Wilderness Blues- Ramblings from the Great Land

   Anyone who has ever had a boat can understand the title of this post. I've spent the last week with the boat in dry dock, sanding, patching, painting and caulking it, plus replacing zincs. Aside from the usual yearly items like those mentioned above, I had to order spruce 1x6's to replace some of the bin boards down in the hold that had started to rot. They hold the ice into separate bins and you can't afford to be out on the water in a storm and have the load shift because some bin boards broke. That's not all that needed done though, oh no,no, no. That was just the least expensive project. Last year my engine started over heating whenever I pushed it above trolling speed. I tried all the simpler things to do, hoping I wouldn't have to replace the water pump, but all to no avail, so I had to replace my thirty some year old water pump, for about $650.00, plus labor. I noticed last year that a guard near the stern of the boat had developed a ...

  2015 will be remembered by me as a year of trial and tribulation, a year when my patience has been stretched to the breaking point and seemingly beyond. We're half way through the month of June, and I'm still waiting for the remainder of the planks to be installed. A project that began at the end of March and was supposed to be finished over a month ago and has no finish date in sight. I'm pleased that we finally have some planks put back on the boat. It's progress that can be measured; however, the dog salmon are running and I'm not on the water taking advantage of them. The weather for the past six weeks has been hot dry and sunny, with an almost daily dose of wind. While it is nice to wake to sunny days, the unseasonably warm weather has melted almost all the snow on the surrounding mountains, which is a primary source of water for the streams that the salmon rely on to go up and spawn. Another ill effect of all this hot weather is that t...

Bulwarks, bowstem and some planks removed  Planks removed to access the bow stem  John Kveum- the shipwright and my good friend  Still intact  It's been almost twenty two years that I've owned the Bonnie J. I first saw her tied up to the transient float in Hoonah in the fall of 1989. She wasn't much to look at, but she was for sale and the price was right- $16,000. I really didn't want  a wooden boat. I know the amount of work that they entail, but she only had 1600 hours on a new Isuzu deisel engine and I was in the market for a bigger boat, so I purchased  her. Since then I've done so much work on her I can't help but wonder if I couldn't have bought a fiberglass boat by now- but I've never failed to come home from a fishing trip and I've been in some fairly ugly water from time to time so I guess I can't complain too loud. Last year when I hauled her out for maintanence I noticed that some of the planks wouldn't pull...

This is a picture of the new boat haul out that Hoonah is getting. I believe someone said it could handle a three hundred ton boat when it's completed. I think it will be a real asset to the community. Right now folks with larger boats have to travel to Wrangell or Sitka or maybe Juneau to get hauled out. With a facility like this here it should open up more job opportunities for the local folks, something that is badly needed. I'm fortunate enought to be working with a crew who is going to be doing some or maybe all of the concrete work. The fellow who got the bid grew up at Game Creek at the farm where we lived for ten years. In the immediate backround is the ramp that the state ferries pull up to. After they are tied up the ramp is lowered and all the vehicles and people disembark and wait for the new passengers to come aboard. The mountains in the backround have been all clearcut unfortunately. All that land is owned by one of the native corporations, Sealaska I believe...