The Good Ship Ziska - Sail from Alaska to Washington
It's very difficult to put certain adventures into words, but here are a few that sum up this marvellous voyage for me - beautiful, wild, surreal, tough and freeing. In total, we sailed 1252 miles in 12 days from Ketchikan to Port Townsend, heading quite far offshore around the outside of Haida Gwaii and Vancouver Island to avoid some gale-force winds (spoiler alert: we dodged one gale, but hit another). The good ship Ziska is a beautiful 38 foot gaff-rigged wooden sailboat. It's over 100 years old and has been completely rebuilt. I joined Ziska up in Ketchikan, Alaska, after the captain put out a call for crew to help sail the boat back home to Port Townsend after the Race to Alaska . While we were waiting to depart in Ketchikan, I started to hone my sailorly skills, learning how to self propel myself up the mast with rock-climbing gear (swinging around at 100 feet is terrifying, but also my favourite place to be on the boat!), how to tie reef knots in the sail and coil rop...