Heading across Boca De Quadra.
Launching today was easy, off the gently sloping sand beach of my island campsite near Kah Shakes Point. By 6:45am, my kayak was in the water and I headed across the 2-mile opening of Boca De Quadra Inlet.
Looking up Boca De Quadra as I cross.
I continued up the coast reaching a small bay just south of Point Sykes at 10am. Until now, the wind had been very calm and I felt confident about attempting the 4½-mile crossing of Behm Channel. About 1/3 of the way across a strong wind started hitting me out of the northeast coming straight out of Behm Channel. I stayed my course, with Point Alava in sight, and forged my way through the waves. About ½ mile before reaching the point, a boat pulled up nearby with two kayaks tied to a rack and three women on board. The boat was from Southeast Sea Kayaks in Ketchikan and was shuttling two kayakers up Behm Canal. We talked for a couple of minutes about each other’s trips and then went our separate ways. A Coast Guard boat was drifting nearby and I believe the crew was checking me out to see if I was having any trouble. I gave them an exaggerated wave to let them know everything was OK.Contemplating the crossing of Behm Canal.
During this crossing of Behm Canal, I was amazed at the large number of floatplanes that were flying overhead coming out of Ketchikan. There was at least one every minute going up or down the channel, and that went on for almost 2 hours. One of them actually made a circle around me as if it were checking me out. I could just imagine what the cruise ship tourists onboard were saying about this lone kayaker out in the middle of this big expanse of water.
My kayak pulled up on the drift logs.
By 11:10am, I had made it across to Point Alava and was continuing up the coast past Lucky Cove. At 1:15pm, after paddling 22 miles, I reached a well-used campsite in a cove just south of Cone Point. This site has a low-lying beach that connects a small island to the mainland except during high tide when the beach is submerged. It had been drizzling for a while, but just as I landed; it really started coming down hard. After unloading the boat and carrying everything high up above the tide line, I set up the pyramid tent and started getting myself organized. This was where everything I knew about camping in the rain was put to the test. I put all my food and clothes bags into the pyramid and proceeded to get into dry clothes and start cooking dinner. By 3:15pm I was sitting comfortably dry in my Crazy Creek chair and eating dinner while the rain poured down outside.
My campsite near Cone Point.
My usual mode of operation every afternoon was to spend a few minutes exploring around my campsite looking for interesting things to photograph. This was the first site on the trip that the rain was coming down so hard that I could not get out and get some photos before sunset. By morning, the rain had let up enough to allow me to snap a few photos and make a record of the site.
Looking out on Revillagigedo Channel from my campsite near Cone Point.
