists come here for the onsen, or baths. Think of it as hot-tubbing, in hot, natural, spring water. The Japanese love it. In fact, the entire town around us, Katsuura, exists to service the demand for onsen. The bad news though is that onsen-ing is done naked, and the vast majority of the time, segregated by gender. Co-ed, I might consider it, but spending my day hanging out with a bunch of naked guys, is not at the top of my list. That said, I’m quite supportive of the underlying concept, and went way out of our way to build our Nordhavn with a hot tub. Although it’s not particularly my cup of tea, the onsen are one of the cooler features of Japan. Amusingly, the Japanese attribute the segregation to the puritanical Americans who frowned about the co-ed bathing when we arrived here centuries ago.

Anyway, I digress, and there is a typhoon coming! …

One of the worst features of tying to a wall is that as the tide rises and falls, your boat must go with it, even though the wall does not. If the wind is pushing you into the wall, this can mean crushed fenders, and popped fenders. When we tied to the wall, I had to climb up to the dock. However, as you can see in the photos above, once the tide rose, our fenders were almost above the dock. This is reasonably ok if the seas are calm, but a really good typhoon can change the equation. Imagine having your fenders about six inches below the wall when you have a two foot swell rolling through the marina. We could easily wind up with the boats sitting on land. After surveying the port, and analyzing the situation, we decided that we were in as good a position as the port had to offer. It is a very protected port, and the typhoon isn’t expected to be a direct hit. We decided that if worst came to worst, we’d move off the wall and drop anchor in the center of the port, but seriously doubt it will come to that. We feel very safe.

Today was spent just exploring the town. One thing is clear: although Katsuura is a tourist town, it is a ‘Japanese tourist town.’ I suspect we may be the first American boats in the port. If there have been others, there haven’t been many others. Roberta and I walked through the town today with a goal of finding any restaurant with a menu in English. No luck. We had planned a group dinner tonight, but Roberta and I decided to eat on board, rather than deal with not being able to order. It’s a lovely town, but we are foreigners and can’t communicate. Maybe we’ll find something tomorrow.

We've somewhat become a tourist attraction ourselves. As we've moved away from Tokyo, and areas where they receive frequent foreign visitors, the novelty of us being here has increased. Cars have been stopping since our arrival, to take our pictures. In Omaezaki, we could see people stopping, taking our pictures, and then phoning friends, so that they too could come see the strange-looking ships.

Interestingly, it was actually a very nice day. There is a gentle breeze, and nothing other than the internet indicates that a typhoon is coming. With a little luck, we’ll have the same good fortune as in Yokohama, and the typhoon will pass by harmlessly.

And, on a completely different topic…

I’ve been lazy about using the video camera. My apologies. I tend to forget about shooting video, because I’m not accustomed to it. That said, I did shoot a little video of our departure from Yokohama. We had high winds, and fairly rough seas, but because the wind was behind us, it really wasn’t a bad trip. However, had we been going the other direction, we’d have had a very bad day. Compare, in the video below, our ride, to that of the giant freighter going into the wind. If you don’t see the video below, click this link to see it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlonMdoRJmo

That’s it for today. Thank you!

Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

GSSR#38 - Shimoda Japan

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Moving a boat, during typhoon season in Japan, is a challenge.

The last major passage of our run from Seattle to Osaka, Japan, is a comparatively short 400 nm run from Yokohama (near Tokyo) to Osaka.

Just prior to our departure, we had a near-miss from a typhoon. This was followed, almost immediately, by news of a Cat 4 hurricane that was approaching Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Although the GSSR is in Japan, it had me worrying, because our son lives in Cabo and we have a home there. Roberta and I were first alerted to the approaching hurricane by our son calling to say that his house was flooded, and he was worried the damage could get MUCH worse. This resulted in us being up all night worrying about him, his house and our house, although mostly worried about him. The hurricane was projected to hit Cabo as a Cat 5.

Like our typhoon here in Japan, the hurricane turned at the last minute and missed Cabo.

So, with that start to my day, the GSSR group departed Yokohama at 6:30am for Shimoda, Japan, only 70 nm to the south. The map above shows our route from Yokohama (near Tokyo) to Osaka. The portion highlighted in red is our route from Yokohama to Shimoda.

The weather was predicted to be a bit rough, somewhat on the high side of what we would normally consider acceptable for a departure. There is a difference between weather that would ‘sneak up’ on you once already at sea and willingly going out into known rough conditions from the get-go.

‘02/1600Z-03/0300Z (Yokohama to Shimoda) : NE-ENE 15-20kt, gusty 25kts (possibly up to 30kt) possible through the period. Waves 3-5ft closest to the coast, up to 7-8ft further offshore. Swells protected early on, then ENE to ESE 2-4ft over more exposed waters by 03/00Z.’

Upon reading this, I was thinking, “OK. I’ll have 20 to 25 knot winds, but they’ll be behind me all the way. No big deal.”

However, at departure, I had the sense that the winds were going to be higher than projected. We were seeing 20 knots inside the Yokohama Bayside Marina, and knew it would be worse in open water. We exited the port all right, but it was a challenge navigating through the marina.

We had hoped that by departing Yokohama early in the morning, we would avoid all the traffic. On our entry into Yokohama, it had been tense weaving our way through seemingly hundreds of boats. Unfortunately, the traffic was just as thick except now we were doing it in poorer weather conditions. The freighter in the picture above passed within a hundred yards of me. Normally other boats steer around our “fleet” of three boats, although traffic was so thick that boats were passing through us regularly.

As projected, the wind was behind us, but the seas were rougher than forecast, and the wind was much stronger. We had steady winds from 30 to 35 knots, with a short period above 40. Seabird saw a gust over 50 knots. The boats handled the seas flawlessly, although it was one of those days I was very happy to have a Nordhavn.

Complicating the trip, I noticed a hose leaking badly on my port engine. It was a small, but steady leak, of sea water that was intended to cool the engine. I tried to tighten the hose, only to have the leak intensify. I messed with the hose clamp, and reduced the leak to a drop per second, and returned to the pilothouse.

For some reason, the lack of sleep the night before, the heat of the engine room, and then the cool of the air-conditioned pilot house all worked against me. I spent about 20 minutes working in the heat, and once back in the pilot house, I suddenly had the chills. A couple minutes later I was violently ill, and proceeded to empty my stomach contents onto the side of the boat. I’m prone to seasickness, but usually only enough to be queasy. This was much worse. This was an unfortunate time for me to be sick as a small freighter was coming straight toward us and Roberta had to make a quick decision to turn us to port in order to miss it. I was unaware this was going on as I was busy hanging my head over the side of the boat.

I was feeling better by the time we arrived near Shimoda, and our hope was that the winds would subside as we turned the corner. No such luck. In fact they never really subsided until we were safely at the dock.

I should say something about Japanese hospitality, and how we came to have our boats at the dock pictured above.

Prior to our trip, we had heard that Japan was an incredible place to cruise, and that the Japanese people would be the high-point of our trip. For some reason, we are being treated like celebrities. Very few American boats come to Japan, so perhaps that is why, although my sense is that the Japanese are very proud of their country, and excited about the opportunity to show it to us. Whatever it is, we have been treated exceptionally well. Other cruisers seem to get the same treatment. Here’s a link to the blog from a sailboat that cruised here a couple of years ago, who experienced the same wonderful treatment we’ve received: http://www.sailblogs.com/member/shadowoflorelei/?xjMsgID=36767

To make a long story short, we have made many friends in our short time here, who have done great things for us. At the Yokohama Bayside Marina, a Japanese businessman introduced himself to us at the docks (I’ve obscured his face in the photo above for privacy purposes), then bought us some incredible dinners, and made calls, arranging moorage for us in Shimoda. I had planned just to anchor, as there didn’t seem to be a marina. We’re lucky we ran into him because anchoring in Shimoda wouldn’t have worked. Then after arrival in Shimoda, his friend, who owns the dock upon which we now tied, called our next port (Omaezaki) where he talked another friend of his into offering us moorage there for free. Our first night in Shimoda, another acquaintance of our Yokohama friend took us out for an amazing feast.

I keep worrying that they will discover we are not rock stars, movie stars, or any other kind of celebrity, and everyone will stop being so nice to us. For now though, we certainly enjoy being spoiled!

We have now been in Shimoda for a couple of days waiting for the wind to subside. To be honest, I chose Shimoda because it looked well sheltered on the charts. I knew nothing about the town.

But, as it turns out, Shimoda has quite a history….

In the mid 1600s, Japan deliberately cut itself off from the rest of the world, preferring isolation to contact and trade with other countries. Some trade was permitted but was very tightly controlled.

In 1853, Commander Perry, from the United States, sailed into the bay at Shimoda with a fleet of four warships, called by the Japanese, the Black Ships. Perry demanded that Japan open trade with the West, and most specifically with the United States. A year later he returned with seven ships, and forced Japan to sign the ‘Treaty of Peace and Amity,’ establishing formal diplomatic trade between the two countries. The United States established the first consulate in Japan, at Shimoda, in 1856. Townsend Harris was the first America consul for Japan – he lived in Shimoda from 1856 to 1859.

There’s a very touching quote on a memorial to Townsend Harris, taken from his diary, in which he is speaking of the first American flag to be put on Japanese soil:

‘Thursday, September 4, 1856. Slept very little, from excitement and mosquitoes. … Men on shore to put up my flag staff. Heavy lot. Slow work. Spar falls, breaks cross-trees. Fortunately, no one hurt. At last get a reinforcement from the ship. Flag staff erected. Men form a ring round it, and half past two P.M. of this day I hoist the first Consular flag ever seen in this empire. Grave reflections. Ominous of change. Undoubted beginning of the end. Query: if for real good for Japan?”

Today, Shimoda is a tourist destination. A modern version of the black ships shuttles tourists to beautiful white sand beaches. The town is famous for its Ryokans (Japanese traditional hotels) and Onsens (Hot Springs). We enjoyed being tourists, and would have stayed much longer, except for word of another approaching typhoon.

Shimoda is not a safe place to be on a boat should a typhoon strike. We have three days to go further south.

We were unhappy about leaving Shimoda, both because we were having fun, and because the winds were still projected to be 25 knots. However, I am typing this while we are at sea, and after a few hours of high winds, the winds have suddenly dropped. We are now at 3 knots of wind, and having great fun!

To be continued…

Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

GSSR#37 - Well, that wasn't very exciting

Mon, 31 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

I always say that writing my blog feels at times like a battle between myself and the readers. It's like a Nascar race. If they were to send out a press release saying, "We have new-improved cars, which are absolutely guaranteed never to bump into anything." The drivers might be happy, but the bleachers would be empty.

Well, I'm VERY happy to report that...

The typhoon appears to have missed us. We spent yesterday preparing for the typhoon, and have been waiting all day for what was supposed to be a direct strike with 80 knot winds. I even charged the batteries on my camera, and on the camcorder, and the wind never passed 22 knots. It was rolly for a while in the marina, but that was it.

Unless there's another storm on the horizon, the GSSR will be back on the move as soon as the sea is calm.

Our plan was to take a week working our way slowly to Osaka, 400 miles south, cruising only during the day, and stopping to anchor along the way. This is the last passage of the GSSR and we'd like to enjoy it. However, my sense is that our close-call with the typhoon will accelerate our trip south. The height of typhoon season is the wrong time for a leisurely cruise down the coast. I don't think we'll run around the clock, but I suspect we'll run faster than we would have.

I'll write more once we are underway.

-Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

GSSR#36 - Typhoon!

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Greetings all!

I've received several emails asking about the typhoon now approaching Japan, so this is a short update. I'll post something longer later today as we get through the typhoon.

For the past two weeks, we’ve been sitting still, enjoying life, at the Yokohama Bay Marina (http://www.ybmarina.com/english/index.html), just outside Tokyo. It’s a spectacular marina, and Japan’s largest, holding 1,500 boats!

Just in front of the marina are several restaurants, and a mall, which is a shopper's paradise (Adidas, Timberland, Eddie Bauer, Lacoste, Nike, Levis, OshKosh B'Gosh , J Crew, etc.) There is also easy access to a train station which we've used to visit downtown Yokohama and Tokyo (only about 90 minutes away).

Our boats were planned to leave today, to start our 400 mile run from Yokohama Japan to Osaka.

Unfortunately, the approaching typhoon has altered our plans….

Japan is an awesome place to cruise, however, September is the wrong month to go cruising. It is the height of their typhoon season. Next year, when we return to the boats, we'll come earlier in the season. Our timing this year was set by trying to find the best weather in the Bering Sea.

All three GSSR boats spent the yesterday ‘battening down the hatches;’ preparing our boats for the storm that will hit us an hour from now. As I type this, the prediction is that we’ll take a direct hit. Luckily, it is projected to be a ‘small typhoon.’ We should ‘only’ see winds of around 60 knots with gusts to 80 knots.

We're currently seeing rain, and winds of only 10-15 knots inside the marina, but there is a strong current, and a one-foot chop, that hasn't been here before. We're rolling around quite a bit. It's a reminder that the you-know-what will hit the fan very soon now.

To be honest, I’ve never gone through a hurricane, or a typhoon (which I’m told is the same thing), so I’m not completely sure what to expect. At anchor, a few years back, we did once experience winds that gusted to 75 knots. It was a terrifying experience, as several other boats around us broke anchor and wound up on the beach.

The marina staff has been incredibly helpful. They arranged to move our boats to a more secure place, and helped us move the boats. The harbormaster dropped by the boat several times yesterday to check on us, and to let us know that six of his staff would be sleeping in the office, overnight, ready to help if needed.

Since I took the pictures above, all three boats have beefed up their lines. Unless the whole dock moves, we aren't going anywhere. If I have any worries, it would be the boats around us, some of which don't look well prepared. In a way, that is somewhat reassuring. Typhoons are a regular event here in Japan, and the marina is well protected (I hope!) If the locals aren't that worried, then we will be fine.

It's raining now, and I don't really want to get the camera wet, so no more pictures for now, but I'll try to have photos and video later today. Hopefully they won't be very exciting.

That said, for some real excitement, check out this photo:

It's a Nordhavn 57 pushing its way through the ice, up in the Northwest passage. If you haven't been following the blog, check it out, and register, at: http://northwestpassagefilm.com/arctic/ It's pretty humbling to think about what they are accomplishing!

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

Trouble finding anchorages on the way to Osaka

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

My project for today is to try to find better charts for our run to Osaka.

Our plan is to depart Yokohama, headed to Osaka, around August 30th. It’s a 400 mile run, and we want to break it down to a series of day runs. All three of the GSSR boats are now running with just the owners. Overnight runs are certainly possible, but not preferable.

We’d like to find anchorages, spaced about 80 miles apart. Currently, I’ve identified only one; called Shimoda.

Even Shimoda is messy, in that my Nobeltec charts, and also the paper charts, have no depths. It’s VERY frustrating. I’m sure there are plenty of great places to drop the hook between here and there, but, where? Nowhere promising has any depth information on the charts. I can't seem to find any crusing guides for Japan, even in Japanese, and the coast pilot doesn't have good information. Basically, we're flying blind in shallow water loaded with fishing nets.

Complicating the quest, we need to know where the ports are, so that if a typhoon comes along, we can hide. Allegedly, Septembers average four typhoons a month, in southern Japan, and we’re heading further south. I need to identify all the good places to hole-up should a typhoon hit. Realistically though, if we are half-way through our run when we see a typhoon coming, my guess is that we’ll decide to run around the clock to reach Osaka.

I’m off to a chart store, in a quest for better information than I have now. I’m sure it will all be in Japanese, but if the depths are in English, I’ll be fine…

-Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

A discussion about weather and mechanical issues

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

I posted a couple of messages on the NordhavnDreamers board on Yahoo, that I thought might be interesting reading for people here. The first discusses all the bad weather that we DIDN’T experience on our way from Seattle to Japan, and the second, is a summary of all the mechanical issues we faced. Neither is particularly interesting, and can be summarized as “We had good weather and didn’t have many mechanical issues.”

But first, I thought I’d pass along a couple pictures from a party on Sans Souci last night.

It was a bit of a special party for Steven and Carol Argosy (Seabird), and one that meant a lot to them. We met on top of Sans Souci to watch Steven give a speech, and toss a key overboard. The event is a little hard to explain. Steven and Carol have been on a multi-year campaign to simplify their lives. This has meant selling their business, their home, their cars, etc. Steven has always thought of it as wanting to get their life down to a single key, the one to the boat. Recently he sold a building, which represented his last key other than the one to Seabird.

Here you see us having dinner on the back deck of Sans Souci. This is the first time the whole group has met to discuss next year’s cruising plans. I published some preliminary thoughts in my last blog, and our plan didn’t shift much from what was there, other than there is now some interest in going to China (Shanghai) and to Korea. The next step is to start researching all of the issues. Are there marinas? What about typhoon season? Where can we safely leave the boats? Are there issues with our dog? Etc.

It was also the first time we've discussed whether or not we'd stay together as a group. The discussion took about 5 seconds. Everyone unanimously agreed that we're a good group, and that we'd like to keep cruising together. Yay!!!

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

PS I'm not sending this blog entry out ... my policy is to not send the entries out when we're not cruising, and we're sitting still for a couple weeks. That will change soon though. A week from now, we'll be back on the road!

OK … here are the two message board postings I mentioned:

	I had a fun discussion today with Steven and Carol Argosy on Seabird that I thought I'd pass along. We were talking about our current trip, and how fortunate we had been with the weather. Over the past four months we have run over 6,000 miles, from Seattle to Japan, through Alaska, the Bering Sea and Russia. We did this against the advice of some very smart boaters, and even earned the nickname 'the wrong way gang' for swimming up stream. I probably shouldn't admit this, but it really wasn't that bad a trip. We were trying to quantify how many hours we had of rough seas. The term 'rough seas' is subjective, and means different things to different people, and to different boats. Amongst our group, out of the 6,000 miles run, the highest estimate was that we were in rough seas for about 20 hours, and the lowest was closer to 8 hours. In other words, we ran some of the nastiest seas in the world, crossed the Pacific, and had a good time doing so. It really wasn't a rough trip at all. Braun (Grey Pearl) and I had this discussion a few nights ago. I said that we were lucky (with the weather), and Braun said that I was being unfair to ourselves. The truth is that we had an easy time of it because: 1) We chose the best months to make the passage 2) We picked a route that had lots of places to hide from bad weather 3) We had good weather routers 4) We listened to the weather routers, and supplemented them with our own research. 5) We moved only when there was clear agreement that it was safe to move. In other words, the secret to dealing with rough seas is actually fairly simple: avoid them. If you follow the rules above, you can go anywhere, and most likely, you will have a smooth time of it. Actually, we had it far better than anyone anticipated or predicted. I asked Steven and Braun whether they thought the currents were against us, or with us, the majority of the time. None of the three of us thought the currents were overwhelmingly against us. It seemed balanced. Sometimes the currents helped us, sometimes they didn't. Braun advised me against admitting that we had so little pounding into bad weather. His thought was that we'd have [censored] owners, and [censored] owners trying the passage, and someone would get killed and we'd have blood on our hands. Braun is right. I shouldn't downplay the potential seriousness of the seas, but the fact of the matter is that we did have a trip in which 99.9% of the time, we were in benign seas. And, the other .1% really wasn't all that bad. I don't think any of us ever felt in danger. So ... if there is any skillset I'd encourage those wanting to do long-distance cruising to acquire, it would be to get good at reading weather faxes, and to work with a good weather router. We had two on our trip; Weather Bob, from ocmarnav.com, and Rich Courtney, who is a NOAA weather forecaster, who is a friend of a friend, guiding us just because he's a good guy, and we needed/wanted all the help we could get. Choosing your route is as important as choosing your weather. A friend wrote me last week asking who our weather router is, so that they could consult with them on their passage from San Francisco to Hawaii. Unfortunately, the weather router is somewhat irrelevant for that particular passage. Once my friend leaves the dock, the weather is what the weather is, and there isn't a darn thing anyone can do about it. Weather forecasting is only accurate 24 to 48 hours into the future. Consulting a weather forecaster during a 20 day passage is a futile endeavor. On a power boat, fuel is tight on major passages, and once you are out at sea, your abilities to hide from bad weather are non-existent. So, I guess my message is: If you are worried about bad weather, don't be. By developing a reasonable understanding of weather forecasting, and perhaps speaking with a weather router, you can limit your exposure to bad weather to a tiny fraction of your cruising. The vast majority of the time you will be enjoying gentle seas and having fun. And since this is the Nordhavn Dreamers board, and in deference to Braun's worry that our good fortune will lure [censored] and [censored] owners out into hazardous waters, I'll add that even with all the forecasting in the world, there will still be that tiny percentage of the time when you get caught in rough seas, and those are the times you'll be darn happy you have a solid boat beneath you. -Ken Williams Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci www.kensblog.com

I had a fun discussion today with Steven and Carol Argosy on Seabird that I
thought I'd pass along.

