The Grizzly Bears of Geographic Harbor

Greetings!

Arriving in Geographic Harbor, on a rare sunny afternoon after days of rain and low cloud, felt like sailing into a real-life National Geographic magazine spread!  Until then, we had had to use our imaginations to picture the tops of the mountain peaks we were sailing by because the clouds and mist hid them, but the weather cleared for our entrance to the bay, and it was extraordinary to see the mountains reflected off still waters in every direction.

As the sky cleared it was nice to finally see the big mountains we were sailing past.

Beautiful weather for the entrance into Geographic Harbor.

Geographic Harbor is part of Katmai National Park, and is so named because a National Geographic Society expedition explored it for the first time in 1919 following the Novarupta eruption (the largest in the 20th century; it threw out 30 times as much ash as Mt St Helens).  We headed for the northernmost bay, which was known as a good bear watching location, and we were not disappointed.  The anchorage area is quite deep, but it shoals near the shore, so we drove our usual 300ft circle around our preferred location to make sure we would have swing room, and anchored in about 80 ft of water as near as we could get to the beach.  There was an area of lighter green water just beyond where we were anchored, and we weren't sure if it was shallow or just silty.  When the tide went out, the mud flats appeared, and we confirmed that it dried out at low tide!  This is exactly why we do our 'anchor circle' recce before we set our anchor!

Our anchor spot. It looks like lots of room but shoals very quickly from 70 to zero feet at chart datum.

We wanted to make the most of our visit, so after a quick lunch, we launched the dinghy and motored ashore for mid-tide.  Our outboard had travelled the better part of 4,000 nm on our back rail since we had last used it, so we all breathed a sigh of relief when it started as usual.  Two float planes arrived for their afternoon visits as we approached the beach, and we all disembarked in the same area.  This proved fortuitous, as their guided group stood closer to the bears than we would have been brave enough to do on our own, and they welcomed us to join them.  Katmai has the world's largest population of protected grizzly bears in the world so it is pretty likely one will see bears ...

Rush hour.  Usually about two float planes a day fly a few charter guests in to see the bears.

For the next several hours, time seemed to stand still.  We stood under a brilliant blue sky, on a gravelly delta at the mouth of a river, with tall grassy areas all around us.  The guide explained that we would just stay there, chatting quietly, and the bears would go about their day.  Since their food supply was plentiful, and they had no experience of being hunted by humans in this park, the bears saw us as part of the environment, and not as a threat.  They were focused on their fishing, jumping and pouncing to catch salmon to eat.   We had a good view in every direction, and could see several hundred yards up the river and across the grass.  The guide was right; at one point, the bears passed only a few feet in front of us, fishing in the river!

and there were bears up the creek

and in the grass ...

The group was quite big  and I was relieved that we didn't have to be rigidly quiet: I found it quite interesting to talk to the other guests, many of whom were from the US Wounded Warrior Project.  I am always curious to hear what other people do after their time in the military, and it was interesting to hear about their various career paths and business ventures.  One of the men has a company which sells para-cord bracelets; when he noticed Victoria's Turk's Head anklet, he gave her the bracelet from his wrist :)

and of course the bears are not there to show off for us but rather to fish the plentiful salmon.

fishing ....

and more fishing ...

and more fishing.  It was a bit unnerving to have the bear charge towards us as it pounced on the salmon.

Thankfully it wasn't too cold standing on the gravel.  Unlike the charter guests, none of us had hip waders, and the water had either flooded over the top of, or through cracks in, our (very old) boots, so we had wet feet.  As the tide fell, Max went out several times to move the dinghy further away from the beach, but eventually we let it dry out when a bear decided to fish between the group and the dinghy, and he didn't want to disturb it! At the end of the afternoon, I was grateful that Max had anchored the dinghy near one of the deeper channels in the delta, and that the WWP group was quick to help pick up and carry it the short distance back to the water :)

My favourite photo of the season: a grizzy between us and Fluenta.  Our tender is on the other side of the bear from us.

Early the next morning, when I went to the cockpit to have a look around, the tide was low, and one of the bears was fishing and prowling right at the edge of the mudflats where we were anchored.  I didn't even need binoculars to watch her as she ambled around and looked for fish.  She didn't stay long, but this proved a pattern that would continue throughout our visit: the bears would come to the edge of the water at the low tide, and we could watch them from the comfort of our cockpit.

A bear in the distance bringing his fish ashore.

