Update: "Here", is now owning a sailboat and outfitting it for a voyage to Alaska--even though we've never "voyaged" anywhere, and hadn't a clue a year ago that we'd be planning such an adventure. But as we say in this bit of history on our crew (and family) there was a lot of water under the bridge to get us to here--and to Alaska. As of two days ago, we're headed to Alaska and I'm typing on the sailboat in the San Juan Islands. Crew Member Alyssa typed this up near the beginning of our sailboat venture, to give you a bit of history on us and why we'd want to sail 700 miles to Alaska.
Our families journey started about 10 years ago with an obsession with all Alaska. Something about the landlocked dry deserts of Utah and the extreme difference of the Alaskan ocean, unequaled fishing opportunities, glaciers, wildlife and pristine wilderness called to us as a family.
Our beginning included family van trips from Utah through British Columbia then the wonder of the Alaska Marine Highway system to ports of Ketchikan, Wrangell, Petersburg, Sitka, Juneau and beyond. Stopping along the way we explored glaciers, forests and little communities. We spent much time observing and also gleaning important information about how to live the dream from locals, fishermen and native Tlingits . We felt that when we left the dry desert air of Utah and arrived in Alaska like we were breathing in air so fresh it was like drinking cold mountain water. As a family we found that the Alaska air, sights, sounds, and feelings healed us from the inside out. Healed us from the noisy, polluted, fast-paced life that we had been living in the lower 48. We were looking for something in every community we stopped in.
We eventually found it in a tiny Tlingit (klink-it) community called Angoon located on Admiralty Island which in the Tlingit language meant "Fortress of the Bears" It was here we stopped. It was here we became embedded in the
community of 450 mostly natives. We grew as a family, and changed how we looked at the world.
The following year through another grant, we brought 12 Native Ute high school students and their advisors from the deserts of Utah to this tiny Alaska community with the purpose of doing a cultural exchange. We spent 2 weeks doing Alaska Native activities with 12 native Tlingit students and their advisors. In exchange the Alaskan students came to the deserts of Utah to spend 2 weeks living the dry desert lifestyle of Utah Native Utes. It was life-changing for everyone. At the end of the month long exchange trip 3 members of our family were inducted into the Angoon Tlingit tribe through a revered Elder Cyril and given Tlingit names from his family.
We felt like we had come to our second home. So we bought forest covered lot across the street from the ocean and took on the ambitious project to build a small fishing cabin for our family. Ambitious because access to this community was only by float plane or a 7 hour ferry ride. Ambitious because this small community didn't have any restaurants, grocery stores or any way to build.
To make this dream happen, everything would have to be brought in by ferry from Juneau a 7 hour ride a way. Nevertheless we persevered. We drew up plans, saved airline miles, and with the help of local Utah builders, electricians, plumbers, who built the cabin in exchange for later fishing privileges. We made the dream come true. 4 trips later through Canada pulling trailers with supplies and storage sheds onto the ferry system in Prince Rupert, loading boats, backhoes, campers, and all the supplies necessary to build this 1400 square foot family fishing paradise onto the ferry from Juneau to Angoon and back again. In 2013 the Utah builders put the cabin up in 20 days. We finally felt like we had arrived.
For the next 3 years we reveled in our Alaska freedom. We spent much time at our cabin with family and friends. We learned how to use our own crab pots and where the best spots were, caught many pounds of all 5 species of salmon, halibut, and rock fish. We learned about the tides, weather and currents all while boating and fishing with our Tlingit Guide. We learned how to live with the giant brown bears that walked the roads, forests and land around Angoon and our cabin and about all the wonder of our new life.
As life progressed we noticed a small feeling of something missing that we couldn't put our finger on but that started to grow over time. We found ourselves looking out our cabin window at the beautiful ocean and scenery at the distant shore line. A shore line in the distance that couldn't be reached with our beloved 22 foot Hewes craft fishing power boat. It was then that we came to the conclusion that we didn't have the ability to explore the distant shore. We had come to know every stream, ocean and lake fishing hole and nook and cranny of our environment within our view, but we were limited to ever see anymore of Alaska. This was a painful realization because we had come to love our beloved cabin that had become home, but we knew that it was limiting the wanderlust that had grown in each of us to see more. We wanted to see parts of Southeast Alaska that if we traveled the rest of our lives we knew we would never be able to see it all.
So in December of 2016 as a family we decided to sell the cabin and our fishing power-boat and start out on our next adventure. In October of 2016 we decided to take beginning sailing lessons because we knew that the places we wanted to explore in Alaska wouldn't have hotels, gas stations of grocery stores. The only form of transportation that would take us to these places we so desperatly wanted to see would be on a sailboat. We knew that we would sometimes be weeks where we wouldn't see any form of civilization. We would need to be totally self -contained and would only have the forest, wildlife, ocean and our family of 8 for companionship. We would be going into a land of fierce weather, tides, animals and currents but also would have a chance to gain the freedom we are seeking from civilization.
We now find ourselves on this new journey. Hoping that the Alaskan skills that we have acquired over the years will help us to be successful on this new, very ambitious adventure.
We have spent the last few months reading sailing books, going to boat show classes and finding and buying the Northern Star. Now we're on our way, and this blog will daily and weekly track each step we must take to make our family dream a reality. We are headed as a family on a journey to the North Star. We hope you will join us on this exciting sailing voyage!
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