We were talking about our current trip, and how fortunate we had been with the
weather. Over the past four months we have run over 6,000 miles, from Seattle to
Japan, through Alaska, the Bering Sea and Russia. We did this against the advice
of some very smart boaters, and even earned the nickname 'the wrong way gang'
for swimming up stream.

I probably shouldn't admit this, but it really wasn't that bad a trip. We were
trying to quantify how many hours we had of rough seas. The term 'rough seas' is
subjective, and means different things to different people, and to different
boats. Amongst our group, out of the 6,000 miles run, the highest estimate was
that we were in rough seas for about 20 hours, and the lowest was closer to 8
hours. In other words, we ran some of the nastiest seas in the world, crossed
the Pacific, and had a good time doing so. It really wasn't a rough trip at all.

Braun (Grey Pearl) and I had this discussion a few nights ago. I said that we
were lucky (with the weather), and Braun said that I was being unfair to
ourselves. The truth is that we had an easy time of it because:

1) We chose the best months to make the passage
2) We picked a route that had lots of places to hide from bad weather
3) We had good weather routers
4) We listened to the weather routers, and supplemented them with our own
research.
5) We moved only when there was clear agreement that it was safe to move.

In other words, the secret to dealing with rough seas is actually fairly simple:
avoid them. If you follow the rules above, you can go anywhere, and most likely,
you will have a smooth time of it.

Actually, we had it far better than anyone anticipated or predicted. I asked
Steven and Braun whether they thought the currents were against us, or with us,
the majority of the time. None of the three of us thought the currents were
overwhelmingly against us. It seemed balanced. Sometimes the currents helped us,
sometimes they didn't.

Braun advised me against admitting that we had so little pounding into bad
weather. His thought was that we'd have [censored] owners, and [censored] owners
trying the passage, and someone would get killed and we'd have blood on our
hands. Braun is right. I shouldn't downplay the potential seriousness of the
seas, but the fact of the matter is that we did have a trip in which 99.9% of
the time, we were in benign seas. And, the other .1% really wasn't all that bad.
I don't think any of us ever felt in danger.

So ... if there is any skillset I'd encourage those wanting to do long-distance
cruising to acquire, it would be to get good at reading weather faxes, and to
work with a good weather router. We had two on our trip; Weather Bob, from
ocmarnav.com, and Rich Courtney, who is a NOAA weather forecaster, who is a
friend of a friend, guiding us just because he's a good guy, and we
needed/wanted all the help we could get.

Choosing your route is as important as choosing your weather. A friend wrote me
last week asking who our weather router is, so that they could consult with them
on their passage from San Francisco to Hawaii. Unfortunately, the weather router
is somewhat irrelevant for that particular passage. Once my friend leaves the
dock, the weather is what the weather is, and there isn't a darn thing anyone
can do about it. Weather forecasting is only accurate 24 to 48 hours into the
future. Consulting a weather forecaster during a 20 day passage is a futile
endeavor. On a power boat, fuel is tight on major passages, and once you are out
at sea, your abilities to hide from bad weather are non-existent.

So, I guess my message is: If you are worried about bad weather, don't be. By
developing a reasonable understanding of weather forecasting, and perhaps
speaking with a weather router, you can limit your exposure to bad weather to a
tiny fraction of your cruising. The vast majority of the time you will be
enjoying gentle seas and having fun.

And since this is the Nordhavn Dreamers board, and in deference to Braun's worry
that our good fortune will lure [censored] and [censored] owners out into
hazardous waters, I'll add that even with all the forecasting in the world,
there will still be that tiny percentage of the time when you get caught in
rough seas, and those are the times you'll be darn happy you have a solid boat
beneath you.

-Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

	The GSSR - Any mechanical failures? (Renamed topic, was Pros and Cons of APH) N4061 asked a fun question, "Ken, I would be interested to hear what type of mechanical failures, if any, did the three boats experienced on this journey. How were they fixed or what type of work around was used?" Technically, the GSSR is not complete. We still have at least 400 miles to go, so there is still plenty of time for things to go wrong. Thus far, I am very thrilled to be able to say that, through our first 6,000 miles, we have had no serious mechanical problems on any GSSR boat. No boat has had to be towed. No boat has had to quit a run early due to mechanical failure. And, no departure has been delayed for mechanical reasons. There are a few reasons for this. 1) They're Nordhavns, and built to take it! 2) Prior to the start of the GSSR all three boats had a lot of work done. We knew we were starting a long run, in potentially difficult waters, and we wanted the boats to be in perfect condition. When we left the dock in Seattle, the boats were `as good as new'. 3) We kept the boats well maintained during the run. Systems were checked and re-checked often. We did have a few minor issues, but none that kept us from moving. I've included a list below. Sans Souci's list is longer than for the other two boats, but this probably just reflects that I know more about the maintenance issues on my boat than on the other boats. In looking at the lists, autopilot issues seem the only common denominator. We all had at least one hiccup. I don't remember anyone having issues on the Fubar or NAR, so I suspect this is just `one of those things'. We saw some very strange sea conditions, and perhaps this confused the autopilots. The interesting year will be next year. It is too soon to say where we're going, or if we'll even stick together as a group. My best guess is that we will, and that we'll rack up a bunch more miles, but I really have no idea. I'm not aware of any of us who have major maintenance being done this winter. We'll be starting next year with boats that aren't in the same pristine shape as last year, and in water that is much warmer. We're now in 85 degree water and will be heading further south. The hotter weather can be tougher on the systems than the 40 degree water we had farther north. Ken Williams N6805, Sans Souci ================ Grey Pearl --------------- * Couldn't pump out black water tank I'm not sure what the fix was. I think a cracked pipe was found and repaired. * Auto pilot glitch A couple times, when running, the Pearl popped out of auto-pilot. This was never resolved. * Hydraulics quit This turned out to be water intrusion to an electrical box that was somehow related to the stabilizers. It was resolved by cleaning things up and relocating the electrical box. I believe the water was just condensation. * Anchor wouldn't come up A hydraulic hose burst. A new hose was made up and installed at our next stop. The anchor was brought up by hand. Seabird ----------- * Generator stop solenoid failure I'm not 100% certain I understand this issue. It affected both Seabird and Sans Souci. There is a solenoid on the generator which shuts down the engine. Seabird and Sans Souci have essentially the same Northern Lights generator, except that mine is 20kw and Seabird's is 16kw. As I understand it, there is a `new technology' stop solenoid, and both Seabird and Sans Souci were among the first to try it. Unfortunately, it was apparently a flawed design, and both our solenoids failed. Our backups were of the same `new improved' design, and they also failed. Old-style solenoids were flown in. * Shutdown solenoid failure The solenoid which shuts down Seabird's main engine fried. A replacement was bought, and it also failed. I'm not certain how this was resolved, but believe some rewiring was done. * Radar couldn't spot remote targets Seabird had a new radar installed. It needed some tuning to get it working right. * Dead autopilot One of Seabird's two autopilots failed. A new one was flown in, and Seabird ran on the backup for a while. * Dead alternator The alternator on the main engine failed. Seabird runs fine without it. I don't know if this has been repaired. Sans Souci --------------- * Generator solenoid failure This issue was common to Seabird and Sans Souci. See my write-up above. * Toilet failure One of the toilets on Sans Souci failed. We carry complete `guts' replacements for the toilets. This should have been a simple swap but apparently Sealand upgraded their toilets, and our backup was not an exact replacement. We were able to repair the existing toilet. * Stabilizer failure The stabilizers quit. The problem was a stuck pressure valve. We adjusted the pressure and in minutes we were back up and running. * Nobeltec glitch Once, Nobeltec inexplicably decided to ignore the GPS input and entered `Dead Reckoning' mode. A simple reboot of Nobeltec fixed it. * Autopilot glitch Once, Sans Souci's autopilot kicked out of Nav mode, causing the boat to veer off course. I put it back into Nav mode, and all was fine. I've run a thousand miles since without incident. * A/C and Heating instability I completely replaced my heating/cooling system during the off-season, and have made great strides forward, but still have occasional glitches. Sometimes, I have to reset the system a few times to get it going. I haven't quite figured out the pattern. * Hole in tender We accidentally popped the tender landing a 275 pound halibut. Patching the tender was non-trivial, with the toughest issue being to get the glue flown in. I had a patch kit on board, but it was for small punctures, not a giant rip. * Failure on one seachest intake The seachest has two raw water intakes. During engine room checks we noted that one intake didn't have water flowing. We bled air from the strainer and this solved the problem. Our best guess is that the air was pushed in during rough seas, but this remained unresolved. It only happened once. * Rope on prop We had to cut some rope off one of my props. The boat was running fine, with no noticeable vibration. *** Internet instability My new Mini Vsat has worked reliably all the way across the Pacific and here in Japan. EXCEPT: it seems to hang two or three times a day, and needs reset. Rebooting resolves the issue. I've called KVH many times, but do not yet have this resolved.

The GSSR - Any mechanical failures? (Renamed topic, was Pros and Cons of APH)

N4061 asked a fun question, "Ken, I would be interested to hear what type of
mechanical failures, if any, did the three boats experienced on this journey.
How were they fixed or what type of work around was used?"

Technically, the GSSR is not complete. We still have at least 400 miles to go,
so there is still plenty of time for things to go wrong.

Thus far, I am very thrilled to be able to say that, through our first 6,000
miles, we have had no serious mechanical problems on any GSSR boat. No boat has
had to be towed. No boat has had to quit a run early due to mechanical failure.
And, no departure has been delayed for mechanical reasons.

There are a few reasons for this.

1) They're Nordhavns, and built to take it!
2) Prior to the start of the GSSR all three boats had a lot of work done. We
knew we were starting a long run, in potentially difficult waters, and we wanted
the boats to be in perfect condition. When we left the dock in Seattle, the
boats were `as good as new'.
3) We kept the boats well maintained during the run. Systems were checked and
re-checked often.

We did have a few minor issues, but none that kept us from moving. I've included
a list below. Sans Souci's list is longer than for the other two boats, but this
probably just reflects that I know more about the maintenance issues on my boat
than on the other boats.

In looking at the lists, autopilot issues seem the only common denominator. We
all had at least one hiccup. I don't remember anyone having issues on the Fubar
or NAR, so I suspect this is just `one of those things'. We saw some very
strange sea conditions, and perhaps this confused the autopilots.

The interesting year will be next year. It is too soon to say where we're going,
or if we'll even stick together as a group. My best guess is that we will, and
that we'll rack up a bunch more miles, but I really have no idea. I'm not aware
of any of us who have major maintenance being done this winter. We'll be
starting next year with boats that aren't in the same pristine shape as last
year, and in water that is much warmer. We're now in 85 degree water and will be
heading further south. The hotter weather can be tougher on the systems than the
40 degree water we had farther north.

Ken Williams
N6805, Sans Souci

================

Grey Pearl
---------------

*** Couldn't pump out black water tank

I'm not sure what the fix was. I think a cracked pipe was found and repaired.

*** Auto pilot glitch

A couple times, when running, the Pearl popped out of auto-pilot. This was never
resolved.

*** Hydraulics quit

This turned out to be water intrusion to an electrical box that was somehow
related to the stabilizers. It was resolved by cleaning things up and relocating
the electrical box. I believe the water was just condensation.

*** Anchor wouldn't come up

A hydraulic hose burst. A new hose was made up and installed at our next stop.
The anchor was brought up by hand.

Seabird
-----------

*** Generator stop solenoid failure

I'm not 100% certain I understand this issue. It affected both Seabird and Sans
Souci. There is a solenoid on the generator which shuts down the engine. Seabird
and Sans Souci have essentially the same Northern Lights generator, except that
mine is 20kw and Seabird's is 16kw.

As I understand it, there is a `new technology' stop solenoid, and both Seabird
and Sans Souci were among the first to try it. Unfortunately, it was apparently
a flawed design, and both our solenoids failed. Our backups were of the same
`new improved' design, and they also failed. Old-style solenoids were flown in.

*** Shutdown solenoid failure

The solenoid which shuts down Seabird's main engine fried. A replacement was
bought, and it also failed. I'm not certain how this was resolved, but believe
some rewiring was done.

*** Radar couldn't spot remote targets

Seabird had a new radar installed. It needed some tuning to get it working
right.

*** Dead autopilot

One of Seabird's two autopilots failed. A new one was flown in, and Seabird ran
on the backup for a while.

*** Dead alternator

The alternator on the main engine failed. Seabird runs fine without it. I don't
know if this has been repaired.

Sans Souci
---------------

*** Generator solenoid failure

This issue was common to Seabird and Sans Souci. See my write-up above.

*** Toilet failure

One of the toilets on Sans Souci failed. We carry complete `guts' replacements
for the toilets. This should have been a simple swap but apparently Sealand
upgraded their toilets, and our backup was not an exact replacement. We were
able to repair the existing toilet.

*** Stabilizer failure

The stabilizers quit. The problem was a stuck pressure valve. We adjusted the
pressure and in minutes we were back up and running.

*** Nobeltec glitch

Once, Nobeltec inexplicably decided to ignore the GPS input and entered `Dead
Reckoning' mode. A simple reboot of Nobeltec fixed it.

*** Autopilot glitch

Once, Sans Souci's autopilot kicked out of Nav mode, causing the boat to veer
off course. I put it back into Nav mode, and all was fine. I've run a thousand
miles since without incident.

*** A/C and Heating instability

I completely replaced my heating/cooling system during the off-season, and have
made great strides forward, but still have occasional glitches. Sometimes, I
have to reset the system a few times to get it going. I haven't quite figured
out the pattern.

*** Hole in tender

We accidentally popped the tender landing a 275 pound halibut. Patching the
tender was non-trivial, with the toughest issue being to get the glue flown in.
I had a patch kit on board, but it was for small punctures, not a giant rip.

*** Failure on one seachest intake

The seachest has two raw water intakes. During engine room checks we noted that
one intake didn't have water flowing. We bled air from the strainer and this
solved the problem. Our best guess is that the air was pushed in during rough
seas, but this remained unresolved. It only happened once.

*** Rope on prop

We had to cut some rope off one of my props. The boat was running fine, with no
noticeable vibration.

*** Internet instability

My new Mini Vsat has worked reliably all the way across the Pacific and here in
Japan. EXCEPT: it seems to hang two or three times a day, and needs reset.
Rebooting resolves the issue. I've called KVH many times, but do not yet have
this resolved.

And lastly, here's a bit of fun; this is the invite I sent out announcing the party. No one 'got it', but it seemed appropriate at the time.

	As we discussed, you are invited to dinner tonight on Sans Souci! It’s ‘BYOWYWTTOTBPSTS’ (bring your own whatever you want to throw on the barbecue, plus something to share). Assuming you drink red wine, or alcohol-free beer, diet coke, or scotch I have you covered.. otherwise, you may want to bring something to drink. See you tonight! -Ken W PS A riddle… (which you’ll never figure out if you don’t speak French)

As we discussed, you are invited to dinner tonight on Sans Souci!

It’s ‘BYOWYWTTOTBPSTS’ (bring your own whatever you want to throw on the barbecue, plus something to share).

Assuming you drink red wine, or alcohol-free beer, diet coke, or scotch I have you covered.. otherwise, you may want to bring something to drink.

See you tonight!

-Ken W

PS A riddle… (which you’ll never figure out if you don’t speak French)

GSSR#35 - Tokyo and the Yokohama Bayside Marina

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

From Hachinohe to Yokohama is a 470 nm run. As we left the port, to work our way south, we didn’t know if we would be running one or two days. The weather outlook was dicey. A typhoon had just left the area, and the seas were still settling down. Another storm system was predicted to move into the area. The one day outlook was fine, but for our second day, the outlook was less certain.

When discussing whether 'to go' or 'no go,' a key factor is whether or not there are any bail-outs along the way. By ‘bail-out’ I am referring to ports, or places to anchor, that we could stop at if we didn’t like the weather. We all wanted to get to Yokohama, and didn’t really want to sit still through another storm system waiting for a long window of good weather. As long as we had a solid prediction of 24 hours of good weather, and plenty of places to bail out if we didn’t like the seas on the second day, it was an easy decision. The GSSR was back on the move.

Our biggest challenge, in navigating around Japan, has been all the fishing gear. Roberta and I took the second shift running the boat, and throughout our entire shift (3pm to 9pm), we dodged an endless stream of the little flag poles marking fishing gear. During daylight, they are fairly easy to dodge, and we’ve decided we can safely run within a few yards of them, without fouling our props. Unfortunately, they are not all the same. Most have poles that stick up from the water, but some just have a ball floating at water level. Some have radar reflectors on them, making them easy to spot on radar, but most do not. The big freighters ignore them and just run them over, whereas if we wrap one around a prop, it would mean putting a diver in the water. Given the warm water we are now in, this wouldn’t be a big deal during the day, but at night it would be a real headache.

Steven (Argosy, on Seabird) struck one, dead on...

All of our boats have line cutters mounted just ahead of the props. Theoretically, if we run over a line, the line cutter will chop it off, and we won’t have any damage. This is exactly how it worked for Steven. He heard it pass beneath the boat, and felt it tangle briefly with the prop. Looking back he saw the diced up line in the water. Afterwards, he felt no vibration and all was fine. A single line of rope isn’t a problem, but some of these might have chain beneath them, which could damage a prop, or a net, which could have too much line to easily be cut.

When Roberta and I retook the helm at 9am, the seas were ‘sloppy.’ We were seeing 20 to 25 knots of wind from directly behind us. Usually, a breeze from behind is good news, however, in this case, it was whipping up a significant swell from behind. This was being complicated by a significant current that was going against us. We were completely safe, but it wasn’t a comfortable ride, and everyone was worn out. It had been a tough night dodging fishing gear.

The prospect of spending another night dodging fishing gear was not appealing, and the rough seas would make it impossible to ‘see’ the flag poles on radar. With the rough seas, in the dark, we would have no choice but to mow down any gear that gets in our way. Braun (Jones on Grey Pearl) referred to it as ‘playing rudder roulette.’

Sans Souci was the only boat with any crew left. Both Seabird and Grey Pearl were running with just two people on board. As soon as Roberta and I were at the helm, we had a radio discussion amongst the boats, regarding whether or not we should stop for the night. The discussion didn’t last long. It was quickly unanimous that we’d like to exercise one of our ‘bail-out’ options.

I contacted our agent, Mr. Furuno, at InterOcean Shipping (http://www.interocean.co.jp/), and asked him to find us a port to pull into. An hour later he was back to me to say that he was unable to find us a suitable port, but had a marina that would take us, the Iwaki Sun Marina. He asked if this would be ok, and after reflecting on it for about one microsecond, I said “Absolutely!.” I contacted the other GSSR boats who were also excited. This could mean shorepower, and being able to get off the boat. Possibly even a restaurant close enough to walk to. Luxuries we hadn’t had in a while. A quick internet search showed that we were indeed very lucky. The Iwaki Sun marina looked like a real winner, and Furuno-san was our hero!

It is impossible to convey how good the marina looked to us. There was a sand beach, with people swimming, and a beautiful marina, with a restaurant at the dock!

Chris, our son, decided that since we were only a couple-hour train ride from Tokyo, he wanted to get off the boat and stay at a hotel in Tokyo. He had lived in Tokyo for seven years, and didn’t want to spend his entire vacation on the boat. We didn’t blame him.

It was decided that he would leave the next morning, and asked if we wanted to accompany him into town, to the train station, to buy his ticket. He said that the good restaurants tend to congregate around the train stations. Going into town sounded fun to our entire group, so we had the marina summon three taxis for us, and we set out for what we thought would be a ride into town of only a few minutes.

Unfortunately, we hit a language barrier and instead of the taxi drivers taking us to the local train station a few minutes away, all three cabs went to a train station over 45 minutes, and a $60 cab ride (for each taxi) away. Oops! By the time we got there, all of us were unhappy campers. It was no one’s fault, and we had fun anyway.

A second language-related issue almost occurred. We were all so tired that we picked the first restaurant we came to, even though the menu was 100% in Japanese. We figured that between our son, Chris, who speaks Japanese, and pointing at pictures in the menu, we’d be fine. I noticed a picture of what appeared to be a good- looking beef curry, and decided I wanted it. One of the others in our group also chose it. As I was ordering, by pointing at the picture, Chris happened to notice the words on the menu. I was ordering a horse-meat curry!!! Uh oh… The restaurant had an entire horse-meat page on the menu, and the menu touted horse as extremely healthy. I passed, as did the others at our table.

One ‘too good to be true’ asset of the marina was that it was next to an ocean-front golf course! I’m not much of a golfer, but what I lack in skill, I make up for in enthusiasm. Our group wouldn’t be leaving for Yokohama until the next afternoon, so Chris, Jeff and I booked a tee time. All they had available was a 5am tee time, which we grabbed. I have always heard that golf in Japan is off-the-top-of-the-charts expensive, so I was afraid of the cost, but how often in life do you get a chance to golf with your son in Japan?

