Aug 20th

We made it to Petrof. Took us long enough to finally get there and we are already headed back to Whitewater. The crew surveyed the stream this morning and were back on the boat early enough for us to get started back up north and arrive before dark, we hope. Chatam Strait is cool, calm and collected. A perfect day at sea mateys! Corny, I know. I got to do something fun this morning after Brad took the crew to the stream. He came back and picked me up in the skiff to go see a black bear along the bank. I got some great pics and will post them on Facebook. Also got to see a ton of pink salmon getting ready to go up the stream and spawn. We spooked them and you should have seen the water fly. I have never seen wall to wall salmon ( gill to gill or fin to fin) like this before. Hoping you can see them in the pics too. Very impressive. And the bear was awesome. She had been fishing and curious about us in the skiff, even walked out towards us. I have to tell you though that Brad's description of the bear was somewhat disconcerting. Now, I have to remember that he's a guy and he's a hunter so he had no idea that what he said could be taken as offensive. So here it is, "see, you can tell it's an old sow, look at her short legs, kind of a humped back and she's fat" ......ummmm, gee Brad, I hope you are only describing the bear in front of you and not the old sow sitting in the boat!!! Anyways, I chuckled to myself and didn't say anything. He was being so helpful in helping me understand the difference between a boar and a sow. :-) Also thinks the sow was 15 - 20 yrs old, that's getting pretty old, I think. I really enjoyed getting to see things up close and personal. We got about 20 yds from the bear, she decided to leave after she got a good whiff of us. Going to cook dinner now, bacon cheeseburgers, potato salad and beans. Still have Kevin left over so didn't bake today. However, tomorrow is Foghorn's birthday so I will need to do something special. Need to think on that a bit. Dinner is over and was a success according to the groans and sighs. Now they are reading, playing chess and relaxing. No TV so have to be creative when it comes to activities. One of them mentioned playing dodgeball on the top deck with rotten cantaloupes. Doesn't that sound like fun? Not sure Brad would go for that besides the fact that someone would definitely fall off the boat. Which isn't a good thing. Before dinner we saw a lot of whales feeding. Got a few pictures so will see if any of them turned out. And by a lot, I mean 30+ for sure. All within a mile or so radius. Pretty cool. Today was wildlife day for sure. Also saw lots of sea otters floating around. They are funny, they float on their back with their head and feet sticking out of the water. If they happen to have a crab for dinner, they eat it while floating around like that. The momma's let the babies ride on their tummies so it looks like a two headed otter. Plus, I learned that the older ones have light colored faces which make them look like a teddy bear, at least to me. Sort of cute little faces but they are real nuisances to the fishermen up here. Hope everyone is having a great day......yak again soon....dj