6/26/04 Sea Kayaking in Seward

We’ve had an almost unprecedented run of warm, sunny weather here, lasting into its second week. When this past weekend was predicted to be sunny and in the 80’s, we decided to get out on the water and went to Seward to go sea kayaking.

The day started auspiciously when we sighted 3 or 4 Dall Sheep close by on the mountains overlooking Turnagain Arm while driving down. We arrived in Seward and met our guide, a kid who had just graduated from college a few months ago. It was sunny and warm with a bit of a sea breeze.

We launched our kayaks (there were 6 of us in 3 tandem boats) and made our way down the shore of Resurrection Bay with mountains all around us. We heard a blow and saw a vapor plumb come up, and there was a humpback whale not far from us. The guides say they never come this far up into the bay, so we were very lucky to see one.

To continue our trip, we had to cut out into the middle of the bay to get around a long sandbar. As we made our move, the waves, which had been a foot or so, grew to 2 or 3 feet, and the sea breeze kicked up stronger. White caps became more numerous.

We finally made it around the point of the sand bar, but by then the waves were 3 to 4 feet, the wind was something just short of a gale, and every wave had it’s whitecap. Our headway was down to nothing, and it became a constant struggle just to keep the kayak heading into the wind to avoid swamping. We were all soaked from the spray of water coming over our bows and from water coming in over our boat skirts. For some reason the theme song of “Gilligan’s Island” kept running through my head.

The guide asked if we wanted to continue but I had to give it a thumbs down. This was getting to be too much like work and I had no desire to go swimming in Resurrection Bay, with it’s 40 degree water temps.

We headed back to the other side of the sandbar again and into calmer waters. The rest of the afternoon was spent paddling around closer to Seward. We still had 2 to 3 foot swells to deal with, but they were manageable. We saw a sea otter swim by us on his back, and watched eagles soaring overhead and in the trees. We had a lot of fun, got some paddling in, and saw some wildlife, but I think I’m glad we signed up for the half day trip instead of the full day!