The course was incredible!!! We had wonderful ocean views, and to my enormous surprise the cost was only $70 each, including rental clubs. All of us had a huge amount of fun, and we were back at the boats, ready to go, by 9:30am.

We didn’t get underway until nearly 3pm. We had only 195 miles to go, and wanted our last eight hours into Yokohama (near Tokyo) to be in daylight. Therefore, we needed a late departure time.

At 9pm Roberta and I handed off the helm to Jeff and Kirt. At 3am, six hours later, when we returned to the helm, Jeff looked under stress. All it took was one glance at the radar to understand why. There were at least a dozen large objects that they were tracking. We were surrounded by freighters!

Freighters move rapidly in comparison to Sans Souci, usually 15 to 20 knots. This doesn’t sound fast, but you would be amazed how quickly a freighter can approach. Sans Souci was surrounded by freighters, several of which were headed our direction.

My general rule is that I will not allow Sans Souci within one mile of a moving freighter. Sans Souci’s radar (and, chart plotter) continually analyzes Sans Souci’s course, as well that of surrounding vessels, and shows me for each vessel their ‘CPA’ (Closest Point of Approach). With a quick glance at the radar, I can tell for any vessel how close we’ll come to each other, and when we’ll be at the closest point. For instance, the radar might indicate that I have a CPA with a particular freighter of .5 miles in 12 minutes. This tells me I’m on a path to get closer to the freighter than I like, and that I have 12 minutes to solve the problem. With a single freighter, this usually is fairly easy, but when navigating through a pack of them, in the dark, it becomes a bit more complex.

There were a number of other factors adding extra layers of complexity. For some reason, at least half the freighters didn’t have AIS. With AIS, each boat’s position, and other important information, is constantly being transmitted to surrounding vessels. One key bit of information, available via AIS, is the name of the vessel. I’ve found, in the past, that when I contact another boat via the radio, being able to call them by name makes a huge difference in their likelihood to respond. That said, whereas it would normally be relevant, it didn’t seem to be in this case. I tried repeatedly to contact the freighters via VHF radio, using their names, unsuccessfully. I wanted to arrange how we could move out of each other’s ways safely. But, no one wanted to talk to me.

Adding further ‘excitement’ to our cruise, there seemed to be no recognition of the basic rules of the road. The freighters seemed to want to pursue their paths, and weren’t moving for anyone, including each other. When Jeff gave me his update, at the start of our shift, he said, “Ken. I have never seen freighters pass so close to each other. These guys seem to actually touch each other when viewed on the radar.” The freighters were being driven aggressively, and not about to move aside for our GSSR fleet.

Prior to our run, I had carefully plotted out a route, which our group had been following. Jeff said that he had given up trying to follow the route, and was focusing on only one thing: ‘Safety.’ We were a mile or more off my route when Roberta and I took the helm, and maneuvering constantly. Whereas ordinarily, we run an entire shift in ‘Nav Mode,’ following a track to within a thousandth of a nautical mile, we were now actively driving the boat, dodging traffic continuously.

Here’s something bizarre from Roberta’s and my shift:

We observed a target coming at us at 6 knots. This speed, and the size of the blip on the radar, indicated to me that it was a sailboat. I was being squeezed by a couple freighters, so I had to get within a quarter mile of it. Once it was in visual range, I could see that it was lit only by two red lights. There are standards which dictate how boats are lit, and if you know how to read the lights you know a bit about what the ship is up to. Two red lights, one over the other, means a vessel is in serious trouble. There are some cute sayings that we use to memorize what the lighting means; for instance, Red Over White, Fishing at Night. This particular boat seemed to be lit according to the saying ‘Red over Red, Captain is Dead.’ I was never close enough to get a really good look at the boat, although I could see it was a sail boat. It was randomly zigzagging through the water. I don’t think I’d want to be dead in the water, floating, and surrounding by fast-moving freighters. Or, perhaps it was just a sailboat tacking upwind, and ‘red over red’ means something completely different in Japanese...

At 4:30am, daylight arrived, and in the daylight, the freighters were much easier to dodge.

At 9am, I handed the helm back to Jeff and Kirt, knowing that when Roberta and I woke up at noon we’d almost be to Yokohama.

Our destination, Yokohama, sits about half way into 40 mile-deep Tokyo Bay. There are many commercial shipping ports within Tokyo Bay, and freighter traffic is constant. In the chart snippet above you see traffic lanes, representing where the freighter traffic should move. I routed the GSSR within the northbound traffic lane. Tokyo bay has an 11 knot speed limit, and I figured we could comfortably run at 9+ knots. We could still be overtaken by freighters, but I had assumed dodging a freighter moving at only 2 kts faster than us would be easy. I could always exit the lane if needed to allow a freighter to pass.

I was too excited about reaching Tokyo to sleep, and returned to the helm at 11am. I immediately glanced at the radar, and was dumbfounded by what I saw. The radar screen had caught the measles! There were spots everywhere.

Even the chart was a mess. Ignore that this is a blurry picture, the camera goofed somehow - but, each of those yellow stripes is an AIS target, and keep in mind that AIS targets represent only a small percentage of the traffic we were weaving our way through.

We were still running at full speed, yet it seemed impossible to me that we could claw our way through all the boats I saw on the radar. Also, we were well outside the traffic lane, and nowhere near the route I had so carefully planned. I asked Jeff what was happening, and he said he was trying to find a safe path through all the boats. I asked about my idea to run the freighter lanes, and he said he thought we would be better off outside the lanes.

Jeff is a sharp guy, and has a 1,600 ton Captain’s license. When he feels strongly about something, listening to him is usually the right answer.

Prior to Jeff’s career running a yacht management company in Seattle, Jeff had a career running charter fishing boats. Many of the boats around us were fishing. Jeff could look at the charts, and the water, and predict where the boats were headed. He also seemed able to predict which boats were likely to understand the ‘right of way’ rules, and which were likely to shoot across our path, even though a strict adherence to the rules would indicate that we clearly had the right of way. Under the official ‘rules of the road’ it is designated which boat has the right of way. The boat that has right of way is supposed to maintain course and speed while the other boat maneuvers to avoid a collision. Ultimately though, a Captain has an obligation to protect the passengers and the vessel. Most of the boats around us seemed to have never read the rules, and a strict adherence to the rules seemed a sure-fire path to serious trouble. Whereas both Jeff and I agreed on the ‘right way’ to handle the situation, Jeff had solid experience and street smarts, which helped to keep us out of trouble. Sans Souci was in the leaad with the other two GSSR boats following right behind, single file, tight to our tail, as we weaved our way at full speed through heavy traffic. By 1:30pm, we were making the final turn into Yokohama Bayside Marina, safe and smiling.

Here’s a picture of just a couple of the boats we had to find a path through; a charter fishing boat, and a passenger ferry that we clocked at 42 knots.

I noticed that the Japanese freighters have a different look than any freighters I’ve seen before. They are newer, and have a sense of style. Some are enormous, many times the size of any freighter I’ve ever imagined possible.

I had thought it would be impossible to surpass the Iwaki Sun Marina, but the Yokohama Marina has done it. It is Japan’s largest marina and is surrounded by hundreds of shops and restaurants. Our initial plan called for only a week or two at Yokohama Bayside marina, but within minutes of arrival, we were asking our Japanese agent if a month-long stay was possible.

We happened to arrive at the marina on an evening when they were having a big party and fireworks. Roberta and I hadn’t known about the party, and had previously arranged to meet Chris in downtown Tokyo. Braun and Steven did attend, and were asked to speak to about 500 Japanese attendees. I have terrible stage fright, so I dodged a bullet by not being there. I asked Steven how he did speaking, and he said that once he realized that no one in the audience could understand a word of what he was saying, it became fun. There was no way to fail! He said it was a fun party and I would really have enjoyed it.

One of the associates of Mr. Furuno, our agent, offered to give Roberta and I (and Shelby) a ride into Tokyo. We’ve been to Japan several times, but usually we are just at a hotel in Tokyo. The drive gave us a different look at Tokyo than we’ve had before. It was quite an eye-opening experience. At home in Seattle, we live near the Port of Seattle. The Tokyo port appears to be an order of magnitude larger, stretching for miles. I’m not an engineer, but the highway we were on seemed of a quality, and scale, that I had not seen before. The architecture around me was stunning. First impressions aren’t always accurate, but my sense was that Japan is doing some very impressive work with their infrastructure.

And on a completely different subject….

The GSSR group has finally started thinking about ‘what comes next.’ We have one more major passage, to Osaka, which we probably won’t make for at least three weeks, after which, the boats may not move again this year. Until now, we’ve avoided talking about future cruising plans, mostly because there were too many unknowns for it to have any meaning. We weren’t even sure the group would hang together after this year, and still aren’t. The momentum is towards the group sticking together, but no decision has been made.

We now have a first-pass plan for next year’s cruising that is being discussed. It is preliminary and almost certainly will change.

With that caveat, I’ll share what we’re discussing…

To be honest, I am just starting to look at the maps, and I don’t really have a sense of what there is to see, or where to go. We had discussed exploring Japan’s inland sea this year, but are now thinking to save it for next year. From there, we would explore the southern Japanese island of Kyushu, work our way south to Okinawa, then visit Taiwan (including Kaohsiung, where our boats were built), finishing up the year in Hong Kong. We’ll be near Korea, and may add that to the agenda, although I am not excited by the idea. I’m hoping that as I start studying the islands I’ll somewhere find a series of white sand beaches, and with some good anchoring, diving and swimming opportunities.

And lastly…

There’s an old saying, 'You had better be careful what you ask for, because you just might get it.' All of us have been asking for hot weather for months. I’ve always described myself as a ‘warm weather cruiser.’ Well, we’re in it now. It is hot and sticky outside. The water temperature is approaching 85 degrees. The inter-boat radio conversation was dominated on our way to Tokyo by topics like, “What temperature is your engine room running? What about your shafts? Transmission?” There are a wide variety of problems that come with warm water cruising. Air conditioning is suddenly mandatory. Working in the engine room can be miserable. Animals and coral seem to grow in the sea chest, strainers, and on the hull. After all of us whined a bit, I said, “So… does anyone wish we were back in cold water?” This was met with total silence. We’re all happy to be back in warm water, challenges and all.

That’s it for today, and probably for at least the next couple of weeks. We’re going to enjoy Yokohama, and do some serious relaxing.

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci

GSSR#34 - Shelby gets out of jail, and the GSSR leaves Hokkaido

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Greetings all.

On Monday, our dog Shelby was officially imported into Japan! An animal quarantine inspector came to the boat and found her still chained to the barstool where he had left her. I suspect he knew that we’d snuck her off the chain from time to time to go out to the deck for potty-breaks, but this was never discussed. In fact, he was a very good and friendly person. He not only had Shelby’s import permit, but had already spoken to the Animal Quarantine office where we would be leaving Japan, to start the work going on her Export Permit, and had worked out a process to make it easy to re-import her next spring when we return to Japan to continue our cruising.

Shelby went ashore, immediately after his departure, and took a walk with Roberta. Although it was her first time on land in nearly a month, it was a bit anti-climactic. The weather here has turned hot and sticky. After about 50 feet, Shelby was giving Roberta a look like, “Please take me back to the boat!” Later in the day, after the weather had cooled down, Roberta took her for a much longer walk which Shelby greatly appreciated!

The change in weather has been dramatic. We were spoiled by the cool temperatures in the Aleutians. I had become accustomed to shaft bearings at 44 degrees, and an engine room temperature in the 80s. Suddenly, engine room checks are a lot less fun.

We were in Tomakomai for five days.

Our marina, and the staff there, were incredible. The facility was beautiful, and the staff worked very hard on our behalf. The marina was intended for boats 40 feet and under, and this presented a couple of easily overcome challenges. For instance, even though the marina had 50 amp power, the pedestals were wired with only one 50 amp breaker, which was shared amongst more than one 50 amp outlet. Sans Souci is a power-hungry beast, and we plugged in two 50 amp cables, resulting in multiple blown breakers, which only the marina staff seemed able to reset. Fueling was also an adventure. The fuel dock was designed to fuel 20 to 30 foot boats, needing 30 to 200 gallons. We were only able to get the back third of our boat onto their fuel dock, and it required several hours to fuel the boat, as the fuel trickled in. The marina staff was helpful and smiling throughout.

Jeff and Kirt took advantage of our time at Tomakomai to patch our tender, which was damaged while fishing in the Aleutians. Because of the size of the rip, we had to have a patch flown in from the U.S. This was not difficult, but we hit a snag with the glue. No freight carrier would transport glue except by cargo ship. Because the tender is hypalon, we wanted to use a certain kind of glue, which was tough to find in Japan. We did finally find some glue locally, which we thought might work, and after doing some testing, decided it would work. Thus far, we believe the tender is better than new.

I would have happily stayed much longer in Tomakomai, if not for two reasons:

1) The Yufutsu marina is a $40 cab ride, each way, from town, with nothing around it. Ouch.

2) We have arrived at the time when all of the boats are starting to losing crew. Bill Harrington, shown above, has already left Sans Souci. We still have Jeff Sanson and Kirt Ahlquist, from Pacific Yacht Management, but they will soon return to their normal lives. (Although, our son, Chris, has joined us for our run from Tomakomai to Tokyo.) The other boats also have crew which will be departing soon. Seabird’s friends, Wayne and Carol Watjus, left the boat in Tomakomai, leaving just Steven and Carol Argosy on board. We’re all capable of completing the trip alone, but it’s easier having more people on board for the overnight passages. From Tomakomai to Yokohama is nearly a thousand miles. It may seem like we’ve reached our destination, but a thousand miles, in typhoon-infested waters, can still represent a challenge.

We had many exceptional meals in Tomakomai. On Sans Souci, Roberta and I were easing into Japanese food, and sought out pizza the first night, and had steaks on the second, at a fancy hotel restaurant. We had identified an interesting-looking Japanese restaurant, but all the signs and menus were in Japanese. When our son, Chris, arrived, who speaks Japanese, we had him take our group to the restaurant, which seemed to be a barbecue place. In the picture above you see Roberta’s and my reaction to discovering that the squid was being cooked, brains, guts and all. The food was excellent, but as a general rule, I don’t like to eat anything which is looking back at me.

Most of the crews from the three boats took the opportunity to visit the nearby town of Sapporo. Japanese mass transportation continues to impress me. We explored many major tourist attractions in just a couple of days. Roberta was thrilled to find a Starbucks, however, after testing the local coffee, she thought Starbucks didn’t taste exactly like in America. No problem. There was a Tullys a block away. We’re from Seattle, and picky about these things.

My current plan is to not do much blogging about our time ashore. There are thousands of websites dedicated to Japan. I generally don’t like to be redundant.

Our departure from Tomakomai was perhaps the most controversial of the trip. Japan is currently in Typhoon season. As we were talking about heading south towards Tokyo (Yokohama), two typhoons were active. Off of Taiwan, Typhoon Morakot hit Taiwan hard, killing hundreds. Nordhavn’s Ta Shing ship yard is there. Following is an email from Ta Shing President, Tim Juan, to Nordhavn’s President Dan Streetch. It is self-explanatory.

Hi Dan,

In fact, Typhoon Morakot was the most terrifying typhoon I had seen in my life. Wind was so strong that trees and sign boards were pulled out and fallen everywhere on the roads. Heavy and continuous rains pouring down and washing away everything they could. There was much more damages than what you had described, thousands had lost their homes, and hundreds were killed. Some villages in the country sides or in the suburbs have "disappeared", either flushed away by the floods or fallen into the earth. A lot of bridges were broken and some cars dropped into the water while driving through. Some made their last call to their families before they sunk into the water, and soon lost contact. Thousands of houses are flooded up to the second floor. Armies, policemen and firemen were sent out to rescue the victims, some helped delivering food to those who were trapped in their own houses, using lifeafts. All these happened in the southern half of Taiwan.

I hate to report them in details to you, but they are real. God bless Ta Shing that none of us or our family members have suffered from this disaster. Ta Shing's location is so perfectly protected from the storm and all facilities are in good condition, only some minor damages. All the boats are fine. Other than giving thanks to God, I could say no words.

All the best,
Tim

Japan also was experiencing a typhoon, although thankfully not nearly as fierce. That said, it was still strong enough that deaths were being reported, and further complicating conditions, Japan experienced two earthquakes in as many days, the second of which, a 6.9, was near Yokohama, our destination. Tsunami warnings were in effect.

It was in this climate that we met to discuss our departure for Tokyo. As you can imagine, the meeting, actually, the series of meetings, had a serious tone. We consulted with Weather Bob, at Omni, in addition to doing our own research. The chart you see above is broken into segments. Each segment is colored according to the severity of the seas. Simply stated, a lack of color is good, green means ‘You can go, but you’ll be uncomfortable’, yellow means, ‘You can go, and you will get beaten up’, and red means, ‘If you go, you may want to notify your next of kin before leaving the dock.’ As we were meeting, most of the east coast of the Japan was lit up in red.

That said, there was one quadrant from our route, which still had no color; the 129 mile run between Tomakomai and Hachinohe. Although we would be sailing TOWARDS the typhoon, all of our weather resources said the same thing, ‘We’d have an easy cruise.’ Have zero doubt of this, no one on any GSSR boat sails towards a typhoon without putting a lot of thought into it. It was not an easy decision, even though we were confident we were right, to leave the dock.

Our motivation to move was not “to get there faster.” With Tokyo 600 nautical miles south, we needed a weather window of three days to “get there.” At this time of year (typhoon season), a clean three-day window can be hard to find. If we could nibble off the piece to Hachinohe, we’d reduce our need to a two-day window. We could see that the typhoon was tracking offshore, and a window should be opening. Our goal was to reposition, such that we could move behind the typhoon.

Our planning paid off. We left Tomakomai at 2:30am, a couple of hours before sunrise, knowing this would put us in daylight when we reached the area populated with fishing gear, and then put us into Hachinohe just before dark. We had a 100% calm cruise in perfect daylight conditions.

Along the way we were able to see some squid boats close up. At night they light the waters up like daylight. As we were approaching Hachinohe we passed through a fleet of at least fifty of these. From close up we could see the dozens of lights hanging down. These attract the squids. To my surprise, when one of them briefly had its’ nose out of the water, I’d swear I saw a bulbous bow.

Hachinohe is a large commercial fishing port. We were assigned a wall to tie up to, which is normally used by cargo ships. It was unbelievably awesome coming into the port. I’m not sure why, but it just felt really cool to know how bizarre it was for three American ships to be arriving at the port. Dozens of passing cars, and even taxis, wandered over just to see our flotilla.

A slight negative for Sans Souci was that we could clearly see that the cargo ship at our space, immediately before, had been carrying cattle. I won’t say why, but suffice it to say that we ran our air conditioning while at the dock (thereby keeping the doors closed), and I’m in need of new shoes.

On the positive side, moorage was priced at five cents a gross ton. This equated to about $3 a day for the N62s, and $5 for Sans Souci. Fantastic! That said, the $500 per boat Hachinohe agency fees put quite a damper on our excitement. We had thought that our new status as ‘domestic boats’ would help us avoid the need for agents to get us from port to port. We’re still discovering what the process is for moving around Japan. Our current understanding is that the requirements are minimal, really just notification, for anchoring, but that if we want to enter a major commercial port, we need a local agent who will act on our behalf. The large commercial ports aren’t really oriented towards accepting small pleasure-craft, and the expenses that make sense for large cargo ships, make less sense when applied to us. Oh well, every day is a new learning experience.

Of course, agents, if their use is within your budget, can be a very good thing. I must call attention to our agent in Tomakomai, H. Shiba, of Narasaki-Stax (http://www.narasaki-stax.co.jp). Anyone clearing in or out of Japan, from Hokkaido, is highly recommended to seek the assistance of Mr. Shiba-san, who made our lives very comfortable, and whose efforts were deeply appreciated. I can’t imagine how we could have accomplished so much, so easily, without his help.

After a night in Hachinohe, the weather had cleared enough that we felt safe to go back on the move. The weather chart above is the most recent information available. As you can see, we are in good shape for the run to Sendai, and could continue to Yokohama. We believe the typhoon will move farther offshore, and the quadrant from Sendai to Tokyo will open up. We’ll make a go/no go decision later tonight.

And, lastly….

I couldn’t resist shooting a picture of our son, Chris’s, socks. He buys them here in Japan, and insists they are as comfortable as it gets. Bizarre!

That’s it for now.

Thank you,

Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

GSSR#33 - Welcome to Tomakomai Japan!

Tue, 04 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	4,971 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	305 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	0 nm

I am very pleased to report that the GSSR fleet has successfully reached our first, of many stops, in Japan. We are now at port, in Tomakomai, on the island of Hokkaido.

