Well not quite in the Gulf yet, but looking to begin crossing from Cordova, AK to Hoonah, AK (about 420NM) and hopefully 4 days for us. This will be Jen and I's first longer passage in a junk rig and we are extremely excited to see how our 30' Benford S/v Thymallus Arcticus performs for us.
In writing this thread I want to introduce ourselves and our purpose in life (it is not just to purely cruise for the enjoyment of seeing the world at this point in life). Jen and I are both "retired" biologists whom have been working for the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game for our short careers. After 5 years working in a bureaucracy and being part of the waste and apathy we decided it was time to leave and make our own path. We have been living aboard various fiberglass sailboats (and a 13' travel trailer) in the past 4 years we have been together. Our first boat we lived aboard together was a 27' Catalina located in Seward, Ak. We moved aboard and learned to sail her in December (not the best season in Alaska).
After a year aboard the Catalina we were looking for our next shell to crawl into. After searching both coasts of North America and chasing down many rotten boats we ended up back in Seward in a Valiant 40; Sv Starship. We had thought we had found our boat for a time! It however turned out not to be the dream when living aboard in Kodiak in the rainy winters. So after replacing a few bulkheads and sprucing her up a bit we were able to sell her for a profit and move on. She sold in November while only being on the market for 2 weeks! Next thing we know we are homeless in Alaska with winter fast approaching. We again researched all the sailboats up and down the coast, while our friends tried to convince us the steel junk the owned would be a perfect fit. We loved the boat, but with a high asking price and the junk rig being almost completely unknown to us we continued our search. As the time came near for the sale of Starship we felt out of options and confessed our frustrations to our friends. That is when they sprung their trap...
As soon as we signed the bill of sale on our Valiant we were moving our things aboard our new junk rig! We had little idea how to sail her but we were now warm and cozy. The S/v Thymallus Arcticus (formerly the Nina G and Fin Whale) is a custom built 1 off built by the Mannings in Homer Alaska. She was built for living aboard in Alaska and thoughts to cruise the world. The story we were told is she was built over about 10 years and the Mannings put their all into her. After launch in 2001, the builders soon came down with sickness and needed to sell her. Our friends whom were in the process of building their own boat, bought her as a favor to them and only used her as a floating office.
Thymallus Arcticus (latin for Arctic Grayling (a fish of northern latitudes)) is, as stated before, a Benford 30 with constructed of a steel hull and cold molded pilot house. Insulated with 3 inches of urethane spray foam, double paned lexan port lights and heated with a sigmar diesel stove, she stays a balmy 75F even in the nastiest Alaskan weather. All lines come into the pilot house (besides topping lift) making her one of the easiest and safest boats to sail we have ever been aboard. Since we moved aboard in December of 2015 we have cruised her going on 4 months, having left Kodiak on March 1. We have seen seas of all states and she handles beautifully in all weathers. With a sloppy head sea and no wind the 50HP Perkins Prima will push her through at 6.5kts without an issue. Steering the mamba sail drive is great knowing that we will have no issues with cables breaking or hydraulic fluid filling our bilge. All systems are very simple and I will document and post them over time on this site if there is interest. She came equipped with zero electronics and we have tried to keep our additions minimal; a vhf, iPad with Navionics for a plotter and an Interphase Probe as a depth sounder comprise our electronic nav gear.
Since leaving our jobs, and finding ourselves happily unemployed and under 30 we decided to enjoy the summer while using our time and our little vessel for something we think matters. We began our project called Alaska Science Junk. Coming from marine and fisheries biology backgrounds we have offered up a volunteer service for marine conservation syndicates around the Gulf of Alaska. So far we have found ourselves cruising through Prince William Sound the past 3 months recording blooms of jellyfish that have not been seen in Alaska, large die-offs of marine mammals and reported to NOAA, and have been collecting water samples for Adventurers and Scientists for Conservation.
The next 3 moths will find us wholly volunteering our time and boat to the Alaska Whale Foundation. Darting sperm whales with crossbows loaded with GPS beacons to help quell the ongoing negative fisherman-whale interactions around Baranof Island will be our main project. We also will be conducting marine mammal surveys and necropsies as they come up. At this point we are completely funded from our own savings and from small donations from friends and family who believe in what we are doing. To learn more about our project, us or our boat we welcome you to check out our website at www.AlaskaScienceJunk.com or our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/AlaskaScienceJunk/. You can also see where we are at just about any time of the day by following our inReach on our website. From time to time I post a blog on our website, and I intend to post more often than I do currently.
Well, I only intended to write a few short paragraphs and it looks to be I wrote a novel. We are excited to be apart of your community after having been apart of other forums, we can already tell the content and communication of JRA is more to our speed. Thanks for taking us in.
Cheers!