During our two night stop to shelter from storms in Egg bay, Atka Island, which felt like the most remote place on earth, we peered out to see on the far side of the bay another boat! It turned out to be a converted fishing boat which took charterers, and they had some Italians on board. It was blowing 40 knots so not the weather to start launching dinghies and being social, but we chatted to them on VHF! They like us were seeking shelter.

The onward leg to Dutch Harbor from Atka Island was 330 miles, which for us is about 2.5 days, on average we cover about 135 miles in 24 hours, depending on the wind and sea state. We were merrily reaching at 7 knots along the top of the peninsular, but although we were three miles offshore, the huge snow covered volcano of Korovin which takes up most of the peninsular, soon cast its wind shadow over us, and we were reduced to motoring for two hours until we cleared the volcano. Meanwhile it had the grace to show its top to us as the clouds rolled away allowing us to see a range of snowy mountains receding away into the distance.

The onward route to Dutch Harbor is strewn with small islands and no anchorages until the big islands of Umnak and Unalaska. But yet again we were chasing to get into Dutch Harbor before another big Low that was heading our way and moving rapidly northwards, so we didn’t explore any of the countless indentations on Unalaska Island’s north coast, as we needed to get to good shelter.

The wind had deserted us by the end of the second day, and we were motoring, but benefitting from 2 knots of helpful tide. The unusually clear night and big horizon gave us a real sense of how far north we are, the sun set at midnight, but the light of dawn was visible to the north two hours later, even though sunrise was not for some hours after that. We are only at 54 North, just a couple of degrees north of home in Norfolk, U.K.

When the sun actually appeared at about 5 am, we were plunged into dense damp fog for a short period, which happily burnt off quickly.

We had lots of dolphins flitting around us in the dark, plenty of Albatross, Fulmar and sea gulls, and then as we got closer to Dutch Harbor we were greeted by three Orcas, Killer Sharks, swimming past, their steep triangular fins rising prominently above the surface!

As we passed Cape Cheerful, and moved into Unalaska Bay, we saw the first boats we had seen in the 330 miles since Atka Island, it is a very lonely sea!

We tied up in Discovery Dock alongside Kiwi Coyote and just behind Sagatta, delighted to have officially arrived in America.

Formalities could not have been friendlier or simpler, Marty one of the Harbour masters greeted us and soon George from Customs turned up, took away our passports and ships papers and returned an hour later with a Cruising Permit, valid for one year and stamps in our passports, all for $19!

We were soon incorporated into the yachtie scene, drinks on Kiwi, and a walk ashore to get a meal. We were horrified by the bald headed eagles everywhere, who had clearly got used to humans, and had been known to attack, as it is they swooped down within a few feet of us and glared in a predatory manner – pretty unnerving!

Next day the rain came, and the grit roads that led past the fish processing factories were awash with grey clayey mush. However, the Uni-Sea hostel, where many of the temporary workers live have a laundry, and we piled our stuff in there, only to be told next day when we collected it that just pay what you fancy!!

Dutch boat Lyra, arrived next morning, just ahead of the storm, and in the evening there was a party of 12 on Brother Wind. Herman and Rianne from ‘Lyra’, Glen and Sue from ‘Dione’, Robin and Simon from ‘Kiwi’, and then a new arrival a young lot, Graham, Becca and John and Eli, heading to do the Northwest Passage on a boat called ‘Dog Bark’. Graham was collecting his wife and two daughters aged 10 and 12, further north in Nome, - what an experience for them! I felt very envious as we would love to have Daisy and Arthur our eldest grandchildren with us!

Dutch Harbour has a great feel to it, it is a very remote community, but people clearly love being there, the old part of town is dominated by a Russian Orthodox church, which we walked to visit, but was sadly locked, there are old clapboard houses, and families and children in evidence.

Internet is in the dark ages no 3G and only the library and the Norwegian Rat Bar has internet on offer, but painfully slow, and expensive as you pay per device that is hooked up. I think this is going to be our American problem, connectivity to the world is way behind the poor communities of the Philippines and the Far East, where we could always find a mast to give us 3 or 4G and at least download our newspapers onto our Kindles!

Sunday Brunch at the Grand Aleutian Hotel is famous, and we were not going to miss out, so along with Kiwi Coyote and Lyra we indulged in the buffet. The highlight was definitely the crabs, sea food and salmon, but also delicious salads and beef, as well as puddings - if you have any room! We started at about 10.30 am and carried on until about 2.30pm. It would have been nice to wash it down with Champagne, (memories of Hong Kong) but being America it was coffee!

Our next weather window was looming, so after filling up on all essentials, on Tuesday morning we set off along with Kiwi at first light. The seas were big once we were into the bay, the legacy of the last few days, but the numerous whales we could see blowing across the bay were incredible. As ever we were worrying that we might have missed our tidal gate for the Akutan Pass.

The Akutan Pass is 20 miles from Dutch Harbour, and on a falling tide, we had two knots with us to get us there. Our departure was timed to get to the pass in its final hour of ebb, when the current is down to about 2-4 knots, I wasn’t keen on experiencing the 8 knot alternative an hour earlier. The pass is 5 miles long, and as it was we were going at 12 knots for some of the time, while at the end of the pass a chop was beginning as the tide turned against the wind. Luckily for us we had wind and tide together and a calm passage.

So the drama of the next 170 miles was over early on, and for the rest of the trip we had fickle winds and had to motor. We had to cross one of the busiest shipping lanes that we have seen for a long time, the Unimak Pass, heading up into the Bering Sea, vast container ships, one of which we had to alter course for.

Next morning saw us sailing through the rocky islands south of King Cove, where finally we made our first landfall in mainland America. Stunning bare mountains surround King Cove, set in a deep bay at the SE tip of the Alaskan peninsular. But although it is connected by land, there is no road connection to the rest of the country. There is no airport, and it is a truly isolated community. The town is dominated by Peter Pan fish cannery at the head of the bay, who import seasonal workers from across the globe.

We tied up in the empty harbour, which by the evening had filled up with a lot of fishing boats, like us, sheltering from the next storm. We watched them weighing and sorting the salmon before they take it into the cannery dock, and fishing boat ‘Victory’ invited us on board to have a look around. She is an old wooden sardine boat built in 1942, run by Brett, a very young skipper, whose sister was a part owner and also lived on board. They fish throughout the year, but in the winter months Kodiak is their base.

General chat is that the salmon has not arrived, unlike last year when they were over-run with them! But out of the blue a little fishing boat appeared waving a couple of salmon, and insisted on giving us and Kiwi one each! Overnight someone else had dropped another couple of salmon on us!! The prize salmon are the King Salmon, and what we have been given is red salmon, a deep coral colour, which remains dark pink when cooked, and totally delicious.

The worst agony has been as ever the lack of internet or 3/4G, but we finally managed to get a newspaper onto out Kindles and poor Giles had to learn very belatedly the sad result of the World Cup!!

Time to move on again, as yet another storm has gone through and tomorrow is set fair, so we will head to a little bay not far from here where we hope to spot brown bears on the beach!