Our five day passage from Petropavlovsk Russia was as calm as they get. Our biggest problem was fighting boredom. On the last day we had problems with sea gulls, with as many as twenty on the bow at one time. We kept a bowl of cherries next to the helm with which to chase them away.

Until the last night, before arrival in Japan.

We had been warned that there would be fishing boats and nets in Japan, and that these could make navigation difficult. This was certainly true, and our last 12 hours into port was quite difficult.

Roberta and I were at the helm, around midnight, with the other two boats trailing slightly. We were in thick fog and the water was dead calm. I started seeing dots on the radar. At first I thought they were just clutter on the radar. Then, when we really studied them, we decided they were either crab pots, or birds. There weren’t many, so I just steered around them. I called to the other boats, but they were far enough behind me that they weren’t picking them up on radar. I suggested we form a single file line, and that they follow my track, which they did.

The number of unknown targets started rising, until I had 15 or 20 of the targets on screen at any time, and was starting to zigzag a lot. The other boats were not picking them up, or were barely picking them up. I tried to get close enough to one of the targets, to see if it was actually there, but could not find one. I was chatting back and forth, on the radio, with Grey Pearl and Seabird, who only half-believed I was seeing all these targets on the radar.

At 3am, Roberta and I went off-shift. At the end of each shift, the outgoing crew gives a report to the next shift. I showed them the targets on the radar, and I went to sleep, knowing that with Bill and Jeff in control, I would sleep fine regardless of what the targets were.

While Roberta and I slept, the occasional blip on the radar, had become a massive number of blips. The guys were zigzagging through a mine field of radar blips. They were able to get close enough to one to identify that it was a marker for fishing gear. We were running about 10 miles off the coast of Hokkaido at the time, and they made the decision to head to deeper water, to get out of the fishing zone. This worked. A few miles farther out at sea, they still had occasional targets, but they were easily avoided. In addition to all the markers we were seeing, Jeff and Bill passed a squid fishing fleet, which looked like an entire well-lit city at sea.

When Roberta and I came on shift, we had only about three hours to go to reach port. Above is what we saw on the radar. The radar above is at three mile range, and the port is about 15 miles to our right. As you can see, to reach shore, we were going to have to weave our way through the mess. Tomakomai is a busy port. I kept moving forward, thinking that sooner or later there would be a break in the targets, but either I didn’t go far enough, or there wasn’t one.

The good news is that the fog lifted. I could now see the targets, and they were plenty far enough apart to drive between. Unfortunately though, I had no idea what the targets represented. Were there nets connecting them? Were there fishing lines? Were these just crab pots? None of us knew, but all of us were of the same opinion (which could well be wrong). Our theory was that these were linked together by long lines holding fish hooks, but that the fishing gear was lying on the bottom hundreds of feet below. We “thought” we would be fine to pass between them.

Whether we were right or not, we were able to pass through all the targets easily. If there were nets, we missed them. I stood outside and watched the water as we moved through, and saw nothing. And, to our surprise, the field of floating targets was only about a half mile thick. Once we poked through to the inside, we were in open water. There were still some random crab pots, but we could move again at full speed.

As we approached the port, we saw a jet ski. It came to us, and started indicating that we should follow it. We were being guided into port! I had sent an email to our agent in Japan, saying we would arrive at 8am, five days later, and we hit our arrival time within minutes. I still can’t believe we were able to time it that exactly. The Japanese, of course, assumed that if we said we would arrive at 8am, that we would arrive at 8am, and were standing on the dock to greet us.

Tying up to the dock was simple, and we were unbelievably happy to have arrived!

We were boarded by a horde of customs and immigrations people, who went from boat to boat. We had prepared a thick set of documents prior to arrival and emailed them to our agent. Within an hour, all three boats were cleared into Japan. All that remained was a bus ride to the immigration office for all of us, to get our passports checked and stamped.

Except, there was one more step for Sans Souci. We are traveling with our dog, Shelby, and we needed to get her imported into Japan. We started the process nearly a year ago. At first our agent thought it was impossible, but then we discovered the process, and educated him to it. He was a bit skeptical, but agreed to work on it. The process involved LOTS of medical tests for Shelby, lab work, and lots of paperwork, all of which we did.

We did hit one problem, just as we were leaving Seattle. There is a form, which needs to be stamped by the USDA, in Olympia Washington, that indicates that they believe Shelby is in good health. We were able to obtain this form, and get it stamped by the USDA. We had to wait until the last moment, so that her health certificate would still be valid when we arrived in Japan. Unfortunately, I left one date blank on the form. It was the date that indicates when Shelby was micro-chipped (back in 2003). I goofed and missed writing in the date. I did put her microchip number. The animal quarantine office in Japan noticed this, and sent me an email, but by then, we were at sea, and it was too late to go back to Olympia to get a new form stamped. Instead, I contacted the Microchip company and got a letter from them verifying the date she was stamped.

Upon arrival in Japan, this was not acceptable to the animal quarantine officer. We had plenty of proof that Shelby had been microchipped back in 2003, and the form was completely filled out, and stamped, except for that one blank. However, he simply could not let her into the country without that blank filled in. I offered to write in the date myself, which got me an extremely dirty look. ARGH! He brought out a steel cable, attached it to Shelby, affixed it to a barstool in the boat’s salon, and said she would have to stay chained until we could get an original form, from Olympia Washington, properly filled in and stamped. Roberta said, “How is she supposed to go outside to go to the bathroom?” He didn’t understand her, and our agent cut her off. “Do not ask questions.”

As you can imagine, this was not a fortunate turn of events.

About this time, a large group of people showed up at the boats. It was the Port Authority Master for the city of Tomakomai. This is a major shipping port for Japan, so I assume he is an important person, and certainly seemed to be. He said that it was the first visit to Tomakomai by American boats, and he wanted to welcome us. Each boat was presented with a large, beautiful, flower arrangement. Lots of people took pictures, including journalists, who wanted an interview.

While two-thirds of our group went off to the immigration office, I stayed behind to meet with our agent, Mr. Furuno-san, as well as a ‘local agent’ from Tomakomai.

They had a long list of questions for me, most of which centered around their wanting to know our plans. They wanted to know when we would leave, and where we would go. This was complicated by the fact that they spoke very little English, and I speak no Japanese. I have corresponded with our agent many times by email, and his written comprehension is good, but face to face, neither of us could understand the other.

I explained that we had no plans. Our plan was to randomly explore the country over the next couple months, and then return to the US for six months, then return to Japan, and go to some other country.

I could tell that this explanation wasn’t working, and it wasn’t just the language barrier. They needed a schedule. They explained that we could change the schedule, but that they must have a schedule.

After much more discussion, they said “You should become a domestic boat.” Assuming I understood them, I have the option of becoming a Japanese boat, and being able to explore with a minimum of bureaucracy, or continuing as a foreign boat, and requiring agents and huge amounts of paperwork every time we move the boats. I have spoken with several other boats that have been to Japan and never heard this issue. I asked the downside, and they said that as a Japanese boat I would need to pay $5 per gallon for fuel instead of $4. This seemed a great exchange. Unfortunately they said we would have to clear back into the country again, and would need to have customs come back. Argh.

I asked how far of a walk it was to town. They said, “Impossible. Must drive.” Ouch. “What about the subway?,” I asked. “No subway here. We are not near anything. Must take taxi.” Double-ouch. “How much does it cost for a taxi into town?,” I asked. “$40 each way,” came the response. Uh-oh. We have 14 people, and we are a half hour drive into the nearest town. Not good. I have been to Japan many times, but always to Honshu, the big island, where Tokyo is located. We are now on Hokkaido, also a big island, but much more remote. In Tokyo, it is easy to move between any two points. The Japanese have mastered mass transportation. It never occurred to me that we could be in Japan and not be able to get into town.

Tokyo is not comparable to any city in the United States, although the closest would be Manhattan, except on a MUCH larger scale. Here on Hokkaido, or at least in Tomakomai, the city is laid out more like a large suburban American city. Everyone has cars, and there are parking lots. We think we can rent a car, although it requires an international drivers license, which I do not have. And, driving would be difficult. The steering wheel is on the right side, and they drive on the left side of the road. $40 for a taxi is sounding better, except that this will add to a lot of money very quickly.

I was starting to realize that this was going to be a long day, and that things were going to get worse before they got better.

Our agent took all of us to a bank to change currency, which went smoothly, but slowly. It took an hour to change money. Our group was split between two vans, and we had asked if they could help Steven (Seabird) and I get Japanese cell phones, and internet cards. I do have good internet on the boat, but it would be cheaper and faster if I could have a Japanese 3g card for my computer. Thus, after the bank we split to two groups. Steven, Carol, Roberta and I loaded into one van, while the others loaded into another. The first group wanted to go get lunch, and we were heading shopping.

At the electronics store, we discovered there was only one “pre-paid” USB internet adapter. Steven paid for it, and the store said that it would take an hour to activate. I wasn’t that worried about being able to buy one. I have decent internet on the boat, and was trying to improve my situation, but am fine without the 3g card. We then went to a store called “SunKus” which looks exactly like a 7-11. Apparently, foreigners cannot buy cell phones in Japan. Our Japanese agent was going to buy a phone, and then we would use it. My American phone works here, but it will be cheaper over the next couple of months to have a Japanese phone. Our agent said that he was restricted to buying only one phone a day, so we would have to buy a phone for Steven, and come back another day for me. A half hour of paperwork later, and with Steven $100 poorer, we returned to the electronics store.

Another surprise….

The store had realized Steven was a foreigner, and had voided Steven's transaction (we think). They will not let foreigners buy their internet cards. We were not happy.

We got back in the van and were taken to a huge shopping mall. I asked if we were going to try again to buy an internet card. “No. Shop,” came the reply. I explained, as best I could, that we did not want to shop. This did not go over well. We had hit a language barrier. I assumed our friends had gone downtown to eat, so I asked the driver to take us downtown. He apparently did not have authorization to do this, and needed to phone his boss. He said “Wait 15 minutes.” After five days at sea, we were exhausted and grumpy. We hadn’t eaten for 12 hours, and 15 minutes sounded like an eternity.

I saw a taxi driving by and jumped out of the van to chase it. This led our driver to chase me down and say, “OK. Downtown.”

Once downtown, we realized no restaurants were open. It was only 4:30pm. There had been a four hour time change since Russia. Our bodies thought it was 8:30pm, and we hadn’t eaten for over 12 hours, but not much was open. We didn’t see our friends, and picked the largest hotel we could, and had some terrific Chinese food. We then taxied back to the boats.

The rest of our crew was there, and told us the part of the story we had missed. Their driver had taken them to the shopping mall and dropped them off. They weren’t sure what to do, or why they were there. They had no idea how they were going to get back to the boat, but thought we would be coming there, so they shopped while waiting for us. Ultimately, they gave up, grabbed some food in the food court at the mall, and took a taxi to the boat.

Our vision of wandering the streets of Japan, finding a cute little pub, and having some sushi hadn’t gone as planned.

I then spent the rest of the evening working on getting someone in Seattle to drive to Olympia, to work on my Shelby problem.

And on a different topic…

Our next destination is Yokohama. It is a three day passage south from Hokkaido. The weather between here and there can be very difficult, and we will need to watch for a good window. We had wanted to stay here in Hokkaido for a week or two, and travel around, but the transportation issue is making things difficult. Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido, is nearby, but not being able to take Shelby off the boat is a huge complication. We think we will solve all this by Monday. My guess is that if we have good weather, we will start our run to Yokohama at that time.

As confusing as all of this sounds, we are very happy to be here, and know that after a few days getting oriented, this is going to be a very cool, once in a lifetime, experience. We need to figure out the whole “foreign versus domestic boat” issue, and understand the bureaucracy involved in moving our boats around Japan. I’m confident we’ll solve all of this, and ordinarily I would not bog down a blog with all of this logistical discussion. However, dealing with clearing in and out of countries is a huge piece of world cruising, and it wouldn’t be right not to give you a taste of it through my blog.

I have mentioned in the past that world cruisers, are a unique group of people. There’s a certain personality it takes to do what we’re doing. There are some people who would be driven crazy by the challenges of arriving in a new country, with a language you don’t speak, bureaucracy you don’t understand, and the worst: surprise costs and regulations that you didn’t plan for. Then there is our group which has smiled through it all. Our day yesterday was not what we expected, but last night we were all celebrating, and it was a party atmosphere. This group seems to thrive on overcoming challenges. We grumbled a few times yesterday, but overall it was a very good day, and things are going to be great soon.

I would like to thank our agents, and the local agent, who worked very hard to make our arrival as smooth as possible. As you just read, there were a few road bumps along the way, but it wasn’t for a lack of effort. Foreign boats, of our size, traveling in Japan, are extremely rare. The marinas aren’t sized to accommodate our boats, and people aren’t sure what to do with us. They are working very hard to make us happy, and ensure that all of our needs are met, but the language barrier is really being a tough one. Roberta’s and my son, Chris, arrives from the U.S. on Saturday, hopefully carrying the paperwork we need to get Shelby out of jail. Chris went to college in Japan. Having Chris here, who speaks Japanese, for even a few days, will be very good.

And, I’m happy to share with you this email I just received from the President of Nordhavn, Dan Streech:

Dear Ken,

As the final miles of the GSSR wind down, I want to take this moment to acknowledge your great success. On behalf of Jim, Jeff, and all of the employees at PAE and Ta Shing, I want to offer you our hearty congratulations.

You have made us proud and our Nordhavns look good. However, the boats are not the stars in this story; the stars are you, Roberta, Carol, Steve, Tina and Braun.

With a perfect mix of careful planning, tenacity, technology, seamanship, flexibility and people skills, you have shown thousands (probably tens of thousands) of people around the world what can be accomplished.

I know that many people are saying “I could do that...”, but they haven’t and you have. The six of you are at that perfect place in life where your health, wealth and sense of adventure are in perfect alignment, and you seized the moment. Ten years ago, it might have been too soon; 10 years from now, maybe too late.

You have accomplished a feat few other people have dared. You will now have your memories to savor for the rest of your life.

Also, I want to acknowledge the kindness, respect and generosity which has shown thru in your blogs (and Steve’s e-mail reports). I get the feeling that each place you have visited has been left better for their contact with the GSSR fleet.

With sincere appreciation and deep admiration,

Dan

That’s it for today!

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

PS At the top of this blog it claims we only have 300 miles to go. That is incorrect. We still have at least 700 or 800 miles to go, and with site-seeing, we'll probably run another thousand. I'll figure out how to reflect that with my next blog.

GSSR#32 - Welcome To Siberia

Sun, 02 Aug 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	4,778 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	498 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	200 nm

Petropavlovsk, Russia, has been the one stop I worried about the most.

I confess to having an irrational fear of Russia. Roberta’s and my last trip to Russia was nearly twenty years ago, and happened to coincide with Russia’s transition from a communist to a more capitalist form of government. Russia was in the process of privatizing industries, and trying to create an economy. The process wasn’t pretty, and resulted in political instability, mass confusion and rampant poverty. Corruption, and crime were serious issues. Our travel agents at the time asked that we not walk the streets unescorted, and we agreed. It just didn’t feel safe.

For Sans Souci, Russia was not an optional stop. The distance from Adak, the western most fuel stop in the Aleutian Islands, and Hokkaido, Japan, is over 2,000 nautical miles. This is within Sans Souci’s range, but it would require slowing down to seven knots, and cutting directly across the Northern Pacific. We would have been required to make a twelve or thirteen day run across a part of the ocean known for its’ inhospitality, with no place to hide.

Although I was concerned about Russia, there were a lot of reasons for the stop:

1) Fuel
2) It would allow us to break the trip into smaller segments.
3) It sounded unbelievably cool to go to Siberia.

To mitigate my concerns about Russia, I made some calls seeking a reputable agent. I spoke with a mega-yacht captain who had stopped in Russia a few years ago, and he recommended I speak with Sergey Frolov, of http://www.siberianadventures.com. Sergey was also highly recommended by Cruise-west, a Seattle-based cruise ship company that I spoke with. The word on Sergey was that he wasn’t the lowest cost provider, but that he could be trusted, and would deliver on everything he promised.

I knew that I would be arriving in Russia with inadequate fuel to reach Japan. This was making me nervous. I didn’t want to be in a position where I was in a ‘must have’ position for fuel, but there was no choice.

Sergey Frolov turned out to be a great find. We were welcomed to Russia by Sergey’s local team. Marina and Alexandra, from Sergey’s company, Pacific Network, are pictured above. They walked us through the entire clearing process, and made life in Petropavlovsk very pleasant. Pacific Network arranged our moorage, fuel, helped with clearing, called taxis, arranged tours, booked dinner reservations, and much more. Anyone heading to Petropavlovsk should contact Pacific Network.

One of the things I had feared most was encountering the local officials. However, there was no cause for concern. The officials were friendly, helpful, and couldn’t have been nicer. They did require a lot of paperwork, but we got through it fine. I use Adobe Acrobat, which allows me to easily edit PDF files. Pacific Network emailed me the documents for clearing, and I had everything typed up and printed prior to arrival. I even emailed the completed forms to Pacific Network so that they could review everything and let me know if I had completed the forms correctly.

DISCLAIMER: We were only in Petropavlovsk for four days. I have not studied Russian history, do not speak Russian, and am basing my commentary on casual chats with bartenders, taxi cab drivers, tour guides and personal observation. In other words, what follows may or may not be accurate. Form your own opinion.

The city that we visited in Russia is called ‘Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky.’ It is on the Kamchatka Peninsula, a 900 mile long peninsula on the eastern coast of Russia.

Kamchatka is considered the boondocks, even by Siberian standards. There is some tourist activity, and there are some direct charter flights from the US, but generally speaking, it is tough to get to. I asked why tourists come to Kamchatka, and was told that most visitors come to fish or hunt. Others come to see the giant Kamchatka bears. And for others, such as ourselves, it is a chance to see a part of the world that few have ever seen.

Because of its position as the eastern-most outpost of Russia, on the Pacific, Kamchatka has strategic military importance. For decades, foreigners, and even Russians, were not allowed access to Kamchatka. This is the region where, in the 80s, the Russians sent a clear message about how seriously they take security, by shooting down Korean Air Flight 007, which had accidentally intruded into Russian air space. Kamchatka is home to Russia’s Pacific submarine fleet, and even today, there are places in Kamchatka that are off-limits.

As we approached Russia, we shut off Sans Souci’s Sonar. If there were subs in the water, I didn’t want the Russians thinking we were looking for them (which we weren’t). As far as I know, we were just being paranoid, but our assumption was that all of our communications between the boats was being monitored. Whether it was or not, who knows?

Near to where we moored the boats was ‘Lenin Square,’ a strong reminder that Petropavlovsk had been communist within our lifetimes.

We happened to arrive on ‘Navy Day.’ We moored next to a battleship, and Lenin Square was filled with various weapons and military vehicles. I didn’t have the courage to try taking pictures, but Jeff had no such hesitation and shot several pictures of himself posing in front of all the gadgets that were on display.

During the communist era, housing was provided by the government, in huge multi-family buildings. Petropavlovsk shows this heritage. There are hundreds of these buildings in every direction, and most of the locals still live in them.

We also saw some older single-family homes. These stumped me. They seemed poorly cared for, yet I would have expected these to be the homes of upper-income people, who wanted their own homes. Roberta and I walked many miles around Petropavlovsk, and never saw any newer single family homes. However we did see new multi-family homes under construction.

Petropavlovsk seems to have somewhat made the transition away from communism, to capitalism. There were stores everywhere, with the shelves loaded with products. We visited a modern department store, a modern super market, and more. Even in Moscow, twenty years before, the stores were practically empty and there was little sign of ‘entrepreneurial spirit.’ Entrepreneurial spirit seems alive and well now, at least in Petropavlovsk.

All of us really enjoyed the restaurants. Our favorite was called Korea House, and was outstanding. Another favorite was the Colluseum with its large dance floor. Above you see Braun showing the Russians that Americans DO know how to dance.

Overall, it felt a bit like we were in Europe, or maybe Eastern Europe.

I asked several people about the economy, and was told that poverty is a problem, but I personally never saw any evidence of real poverty. I usually look at the cars for some insight into the local economy. The cars I saw were newer models, in very good shape, and even included high-end vehicles such as BMWs. Most of the cars seemed to be Japanese, although most were larger cars. There were far more SUVs and vans than I would see in Europe.

Fishing is the primary industry in Petropavlovsk, primarily crab and salmon. That said, the town has 200,000 people, and I didn’t see a large enough fishing fleet to support a town that large. Something else is driving what appeared to be a healthy economy, and I don’t know what it is. Military perhaps?

One interesting side-note. Some articles about Russia attribute the economic success to the implementation of a flat-tax. In 2001, Russia adopted a 13% across the board tax, which resulted in a higher-than-anticipated tax revenues. Collections increased dramatically.