Tough duty:  watching bears in sock feet while eating breakfast.

For the next two days, we had Geographic Harbor entirely to ourselves!  The charter boats both left, and the float planes didn't come.  We dinghied up to the beach to watch the bears, but we didn't go ashore on our own; we just anchored the dinghy a few feet off the shore, and watched from the boat.  With two pairs of binos and a telephoto lens on our camera, we had a good view of the action.  Again, time seemed to stand still, and we enjoyed several hours of our live version of "Bear TV".

On one excursion, I commented wistfully that the bears seemed really far away, and that I wished that I was closer.  Somehow this turned into a collective decision to anchor the dinghy and stand on the gravel delta!  Right on cue, three bears ambled through the grass off to our right.  They seemed to be adolescents, as they were just as interested in wrestling with each other as they were in fishing.  When they started to growl as they fought, all of a sudden I didn't feel so enthusiastic about being close anymore!  The instinctive urge to be further away kicked back in, and we scrambled (very calmly and quietly) back to the dinghy; a few minutes later, the bears wrestled their way to the exact place where we had been!  I may not be cut out to be a bear guide!

Liz said she wanted to get closer ... The bears were playing nicely at first ...

But then when the third bear joined in, it got rather loud

but maybe this was too close as they started to really wrestle.  You can see in the picture at the top of the blog post that one of the bears has drawn blood.

We had an interesting visitor the following morning: Max and I were sitting in the cockpit enjoying our morning coffee and watching bears on the beach when the first float plane of the day arrived with its passengers.  As usual, it dropped the passengers off at the shore and then fell back to anchor.  Max had hardly finished saying that he might pop over in the dinghy to say hello, when it appeared that the plane was taxiing.  He jokingly said that perhaps the plane would come to us.  Moments later, it was evident that this was exactly the case.  With the finesse of someone who has handled big equipment for decades, the float plane glided up behind us, coming to a stop mere inches from our solar panel and wind generator, and the pilot stepped out with a painter in hand.  He scrambled aboard at our stern (over the pushpit rail and all the gear and antennas that we keep there), and joined us for a visit!  We had a most enjoyable morning sitting on our back deck and watching several bears ashore.  Thankfully, it was warm enough that we didn't need the shelter of the rain enclosure (although I went inside for extra layers a couple of times!)

Rolan and I talking bears and aviation.

We learned that Rolan and his wife had been operating Sea Hawk Air with their vintage de Havilland Beaver out of Kodiak since 1987.  Speaking with Rolan gave us a better sense of the activities of the bears, as well as some of the history of the park and its more interesting inhabitants!  While he was there, two bears started chasing down the beach; apparently we were seeing mating season in action, with the smaller female bear running away from the larger male bear.  Despite his size, we were told that this male was much smaller than the dominant male bears who would show up later in the season.   

I am sure there is room on Fluenta to have a float plane as a tender ...

With no wind, the current kept pushing the float plane towards Fluenta, so we eventually suggested a longer painter to put it back a little further.  This meant that Johnathan and Max had an excuse to take Roland back to his plane in our dinghy after his visit, so they were able to have a look inside his beautifully maintained aircraft.

A quick tour of Rolan's 'plane.  We really need a float plane (and a new dingy)...

Our passage from Sand Point to Geographic Harbor had been calm enough that Victoria and I could make salmon berry jam, and bread to put it on, while we were underway.  Our friends on Galactic had said that they "just followed the recipe on the box of pectin", but I wanted a little more information, so I did a 'remote internet search': we had no connection, but we emailed both grandmothers to see what they knew or could find!  It turns out that Salmon Berries are low in pectin, so it made sense to use the boxed powder.  We used the amount of sugar listed for raspberry jam (7 cups sugar for 8 cups fruit).  Our jam was tasty but very sweet!  We ended up with four jars of jam, two that we ate right away, and two that we will save for reminiscing!

Ever since we decided to return to BC from the tropics via Alaska, I have been hoping to meet again with friends from the Baja Ha Ha and Mexico.  SV Northern Passage was one of the first kid boats we met when we left California (in fact, our friends on SV Totem had been corresponding with both of us as newbie cruisers, and and suggested we look for each other).  After their year in Mexico, they put their boat on the hardstand and returned home to Alaksa, where they spend winters in Anchorage and summers in Seldovia, which happened to be right on our route!  Seldovia was our next destination, and we were excited to finally see them again.

