November 8, 2011 | Captains bLOG | 0 comments | Author: Captain Rob
After ten days of mobbing, which was gearing up 7 vessels, lines were finally cast off; an ebb tidal current was caught for travel down Upper Cook Inlet for an evening cruise to Tyonek from Anchorage. There was of course the snow. Flakes were large, abundant and beautiful other than the fact they were being blown sideways coupled to obscuring any vision past the bow of the boat! But then that is what radar is for! Note the three red blobs on the screen. Those were three boats in our fleet ahead of me.
The nav operators where all cozy in their deck module unit testing out equipment and happy in the knowledge that soon we’d be in the production mode.
Tuesday morning brought clear cool weather and smooth seas. The Anna Marie is the small landing craft which is transporting crew between the vessels and shore. Temps were a low of 10 and a high of 19.
We can see three of Cook Inlets volcanoes from here. Spur, Redoubt, and Illiamna which is venting as she always seems to be doing. Was a gorgeous view.
I put a small tree on board to get me in the spirit of Christmas. We’re slated to be back in Homer by the 15th of December. No one really believes we’ll last that long. Already had ice coming by us this evening. Small chunks, but ice nonetheless. I’m hoping we go as long as possible but once this upper inlet starts freezing it will push us out. There is a betting pool being started on board to guess our last day of operations with a $5 dollar buy in!
Enjoy your evening. I get off shift at midnight and then it is off to dreamland and visions of warm HI beaches. I checked, it was 82 in Kauai today. That was only 72 degrees warmer than it was here!
Take care,
rob