Our weather luck held for another day, otherwise mostly uneventful. Winds were calm or favorable, and we were able to again make good time. Towards the end of the day, we stopped in briefly at Namu, the now deserted former cannery town. The location had been described as "a dump" to us by others, but since we were in the neighborhood...
In the end, I think we agreed, though it's always interesting to see these remnants of a past age... I often wonder what now-important places will be viewed as quirky tourist attractions by the odd paddler or RV tourist. The Alaska Pipeline? Juneau? Anchorage? There often seem to be a lot of dreamers trying to come up with a future for places like Namu, but these remote remnants of past resource extraction often simply don't make economic sense as fishing lodges or remote marinas.
We considered staying in or near Namu, but the spray painted "No Trespassing" signs and, probably more importantly, lots of bear sign convinced us to keep moving. Glad we did--Northeast of the ghost town, we camped on a small group of islets Kimantis talks about in his guidebook; a place with beautiful clamshell beaches and at least one slightly hidden and very comfy upland site.
Later on in the trip, I started to think systematically about desirable properties for tent sites. The big three characteristics are: flat, smooth, and soft. A few other potentially important ones may be: clean (as in, no mud or sand), sheltered (from strong winds), exposed (to blow away the bugs), access to water, etc. In any event, this location had a pretty perfect tent location, was essentially bug free, and gave us a beautiful view of the sunset. And a good, close view of one of the relatively few whales of our trip. Win, win, win.
Wish I was better at identifying whales, dolphins and porpoises. Also sea birds.
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