Being a curious type, I had to ask about home ownership and rents. The estimate I heard was that about 60% of residents own their own home (apartment). I asked about pricing, and pointed at a few different buildings. A one-bedroom unit in an older building goes for around $50,000 with the same unit in a new upscale building going for closer to $150,000. Rents average around $100 per month for a one-bedroom unit. It was mentioned that larger families tend to buy multiple units, and join them together to create larger units.

Prices in stores seemed comparable to prices in the United States.

Our first encounter with the local ‘vodka’ culture came when we stopped for lunch at a little lakeside café. We were surrounded by families sitting at picnic tables, enjoying a day in the park. At virtually every table, the diners had a flask, or bottle, of hard stuff, to spike their drinks. I did a little Googling, and found articles saying that alcohol consumption in Russia had tripled over the past decade. One article I found said that the Russian population is now declining, and said that alcohol is listed as a factor in nearly a third of deaths.

I was told that gambling has been a bigger problem. I saw no casinos, although they were apparently all around us, and have been closed down over the past month. On July 1st of this year, the Russian government shut down all gambling in the country.

I noticed that there was a giant two-story Gold’s Gym right in the center of town. The Russians take good care of themselves. Whereas we tended to wander around town in t-shirts and blue jeans, the locals, particularly the women, seemed to wander around town in dresses and high-heels.

I signed up for a city tour, which everyone else loved…

Our first stop was at a small, but beautiful, Russian Orthodox church. It was fairly small on the inside, with no pews. I would guess that it had enough space for perhaps fifty persons to worship. I asked how many other churches were in Petropavlovsk, and was told that there were a total of five, and that the others were of similar size. My ‘takeaway’ was that the population was not particularly religious. Churches were banned under the communist era, so this was not a surprise.

Our second stop was at a museum. It was a very nice museum, and gave an overview of the sea life, volcanic activity, and Indian history of the island. Unfortunately, I have a fairly short attention span, and the tour dragged. We went from display to display through two floors of the museum as a Russian lady gave a talk in front of each display, while our tour guide translated to English.

As part of the tour, Jeff, from our boat, dressed in native Indian attire.

After the museum, we went to a gift shop. I’m not much of a shopper and escaped with the same number of rubles I started with.

Part of our group took a tour into the country side, and visited the dacha (country retreat) owned by the mother of one of Pacific Network’s tour guides, Yelena. It was small, but very nice. Yelena’s mother fixed a traditional Russian meal for the group, and gave a tour of her gardens. There were hundreds of these small houses, about an hour drive out of town. Apparently, it is a part of Russian culture to have these cottages outside of town, and nearly a quarter of Russians living in cities have them. All of them have beautifully cared-for gardens, which seems to be very important to them – perhaps this is a throw-back to the communist era when food was rationed.

And lastly (on life in Petropavlovsk)….

Given all the talk lately in the United States about health care, I had to ask whether or not Russians have free medical care. To phrase the question I said, “If you needed an operation on your knee, would you be able to get it fixed for free?” The answer, “No. I would have to pay a doctor.” I countered with, “So, you are saying there is no free health care?” This time I struck a nerve. My respondent made a spitting motion, and said “The government gives free health care, but it is horrible, and only the poorest use it. It isn’t any good.”

And, on a completely different topic…

We’ve had a few injuries during the trip. Nothing serious, but enough that it is starting to add up. Here’s a brief list: fractured ankle, twisted foot, severe back sprain, banged nose, chipped tooth, bruised ribs, and even a dog bite. This may seem a lot, but to me it actually seems fairly light. Between the three boats, there are fourteen of us, and we’ve been doing fairly aggressive activities. We are constantly going up and down stairs on the boats, while the boats are pitching. We’ve been hiking on the islands, around towns, fishing, climbing, etc. Between the three boats we have enough medical supplies to stock a pharmacy. Everyone has had some first aid training, and during one incident when I asked who had stitched a wound before, three hands went up.

Probably the most dangerous thing we’ve done is climbing on and off of the boat. It has been about six weeks since we were parked at a normal dock. We’ve been climbing on and off each other’s boats, often having to cross gaps of three feet and more, while the boats are being bumped around by the water. The scariest incident was in Adak, where soon after Roberta, and Carol from Seabird, crossed a ramp it plummeted into freezing water, twenty feet below.

And on a different topic…

All three boats needed fuel, which turned out to be more complicated than expected. Our agent called to say that before we could be given fuel, we would need to provide copies of our boat registration. I contacted Seabird and Grey Pearl to get their documents and scanned them. Our agent then said we would need to provide copies of everyone, on every boat’s Russian Visa. Once again I had to contact everyone and scan copies of their visas. The agent then needed to know the fuel burn daily for each boat. She also wanted additional information about where we were going, and how many days we would be at sea. None of us could figure out why the tight security around purchasing fuel. Our best guess is that they wanted to know that we had enough fuel onboard to get out of the country.

In any event, we ultimately passed the test, and it was agreed that we could have fuel. Our fuel was to be delivered to the dock via a truck the next day.

At 11am the fuel truck appeared as promised, but only had 2,000 gallons. We needed roughly 3,000 gallons between the three boats. We were assured another fuel truck would be available in the afternoon, but, to be safe, we decided to fuel Sans Souci first. Sans Souci was low enough on fuel, that without more we could not reach Japan, whereas Grey Pearl and Seabird had adequate reserves.

Before fueling, though, Braun (Grey Pearl) wanted to ‘test’ the fuel. This took some explaining to the Russians. I’ve never tested fuel, but Braun has three different tests he wanted to conduct. For the first test, he put something that looked like toothpaste, called ‘Kolor Kut’ at the end of a long pole, and dipped it to the bottom of the tank on the fuel truck. This test was to detect water in the fuel. The second test involved putting some of the fuel in a jar and studying it visually. If the fuel had algae, this would appear as ghostly translucent crud floating in the fuel. For the third test, Braun asked the truck driver to put a gallon of fuel in a bucket. Braun then let the bucket sit for 10 minutes, and checked the bottom of the bucket for sediment. The fuel flunked this test. Braun showed the sediment to the driver, and through the translator he responded, “No problem. That’s just rust from the storage tank.” After this response was not-too-warmly received, it was discovered that the driver had taken the test fuel from the sump at the bottom of the truck’s tank. The test was run again with fuel from the normal hose, and the fuel was certified, by Braun, as clean. I was very happy to have Braun doing this. Our next passage is a long one, and it would be a major problem if we were to take on bad fuel.

The fuel tested fine, and Sans Souci filled our tanks, as did Seabird. Grey Pearl got stuck waiting for the second truck, which didn’t arrive until well into dinner time. But, the good news is that all boats received fuel and were ready for our next adventure!

Our departure was even smoother than arrival. Another thick stack of documents was required, but all of us now have these documents in our computer, and it was just a matter of running the printer, after changing a few dates.

Prior to departure I had sent an email to the other boats asking for any pictures they might have, that I could use in my blog. Ordinarily, I shoot all the pictures for my blog, but I always felt a little uncomfortable carrying a camera in Petropavlovsk. Nothing was ever said, and in fact, the travel agents encouraged picture taking, but I couldn’t get over the notion that we were in Russia, and I didn’t want to risk irritating anyone.

Everyone was so busy getting ready to go, that I never received any pictures. However, a few minutes after we were underway, a call came on the radio, saying “Ken, this is Braun. We forgot to give you pictures, but have some for you. We’d like to turn this into a training exercise if you don’t mind.” This sounded fun. Braun’s idea was that the Pearl would sneak up behind Sans Souci, while we hold course and speed. They would then pass a memory chip with the pictures to a person positioned on our stern. A few years back, while crossing the Atlantic, my boat, and the Nordhavn Goleen, had tried passing medical supplies between the two boats, while running side by side. As our two boats approached each other, my boat was hit by their wake, and veered suddenly, and potentially dangerously. Braun’s suggestion seemed a smarter approach, so we gave it a try, successfully.

And, as we were leaving Petropavlovsk, a little bit of ‘adventure’…

Petropavlovsk is at the back of a bay, which is entered or exited by a narrow channel, which is several miles long. As we were coming in, I had my navigation software, Nobletec, lay down a ‘track’ memorizing the route we used to enter the bay. To exit, all I had to do was follow my track. However, as we were exiting, something didn’t seem right. We were closer to the rocks on my starboard side than I remembered being. I immediately used the radar to verify my position, and discovered that something was out of whack. I called the other boats, and said “Something weird is up with Nobeltec. I’m not sure where I am. Can someone track me while I sort this out?” This was a dangerous situation. We were in a narrow channel, and our charting software had decided to go haywire. I restarted Nobeltec, and it still wasn’t right. We then noticed that Nobeltec said “D.R.” in the upper right hand corner. This mean “Dead Reckoning”. For some reason Nobeltec had lost connection with my GPS, and was literally guessing at my position. Ouch. This has never happened before. I shut everything down, and brought it all back up, and all was fine. I still do not know what the problem was. I always validate the charts against the radar, and had done so shortly after leaving port. Once I had everything working again, I asked the other boats why no one had mentioned that I was off course. “We thought you were taking a short cut,” came the response. Argh. The good news is that I am compulsive about triple-checking our position and found the error fairly quickly.

As I type this, we have just entered Japanese waters, and are three quarters of the way through our 1,100 nm passage to Japan.

The first three days were calm. Only rarely did we see another boat, however, now that we are in Japan, there are boats everywhere, and unfortunately, many of them are fishing boats. We’ve been dodging fishing nets, and fishing gear in the water. During the day this is reasonably easy, but overnight, it will be tense.

Tomorrow at this time, we will be at the dock in Tomakomai, Japan, near Sapporo, on the island of Hokkaido!

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

GSSR # 31 - Attu To Russia

Mon, 27 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	3,913 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	1,363 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	1,108 nm

There were two places in the Aleutian Islands that I most wanted to see. Dutch Harbor, because of the show 'The Deadliest Catch,' and, Attu, because of the WWII battle that was fought there.

Bill had warned me prior to arrival that Attu had been 'cleaned up.' Kiska still has many left over artifacts from the Japanese occupation, just lying on the beach. Whereas, on Attu, if you didn’t know what had happened there, you might never suspect it.

Of course, signs like this on the beach are reminders of the island’s history.

In June, 1942, six months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese captured, and occupied the islands of Kiska and Attu, claiming them for the Japanese Empire.

A year later, after a year-long bombing campaign, the Americans decided to re-capture Attu from the Japanese. Approximately 15,000 Americans arrived, to dispatch the estimated 1,500 Japanese on the island. The battle was expected to last 36 hours.

Instead, it became one of the bloodiest battles of WWII, and one that both governments, arguably, swept under the carpet. Few Americans are aware that Dutch Harbor was ever bombed, or that the only land battle of WWII, fought on American soil, was at Attu.

Mistakes were made by both sides, and the weather on Attu was badly underestimated. In order to maintain secrecy, the American soldiers were not told where they would be going. Many thought they were headed for Hawaii. Training was on the beach in Monterey, California. Instead, they were confronted with the freezing temperatures of a land invasion on Attu, in which the enemy forces were 2,600, not the estimated 1,500, without appropriate jackets or shoes, and an enemy who controlled the high ground.

The battle lasted for 18 days, and casualties on both sides were devastating. Of the 15,000 U.S. troops, 550 died, and 1,500 were wounded. Another 1,200 were casualties of the climate (mostly trenchfoot and frostbite). Of the Japanese force of 2,600, only 29 survived.

On the last day of battle, with the Americans clearly having momentum, the commander of the Japanese troops, Yamasaki, was down to 800 combat-ready soldiers, and 600 wounded. In a bold, last-ditch effort, he gave the order to kill and leave behind their own wounded, and lead a banzai charge directly against the Americans.

An excerpt from the diary of a Japanese doctor:

“… The last assault is to be carried out. All the patients in the hospital are to commit suicide. Only 33 years of living and I am to die here.... At 1800 (hours) took care of all the patients with grenades. Good-bye, Taeki, my beloved wife, who loved me to the last..."

-- Dr. Paul Nebu Tatsuguchi, May 28, 1943

The Japanese strategy, with their final attack was to focus all their remaining soldiers on one highly focused charge. Their strategy came very close to working. They broke through the lines that the American soldiers had established over a three-week period, but were stopped perilously close to reaching their goal of seizing the American supplies -- by a group of engineers! When it became obvious that the Japanese were beaten, the remaining Japanese soldiers, approximately 500, also took their own lives.

Writing about the Battle of Attu is outside the scope of what my blog is normally about. I just wanted to give you enough of a taste, that hopefully some of you will Google it, and get a better sense of what had occurred in Attu.

Today, my understanding is that the only population on Attu is 20 Coast Guard men who occupy the Loran station. Loran is an alternative to using GPS for navigation, which used to be in fashion, but now is being phased out, or about to make a comeback, depending on whom you ask.

We were told, prior to arrival, that we would probably be treated well by the Coast Guard staff. They don’t get a lot of visitors, and enjoy having people drop by to say "Hi!"

And, to my great surprise, they are fond of their island. Our group met with the Commanding Officer who proudly showed us around their facility, then offered to have the second-in-command (the XO) to give us a tour of the island in their ‘snow caterpillar.’

Coast Guard personnel assigned to Attu do a one year tour of duty. Once a month, a C-130 (the plane in the picture above) arrives to bring the staff supplies, and transport staff. We were lucky enough to watch the monthly flight come in. It was picking up two Coast Guard men who had served their one year, and were heading home. Two men were on the in-coming flight to replace them.

Next to where we were anchored was a grim reminder of the harsh environment at Attu; the wreckage of a C-130 that went into the hillside.

The Coast Guard staff assigned to Attu seem to be passionate about Attu. Brad, who gave us a tour was quite an ambassador for the island. He spoke with obvious delight about doing hikes several times a week, and even a make-shift ski mountain they set up in the winter. On these hikes, he said it is not uncommon to find ammo, weapons, and recently he found a human leg bone. Another reminder that Attu wasn’t always the peaceful, pretty island, that we were seeing today.

We stopped at a memorial for Yamasaki, the commander of the Japanese troops, marking the location where he died.

I decided to 'tough it out,' and walk it from the Yamasaki memorial, to the ‘Japanese Memorial,’ which isn’t terribly far, but it is steep and uphill. Roberta and I were fine, but Shelby ran out of gas. Here we see me carrying her the last 100 yards. (Being a 13-year-old dog, she isn't as spry as she used to be.)

Overlooking the valley where the final banzai charge occurred, is a memorial to the soldiers who died there during the war. The inscription reads, “In memory of all those who sacrificed their lives in the islands and seas of the North Pacific during World War II and in dedication to world peace."

Brad mentioned that there is a major effort going on by the Japanese and Americans to find the mass graves of the Japanese, some of which are in remote locations, and return the soldiers to their homeland.

As we hiked around the area, we saw the shallow trenches dug by the American soldiers. It was a strange feeling, standing in an American trench, looking up at the hills where 65 years ago the Japanese had controlled the hills and exchanged fire with the American soldiers. It was inconceivable, but it did occur.

Back on the beach, everyone loaded into tenders to return to the boats.

The last tender to leave the beach was Sans Souci’s small tender. Our larger tender is in need of repair, so we had brought to the beach our nine foot little light-weight tender, with its seven horsepower engine. Into it we crammed Jeff, Bill and myself (Roberta and Shelby rode in Grey Pearl's tender). We had come ashore at Massacre Bay, which is probably a two mile ride from where we anchored the boats, in Casco Bay.

We had planned poorly, particularly in being the last tender to leave the shore, and in being overloaded. Our selection of weather also wasn’t looking so wise. The wind had come up to over 20 knots, and was freezing. The tender’s engine decided to be grumpy, and stalled, within about five minutes of leaving shore. Fortunately, it restarted, only to die again. After being restarted five times, and only making a mile, we realized we were in trouble. Three very experienced ship’s captains, sitting in a tiny tender, a dead outboard, high winds, freezing temperature, and being blown towards a reef. This seemed a good time to call for help. Steven Argosy, back at Seabird, responded immediately. He said that he had deliberately stalled on loading his tender onto the deck of Seabird, sensing that we might have problems. In five minutes he was to us, offloaded Bill and I to his tender, and without the overload, the little tender and Jeff made the run back to Sans Souci without further incident.

Back on the boats, we loaded the tenders on deck, and prepared for departure.

We have been using two weather routers, each of who predicted calm seas for our three day trip to Russia. However, inside Casco Bay, as we were pulling anchor, we were watching the wind rise. The 20 knot winds became 30 knot winds. As we were approaching a full-on gale, I called (via radio) to Steven and Braun, to say “Are we sure we should be pulling anchor? Something doesn’t seem right.” Braun came on the radio to say, “I think we’re going to be fine. This is probably wind being funneled through the mountains. I think it is a local phenomena, or at least I hope it is.” We continued to pull anchor, and were in dead calm seas fifteen minutes later, as we exited the bay. For the next three days, our trip went as smoothly as a trip can go. We had flat water and zero excitement. A great cruise.

We had been warned to call the Russian Navy 12 miles before reaching Russia. However, we weren't sure who to call, or on what radio channel. Rather than take any chance of ‘surprising’ the Russian Navy with our presence in their waters, I started calling on the radio 50 miles out, “Petropavlovsk Navy, this is Sans Souci.” No answer. 40 miles out, same thing. 30 mile out, same thing. Etc.

At 12 miles out, I started calling both for the Petropavlovsk Navy, and for the Petropavlovsk Pilot. We had been told that a pilot boat would be guiding us into the harbor, although we weren’t clear if the pilot would guide us, or actually board our ships to direct us. In any event, I was to call them at 12 miles out. However, still no response. This was at 6am, and we were starting to get nervous about being too close to Russia without speaking with anyone.

That is when a voice came on the radio, “G S R. This is Petropavlovsk.” Did he mean us? Could it be the USSR calling the GSSR? Was it the pilot, or the navy? Bill tried responding, and they did answer, although the person calling spoke only a couple of words of english. We think he said we should continue, but we weren’t sure who he was, and we weren’t sure he knew who we were. We continued.

At about five miles out, another voice came on the radio, calling to Seabird. This time the English was better, and we were being directed to continue to the pilot boarding location, and call when we reached there. We still didn’t know who we were speaking to, but they seemed to know who we were, and we had orders, so we followed them. We were being guided towards a point a couple miles before the entrance to the harbor.

We arrived at that point at 6:30am. The voice came back on the radio, and asked us to wait until 8am for more instructions. Once again, no idea who the voice was, and they didn’t seem to like questions, but, we did as told. Roberta was steering, and chose a tight circle, which we traversed many times while waiting.

At 8am, we were given clearance to enter the harbor, and proceed to our berth. This was great news. We had previously been given the latitude and longitude of where we would be tying up. Being able to proceed directly to our slips would be easy to do, and allow us to stop the engines. After three days of running, we were fatigued.

It took us another hour to reach the harbor. Once there, things were more complicated than expected. The dock is meant for tying giant cruise ships. Sans Souci tied up first, but then realized it was impossible to get to shore. There were giant tires strapped to the dock, which were keeping us five feet or so from the quay. Standing on shore was the seven-person immigration team, ready to come aboard Sans Souci. They were looking at us, and we were looking at them, but neither of us had an idea how to bridge the gap. It took about a half hour for someone on shore to find a gang plank, which would allow the immigration officials to board Sans Souci.

While waiting for the boarding ramp to arrive, I was speaking to Seabird and Grey Pearl via radio. We decided that it would be simpler for the other boats to side tie (raft) to Sans Souci, rather than for all three boats to need boarding ramps. However, as Seabird was positioning to tie to Sans Souci, the immigration officials were boarding Sans Souci, and they immediately ordered me to stop Seabird from tying up. We had an agent, who had arranged our moorage in Petropavlovsk, who was translating. The Russian officials wanted to deal with our boats, one at a time. Seabird and Grey Pearl would need to float, until they were given the green light to tie up.

The clearing in process was time consuming, and involved a huge amount of paperwork. Each of our boats had to assemble a thick set of documentation (nearly 100 pages including copies!) each of which had to be reviewed and stamped. Overall, though, it went incredibly smooth, and the Russian officials couldn’t have been nicer, or easier to work with. I remember clearing in and out of Mexico, each of which involved running around town, going from office to office. We had all of the agents, for all of the agencies, sitting in our salon, working with us to make the clearance as painless as possible.

After about an hour to process Sans Souci, Seabird was green-lighted to raft up, and 45 minutes later Grey Pearl was cleared, and we were in!

We were parked next to a Russian battleship! They had all soldiers on deck for our arrival. I suspect we must have looked very strange to them. It felt totally bizarre standing 20 feet from the Russian battleship. The soldiers were smiling, so we figured we were ok. Once ashore we discovered that we had arrived on “Navy Day.” The navy was there showing off their battleships, bombers, fighter jets, etc. We were offered tours. I found it amusing, in that prior to arrival I had mentioned in the comments section of my blog that I was going to work hard to NOT see anything controversial. We’re a guest in Russia, and I didn’t want to see anything they didn’t want me to see. Suddenly, here was a Russian battleship inviting us aboard for a tour. How strange is that?