Sand Point to Geographic Harbor

A more detailed chart at 1:60,000 showing the entrance to Geographic Harbor

And a more detailed chart showing the anchorage itself.  We anchored at the western extremity of the red "track" line.  The recommended anchorage from the RCC was closer to the beach than we were comfortable with.  Depths are in fathoms.

We left the following morning for what we thought might be a one-day sail, but the wind had other plans.  When we got out into the Shelikot Strait (between the Alaskan Peninsula and Kodiak Island), the wind and sea state built well beyond the forecast.  By suppertime, we didn't like the uncertainty of the conditions - was this as bad as it would get, or would it continue to deteriorate?  One nice thing about cruising (as we often have to remind ourselves) is that we can stop if we choose to.  We were on a deep broad reach towards Malina Bay, and Max determined that rather than jibing towards Seldovia, we could probably just anchor overnight!  We radioed a fishing boat which we saw departing they bay on AIS, and asked about anchoring in the little bight we had spotted.  In the understated way of fishermen, he said that we could anchor there if we wished, but it would be rolly from swell wrapping around the corner, and the local fishing fleet would be at work right beside us from about 0500 the next morning.  His recommendation was to go through a narrow channel, beyond the reach of the swell, and anchor overnight with the fleet.  We did a quick speed-time-distance calculation, and determined that we could make the four-hour journey into the bay with minutes to spare before dark, so this is what we did: by 2330 we were anchored in the fading twilight.  Thank goodness for the long northern days!

The forecast was not good for the next day, but it was not terrible, and the weather was predicted to get worse before it got better, so we decided to set out for Seldovia the next morning.  It was good that the wind was behind us: we had up to 38 kts sustained (i.e. gale force) and steep seas for most of the day.  It was not fun, but we made it.  Despite the tough conditions, we were glad we left Malina Bay when we did: as predicted, conditions only intensified over the next week, and we would have been stuck, not visiting our friends, *and* not seeing bears, while we waited out the storm. 

Geographic Harbor to Seldovia with an overnight stop enroute.  It was a tad sporty with a gale for much of it.

The wind died away to nothing as we came into Seldovia Bay, so I woke at dawn to the sound of the engine changing tone.  Max was already setting the anchor by himself!  We both got some sleep, and then moved Fluenta onto the dock in the morning.  We had the rest of a beautiful sunny Sunday to clean and wash the boat before our evening reunion with Northern Passage.  With the foredeck heaped in kiting gear and sails, and two lines of clothing and bedding flapping in the wind, I am sure we looked a bit like a group of vagabonds, but it was worth a few stares to get the cabin emptied and to see what damage we had taken during the month at sea.  Thankfully, although a lot of gear was damp, there was not much actual damage.

Once everything was dry, it didn't take long to stow it again.  With a tidy saloon, swept floors, and order restored to the V-berth, we were ready for a week of catching up with our friends!

Love to all,
Elizabeth

Along the Bering Sea to False Pass .

Salmon berry season !

[This is our second long-overdue installment of stories about our Alaskan Summer.  We are slowly catching up with ourselves!]


Greetings!

After a week on the dock at Dutch Harbor, and with lots of hugs and 'see you down the way' being called out, we headed East along the Aleutian Islands in a series of short hops.  One of the hardest parts of cruising is the constancy of these farewells, but one of the delights is the reconnection with old friends, often many years and and/or many thousands of miles later.  This week held both.

The first afternoon, we saw what we hope will be an unusual sight: a baby whale was floating dead and surrounded by birds.  We reported it to our friends back in Dutch Harbor who passed the information along to the Fish & Game folks.  The cause of its death was not apparent to us.

A sad sight on the passage across the Bering Sea

Our first stop was False Pass, so named because early explorers believed there was no route through there from the Pacific to the Bering Sea.  It turns out that a channel does exit through the shoals on the Bering side, and we picked our way carefully from buoy to buoy, as their positions were different than the channel marked on the chart (and different from NOAA to Navionics charts).

Entering False Pass.

There was a small general shore at the top of the dock, then the town was a 15-minute walk away.  We were so warmly welcomed!  With Fluenta secured to the dock, we walked ashore in time for the evening rummage sale at the library; the cashier at the store was also the part-time librarian.  We left with full tummies (hand-made pizzas accompanied by macaroni salad with salmon roe), new sweaters (especially for Benjamin), and two bags of books (no surprise there).

