Little Port Walter, with its American flag beating in the wind, turned out to be a fun stop. We got there before noon. It was nice to get out of the weather on Chatham Sound. The wind was around 20 knots from the north, and Chatham had easily 50-60 miles of fetch where we were traveling. Changing our course into a more westerly direction toward Little Port Walter, put the seas partially on the beam rather than directly on the bow, which made for a much more comfortable ride. Thank goodness for the paravanes! We were betting the wind would abate and we could travel more easily in a northbound direction the next day. That didn’t quite work out….but that’s for later.
There is a NOAA research station in Little Port Walter, along with a fish hatchery. It is a reasonably large station, and they said it was the longest running NOAA station in SE Alaska, with year-round employees. We enjoyed some sunshine, kayaked around the bay and checked out the creek that was teeming with King salmon. We talked with the caretaker of the station, ‘Walrus’ and learned that they have good water at the dock. He also told us about a sow and her 3 cubs that he chased off with a gun earlier, trying to keep them from getting comfortable around the station buildings. As we continued our tour of the bay, we saw the sow and her cubs right in the middle of the station property grazing on the grass and berry bushes. We notified ‘Walrus’, and a short while later a NOAA worker fired another shot to scare them away.