MV Columbia left Bellingham eight hours late at 2 AM Saturday morning. We squirmed around in our tent, pitched on the upper deck at the stern and surrounded by ten or fifteen other tents. Despite the quiet and clear night sky, Ursa Major and the north star leading us forward above the Alaskan flag mirroring the dipper on the mast, the sea air was punctuated by broadcast ship announcements, the deep vibration of engines and the enthusiastic conversations of the people two tents away from us who had brought pot to smoke and party. From the moment we pulled away from port, the air curling around the ship buffeted the tent mercilessly. Finally we fell into a restless sleep with the nylon of the tent snapping against our backs and cracking like whips in the wind.

The MV Columbia is the flagship of the Alaska Marine Highway system, the largest ship and the one chosen for the longest travels. We are heading to Haines a three- day trip up the inside passage, following the coast along British Columbia and the Alaska Panhandle. From there we will drive to Denali over two days, back into Canada and then back again crossing the border to Alaska. The weather is spectacularly clear, a fact about which I feel somewhat suspicious knowing how unlikely that is, but will choose instead to feel lucky. Cruising along the shore and among coastal islands covered in deep green forest and backed by spectacular mountains, many still snow covered or holding glaciers tucked into their valleys, we peek up quiet streets of the rare tiny coastal town, watch for whales and let the expanse of unpolluted sea and land soak into our bones. Once in a while clear-cut hillsides remind us of the constant peril this land faces. The scar on the land is gruesome, the more so considering its terrible impact on the ecosystem in total. Even with the sobering reminders, after travels around the world purposefully seeking out beautiful mountain regions, I still don’t think anywhere comes close to the majesty of British Columbia and Alaska.

Cruising north on the ferry is not unlike getting on the plane to Alaska in winter- you would never confuse it with a ferry in California for example. Most of the people look like Alaskans, or like they’ve spent plenty of time in Alaska. Plenty of flannel shirts, suspenders, unkempt hair. I resemble the last characteristic at this point. Most are American- we haven’t heard another accent, which surprises me a little bit.

Teton is sadly required to stay in the car on the car deck. We are on the upper car deck, which, upon loading, required us to drive onto a cable lift and then off again. The cars are packed in like sardines. Three times a day a fifteen-minute “car call allows us to quickly access our cars- and dogs. We didn’t know this would be such a rough trip for Teton. The walking option for dogs is up and down between tightly packed rows of cars on cement. After 24 hours on board, she finally braved the cement floor to pee. We are grateful. The number of cars cleaning up accidents is growing each car call. The worst she has done is to drool impressively on my baseball cap in the car.

The ferry is not only the bare bones transportation I expected; a reasonably priced if uninspired cafeteria has a few options fresher than the packaged food we brought (though also allows us to bring in our groceries for meals), a dining room, a bar, a movie lounge. There is fresh water available for water bottles. If you didn’t bring your own water bottle, a machine with Dasani bottled water will charge you $2.25 (not to mention the waste of plastic bottles) We’ve opted to camp though cabins are available if you book early enough. Showers are available for anyone, which we’ll try later today. In addition to the fifteen tents, there are maybe a hundred plastic lounge chairs where people have brought sleeping bags to sleep in the solarium, an outdoor covered area with heat lamps where we will sheepishly slink if the rains start coming hard.

Our ferry forest service guide’s enthusiasm partly makes up for lack of substance though she holds several programs a day to talk about the natural world in Alaska. Mostly high level, she nonetheless gets in some interesting facts. Of the salmon eggs laid each year, only single digit percentages will make it back to spawn. 145 million salmon are taken by commercial fishing each year. Sport fishing is a 1.4 Billion dollar industry in Alaska. She does not convincingly make what is the very important point that salmon are critical to the survival of the forests. As salmon swim up river to spawn, astonishingly close to where they themselves hatched, they die after spawning, or are caught and consumed by eagles, seagulls, wolf and bear. Some of these predators eat only the belly and heads, the fattiest portion of the fish, and leave the rest to leave nutrients in the soil. But even deep in the forest salmon DNA has been found at the top of the tallest trees (which in SE Alaska are tall indeed, the Sitka Spruce soaring from hundreds of days of rain). When predators consume the salmon and return to the forest, they leave the digested salmon remains, rich in the critical ingredient of nitrogen as well as others, in the forest in their scat. This provides the nourishment the forest needs to grow.

Maybe the biggest lesson here is the deep complexity of the interdependence of life. We have barely scratched the surface on understanding this. But when salmon are threatened, the forest is threatened. Habitat destruction through development as well as overfishing- a complex issue, as hatcheries in Alaska release over a billion salmon each year which can compete with resources of wild salmon, threaten the salmon. The Tongass National Forest, the largest national forest in the nation- needs salmon to survive. Our earth needs forests to survive. We cannot allow any part of this system to be destroyed without causing the ruin of the system itself- which includes ourselves.

Alarmed at the continuous violent pummeling by the wind and potential damage to the tent, Peter moved our tent back from the railing before we settled in for the second night. Several people had given up after the first windy night and opted for the solarium, and space opened up. Secured closer to the ship, the tent sits quietly. We had our dinner of thai noodles from Trader Joe’s, watched a video, I put in ear plugs, and we sleep soundly. Our previously active neighbors, including a guitarist, a drummer and a harmonica player, fortunately seemed to have worn themselves out the night before and were quiet. We’re just about caught up from the crazy week of packing and moving out of the house. And we’re now officially into our second trimester, so I’m eagerly awaiting the return of energy promised by all the books. I’m sure Peter is too, so I can pull a bit more of my own weight!

On this second full day of travel, we are pulling into Ketchikan, people hanging on the railing looking for eagles- from where we hope to post the blog- in another hour and a half and have two hours in port- Teton will finally get some fresh air and a chance for a dignified bathroom break, and we’ll get in a jog, some fresh food and air!

Tags: Alaska, Alaska Marine Highway, British Columbia, clear cut hillsides, Inside Passage, MV Columbia, salmon, Tongass, Tongass National Forest

This entry was posted by Shannon and Peter on Sunday, June 14th, 2009 at 1:29 pm and is filed under Blog entry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.