As we walked along the road, people driving by stopped to tell us to us to watch out for bears (not just once, but three times!) and when we met the town safety officer (a combined police, fire, EMT officer) at the sale, he told us he had maxed out his overtime dealing with bears, so he is only allowed to respond to "predator" issues if a bear is actively trying to get into a house.  About 50 people live in the City of False Pass, and another 700 people come from away (many from the Ukraine) to work at the two canneries, so there was lots of foot traffic between the residential area and the dock, and we didn't see any bears.

Playing in the park.  Later we found out a child had been attacked by a grizzly bear previously in the same location ...

We did not see any bears but this fox was curious about us.

On the way back, the big kids ran ahead once we got to the dock, but Max, Benjamin and I stopped to talk at a fishing boat where the captain and crew were cleaning the day's catch.  The captain, Ivan (in his words "a good Russian name") had been fishing these waters for over thirty years.  He generously gave us a big silver salmon when he heard that we were visiting.

The fishermen are so generous

A fishing boat had pulled in beside us while we were in town, and a flock of kids poured out when we got back to Fluenta.  We invited them aboard to have a look around.  It turned out that this Aleut family was thinking of selling their fishing boat and going cruising one day.  I enjoyed showing people who spend so much time on the water how we had been living for the last seven years.  Max had a similar tour of their boat (you can stand up in their engine room!).  They suggested that we should trade boats so that we could take up fishing in False Pass (and our kids could attend the local school) and they could take Fluenta and go cruising, but we decided we weren't ready to settle down just yet!

An amazingly welcoming family.  The accommodation building for the new fish plant is visible over their shoulders.

As they left, the mom asked if the big kids would like to go salmon fishing with her teenagers (14 and 16) in their skiff, and whether Benjamin would like to come over to play with their four-year-old's toys.  She also offered that we could all shower and do laundry.  Imagining a typical cruiser scenario, I assumed that she meant to come to their boat, so I packed a bag for 'drinks & nibbles' and walked up the dock.  It was time for a paradigm shift!  They use their boat only for fishing, and they have an actual house, with a real bathroom and laundry, up the road :)  We decided that the moms and the small kids would leave the dads talking engines and go up to the house.  I would come back for laundry and dads in their truck.

The kids heading out fishing.

It was 10:40pm by the time we had the kids dropped off and I was driving back to the dock (with their dogs along for the ride - the big black one in the truck box, the little grey one running down the road beside me, and my heart in my throat for fear of something happening to one of them 'on my watch').  The sun was still up and we were just starting our evening's activities!  As I have mentioned, it is pretty hard to shift the four hours from Marshallese time to Alaskan time when sunset is so late.  Once we had everyone back at the house (moms, dads, big kids, and little kids), we had a fantastic time sharing stories and talking about travelling.  The four teenagers had seen a bear and a shark on their expedition.  The dad whipped up a late dinner of burgers and French fries for everyone (much to Benjamin's amazement, as he has never seen real home-made (i.e. deep-fried) French fries on the boat) and their machines capably did what I would otherwise have been doing by hand (washing *and* drying, hooray!).

Group photo of the moms (photobombed by the kids).  I am sporting my new False Pass sweatshirt, which kept me cozy, and reminded me being embraced by Aleut hospitality, for the rest of the season.

Cruising kids and False Pass cousins.

I was fascinated to learn about their techniques for fishing (their big boat is a seiner, so they anchor it in a bay, net the fish between two skiffs, and then bring them back to the big boat).  They can be in the little skiffs from 6am until midnight; when I asked how they stay warm (as someone who gets cold just thinking about their typical conditions) the answer was, "We don't! We wear every layer we have and still expect to be cold!"  I loved hearing about how the traditions are passed through the generations; our host, his sister, and his brother grew up fishing with their dad, and now their kids fish with them.  It was also a privilege to hear some of their family history and to gain a first-hand understanding of the effect of the 1964 earthquake.  We were even given a '4th of July bag' that contained some False Pass memorabilia - a sweatshirt, two t-shirts, and some treats - the sweatshirt was a Mom size, so I have felt enveloped in their generosity and friendship all season!

Fluenta on the dock in False Pass.  The two fishing boats are owned by the same family.

We arrived in False Pass at the height of salmon berry season.  Victoria and Johnathan had gotten a taste of picking with our friends in Dutch Harbor, and they were eager to pick some more in False Pass.  Their progress was a little slower than usual, however, as they had to take turns with one kid picking and the other watching for bears, even on the slopes along the main road!

