Day 56 – Sitka to Deep Bay

∞Our last day in Sitka before we begin our journey south towards home. Yesterday I made an 8AM appointment with Baranof Taxi to pick me up and take me to the grocery store so off I went to stock up for the next week as the Dropperts arrive today to spend a week with us. The taxi driver this morning was the most delightful young man who moved to Sitka from southern England 6 years ago specifically to work saving bears at “Fortress of the Bears”. He supplements his income by driving the taxi. Anyway he was so cheerful and helpful that I made arrangements with him to pick up Marc and Beth from the airport at 1PM, then take us all out to Fortress so the Dropperts could see the bears. On the drive out there that afternoon “Chris” gave us a very informative rundown on what they do at Fortress and, even though John and I had already heard this, it was fun to hear it again in an English accent. We got another great show at Fortress with the female bear showing us the sign language she had learned which means “give me more food” so she does it a lot, and it is so adorable! The male bears were playful, one of them spends most of his time in the water playing with sticks and rubber tires and whatever toys they have in the pool. The founder of Fortress was on site and gave us a very detailed talk on how he started the bear rescue operation in 2003, and all the obstacles the state threw his way in attempts to ignore him and how he persevered and after 5 years was able to get his first orphaned bear. They have since saved a dozen bear cubs and found homes for many of them – in captivity yes, but once they are acclimated to humans there is no other option. He feels it’s better than euthanasia and they are super picky about where they place the bears. Then, unfortunately, the government has now changed the hunting laws up here and it’s legal to shoot a hibernating bear, even a mother bear and her cubs, and it’s also legal to now shoot them from an airplane or helicopter. So cruel. No words. His organization raises money to help fight this type of legislation and also to pave the way for a program to successfully rescue, rehab and release back into the wild.
∞Pulled away from the dock around 3:30PM and slowly motored our way up to Deep Bay. Saw many humpbacks along the way but the best was arriving in Deep Bay to our own personal humpback right where we intended to anchor. We set the anchor down and got a whale show for the next 10 minutes as he slowly made his way out of the harbor. It never gets old!
∞Dinner tonight was Beef Curry (again) but it turned out better this time.