Our first priority, once into Russia, was to obtain shore power. All of us have been running on our generators for nearly a month. Our local agents in Russia, Pacific Network (highly recommended!), were on the boat within an hour, to bring us shore power. Amazingly, they asked us what we would most prefer, and we were astounded when they said “No problem!” We asked for 240v, 50 amp service, preferably 60 hertz. They were able to comply with all but the last part, and asked if our boats could handle 50 hertz power. We said yes, and they started wiring. As they were working on it, I noticed that they had three phase power, at 420 volts. My boat has a super-duper-magic power system that is supposed to be able to handle anything I throw at it. Thus I asked them to give me the 420v three-phase. This would give my boat a ton of power, through a single 50 amp cable. Steven and Braun looked at me like I was crazy, but I remained confident that it would work. Inside, I was sweating, and my fingers were crossed. It did work. Yay!!

Above is one funny picture, though. I went out for a hike, and was coming back to the boat when I noticed thick, black smoke above the GSSR boats. I phoned to Roberta who was in our stateroom, to ask if we were on fire. She said, “Not as far as I know," and rushed upstairs. Leaning out the back door she realized that the battleship had started engines in order to leave, and was throwing out thick black smoke. When I reached the boat, the battleship was gone, but the smell inside Sans Souci was not great. It smelled like we were on fire! Roberta said my call was timed poorly. I called just in time for her to take a full load of thick black smoke into the boat. Oops.

I am deliberately refraining from talking directly about Petropavlovsk until my next blog. Suffice it to say that the city has exceeded my expectations, and I have nothing but good things to report. I didn’t want to mix talking about Attu and Petropavlovsk in the same blog, so that each location gets proper respect.

And lastly…

It really took until about an hour after arrival before it set in, 'WE HAD CROSSED THE PACIFIC.' For Grey Pearl and us, this means we have crossed both the Atlantic and the Pacific. Wow! There were wide ear to ear smiles on all three boats! We still have a challenge ahead of us to reach Japan, but this arrival marked a huge milestone for us.

More soon…

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Sans Souci, Nordhavn 68
www.kensblog.com

P.S. Roberta snapped a collection of lovely pictures of the plants and flowers on Attu. To see them, CLICK HERE

GSSR#30 - Kiska and the Fish That Wouldn't Die

Thu, 23 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	3,175 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	2,101 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	190 nm

Our departure from Adak went smoothly, although, we were a bit worried about the weather. The forecast called for a 20 knot west wind throughout our 24 hour ride to Kiska, and we would be heading right into it. We thought about staying and waiting for a better forecast, but the forecast for all of the next five days looked exactly the same.

As we were exiting Adak harbor, we noticed that Seabird had a whale riding along, within a few feet of their boat.

Within an hour of starting our trip we noted that the winds were much higher than predicted. The wind was running over 30 knots sustained, with gusts up to 50 knots.

As we were pitching, I noticed Bill smiling. I asked him what he found amusing, and he said that he had received a lot of questioning from his fishermen buddies about whether or not a ‘yacht’ like Sans Souci was really able to handle the Bering Sea. This was our first taste of real action, and he was very happy to report that we were handling it just fine.

Our route, between Adak and Kiska was along the north side of the Aleutian islands, in the Bering Sea. As we were running west, we passed a succession of volcanoes and small islands on our left (port) side. Beyond these islands lies the Pacific Ocean.

Between each island, there is a pass, usually between one and twenty miles wide. After passing a few of the islands, we noticed a pattern. As we would approach each pass, we would get 30-40 knots of wind in our face. This would last until we were in the middle of the pass, and then we would often see the wind drop, or even shift around to behind us. Once past the pass, the wind would resume the forecasted westerly direction at around 20 knots. This ‘pass weather’ phenomena is something I haven’t seen before. I assume it is caused by winds flowing from the Pacific to the Bering Sea through the passes.

Overall, it was a good run, and very scenic. The waterfall above is probably a couple hundred feet tall and spectacular! Were we somewhere less off the beaten path, a waterfall such as this would have a name, and perhaps be a tourist attraction. But, not here…

Here’s a bit of background on the island of Kiska:

The island of Kiska had a major role during World War II, and really represented the last assault in the Aleutian War.

After the Japanese bombed Dutch Harbor, in June 1942, Japan captured the two western Aleutian islands of Kiska and Attu. Roughly five thousand Japanese were on Kiska, and six thousand on Attu.

In May, 1943, the U.S. fought and won an extremely bloody battle to rid Attu of the Japanese. I’ll talk about that battle when I do my Attu blog. After capturing Attu, the U.S. realized how difficult it would be to take Kiska, and spent months training, and assembling, a huge attack force.

On August 15, 1943, thirty-eight thousand U.S. and Canadian troops landed on Kiska, where three days of heavy battle ensued under foggy weather conditions. Casualties included 25 killed and 31 wounded, all by friendly fire. The Japanese had abandoned Kiska nearly a month before.

A Japanese ship sunk in the harbor near where we anchored.

There is an old Japanese submarine lying on the beach.

The inside of the sub surprised me. It appears to be ‘all electric.’ The majority of the length of the submarine is filled with old batteries. The sub shows signs of having been bombed.

To our surprise we were not alone at Kiska. There was a sail boat in the bay when we arrived, and another one that arrived a few hours later. Both had made the two thousand mile passage from Japan, without stopping in Siberia. We did some exploring together, and invited them aboard Sans Souci to do their email. Each had only two persons (a male and female) on board.

They had covered the 2,000 miles from Japan in just over 13 days, averaging around 6.5 knots. Very impressive! Also impressive, both crews were alert and ready to hike upon arrival. After a run like that, one would think they would want to sleep for days.

We saw a lot of ‘stuff’ on the island, but I had trouble deciding what artifacts were Japanese, and what were American. After Kiska was recaptured by the Americans it was briefly occupied by the American military. My guess would be that the docks and telephone poles are of American origin.

For instance, here’s a junkyard we walked past. Lots of old rusted vehicles, and once again, no idea if these were Japanese or American – but most likely American.

During the year that the Japanese occupied Kiska, they were bombed frequently. This perhaps explains why the Japanese had a network of caves and tunnels. During Bill’s last trip to Kiska, he and his crew had discovered some tunnels and caves, which he said were an easy hike.

Bill’s definition of an ‘easy hike’ and mine differ. We probably only hiked a mile or two to the caves, but it was in thick grass, with very uncertain footing. As we were hiking, I couldn’t help but think how bad it would be if someone broke a leg. Whereas it is great fun to explore a remote location, on a remote island, in the middle of nowhere, my guess is that if someone were to have a serious bone-through-the-skin broken leg, we would be 12 hours, at least, from receiving medical attention. All of us have had some degree of first aid training, so I do believe we could stabilize a patient, but any serious injury would mean a call to the coast guard, a helicopter, and odds-are, a flight to Anchorage. Oh well… As Roberta would say, I worry too much.

I’m actually not sure what we were walking on. Often, it seemed there were logs, or old irrigation conduit, hidden just beneath the grass. We were stepping from log to log (or, pipe to pipe), with deep holes in between. All we could see when we looked down was the thick grass and foliage but we could feel that every step had to be carefully placed. Of course, the signs on the beach warning us about all the unexploded ordnance still lying around weren’t making the hike much easier on the nerves.

[

Finally, we found some caves, and several members of our group went inside. The caves were simple dug-out tunnels, but have lasted for 65 years. About half of our group went inside, and the other half, including myself, wanted no part of being inside a 65-year-old Japanese tunnel. The cave was empty, although no one in our group explored its full length. Bill had previously discovered a cave, a little farther along that was a full hospital, with tables and cots still inside. He encouraged us to go come along, but we were all too tired to continue by this point.

Once back on the boat, Jeff and Kirt asked if they could take our tender fishing. We had befriended a ship’s pilot, David, in Dutch Harbor, who happened to be in the harbor at Kiska guiding a freighter. The freighter was sitting in Kiska harbor, accepting deliveries of fish from commercial fishermen in the area. I thought it was late in the day to be going fishing, about 9:00 pm, but they said “No worries.”

Their fishing went very well. Too well, in fact. Almost immediately, the guys caught a 30 pound cod. They then caught a 45 pound halibut.

That’s when they captured this guy, and disaster struck. As they were pulling in this monster halibut, they put the gaff (like a giant fishhook on a chain) in him, and he rammed into my inflatable tender.

Pop!

The gaff popped our own tender. One of the tubes went flat, and the halibut was still fighting. Luckily, the tender wasn’t sunk, but it was leaning. The halibut wasn’t giving up. It started pulling the tender, and gave the guys a tour of the bay, including almost dragging them onto a reef. Throughout the episode, there was quite a debate over whether or not to just cut the fish loose. With 20/20 hindsight, that option should have been more seriously considered.

Several times, they pulled in the fish, and tried to kill it, but this fish had nine lives. They would think it was dead, and it would relax for a bit, then ram the tender again. They finally tied it by the tail, and towed it back to the freighter, because it was much too large to bring into the tender.

Meanwhile, fog and darkness had set in. Luckily, David had a handheld chart plotter that he used to guide the tender to the freighter. Once at the freighter, the decision was made to give all the fish to David. I’m not sure why. I think Jeff was feeling guilty about wrecking my tender, and knew that it was the wrong time to be slicing up fish in my cockpit, especially after midnight!

Once at the freighter, Jeff and Kirt had to solve the problem of finding their way back to Sans Souci. Luckily, the fog lifted, and they had no trouble getting home.

When David called me, via radio, the next morning to ask if I wanted some fish, I declined the offer. Fish seem to be a common gift in the Aleutians, and we’ve been taking on fish regularly. At Harris Electric in Dutch Harbor, as I was looking for a power adapter, I was given some smoked salmon. At Adak, as we were paying for fuel, we were given another giant slab of salmon. A friend of Bill’s gave each boat a generous portion of King Crab legs and some halibut in Sand Point. And the list goes on…

When the other boats overheard me, via the radio, decline the offer of fish, they were immediately on the VHF saying “We’ll take all we can get!” Our crew also overheard me and said they wanted fish.

The problem was that everyone’s tenders, including my own crippled tender, were already back on deck; we were ready to go to our next destination: Attu.

David, who was also feeling bad about my popped tender, was looking forward to an opportunity to do something nice, and said “No problem. Just come around to the back of the freighter and I’ll toss it overboard to you.” One by one the three GSSR boats stuck our noses to the stern of the freighter. Even split four ways, we received a massive amount of halibut.

It is about 190 nautical miles from Kiska to Attu. Once again we had a dicey weather forecast; another 20 knot west wind. Our forecast had been the same when we left Adak, and other than when we were at the passes, it really wasn’t that bad.

Within about an hour of leaving our anchorage at Kiska, we were in heavy, confused seas.

At first, it was kind of fun, and offered a good picture-taking opportunity. I shot some video of Seabird, which is below, following by them taking some pictures of Sans Souci (note: those pictures are at the top of this blog, chronologically out of sequence, but I didn’t think anyone would care).

Here is some very cool video I shot of Seabird and Sans Souci enjoying the rough seas, as well as some video shot on Kiska.

If you don’t see a video above, then click this link to watch it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5q_kiaOi-o

After this video was taken, the winds climbed a bit, into the 25-35 range. This wasn’t our real problem though. The seas were ‘confused.’ We had waves coming at us from both sides! Wind and waves were coming at us from the northwest. However, waves were also coming at us from the southwest! At one point I looked out the window and saw a wave, at least 10 feet tall, about to hit Sans Souci on the starboard side, at the same time as a large wave was about to hit on the port side. We were the baloney in a wave sandwich! Not fun.

Steven, on Seabird, noted another phenomena. The seas were forming what looked like miniature water volcanoes. These were cone-shaped piles of water, which appeared around us, like pylons we were supposed to be steering around.

My autopilot and stabilizers did what they could, but after an hour a message appeared on the LCD for my stabilizers, ‘Servo limit exceeded.’ After that, my starboard stabilizer just centered itself and stopped working. We were getting pounded pretty solidly at the time. I wanted to try completely killing the stabilizers, and seeing if that would get the starboard stabilizer going again. After vacillating for a bit, and consulting with Jeff, and not looking forward to even a few minutes without stabilizers, I went for it, and both stabilizers came on-line immediately.

We were now at 3.5 hours into our ride to Attu. The stabilizer incident prompted me to get on the radio and say, “GSSR Fleet. This is bad and getting worse. Should we consider turning back?” I relayed my problem with the stabilizer, and after a bit of discussion, we decided to continue on.

Perhaps an hour later, Steven was on the radio, “GSSR Fleet, we’re getting beat up pretty badly. Perhaps we should turn around.” Braun came on the radio to suggest we try slowing down to 6.5 knots, and see if that would give a better ride. We also agreed to shift heading by 10 degrees to starboard, putting us directly into the oncoming wind.

One or the other of these two moves helped. I assume it was the speed reduction. Our ride went from rough and intolerable to rough and tolerable. It was a long way from comfortable, but much better.

Even at the slower speed, we were still getting slammed. After Roberta and I were off-shift, and sleeping, we slammed into a wave so hard that water didn’t just spray across the bow, it flowed across the bow, and everywhere else. Jeff, who was driving at the time, said that all you could see out the windows in the pilothouse was water. Roberta and I both jolted awake immediately. Jeff said the cockpit (at the back of the boat) filled with over a foot of water.

Because of the slower speed, it actually took us about 30 hours to get to Attu. The anchorage was absolutely dead calm, and the sun was shining! We couldn’t believe it. I even noticed one of the guys on the other boats running around without a shirt. It was the first real sunshine we had seen in a thousand miles. Beautiful!

When Braun, Steven and I met to discuss our next major passage, to Petropavlovsk, Russia, there was instant unity on one thought, “We will wait as long as it takes to get a weather window with calm seas for our next run. We’re not going out in rough seas again for a LONG time.”

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

P.S. Some photos have appeared of the molds for the new Nordhavn 63. It is intended as the next evolution of the Nordhavn 62, and these photos are quite interesting to those of us who are fans of the Nordhavn 62 (http://oceanlines.biz/2009/07/first-photos-nordhavn-63-01-hull-complete-deck-plugs-under-construction/). Enjoy!

GSSR#29 - Adak - Sometimes we win, Sometimes the weather wins

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	2,938 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	2,338 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	240 nm

Greetings from Adak!

There’s a poem, posted at the airport, that greets incoming visitors:

“…
A soldier stood at the pearly gate,
his face was wan and old
He gently asked the man of fate
admission to the fold
“What have you done,” St. Peter asked,
“to gain admission here?”
“I’ve been in the Aleutians
for more than a year.”
Then, the gates swung open sharply
as St. Peter tolled the bell
“Come on” said he, “and take a harp.
You’ve had your share of hell.
…”

The GSSR group has been waiting for good weather for a week. Throughout our time here, the weather has steadily worsened. Our hope is that yesterday was the worst, although today is off to a really bad start.

The weather yesterday was projected to be from the west at 35 knots. However, at the dock, what we saw was 40-50 knots, with gusts near 60.

Sans Souci is moored alongside an old fuel barge, and somewhat protected from the wind. Seabird is tied to Sans Souci on our Starboard side. Grey Pearl has been across from us, rafted to two tug boats.

Yesterday morning, Jeff and I had run into Adak town for breakfast and were returning when we encountered Braun, from Grey Pearl, standing in front of my boat. “We need to move the Pearl,” Braun said. I said what seemed obvious, “You can’t. The wind is too high.” Braun replied, “We have to move the Pearl, or we have to go to sea, but we cannot stay where we are.”

That’s when I realized he was serious, and took another look at the Pearl. The 30+ knot winds were slamming the Pearl into the tug boats she was pushed against. Her fenders were being pushed above the rails on the tug, and it didn’t just look like an uncomfortable ride. It looked like a very dangerous situation.

Braun’s idea was that Sans Souci slide back, and Braun tuck in ahead of us, tied to the fuel barge. At first, I didn’t like this idea. The idea of Braun untying his boat in this weather was frightening. The idea of me untying my boat, in the same weather, was even more so.

Sans Souci was sitting dead center in the middle on the 120’ fuel barge. My boat is 70’ long. By sliding to the end of the barge, we could free up 50’ of space. It wouldn’t be quite enough for Grey Pearl, but Braun wasn’t picky. We discussed having Seabird untie from Sans Souci, but ultimately decided that we could leave the boats together, and with the use of lots of lines, and Sans Souci’s engines, slide the boat backwards. The wind was pushing Sans Souci back, and off the fuel barge. Sans Souci’s engines were used to counter the wind, while a fleet of 5 line handlers collected from the other boats worked Sans Souci back, a few feet at a time. Steven stood by on Seabird, engines running, to be prepared to add his thrusters to my own if needed.

Our careful planning paid off, and 15 minutes later, Braun had a parking place. He only had to move about 100 yards, but I knew it was going to be rough. Braun’s a master at handling the Pearl, and made it look easy. He was able to position the boat within about 10 feet of the fuel barge. This was close enough to where lines could be thrown, and secured to the barge. He then worked the boat back and forth, and we pulled it into the barge, inch by inch. As the wind passed 50 knots, in the afternoon, we couldn’t help glancing over at the Pearl’s prior resting place from time to time, to see how it looked. There is no doubt in my mind, had we not moved the Pearl, there would have been serious damage as waves were now crashing against the side of the tug to which they had previously been rafted.

I mentioned at the start of our Aleutian run that I expected our definition of rough weather would be ‘recalibrated’ by this trip. I chose that word carefully, and it has come to pass.

Yesterday, as the three captains were looking at the weather forecast, and seeing nothing cheery in it, we had a discussion where we tried to quantify the worst conditions we’d be willing to leave the dock in. We all want calm seas, but are starting to believe that it may be weeks, months or years, if ever, before the seas we’d like come along. Our goal with the meeting yesterday was to give the weather routers exact guidance as to what the group is willing, or not willing, to run in.

I looked back to see what I told them at the start of the trip, and this quote, which now looks pretty naïve, is taken directly from the form I sent in:

“… Sans Souci is extremely seaworthy, but we greatly prefer a smooth ride. Happy to
sit for days if it means better weather. …”

Contrast this comment to the email that represents the group consensus after yesterday’s discussion:

“…
As a guideline for this run (and our entire trip) we are using these criteria for departure:

Bow sea or 30 degrees off bow, wind 15-20 waves 6-9 feet
Beam sea wind 20-30 waves 9-12 Following sea wind 20-30 waves 9-12

Admittedly these are ideal criteria and we occasionally expect to experience poorer conditions. Our boats can handle much worse than these criteria and if we get "caught" we will be ok, but we don't want to knowingly embark into conditions worse than the criteria.
…”

Here is the forecast I just grabbed:

PKZ175-180200-
WESTERN ALEUTIANS ADAK TO KISKA
400 AM AKDT FRI JUL 17 2009

...SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY THROUGH SATURDAY...
.TODAY...W WIND 30 KT. SEAS 13 FT.
.TONIGHT...W WIND 25 KT. SEAS 10 FT. PATCHY FOG.
.SAT...W WIND 20 KT. SEAS 8 FT.
.SAT NIGHT...SW WIND 20 KT. SEAS 7 FT.
.SUN...SW WIND 20 KT. SEAS 6 FT.
.MON...W WIND 20 KT. SEAS 7 FT.
.TUE...W WIND 20 KT. SEAS 8 FT.

Comparing to our criteria above, you see that we should be able to leave tomorrow morning. But, you can also see that we’ll be at the outer limits of what we are willing to run in. We’re moving west, and going directly into a 20 knot head wind; it will be very uncomfortable.

It may also trigger a bit of a controversy. We shall see. Our next major stop is the island of Kiska. It was occupied by the Japanese during WWII, and there are many artifacts to see. Bill has been there and discovered artifacts that probably no one has seen before. I’ve just finished a book about the war in the Aleutians, and want to see the battle grounds. The other boats are less motivated to want to stop. I don’t blame them. Stopping when we have a weather window opens the possibility that we could be trapped somewhere for a week or two. None of us wants to risk being at an anchorage in the kinds of winds we are seeing now, myself included. ‘Wasting’ a weather window to stop for site-seeing, will not be popular. I don’t know how this one plays out. My best guess is that we’ll drop the hook at Kiska, jump off the boat, take a picture of a Japanese submarine, dash back to the boat, and continue to Attu. It’s certainly not the best of ideas, but as good as I’ve got at the present time.

And, with that preamble, I should tell you a bit about Adak….