More berries for jam (if they are not all eaten before)

After photos on the dock with our hosts, and promises to reconnect if we crossed paths again, we motored out to anchor the next afternoon.  There was a sense of peace that came over us at anchor:  for the first time in over a month, and the very first time in Alaska, it was just our family at anchor.  Needless to say, we celebrated with 'arrival chips'.

We had glorious conditions the following day - whales and sunshine!  The whales we saw were very much alive - and surfaced multiple times right beside Fluenta!  Victoria and I were on watch together, sailing downwind, and it was unnerving to see them come within about a boat length beside us.  These whales were black and shiny, with their dorsal fin further back from their blowhole.  We learned later that they were fin whales.  We held our course (and our breath) and trusted them to keep track of our whereabouts!  We even delayed our jibe into our next anchorage in order to give the whales a little more space :)  As we approached the Shumigan Islands, we saw big groups of humpbacks feeding and breaching in the distance, in greater numbers than we had ever seen in Tonga. 

So many whales !

We have spent a lot of time sailing where the fishing boats don't answer the radio, or don't speak English, when we call them.  We are enjoying the contrast of being in Alaska: they answer calls on the radio, they speak English, they are friendly, and on nightwatches when there is more time to talk, they are curious about our travels.

So many fishing vessels but they all listen to the radio and actually respond to hails.  They were all great to talk to.  Unimak Pass is on the great circle route between Asia and North America so in addition to the fishing vessels, there are big ships transiting too - you can see MV San Diego Bridge (almost 1000' long) and Kyoto Star (750' long) passing south of us.

A zoomed in view.  We are close reaching much of the time in winds less then 10 kts so our course was quite erratic and kept pulling us towards the cluster fishing boats to the north.

Our next stop was for a reunion with a family we had first met in 2014 when we were flying the universal baby-boat flag: diapers drying on the lifelines!  Five years later, we picked up where we left off :) We had met SV Galactic in the Tuomotus (French Polynesia).  Since we had last seen them, they had sailed to and wintered over in Patagonia, spent time in South Georgia and the Falklands and sailed back home to Kodiak, Alaska via Cape of Good Hope - more details at http://thelifegalactic.blogspot.com/.  Now they live in a house (!) and use their boat to do summer research projects as marine biologists.

Dinner with Galactic.  A long way from French Polynesia !

Dinner with Galactic.  A long way from French Polynesia !

 As we arrived they were heading out in their heavy rain gear and hip waders to do some shore sampling.  We quickly made plans to spend the evening together.  Curious as we were to see a boat that had covered so many high-latitude miles, we were happy to host aboard Fluenta as it continued to rain all evening, and I was glad to be the one staying home!  Coincidentally, both of us cooked battered fish (salmon and perch), and with the addition of rice and vegetables, and an apple crumble to use some of the last of our Marshallese apples, we had a good meal and a fabulous time catching up.  With our table opened at is mid-point piano hinge, the lights reflecting off the varnished wood, and nine people sitting around its perimeter, we had a cozy space for reconnecting.  We sadly said good by at midnight, and wished them well on their early start the next day.  Our plans were to leave a little later and head for Sand Point Harbor.

Departing Baralof Bay in the Shumagins.  Unfortunately a short visit as we would have liked to spend more time there.

Imagine our surprise when we tied up at Sand Point and Galactic was there on the dock ahead of us!  They had decided to do a last-minute logistics stop, so we had another bonus day together :)  Their older boy immediately set off with his fishing rod and returned with a salmon for us.  The younger boy showed up at our door and asked if the kids wanted to go salmon berry picking; even Benjamin went along to 'help'.  Victoria was especially eager to fill multiple buckets so that she would have enough berries to make jam.

The Galactic crew cannot escape us that easily.  We meet up with them again at Sand Point.

Most of the fishing fleet was away when we arrived, so many of the marina slips were empty.  It felt like a bit of a ghost town.  A couple of days later, the vibe changed completely, as there was a pause in the season and the boats started coming back and filling the slips.  It was a bit like living inside a time-lapse movie - each time we looked around, there were more boats in the harbor.

Fishing on the dock with the very proficient Galactic boys.

Fishing on the dock with the Galactic boys.

