Literally.
That's one thing I've admired about Julian Stockwin, author of the well acclaimed "Kydd" series novels. He writes of the days when our seas were defended with wooden ships of fighting sail and iron men.
And no GPS.
Julian is definately one who does his homework. He's a seaman who has seen the harder ways of a life at sea, and in reading one of his novels, "Quarterdeck", I couldn't get past the navigational solution worked out between Kydd, now an officer, and his navigator Rawson at the end of Chapter Four, without remembering a time when I would have enjoyed a bit of peace having Julian along.
There have been times when knowing the sea and the way she works has saved me. During the ice storm related in the beginning of this web log was only one such incident.
The one time that memory recalled Julian's novel "Quarterdeck", only fortunately without the fog, happened several years before that day in the Arctic. But it proved just as memorable, and with just as unexpected an ending.
Kodiak Island, Alaska is located at the northwestern head of the Gulf of Alaska, where the Japanese Current comes up along the Aleutian Chain and then curls down into the Southeastern Panhandle, as we Alaskans refer to it. The weather that these colliding fronts can create is serious business, especially beginning in August, and hits the southeastern side of the Island and it's archipelagos quite hard.
But it's through this open coastal waterway I had to travel each fishing season, to get to my commercial fish site on Kupreanof Straits, over 140 nautical miles away. In an 18 foot open double ender.
Then after the fishing season was over in August I had to use this same route to return, to get to our home at the village of Old Harbor, tucked just inside the straits of Sitkalidak Island. Over two thirds of the passage was across the open face of the gulf of Alaska, and it's not a run to take lightly. The weather picks up suddenly and hits hard across this stretch, and several of my friends are no longer with us now because of it.
On this occasion I had completed a good season, and was towing a new skiff I had designed and just shelled in to complete once I had it home, for the next year's fishing season. She was a gull wing 18 foot built to run with twin outboards, but until it was finished I would not have use of her. So she had to be towed behind the tough little double ender.
I had been watching the weather fronts - Alaska has some of the best weather channels I've seen, covering marine weather at sea as well as for flight operations. I studied the moving fronts, calculating the effect on the tides and the wind patterns that I would encounter on the way home. The currents would play a serious part in the way the passage was effected by the oncoming weather, especially across the open waters of the Gulf, and timing the tides with the hours of daylight remaining that time of year was critical. A mistake would find me in a building sea at night, with several rocky areas across my path - and a falling 20 foot tide exposing their hazards to a wooden hull.
Not good.
I'm known for being safety conscious, especially at sea. I did the math, worked out the time and distances with the tidal effects, and calculated the positions I should find myself in at each point I knew needed to be specific.
Then I went over the boats again to make sure everything was in order. The little double ender was a proven, tough little boat. We had weathered a lot of rough seas together, and I knew the route well enough that, if things got too bad, or the unexpected happened, I could find a hole to get out of it. Even if I had to get rid of the new skiff to do it, I would make it.
As long as knew where I was - even in the dark.
Which meant doing the math.
It was a good thing I did.
The day I was to depart, unexpected family complications held me up, and I didn't cast off until several hours past my planned departure. I knew from the allowance I had made, that the tides would work with me past the worst of the points across my path. But approaching the Straits into Sitkalidak, if the weather started to build, I would be hunting a hole.
At night.
The long Alaskan days were starting to shorten enough that I knew I wouldn't make it in time if the weather turned. The forecast was good, and was usually reliable, but anything could happen. I rechecked my positioning as I went, the tide finally changing and my time and distance calculations with it. Dusk had settled in long before I cut across Boulder Bay as I passed Dangerous Cape, and adjusting for the building ebb tide, I approached the entrance of Sitkalidak Straits in darkness.
Here's where a moon would have been nice. Any light at all. But the new moon was invisible and the stars that sparkled above me, while helping me to maintain my course, only gave enough of a visual aid to show the black outlines of a cliff side to either side of me. There was no references of any kind to indicate how far I was from either side. Or the rocky shores defending them.
I could tell by the motion of the boat beneath me the way of the water, the depth enough to feel at peace with my position in the channel thus far. But it felt like I was in a black tunnel with only the top of the box open, and no way to see where I was at going through - middle, or sides. But I was familiar enough with the double ender to know what she was telling me, and continued with my faith in her reading the water I couldn't see - and the math that had told me earlier where I should be.
But after the first hour, now deep into the channel against a strong ebb tide, I couldn't help but long for a light, any light of some kind to confirm my position.
Be careful what you pray for - you just might get it.
I was studying the blackness around me when I noticed ahead, that the channel was starting to brighten. And not just a bit, but with a blaze of light as, from around the bend to my port bow, well ahead of me, a large fishing boat came into view from around his side of the channel. His "Norwegian Sunrise", as we refer to the massive array across the masthead light bar on our fishboats, was brilliantly illuminating everything for miles across the channel as he turned my way, and headed for the open sea.
Suddenly everything was vividly portrayed in every detail - and to my relief, I was right on course, in the middle of the channel.
And right in the fish boat's way, if I didn't adjust course! Fortunately we passed without incident, and in the fading light I found a perfect little bay to drop the hook for the night. I secured my berth, fixed a welcome meal, and stretched out under the stars after a prayer of gratitude to a loving Heavenly Father who saw the needs of a simple fisherman. Sometimes He teaches us in His answer, and sometimes He teaches us without one, knowing whatever it is, it's something we can handle and learn from ourselves. The important point is that we are willing to learn.
I fell asleep having learned that either way, He answers prayers.
And it pays to do your homework.
Thank you, Julian.
-WKD
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