Adak is one of the largest Aleutian islands; about 20 miles wide. The weather on Adak is best described as harsh. I googled the weather on Adak, and happened into a website for pilots that describes it this way: “The weather report almost never varies: Winds 25-40 gusting to 60, mostly cloudy with layers at 800 feet, 1200 feet, 2000 feet. Visibility 7 miles, rain. Temp 40 degrees F (plus or minus 5 degrees for most of the year).” That’s consistent with what we’ve seen.

During WWII Adak played an important role in the Aleutian war, holding as many as 90,000 soldiers.

After WWII, Adak was taken over by the Navy. From the 1950s to the late 1990s, Adak was a major Navy air base. At its peak, Adak was home to over 6,000 Navy and Coast Guard personnel.

There was essentially no civilian population. The Navy base on Adak had no nearby city that the troops could visit for a little relaxation. The base was essentially in the middle of nowhere, disconnected from the rest of the world. It is perhaps for this reason that the Navy seems to have gone ‘over the top’ to create a livable community here on Adak. Families seem to not only have been tolerated, but welcomed, and encouraged.

In the 1990s, Adak had all the comforts of a ‘real city;’ a college, movie theater, two high schools, elementary schools, roller skating rink, Olympic sized swimming pools, ski lodge, bowling alley, skeet range, auto shop, photo lab, racquet ball courts, day care center, an $18 million hospital, designated bird watching areas, organized fishing trips, hikes and more. The Navy even had a group, called MWR (Morale, Welfare and Recreation) whose only job it was to keep the troops happy.

Even a McDonalds and a Safeway grocery store!

I’m not complaining. If someone is willing to put their life on the line, on my behalf, I don’t think you can treat them too well. If anything, I hope that Adak is representative of how we treat our soldiers around the world, although, sadly, I suspect it isn’t.

The Naval base at Adak was closed in 1997, effectively shutting down the island. The Navy, with no use for the island, sold virtually everything to the Aleut Corporation, a corporation formed by a tribe of native Americans who had lived on the island prior to the 1800s.

Once the Aleut corporation had the city, they made an offer to their shareholders (Aleuts) to move to Adak, in return for a free home. Thirty brave families thought it sounded like a good deal, and moved to the island in 2004.

I have heard different estimates as to the current number of residents on Adak, ranging from 50 to as high as 150. I’m not sure anyone really knows.

Because of the types of missions being performed at Adak, the infrastructure requirements were huge. Two of the longest runways in North America are here. Giant satellite communications towers are in town and on the hillsides. As we have explored the island, we’re constantly running into more satellite dishes. The power generation facilities were built to power weapons labs, atom bombs, submarine bases, underwater surveillance labs, and more. This wasn’t ‘just’ a city of 6,000. It was a military base, with all of the conveniences of home, located in one of the harshest environments in the world.

Adak has a spectacular airport, with twice weekly flights, by full-sized jets, to and from Anchorage. The runways are large enough that they are designated as an alternate landing site for the space shuttle.

When I saw the airport, I started thinking to myself, “How many people does it take to run an airport?” An airport of this size, with two 7,000 foot runways, in most cities, might have more employees than live in the entire town of Adak.

One of the first comments someone made to me, when I first arrived in town, was, “You’ll notice that parts of the town are run down. There is a lot of work to be done here, and only a few people to do it.” That’s a major understatement. The airport was just one example. How many people does it take to run the power plant, the fuel dock, the harbor, the school, the hospital, run the schools, cut hair, provide medical services, pick up the trash, provide water, cable tv, telephone, pump gas, fix air conditioners, patch roofs, patch the roads and more? Whatever the number is, I’m sure it’s larger than the approximately one hundred people who live here.

Sans Souci has passed through some small towns on this trip, including some with only a few dozen residents, but those towns had infrastructure that matched their headcount. People live in old cabins, oft-times with acres of land, and are self-sufficient. And, most have been within driving distance, or a short flight, to a major city. Planes from Adak go only one place: Anchorage, and it takes four hours, a bunch of money, and you have to wait until Thursday or Sunday to travel.

Adak is different. When you first view Adak, the first impression is very positive. It appears to be a modern town. For example, our first exposure to Adak was a party, held in our honor, at the local high school. Standing in front of the school, my first impression was “Wow!” It’s a beautiful high school, across the street from the elementary school which is also huge. Were this the mainland, I’d guess at the high school as being sized for 500 or more students.

However, the current population on the island is such that kindergarten through 12th grade represents only 15 school age kids, total, all grades included.

The residents are not alone on Adak. The population of Adak is doubled by ‘contractors,’ essentially all of whom are here to do clean up.

The Navy occupied Adak for over forty years, and left quite a mess. Here’s a paragraph from a report done on the environmental impact on Adak by the Navy base:

“…Over a 40-year period, hazardous substances were disposed of in areas on the island, including landfills, storage areas, drum disposal areas, spill sites, and pits for waste oil and fire-fighting training. Petroleum, chlorinated solvents, batteries, and transformer oils containing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are some of the hazardous materials present at the site. Primary releases include: PCBs (over 2,000 gallons), unexploded ordnance (70,000 items located, not including ranges and offshore disposal), petroleum (1,000,000 gallons), solvents, and pesticides….”

My first reaction is “So, who cares?” There aren’t a lot of people standing in line to move to Adak, and the current population can’t fill the current city. A ‘Do Not Enter’ sign or two, would be adequate to keep people out of the polluted areas. Obviously this isn’t a perfect solution, and I certainly would like to see everything in the world be pristine, but when times are tough sometimes tough decisions need to be made. The people of Adak are lucky I’m not in charge, because all the contractors represent one of the city’s few sources of revenue.

For ten years, crews have been coming to Adak to clean up the island. I spoke with one of the engineers this morning who felt the cleanup was going to take at least another 10 years. Although no actual war was ever fought on Adak, the troops did artillery practice for decades, and fired hundreds of thousands of rounds, a percentage of which are still lying around unexploded. Nuclear weapons were stored on the island. When the base was closed, some items were simply buried rather than being shipped away. One resident I spoke with claims that brand new vehicles, including a couple of new ambulances and a new fire truck were buried. I’m not sure anyone knows for certain what lies under Adak, and where.

Some of the local residents have found it profitable to rent homes to visitors to the islands. Most of the homes on Adak are four-plexes, and can be bought for anywhere from $5,000 to $25,000 depending on their condition. Where else can you buy a fairly nice four-plex, in the United States, for under $25,000. I don’t think it exists.

The homes even come with furniture! When the Navy departed they moved all the furniture from the homes into the garages.

There aren’t enough people here to use all the homes. Adak is divided into many different neighborhoods. The residents couldn’t possibly provide power and water to all neighborhoods. Decisions had to be made. Services have been cut to many neighborhoods. Entire neighborhoods are sitting and decaying. They are spooky to drive through. Waterfront homes, with their entire neighborhood just shut down, waiting for the wind to destroy them. One resident described it this way, “The homes survive until the first hole is opened into a residence. A window breaks, or siding is ripped off by a windstorm. As soon as the wind finds an opening, it is all over. The next storm rips the home apart.”

The lack of residents, coupled by the excess of infrastructure creates some unusual problems. For instance, Adak had two giant building-sized generators to power the town. The generators were sized to provide power to a power-hungry military base. The costs to run them, and maintain them, were well beyond the capabilities of the local residents. New, smaller generators needed to be installed, and even now, there are signs that all is not perfect. Power outages seem to be common.

This all raises the question, “Why would someone want to live here?”

I asked a few people and the answer had some good news, and some bad news. One gentleman said, “I moved here because of the tremendous upside potential of Adak. I saw it as the next Dutch Harbor. We have the airport, which can accept full-sized jets. We have the fuel dock. We had a cannery. It’s a much better location to be the hub of the Aleutians than Dutch. However, now that the cannery has shut down, I don’t know what happens.” I heard this same sentiment from several people. There is a fish processing plant here that gave fishermen a reason to come to Adak. Due to a financial dispute between the city and the fish processing plant, the plant is shut down. The fishermen are having to run to Dutch Harbor, to sell their fish. This loss of income to the town hurts, and will hopefully work itself out, before they start losing residents.

One terrific reason to be in Adak is the Aleutian Sports Bar and Grill, affectionately nicknamed for its initials, 'The ASBAG.' Be careful with the pronunciation...! It's the only game in town for dinner or pubbing in Adak, and the GSSR did our part to boost their revenue.

I’ve received a fair amount of email from people who have lived in Adak in the past, asking for pictures. If you click here (http://www.kensblog.com/aspx/m/550425) you’ll see a full photo gallery I created with scenes from Adak. It’s worth checking out!

Lastly, I mentioned in a prior blog that the two guys who made national headlines by spending days floating off shore in a 15’ tender were based here in Adak. We were able to track them down, and talk them into sitting for an interview with me. Imagine two guys, in a little raft, in 12 foot seas, 40 degree water, high winds, and waves often breaking into the tender. Frozen, floating alone offshore in the middle of the Aleutians. When I asked Rod what he thought his odds were, he said, ‘Thin. We were under a thick cloud layer, and I didn’t think we’d be found.’ His story of being lost, and his rescue, is riveting. Unfortunately, it is also long. I have a half hour interview, and can’t imagine editing out a second of it. I’m not sure how I’ll publish it, but will figure it out sooner or later.

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

PS A very special GSSR thank you to Cynthia and Joe Galaktionoff. Cynthia organized our welcoming party, was our tour guide, helped us get spare parts and groceries, and much more.

GSSR#28 - Atka - Visiting A Plane From The Past

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	2,938 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	2,338 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	ZERO nm

At 6:30am all three crews were on the bow, pulling anchor for our departure from Umnak.

Our planning discussions for this leg had been difficult. Our goal was Atka, 260 nm to the west. However, a storm was coming, and would arrive in just 48 hours. This would give us plenty of time for reaching Atka, but probably not our next destination, Adak. In other words, if we stop in Atka, we will be trapped in Atka, by the weather.

The unanimous preference, if we were going to be stuck somewhere waiting on weather, was to be at the docks in Adak. This would allow us to weather out the storm, safely tied to docks, rather than spending nights worrying about an anchor dragging.

Put simply, we could have an easy run to Adak, 360nm away, or stop for the night, two thirds of the way, at Atka Island, and then either be stuck at Atka, or risk being caught in rough seas when we do our next leg to Adak.

The GSSR has a simple guiding philosophy: we move when the weather is good, and sit still when it isn’t.

The weather forecast called for 48 hours of southeast 15 knot winds, followed by a day of southeast 25 knot winds, then a day later becoming a west wind of 25 knots. We are moving west. So, for two days, we would have relatively light winds, behind us, followed by a day of fairly strong winds, once again behind us, followed by strong winds in front of us.

There are many factors to evaluate when looking at weather. Some of the important ones are: Wind Speed, Wind Direction, Fetch, Current, Swell Height, and Direction of the Swell. All of these need to be taken into account to really understand sea conditions. I’ve been in 50 knot winds that I hardly noticed, and 15 knot winds that had sea water over the bow hitting the pilot house.

Weather is a huge topic, and many books exist for those who really want to dig in, and it is a topic that can get boring fairly quickly. Thus I will give only a quick generalization. As a rule of thumb, if the wind is coming from behind you, you are in much better shape than if the wind is coming from in front of you. Personally, if the wind is behind me, and under 30 knots, I might worry about maneuvering in port, but the passage itself, and anchoring, are not concerns. On the other hand, if the wind is anywhere over 10 knots, and I’m going straight into it, I know that, at a minimum, it will be an uncomfortable ride.

For our run to Atka and Adak, the weather report was telling us that the winds would be behind us for the next three days. For the first two days we would have light winds behind us (15 knots) and on the last day they would strength to 25 knots, but stay behind us. It would make for a messy arrival, but otherwise it should be an acceptable run.

Here’s the summary from a weather report we received while underway:

“…Based on the more favorable wind/sea pattern … you may wish to consider continuing to track directly toward Adak Islands while the conditions are favorable. Stopping in Bechevin Bay (Atka) then continuing onward on Friday will tend to result in increasing SE-S winds that could be near/at Gale force by the time you arrive, not to mention rain/rain showers and fog which will tend to lower visibility. …”

The words 'Gale Force' are a real wake-up call.

All of this raises the question, “Why were we even discussing stopping at Atka, and how bad do we want to go there?”

Our goal was to find a B-24 Liberator that was wrecked there, in 1942. There are only three of the B-24 Liberators in existence today, one of which is in a museum, one of which is in tiny pieces, and the other is lying near a beach on Atka, rarely seen by human eyes.

Bill visited the plane a decade ago, and knew where to find it. He wanted to see how it had deteriorated over the years, and we also wanted to find it.

Ultimately, we decided “Let’s just go for it, and if the weather turns nasty we’ll just sit at anchor for a few days.” We didn’t want to miss out on seeing the plane. Plus, our experience has been that any forecast over about 24 hours, is subject to change. And, in the worst case, a few days sitting out a storm at anchor wouldn’t be the end of the world. All of us have good faith in our anchoring gear, and would be just fine.

Our run to Atka lasted overnight, but was as smooth as it gets.

Here’s a few pictures from the run...

Here's a look at Roberta driving the boat. On the right hand monitor is an engine room camera. Kirt was doing an engine room check, and we were spying on him.

Here’s a look at Grey Pearl running alongside. The Internet on Sans Souci is still working perfectly (Mini Vsat). Every once in a while a call will come on the radio, “Sans Souci, this is Grey Pearl. We’re going to sneak alongside to do our email.” They need to come in fairly close to pick up our wifi signal.

This is the Kasatochi volcano. I’ve got a wild story about it erupting last year that I’ll include in my next blog. The volcano may not look too impressive in this photo, but keep in mind: This is post-eruption.

There is a 46’ trawler, a Diesel Duck named 'DavidEllis,' which has been working its way from Hong Kong to Seattle. We’ve been tracking its position, as have they ours. We were to pass near each other overnight, and frequently called them on the radio, as well as zooming the radar out to 24 mile range. And, in fact, I know now that we did pass near each other, but we never saw them on the radar or had radio contact. Darn! They were recently in Japan, and we were looking forward to speaking with them.

As we were approaching our anchorage at Atka, Bill and I had a funny discussion...

I switched on the Sonar. Bill was running the boat at the time, and said “I don’t need that. I’ve got everything I need to drive.” This led to a debate over the merits of Sonar. My favorite line from the debate was when Bill said “This isn’t a boat. It’s a [bleep]-ing video game!” Bill was referring to Sans Souci’s extensive collection of electronics, which can be intimidating, until you get used to everything.

It was a good natured discussion, the result of which was that I learned some new tricks.

Sonar allows you to look around, under the water. Physically, it is like a periscope that pokes out beneath the boat. I use it when entering unknown bays, to look for rocks. I also use it underway, to look for uncharted shoals, and while at anchor to look for any rocks, or shallow spots, that might be within my swing circle.

I said this to Bill, and asked him how he could possibly know that there aren’t rocks ahead of us in the bay without Sonar. His answer, “I’ve been here before.” I said that wasn’t a valid response, because there are plenty of times we enter bays that we haven’t been to before, and that the charts can’t be relied on this far off the beaten path. His reply, “I use my depth finder.” This made no sense, and I said so. “A depth finder only looks beneath the boat. What good does it do to discover a rock, if you’re already on top of it.”

SONAR

DEPTH FINDER

This led to Bill conducting a class in 'Advanced Depth Finder' usage. I had always thought I understood depth finders, but Bill explained some pro-tips. I don’t know that I quite understood all that Bill taught, so I’ll just give the quick overview and those of you with boats, and good quality color depth finders (aka fish finders) can experiment at home. Bill had me manually set the range to much deeper than the water I was in, and then crank up the gain. The image for the bottom was replicated. This told Bill it was a hard bottom. A soft sand bottom, such as in the image above, would not have produced the second echo. He then showed how the color could be used to warn of an upcoming rock or shoal. A blue tint meant the depth was about to change. As you are moving forward, if you look beneath the thick line that indicates depth, you’ll see some blue start to creep in. With enough experience, you learn that it is an indication of a shallow spot coming.

Overall, he didn’t convince me, and I didn’t convince him, but I definitely will be working to hone my depth sounder skills. There’s more to it than I realized.

Anyway … enough tech talk… now, on to the fun stuff…

Here you see the three boats, at anchor, and us tendering to shore.

Steven and Carol Argosy (Seabird)

Here is a short video interview, with Bill Harrington, where he gives a brief background on the plane, and how it crash landed:

Note: If you don't see a video above, then click the link below to see the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYjlOTV0ckU

Here’s our first view of the plane, as we came over a tall bank. The plane is completely hidden from view from the water.

You can still see where the plane first struck the ground, and parts are scattered over about a 200 yard area. It says something about how isolated we are, that the parts are still where they were first scattered, sixty years after the incident. We did touch things, but were careful to put them back exactly where we retrieved them from.

Here’s the strut and wheel. It appears that the plane separated from the wheel and came to rest about a hundred yards farther, where the tail broke off.

This is the tail section of the plane, upside down.

Here’s a few shots of the graffiti inside the plane. Bill remembers much of it from when he was here many years ago, and believes most of it was written by the original crew.

My guess is that this hole in the side of the plane was cut by someone wanting to take some of the graffiti home to put on display.

There is one panel from the plane where visitors have been marking their initials, and when they visited. There haven’t been many visitors. We thought about carving initials, and putting the date, but it seemed wrong. Bill knew some of the people who have their initials here.

Above is the Sans Souci crew (L to R – Jeff Sanson and Kirt Ahlquist of Pacific Yacht Management, Roberta Williams, Ken Williams, Shelby (Dog), Bill Harrington)

I looked under the plane, and the spare tire is still hanging there, looking brand new, sixty-five years after the crash. Bizarre.

Reindeer.

This is a strange looking fox. I’ve never seen one that looked like this before. It's also one of my favorite pictures ever. The fox was watching us from just outside his lair.

A fishing boat that dipped its nose into our anchorage, just at sunrise.

At 6:30am the next morning we started our 70 nm run to Adak. As usual, everyone was on the bow with their windlasses running by 6:29am, but at 6:30am when Sans Souci and Seabird were floating free, Grey Pearl hadn't moved, and their crew was still standing on the bow. A few minutes later, we heard on the VHF, “GSSR fleet, this is Grey Pearl. We have blown a hydraulic line and are trying to bring the anchor up by hand.” Braun went on to explain that the hydraulic break was in a hard-to-reach place, and not easily fixed. He had made the decision to continue to Adak without making the repair. On his N62, there is a closed hydraulic system, used only for the thrusters and the windlass. If he could get the anchor off the bottom, his only other problem would be on arrival in Adak. Without thrusters, if we arrive in strong winds, docking will be ‘interesting.’

I couldn’t imagine how Grey Pearl was going to get their anchor off the bottom by hand. I wanted to ask, but knew Grey Pearl had plenty on their plate, and it would be wrong to interrupt them. I’ve thought often about how Sans Souci would get our anchor off the bottom, if we were to lose a windless (the motor that pulls the chain up, and lifts the anchor from the bottom). Our anchor weighs 250 pounds, PLUS the weight of the chain, which is many times that. I do have a backup windlass, but both are powered by the same hydraulic system. In other words, if I lose my hydraulics, I’ll have lost both windlasses, and in my case, I’ll also lose my stabilizers, as well as all thrusters. There are valves I can close (I think) which would allow me to isolate parts of the system, and get some functionality back, but I’ve never done any of this. The hydraulic system has been very reliable, on this, and on my Nordhavn 62. Hopefully my luck will continue.

While Braun was lifting his anchor by hand, I was trying to do circles in the bay. The wind had come up, and we were keeping busy just trying to make turns. Sans Souci has a fair amount of windage. We were seeing 25 knots and more of wind, inside the bay. Turning the boat, and doing circles was easy, kind of. It wasn’t a huge bay, and we also had Seabird circling, plus Grey Pearl at anchor, and very limited visibility (due to the sea spray and rain.) Miraculously, we only circled for about 30 minutes before Grey Pearl was on the radio saying “GSSR Fleet, Grey Pearl is ready to go.”

Our run from Atka Island, to Adak, was in the roughest seas we’ve seen so far, but because the wind was behind us, the boats hardly felt it. We were consistently over 20 knot winds, with long stretches over 25 knots, some 35 knots, and even some gusts touching 50. But, it was as smooth a trip as you could imagine. The bows weren’t even pitching. If you watched the Atka video, you saw an example of our ride, and heard my comment on current. We were in strong current, that sometimes shot us forward, and other times held us back, but overall we made great time, and had a good ride. Approaching Adak we were a happy group of cruisers.

Once underway I was able to ask Braun about lifting his anchor. He explained that he had a custom made winch-handle, manufactured by the Argosy company. My windlass has a place in the top where you can insert an aluminum bar, for cranking up the windlass, but there is no leverage. Actually lifting the anchor would be impossible. Apparently, Braun thought ahead, and him and Steven (Argosy) custom fabricated a much longer handle, that would provide the leverage needed to crank up the anchor. A great idea! I wish I had one… All I have is the standard-issue popsicle stick that Nordhavn provides.