One of the boats I noticed was very tiny - two boys were on the walkway by the boat ramp, with a model seiner that one of them had made, and they were trying to catch a fish in a net that they had strung between the seiner and a skiff, both of which they were controlling from the dock with long lines.  It was an impressive show of creativity and ingenuity.

Boats need to be tough to survive up here !

Sand Point has two grocery stores and a fuel dock with propane, so stopping there offered a chance to reprovision for the next leg of our journey.  The fuel dock had pilings rather than a floating dock so we elected to push two dock carts with our 11 jerry cans and two propane tanks rather than to test our luck on the dock, especially since our fender boards were still deeply buried, and it was blowing enough to make things dicey.  Max and I joked that the upside of walking was that it offered us a rare hour of time alone together, which was an added bonus :)  We learned later that many sailboats raft up to one of the fishing boats to come alongside.

With the fishing fleet headed back to the harbor, we quickly arranged a tour of the processing facility before they were inundated with everyone's catch.  We were led around the Trident plant by their Safety Officer and the Production Manager.  The whole family had fun gearing up for the tour in hair nets and ear plugs, and then we were fascinated by the combination of heavy machinery and human labour that converted bins of fresh fish into racks of frozen fillets.  After the fillets were cut, the bones were mechanically stripped of all remaining meat (destined for salmon patties) and it was gratifying to see how little was wasted.  Processing halibut was even more labour intensive, as these large fish were filleted entirely by hand.  We certainly gained an appreciation for the effort that goes into the fish that we have so mindlessly tossed into a shopping cart in the past.

The head of Safety giving us a tour.  Turns out he was ex-USAF.

With the head of production and the head of safety at the completion of our very interesting tour.  It was great to see the pride in their work

Sadly, the Trident facility wasn't given out free samples, but our tummies still benefited amazingly from our time in Sand Point - two of the fishing boats tied up beside us shared with us.  King Salmon is the favourite of the fishermen, and we were given it twice!  On the advice of Galactic, we baked it gently on a bed of onions and with a sprinkling of Lemon Pepper.  Delicious!!

In addition to a beautiful white king salmon, the fisherman across from us gave Max a tour of their purse seiner, and then gave us a tiny knotted bowl that he had made.  We may well hear from him again down the line - he has already bought a sailboat near his home in California, and has plans to leave to go cruising with his young family.  His boat needs an entirely new interior, so he can build it to his own specifications, with skills of a lifetime on the water, so we look forward to hearing how his adventure unfolds.  One lesson we enjoyed discussing, and that we had all learned the hard way, was the necessity to over-spec hardware and equipment on an off-shore vessel :) 

One of the very friendly fishermen we met.

and the basket he made Victoria after he found out she was interested in traditional crafts

The end of the week brought our time in Sand Point to a close, and we set off on Sunday morning for Geographic Harbor, famous for its bears.  Our passage required lots of gybing around headlands in shifty winds; we joked that we gybed more in one day than on the entire 3700nm passage from the Marshall Islands!  We had expected light winds (i.e. motoring) but we had everything from 2-25 kts on every point of sail (downwind to close hauled).  We suspected that the unpredictability was due to our proximity to a big mountain range.  It was scenic with snow and glacier-covered mountains and the massive Veniaminof Crater visible for most of one day and Mount Chiginagak visible the following day.  We had lots of puffins around the headlands and the fin whales paid us a visit again.


Love to all,
Elizabeth

This new dawn is looking rather tired.

A screenshot of the raster chart from Dutch Harbor to False Pass.  Our track was the red line.

and from False Pass to Sand Point

Come and See us at the Boatshow

The Fluenta crew will be at the Vancouver Boat Show ! Elizabeth is the keynote speaker for the Women's Day and the whole crew will be presenting three times through the weekend. 

We are looking forward to visiting with friends - old and new - during the show.

Fluenta and Crew on TV - Two Minutes of Fame

We spent several hours today hosting Paul Johnson and a camera man from Global TV onboard Fluenta for interviews and filming while anchored in False Creek.  Pretty amazing that they managed to take all the interviews, combine them with some photos and video that we provided, and come up with this two minute segment a few hours later.  

The link to the video is here:  https://globalnews.ca/video/6186721/b-c-family-ends-epic-vacation?fbclid=IwAR04lFhqYrxiDE4QuHyvghiwmcB0T7vx5L6OEdwR8EP6CK5vD1hhzHiZcvE

Elizabeth's turn to be interviewed.

Johnathan chauffeuring the crew back to the dock