Paige Jehnke is a student at NMC’s Great Lakes Maritime Academy. She is completing a sea project for the fall semester of her junior year in the engine room of the M/V Taku, a ferry which travels the Alaska Marine Highway. Paige is blogging about her adventures and has graciously allowed us to share her updates.
Today, September 3, 2013, I start my fall semester aboard the M/V Taku. The Taku is a passenger/car ferry with Alaska Marine Highway. I will arrive this evening in Juneau to meet the ship. The ship does a daily run between Juneau, Skagway, and Haines. I have never been to Southeast Alaska before and I am anxious to get there. This internship will be counted as sea days towards my 3rd assistant engineer’s license, which I will receive at the end of my four years of schooling. I will complete assignments and help carry out engine room tasks.
Basically, I will always smell like diesel or lube oil.
I write this from the Homer Public Library, sitting at a desk with a great window view of Kachemak Bay. The peaks that make up Kachemak Bay State Park are currently covered by clouds.
I came to Homer mid-July to volunteer for the state parks as a ranger station attendant at Halibut Cove Lagoon. My responsibilities included: stocking the outhouses with toilet paper and passing out stickers to kids that read, “Kids don’t float, lifejackets do.” I basically read, took pictures of mushrooms and chatted with hikers. The ranger station is very remote and can only be reached by boat or seaplane. The tides also played a huge role, only allowing passage into the cove at high tide. The remote nature of this place did not keep out the crazies though.
While I was there, a baby ate an unidentifiable mushroom and a dog fell off a cliff. Both are fine.
I also got to help the trail crew with the construction of a bridge. It was interesting to see the dynamics of this group near the end of their season. I am honored to have worked with the interesting group that built that bridge. There are certain people one can live in the Alaskan wilderness with, getting eaten alive by mosquitos and flies, while pulling 10 hour days. And they were those certain people.
This is the crew on Grewingk glacier:
So now it’s time. I am pulling my wrinkled school uniform from the bottom of my pack, and I am iron-less. My gear from my last adventure is packed away and my new steel-toed boots are ready to go. My last minute packing is calling. And the pancakes I plan to make for lunch are too.
I am off.
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