On the 10th, the big deal was to pass through three sets of rapids near the "community" of Big Bay on Stuart Island. Although the names of Yuculta and Dent Rapids and Gillard Passage don't evoke the same kind of affective response as something like "Peril Strait," they seem to have a similarly fearsome reputation, if we are to take the various and sundry guides to paddling the region seriously. Not quite the 16 knots of Peril between Chichagoff and Baranof islands in Alaska, but Dent and Yuculta routinely reach over nine knots, and generate dangerous turbulence and instability.
Our plan was to get up at six, which was close to our regular time (tough we set an alarm) in order to make it to Kelsey Point, South of Yuculta Rapids, a bit before slack (in theory around 11:30). We just made it, fighting headwinds along the way, and repeatedly stopping to avoid a tug pulling a barge which circled around and around near Kelsey Point, evidently to keep the barge under tension so as to not lose control. Made sense, of course, but he kept crossing our path, and as we didn't want to get tug boated or barged, we stayed clear for a long time.
In the end, our run of Yuculta was fine. We just made the tail end of the ebb, which gave us a nice push through the short section. No issues, though we did encounter significant boils and small whirlpools; easy to imagine that the rapids are pretty hairy at full current. What we experienced reminded me a bit of some of the faster sections of the Yukon between Whitehorse and Dawson; lots of boils and eddies, but not much whitewater.
Our five or six hour stop in Big Bay was low key. There are a number of all-inclusive luxury fishing lodges, but not much in the way of services for paddlers. A post office/general store with showers and laundry where a lot of paddlers seem to get permission to camp on the lawn. The store seems to be a liquor store as much as anything, though we were able to get some soda and ice cream. In general, though, it was a pleasant rest stop where we were able to sit in the sun or (when it briefly rained) under an enormous covered porch area, and where we paid for showers and snacked. Lots of friendly passers-by as well. We were invited to a bonfire and got lots of questions about our trip. Nice place.
We hit the water again around five, hoping to catch slack through Gillard Passage and Dent. Wound up waiting another 40 minutes or so for the current to slow enough to get through Gillard, then fought some wicked head winds on our way to Dent, maybe a mile away. Probably took us most of an hour to get there, despite the current turning in our favor, and we felt more push against us from the wind for the rest of the evening than we felt the favorable tidal current.
Our objective was a campsite of the Northeastern tip of Thurlow Island, several miles up the channel. We made the site by sunset around nine, after a particularly strong push against wind the last mile or two, as channels opened to the South and North. By comparison, our campsite was calm and even a bit buggy. It was set up for use as a lunch stop by commercial whale-watching groups, so we weirdly shared the site with about a dozen picnic tables and several gas-fired barbecue grills, as well as a commercial crab boat and crew, tied up to a float. The crabbers watched us from their boat as we paddled in--I wondered what they were thinking, but when I waved, they waved back.
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