Otter Cove

It was late in the morning by the time we finished socializing with the couple off of the Nordhaven, so we skipped the hiking in Fox Farm and headed off toward our next anchorage. Some of our local knowledge experts had raved about the beauty of Bainbridge Passage, a six mile long channel into Prince William Sound between the continent and Bainbridge Island. This narrow cut is only a quarter mile wide in places and is never more than half a mile wide. On both sides the snow capped peaks are over 1,000 feet high. Mr Bainbridge was a lucky guy. He got a lot of features here named after him including the passage, island, and even a glacier that we passed on the way. It was our first glacier of the cruise.

The clouds disappeared, wind died, temperature climbed, and water got glassy as Starr moseyed up the passage. The crew migrated to the flying bridge to enjoy the fine weather. I had to rummage through my gear to find my hat and sunglasses that hadn't been needed for days.

Our destination was Otter Cove, an opening on the mainland at the northeast end of Bainbridge Passage. We decided to try our luck fishing just before entering the cove, so we stopped Starr, drifted, and dropped a couple of herring baited hooks to the bottom in 200 feet of water. It didn't take long for Don and Lori to catch two six pound "yellow eye" rockfish, a type of red snapper.

Don carefully nosed Starr between rock piles and into the cove. He has a very nice directional sonar on the boat that shows the bottom features in every direction. The system takes a a bit of getting used to, but it completely eliminates the mystery of what lies below the surface.

On the way in we saw seals basking on exposed rocks and otters cruising around on their backs. Lori and I took the dinghy out to explore the cove after the fish cleaning was done. We didn't see any opening in the dense forest that looked like good hiking so we stayed in the boat.

The sautéed yellow eye was superb, and Starr enjoyed a peaceful evening snugly anchored all alone in Otter Cove.