Sitkoh Bay & Peril Strait
Stories of the indigenous Tlingit people and the much more recent Russian and European settlers echo up and down Sitkoh Bay. Ancient Sitka spruces that line the shore have seen sights that we can barely imagine. For thousands of years native people paddled their long cedar canoes into this inlet to catch and preserve the sockeye salmon that spawn in a lake above the bay. Stories of great feasts called Potlatches (to give) held on an island near the site of the old cannery have been passed down. All up and down the Northwest coast, villages hosted each other and performed inherited ceremonial dances through the dark and wet winter nights. In 1804, following a devastating blockade and battle with the Russian fur traders in Sitka, one thousand Tlingit people marched over mountainous Baranof Island and settled on Craven Point, the outer tip of the bay, where they stayed for seventeen years, blockading boats carrying furs to Sitka and ignoring the Russian envoy’s pleas to return to their homeland. Scholars tell us that in this area artifacts dating back 9500 years have been found.
The restored buildings of the cannery complex date back to 1901, when salmon was king. Preserving food by canning was a lucrative new enterprise and resources seemed unlimited. Chatham, the settlement that grew up around the cannery and named for Captain George Vancouver’s vessel, had a post office from 1906 until 1963. Signs of past logging are evident here as well, most noticeably overgrown clearcuts and the roads we walked on today.
Walkers ambled down the overgrown lane bright with new spring growth and overhung with white-barked red alder. The occasional banana slug slimed along the path, and our bear awareness was kept keen by the frequent piles of fresh sign. Just before breakfast, we watched a bear in this area and now we are walking on its trail. Across an intertidal slough, two Sitka black-tailed deer move along the beach. Appearing small and distant, they remind us of the vastness in this wild place.
As our group stepped from the beach onto the road to begin our homeward walk, an adult bald eagle leapt onto the ground in front of us! After a bit of observation and the unusual behavior of being very still and remaining on the ground, we discovered that the animal has an injured wing. We radioed the ship with a GPS position and they called the Raptor Rehabilitation Center in Sitka. I hope that they will be able to bring it in.
After a deck lunch in the sun and another brown bear on the beach, the winding passages of Peril Strait made for a beautiful afternoon of cruising, packing, sunbathing, looking for wildlife and resting in the happy memories of wilderness adventures, wildlife sightings and new friendships kindled aboard the National Geographic Sea Lion.