We had been warned, by Bill, that the docks in Adak are ‘rustic.’ Adak really has two places to tie up; a small boat harbor, which is well protected, and very nice, but with only enough space for about ten boats, and in bad need of dredging. Depths at the entrance are only about five feet at low tide. There was no way we could enter, and there was no space for us even if we could. The larger docks also had their issues. The pilings were badly in need of repair, and the ladders that you climb to reach the dock were falling apart. On a nice day, we could perhaps have found a decent place at the dock, but in a 25 knot wind, approaching the docks was dangerous and not happening.

We had received advance notification, from the harbormaster, that one of us could tie up to a fuel barge that was tied to the docks. It would float up and down with the tide. This sounded great to me, and I tied to it. Grey Pearl entered next, and quickly ascertained that tying to the dock would be impossible.

I asked them to stand by while I sought permission for them to raft to two nearby tugs. Permission was granted and Braun worked some magic approaching the tug. In a few minutes he was tied up. Steven then rafted alongside Sans Souci, and we were happily tied up at Adak.

Although our boats were now docked, we still needed to figure how to get ourselves to shore. Between Sans Souci, and the dock is a big fuel barge. Transiting from Sans Souci to the fuel barge means stepping across a three foot gap, twenty feet above the water. Then crossing from the fuel barge, to a platform beneath the dock means stepping across a gap, also 20 feet above the water, which is sometimes only a foot across, and at other times six feet across. Here we see Steven yanking on a line, trying to bring the six hundred or so tons of Sans Souci, Seabird, and the fuel barge, closer to the dock, so he could step across. With high winds, this can be quite a struggle. Once across, you climb 10 feet up a ladder. This isn’t too bad, until you remember that we usually are carrying Shelby, and a bag of trash. Cynthia from the Harbormaster’s office brought us a bucket, making life much easier. Shelby likes her daily bucket rides…

We were assisted in tying up by several Adak residents who had come out just to welcome us to town. I asked one how often they see boats, other than commercial fishing boats, or military boats, come into Adak. He said that it used not to be very common, but was starting to be much more frequent. “Usually,” he said, “we see sail boats, headed east.” I asked him to quantify how many yachts a year Adak sees. “Two,” he guessed. Wow! We had achieved 150% of Adak’s annual quota, just with our little group.

Cynthia, from the Harbormaster’s office, invited us to a party in our honor, being held at the local high school. We couldn’t believe the food they put together for us! It was wonderful, and creative. The local kids played drums for us, and we had a Q&A session. Very cool. We keep running into posters around town, including a brochure on the bulletin board at the local pub with bios for each of our boats.

I am deliberately saying nothing about Adak itself. This blog is already too long, and I want to give Adak plenty of attention.

Just to give you a teaser, Adak is the most unusual town I’ve ever been in, and I’ve been a lot of places. It’s like a town plucked from somewhere deep in the twilight zone. By this I do not mean anything derogatory. I always say that the people ARE the town, and the people of Adak are incredible. I also say that it’s not the cards, but how you play them. The people of Adak have been dealt some tough cards; some of the worst weather in the world, and a town that is eerie, that comes with a lot of unique challenges. Don’t miss my next blog.

And lastly…

I spent this afternoon playing with a new toy that is pretty cool! I used an underwater camera to check out the props on my boat, and on Seabirds. I have heard about these things in the past, but always thought they were a waste of money. A fisherman in Juneau convinced me I should give one a try, and I found one cheap on ebay. Depending on quality they cost anywhere from $200 to $1,000 new. The one I bought cost around $400 on ebay, and probably double that new (the Atlantic AUW-5600.) It’s a camera for seeing underwater. The camera hangs at the bottom of a cable, 200’ long, that you can dangle under the water. Once under water, you can turn on lights on the camera, and have remote control over aiming the camera. After looking at our props, which were clean, we decided to experiment with dropping the camera all the way to the bottom, about 40 feet below. Wow! We had a crystal clear view, and watched fish swimming, found an old aluminum gang plank, and even a rotting old wooden boat. We were hoping to see some King Crabs wander by, or a Halibut, but, no luck. A very handy device!

Thank you,
Ken Williams
Nordhavn 68, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

PS Some of you may have sneaked a peek at the weather, and realize that we’re “stuck” waiting on weather. This is our first real weather delay since the trip began, and it is a big one. Our next major stop is the island of Kiska, 220nm west. To get there we would be fighting a 20 to 35 knot headwind all the way. I suspect we’ll be here at least another four or five days, or longer. Oh well… this isn’t a bad place to be stuck!

GSSR#27 - Umnak Island, and the Swell From Hell

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	2,610 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	2,666 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	260 nm

Our departure yesterday was a bit more disorganized than usual. Historically, this group has been almost military in handling our departures. When we say “Anchors up at 6am,” we mean it. At 5:59am, three anchors will rise from the depths.

As we do prior to every departure, the captains of the three ships hold a Captain’s Meeting, where we discuss the upcoming trip. We review the latest weather report, any mechanical issues, and anything else that might be relevant to the upcoming passage.

Because the weather around Dutch Harbor had been bad for several days, there was a more serious air than usual to the discussions. We were looking out the window at nasty weather, but a two-day weather window was to open the next morning. Based on this, we made a decision to leave the docks at 6:30am.

However, as we were coming back from dinner, the wind was still over 15 knots at the docks. This led to some casual discussion of whether or not we would still leave if the wind hadn’t dropped by morning. Our worry was that if we were seeing 15+ knots sitting at the dock, it might be much rougher out at sea. We loosely said we’d make a go/no-go decision when we woke up. Then, later in the evening, Braun (Grey Pearl) stopped by and we started talking at the back of the boat. I mentioned that I had just pulled the weather report, and the latest outlook was that the winds would not drop until the afternoon. I also mentioned that Bill had spoken to some local fishermen who said they were going to wait for the afternoon to depart. We talked about possibly waiting until noon for departure, and once again said that we’d decide in the morning.

At 6am I was at Sans Souci’s helm ready to go, but saw no activity on Seabird or Grey Pearl. At 6:30 Braun wandered over to the boat – “Are we going?”. The wind was still above 15 knots, sustained. I was tired and would have been happy to go back to bed. I said, “Let’s talk to Bill.” To no great surprise, Bill had an opinion. “Look guys. The days of flat seas are over. This is about as good as it gets. Don’t ask my opinion, because I wouldn’t even think about whether or not to go in this.”

Braun and I said, “That’s it. Let’s go!” Braun said he’d be ready in 10 minutes.

Although we started our time at Dutch Harbor rafted to each other, extra space at the dock had become available, and the other two boats had moved to the inside of the dock. To leave the docks they needed to maneuver around the end of a very tight dock, in very shallow water. Both boats exited easily and in 10 minutes were underway. Only later did I hear that Seabird had understood from our prior night’s conversation that we would be leaving at noon. Oops. I was quite impressed that Seabird’s crew was able to go from sleep to leaving the dock in minutes!

The wind died as quickly as we left the dock. The weather gods seem to be fans of the GSSR. Throughout our 100 nm run to Umnak Island, we had calm seas and light winds. It was a very smooth run.

About midway through our trip we overheard a helicopter overhead. It was the coast guard just saying hi. Bill chatted with them on the radio as they passed overhead, and
posted this message on my comment board:

The Coast Guard helicopter gave us a nice fly-by this morning and I spoke to my friend Jason, a rescue swimmer. They were out searching for a crewman who fell overboard a fishing boat so were low on fuel and could not give us much chance to take photographs. It's a privilege to have acquaintances there and know they are on our side. I have a good many friends who are still alive due to a ride in their hoist basket, and I thank the CG for being there every time I see them.

As we approached Umnak Island, there was a bit of fog. This photo is of some waterfalls on shore.

Here’s a look inside the pilot house, and our first view of where we would be anchoring. We would be dropping anchor at 8:30pm, which would normally mean bedtime after a long day.

However, the weather report once again had us thinking. We were projected to have two days of good weather, followed by a storm. As I’ve said many times, we have been spoiled by calm seas, and hope to keep it that way. Storms roll through the Aleutians quickly, and unless we are willing to accept getting bounced around, we need to move whenever we have a weather window. I can tell that our extreme focus on seeking weather windows is a sensitive issue for Bill. He is on this trip because he is passionate about the Aleutians, and excited to share his passion with us. We were now anchored at a tremendous spot, in front of a volcano that he was looking forward to hiking, and enjoying. However, the group’s analysis of the weather was that we had only a couple days to reach Adak, our next major destination, before another storm would be on us.

Rather than miss the opportunity to see Umnak Island, we decided to drop the tenders and explore, even though it was 10 at night, and we would be departing early the next morning. Specifically, we wanted to find the hot springs. Umnak has a volcano that violently erupted last year. When Bill was here prior to that, the sand on the beach was too hot to be walked on barefoot. His crew dug pits in the sand, that filled by sea water, creating personal hot tubs.

Here is Roberta and Steven from Seabird -- Shelby looks unhappy because she was having trouble walking through this high foliage with her life jacket on. (A bit later, we removed her life jacket and she was much happier.)

I have been VERY curious to set foot on an Aleutian island. When viewed from the boat they have a smooth green appearance, like a well manicured lawn. We’ve been referring to it as green peach fuzz that covers the islands. Here you see a close-up, and as can be seen, it is a dense brush, with flowers, a couple feet deep. We hiked for a mile through this stuff, and it is fairly easy to hike through, with or without a path. Walking, we hit a few areas where the bottom was cluttered with old logs, requiring us to step from log to log or fall into pits of unknown depth. I don’t really understand where the logs came from. Other than a few trees, hand-planted by local island residents, we haven’t seen a tree for over a thousand miles. I asked Bill, and his guess was that they fell off logging boats.

Umnak is a big island, third largest in the Aleutians, covering 700 square miles. That said, like most Aleutian islands, it is sparsely populated, being home to just 39 persons.

Although light on population, Umnak played an important role in American history….

[Note: I am not a historian, however, my blogs over the next few weeks will necessarily need to recount some events from WWII. I do not have the time, or inclination, to fact check everything I say, and will apologize in advance for any errors. I’m confident that those of you reading my blog will flood my email box if I botch the facts, and I will publish retractions as they are needed.]

For those who may have forgotten, Dutch Harbor was bombed on June 3rd and 4th, by the Japanese, nearly six months to the day after the bombing at Pearl Harbor. The war in the Aleutians is considered by some as the forgotten war, so don’t be surprised if you aren’t familiar with it. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be visiting the islands where the Aleutian war took place. The bombing of Dutch Harbor was the opening salvo in the Aleutian war.

Although neither America, or the Japanese, had any real interest in the Aleutians prior to WWII, or since WWII for that matter, they were considered of critical strategic importance by both sides during the war. Each side felt that the Aleutians could be key to launching an air offense against the other. Simply put, planes with bombs have fairly short range, and must be launched from close to their targets. Both the Japanese and the Americans felt the Aleutians were critical for both offensive and defensive reasons. It was important to each country that ‘the other side’ not use the islands as air bases, and that air bases be established from which to launch attacks against the other party’s mainland.

The Americans were not completely taken by surprise by the Dutch Harbor bombings. They knew an attack in the Aleutians was coming, and had been working to establish airbases in the Aleutians. One of these was on Umnak Island, only 100 miles from Dutch Harbor.

The bombing of Dutch Harbor on June 3rd was not a proud moment for either country. The weather was horrible, and half the Japanese force turned back unable to find Dutch Harbor. The other half was able only to bomb relatively insignificant targets. America did not respond at all, due to communications foul-ups between Dutch Harbor and the air base at nearby Umnak. Given the lack of American response, the Japanese decided to try their luck again on June 4th. The weather once again helped shield Dutch Harbor from the brunt of the bombing. Between the two bombings, approximately 60 Americans were killed, mostly military personnel, and a like number were wounded. The Americans this time did react, fiercely. Planes were launched from Umnak, to the complete surprise of the Japanese, who had no idea that an airbase existed on Umnak. Six Japanese planes were quickly shot down, and the Japanese ships they were launched from were on the run.

For a bit more about Umnak during WWII: http://www.hlswilliwaw.com/aleutians/Umnak/html/Umnak-wwii-scrapbooks.htm

Here’s a video showing our unsuccessful hike around Umnak seeking hot springs. If you do not see the video below, click this link to see the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkNvWFZffTA

Hiking on the beach, we found only a couple of things; a dead baby orca whale, and a strange pouch with Japanese writing. Our guess was that the pouch was a ration off a Japanese liferaft.

Unfortunately, we were running out of light, and needed to return to the boats.

I was surprised when I saw the back of Sans Souci, and realized that it was going to be difficult to approach the stern with the tender. Sans Souci was rolling, at anchor, fairly strongly. This caused me to glance over at Grey Pearl and Seabird. They were being tossed around violently by the swell.

We were in a six foot swell, coming in to the bay. The wind was positioning the boats so that we were beam-to the swell. When the swell is coming from the bow, it isn’t that bad; however when the swell is from the side, it can be miserable inside the boat. We had run for 12 hours to reach the anchorage, dropped the tenders, hiked for a couple of hours, and put the tenders back on deck. We needed to pull anchor the next morning at 6:30am and were exhausted. Roberta and I went immediately to bed, but quickly discovered that it was impossible to sleep being rolled violently from side to side.

Sans Souci has “flopper stoppers” which can be used at anchor to dampen the rolling motion caused by swell. These are large metal plates, which dangle into the water from giant poles that protrude from Sans Souci’s side. They are quite effective and would have given us a better night's sleep. However, they take half an hour to set up, and half an hour to take back down. We were too tired to put out the flopper stoppers, but certainly would have had we known what the night would be like.

As Roberta and I laid down for the night, I said to her, “Do you think we should just call the other boats and ask if they would like to pull anchor and go?” Our next leg would be 260 nautical miles, requiring a day and a half. I didn’t need to check the weather report to know we would be more comfortable at sea than continuing to lie at anchor rolling like this. Roberta asked if I was serious, and I said I was. After a brief discussion, we decided that everyone was probably sleeping on the other boats, and we shouldn’t bother them.

The next morning, as we were pulling anchor, Steven (Seabird) and I were chatting on the radio. Steven mentioned that he hadn’t slept, due to getting beat up by the swell. I said that I almost called him to say “Let’s go.” He said, “You should have. I almost called you to say the same thing.” Later when we spoke with Braun, he mentioned that he almost called the two of us to ask if we’d be willing to pull anchor and go. A miserable night could have been avoided had we spoken to each other. Ouch.

And, lastly…

Here’s a photo of the fishing boat I mentioned yesterday, built in 1913, that sank a submarine during WWII.

Also, I mentioned that our boat had been ‘sooted.’ Here’s a close-up showing some of the soot that was dumped on our boat.

That’s it for today. Next stop: Bechevin Bay on Atka Island, where we’ll hike to a B-24 Liberator that crash-landed during WWII.

Thank you,

Ken Williams
N6805, Sans Souci
www.kensblog.com

PS The Nordhavn 57, Flat Earth, just completed a successful passage from Hawaii to the west coast. For more information, click the links below.

http://lists.samurai.com/pipermail/passagemaking-under-power/2009-July/005299.html

And, http://lists.samurai.com/pipermail/passagemaking-under-power/2009-July/005305.html

GSSR#26 - Back in Dutch Harbor

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Total Distance:	5,276 nm
Run so far:	2,510 nm
Nautical Miles to go:	2,766 nm
Tomorrow's goal:	100 nm

Roberta, Shelby, and I flew back to Dutch Harbor yesterday, and we’re ready for the next phase of our journey: the Aleutian Islands.

Nothing bad happened yesterday, at least not to us, but I’d categorize it as a ‘bad day.’ Our flight from Anchorage to Dutch Harbor was delayed a couple of hours. No reason was given, but we had our suspicions. The weather at Dutch Harbor was not good; 35 knot winds and raining. The airline was probably not 100% sure they could land. The Dutch Harbor runway is short, and has nearby mountains at each end. The pilots who regularly fly in and out, in the horrible weather conditions here, have special training, and are real heroes.

After a couple of hours, our flight did take off. However, with no advance warning, until after takeoff, we stopped halfway for fuel at a desolate airport called “King Salmon.” Once again, I had my suspicions as to why we needed a fuel stop. Landing conditions at Dutch Harbor had to be on the grey edge. My guess is that they wanted to be sure that they would have plenty of fuel for proceeding to an alternate destination if the pilots didn’t like what they found at Dutch.

I have landed at Dutch Harbor exactly one time, so I have no idea what the ordinary approach is. I can only say that our approach was extra-ordinary by my standards. The cloud layer was only a few hundred feet off the water. Well before arrival at Dutch the plane dropped to only a couple hundred feet off the water, and drove the last ten miles or so close enough to the water that I was reminded of my days waterskiing. We slalomed for what seemed an eternity, but was probably only a few minutes, through a narrow passage between multiple islands.

I have seen many seas from inside many airplanes, and they always look calmer than they really are. The seas around Dutch Harbor looked frightening, and were I on the water, I knew they’d look far worse. I have no idea how tall the waves were, but I knew that there was no way I wanted anything to do with them.

Our actual landing was anti-climactic, other than being blasted by rain, cold and 35 knot winds as soon as we left the plane. I looked at Bill Harrington, and he just shrugged, smiled, and said “Welcome to the Aleutians.”

Steven Argosy, from Seabird, was waiting to take us to the boat, along with Kirt, from our crew.

I asked Kirt if we had missed anything during our absence. His answer wasn’t pretty. Kirt said: “Do you remember that I mentioned that there was a fishing boat on the dock that dumped soot on us a few days ago?” After saying “Yes,” Kirt continued, “Someone stopped by the boat today and mentioned that they lost a crewmember over the side in 80 knot winds.” This seemed incomprehensible to me. I had been looking at the forecast and hadn’t seen any 80 knot winds close to Dutch Harbor. I asked how this could be. They couldn’t have gotten too far away in just a couple of days. Bill answered for Kirt, “80 knots can happen here at any time. That isn’t that unusual.” This took some time to digest.

After telling Kirt I was sorry I had asked, he said “There’s more. A couple of nights ago, at the local Mexican restaurant, they had a shooting. A guy shot the chef, then shot himself.” Roberta and I had just dined there the day before leaving for Seattle.

I asked if there could possibly be more, and he pointed out the approximately 35 foot long sail boat tied at our stern. He explained that it was headed north to the Northwest Passage (http://www.openpassageexpedition.com ). I was duly impressed. Kirt said that they had a lady, a documentary filmmaker on board, who had struggled with seasickness on their run across the Gulf of Alaska, and then been beaten up here at the dock for a couple days. I looked at the sail boat, and it was being tossed around by the seas and wind, at the dock, as though it were a rag doll in a very large dog’s mouth. The film maker had had enough fun, and was headed to the airport, abandoning the expedition. As if that weren’t enough news, Kirt added that the sail boat had snapped their bow line the previous evening, and was almost torn away from the dock.

Kirt had nothing more to report, but that had been enough.

I almost didn’t write this report, because I don’t want to leave anyone with the impression that Dutch Harbor is a bad place. I doubt my day yesterday characterizes Dutch Harbor - other than the weather.

This can be a very harsh environment, and that cannot be overstated.

I also cannot overstate how nice the people have been to us here, and how good the services are. For instance, all of us have relied heavily on Harris Electric and Lunde Electric. Both have gone over the top to help us, in multiple ways. For instance, we’ve been having packages delivered all week to Harris Electric, most of which had nothing to do with anything electric. They’ve been good sports about it, and have even been personally delivering our packages. A manager at the Grand Aleutian Hotel offered to take our group hiking, then helped us find someone to wash the boat. Another manager took Kirk scuba diving. A propane place earlier today stayed open after hours to fill our tanks. A package that came in after the air cargo company closed was delivered anyhow, by personal delivery of a clerk in her own car. I suspect everyone knows we’re not likely to pass this way again, yet we’ve been treated like regulars.

It’s also been interesting on the docks. A few boats behind us is a big wooden fishing boat, probably 90 feet long. Bill mentioned that it was built in 1913, and commandeered during WWII for use dropping depth charges on submarines, and did actually take out a submarine. Last week, there was a sail boat here that was working on a circumnavigation. This week, in roughly the same place, there is the sail boat headed to the Northwest Passage. Both boats invited us aboard for tours. We haven’t seen anyone who is here, “just hanging out.” This is a place you come for a reason, and whether it is commercial fishing, or exploring the world, if you are here, you are probably doing something interesting.

I whine a lot, but the fact is: It’s pretty cool being here.

Thank you,
Ken Williams
N6805, Sans Souci

PS Sorry about the lack of pictures. We just got here, and are getting ready for departure tomorrow morning early. Weather permitting.