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Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

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Duncan Murrell - A Whale of a Time

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4 images Created 20 Nov 2014

Alaska Ferry

Most of my Alaskan trips started and ended on one of the Alaskan state ferries, either when I was just arriving from England or setting off on a kayaking trip in Southeast Alaska, with my kayak, gear and supplies on the car deck.

Alaska is over 650,000 square miles and much of that has no road access. The primary forms of transportation in areas without roads are by air or sea, so the Alaska Marine Highway is a big part of the 'highway system.' It is such a unique set of routes that is has been designated as a National Scenic Byway and an All American Road, the only marine route with this distinction. With its southernmost port in Bellingham, WA, the Alaska Marine Highway extends more than 3,500 miles to Dutch Harbor, with over 30 stops along the way. Taking a ferry is an excellent way to see a huge swath of Alaska's coastline while visiting unique communities along the way.

Passengers can either travel conventionally in cabins or sleep out on deck in the fresh sea air on reclining chairs or even pitch tents to sleep in, which is what I often used to do. There can be few public means of transportation in the world that provide such an affordable cruise through such breathtaking scenery, with the possibility of viewing whales and other wildlife along the way.

In the late 1980's I was fortunate enough to start providing photos for the AMH ferry schedules and other promotional purposes, which provided me with free travel passes for all of my trips. The ferries became a very familiar home away from home for me, especially at the end of a long kayaking trip and being alone in the wilderness for several weeks.
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  • I took this photo from the end of the salmon cannery where I worked from 1979-86. The Devils Thumb mountain is clearly visible on the border between Canada and the USA.This photo was my first photo to be used by the Alaskan Marine Highway, and appeared on the cover of the ferry schedule. They used several more of my photos in exchange for free passes every year.
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  • I became very familiar with this small local ferry because I usually used it to get to one of the small native communities like Kake, Angoon and Hoonah, from where I started my kayaking trips that often ended up at Tenakee Springs, where I boarded it to return back to Petersburg. It became like a trusted old friend that I enjoyed seeing cruising past my various campsites, and looked forward to being reunited with at the end of my arduous trips, and then relaxing in relative comfort on my way home to Petersburg.<br />
MV LeConte is a feeder vessel for the Alaska Marine Highway System, built in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin in 1973 and commissioned in 1974 by Alaska's ferry system. LeConte is the older sister ship to M/V Aurora, and both serve as feeder vessels that pick up passengers in small communities such as Hoonah and take them to larger regional communities (this process is colloquially known as the "milk run").<br />
In the case of the LeConte, it primarily serves in the northern portion of the Alaskan Panhandle in between Sitka and Juneau, but it also occasionally ventures all through Southeast Alaska as well, LeConte and the M/V Aurora are the only AMHS vessels able to serve the communities of Angoon, Pelican, Tenakee Springs, and two of the three vessels (the M/V Taku also is able to access these ports) to serve Hoonah and Kake. This quality is due because of these vessels' small sizes thus making them both vital assets for the ferry system and the residents of these rural villages.
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