Dutch Harbor, Aleutian Islands - Alaska

Dutch Harbor, Aleutian Islands - Alaska Libertaire swallows the 580 miles between Sitka and Kodiak in 4 days and drops anchor off the fishing port of the town on the eponymous island on May 1st. We stay a little over a week, the weather not being favourable to continue west. Despite very predominantly rainy, windy and cold weather for the month of May, we enjoy our stopover thanks to the hospitality of its 6000 inhabitants and the nice encounters we make. Mike and Alysa, marine biologists at the town’s research centre, sailed in the same regions as we did a few years ago with their children aboard their sailboat Galactic, and we happily reminisce about some of the stopovers. Martine and Joël, a French couple settled in Kodiak for 20 years where they ran a pastry shop, make us good cakes; Sylvie and Manu, travelling in a camper van, take us for a drive to White Sand Beach and Fort Abercrombie… We find a little blue sky at sea on our way to Eagle Harbour in the Shumagin Islands 380 miles west, then the small village of Sand Point. We enjoy a rare sunny day to anchor at Baranof Bay, where we visit an old fish cannery and enjoy the fine walk overlooking it. There are normally no bears on the island, but we quickly spot suspicious tracks… A grizzly has indeed crossed the 8km-wide passage separating us from the Alaskan peninsula by swimming. We keep our bear spray close at hand! Then, after 36 hours downwind, we reach the islands of Akun and Akutan, where the fine weather and lengthening days let us fully enjoy our new playground — these first islands of the Aleutians. We have been in Dutch Harbour since noon, a large and welcoming fishing port where the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea meet. The Aleutians are ours!