Kalinen Bay is said to be a very popular anchorage. When we arrived, we were the only two boats in the anchorage. This is consistent for this summer. We have been alone in almost every anchorage we have gone to.
The anchorage, and the river/stream opening into the bay, were full of returning pink salmon. Fish were jumping everywhere. We took the tender to the stream outlets and up the river as far as we could get (not very far, before it got too shallow). The next morning we were set to take a 2.5 mile hike to Seal Beach. We used the small dinghy, knowing that there would be a huge tidal exchange and we could get our big tender stuck up on the beach. With the little tender, we could move it without too much difficulty.
It took us a full 2.5 hours to hike the 2.5 miles to the beach. The weather was misty and rainy. The path started by walking along the river delta. Then we turned into the woods and hiked up some nicely cut stairs up the hill and through a bog to a rather larger lake. We walked in the forest along the lake, then on through more bogs until we came out at the beach. It was pretty wild, but really fun. We were doing the bear chant, ‘Hey bear’, blowing whistles and generally talking very loudly. We did have bear spray and an air horn with us as well.
When we arrived at the beach, the sun decided to make an appearance, and the sky dried up. We enjoyed an hour or so at the beach. We had lunch, flew the drone and just wandered about, before the hike back. We did not encounter any bears on the trail, though we did pass another couple on the way back who said they had seen a bear at the start of the hill climb. (They carried a handgun). We were pretty spent by the time we returned, but it was a fabulous hike. The next morning, we would head to Sitka, our first town since Wrangell, 3 weeks earlier.