As cruising destinations go, Southeast Alaska is relatively easy to get to. From the Seattle area simply head north along the East coast of Vancouver Island, and then up the inside passage. It is all protected. But to get to the Alaskan Panhandle, Prince William Sound, and Cordova, you have to cross the Gulf of Alaska. This can put hair on your chest. So the boats which you find here have probably covered some tough miles.

What follows are several boats that caught our eye.

We did not get a chance to meet Companera‘s owners, but you can tell by looking at her that she has some good features for this part of the world. We’d call her a motor sailor in the olden days, but with this hull shape and the short spars she is really a powerboat with steadying sails.

That big pilot house is ideal for cold and wet climates. We’re told her owners are experts in avalanche prediction and into long distance kayaking. Companera carries two sets of kayaks: a conventional pair on the house, and a second, longer pair forward, which are set up for rowing.

Companera has two anchors, one of which is a new ROCNA. That skid plate on the hull is UHMW plastic.

In the same idiom is Nellie Juan. There’s more sail in her rig and we’d guess she probably moves along reasonably well once she is off the wind. Once again the large pilot house is optimized for this part of the world.

Trig caught our eye the first time we walked down the dock. Her details speak of experience.

Mike and Delphi Godsil built her from the bare hull of a Cascade 36, which they lengthened to 40 feet with a stern extension. They have been cruising for 30-plus years. Trig has been through the South Pacific, to Mexico, back and forth to Hawaii numerous times and of course to Alaska, where Trig has been based the last few years.

The first thing we noticed were these chainplates on the aft corners of the hull. They are for attaching a drogue to in heavy weather.

They have this simple stern frame which serves as an antennae and light base as well as an anchor point for a cockpit awning.

Storing the companionway washboards is always a dilemma. This is a simple solution, at the forward end of the cockpit.

Mike is a ham and has an SSB as well as ham radio aboard. He uses his backstay as a long wire antenna, with a tuner of course, as do most sailboats. What is different is that there is no bottom insulator. Mike figured the fiberglass hull would work to isolate the bottom end of the backstay. His SWR meter shows really good tuning so it looks like we’ve been adding a needless insulator to the bottom end of our backstays on fiberglass boats.

Mike and Delphi have switched to the French Spade anchor, which they like as much as we like our ROCNA. Both are similar in concept.

This is a combination air intake and exhaust for their Webasto diesel heater. A simple yet clever approach. The hot exhaust warms the cold ambient air being drawn into the combustion chamber of the heater. A big improvement in heater efficiency.

We like tiller steering when the boat is easily steered. The tiller is simple to get out of the way at anchor, provides reliable control of the rudder, and is ideal for connecting to the self-steering gear (in their case a servo pendulum wind vane). Look carefully at the massive connection between the top of the rudder shaft and the tiller. This is on an easily steered 40-foot (12.4m) yacht. It is the way this should be done.

Note the large frame alternator, double B belts and heavy bracket on this alternator. Again, the way it should be done.

700 amps of deep cycle batteries, properly held in place. Note the substantial copper connection bars between terminals.

This kerosene lamp provides enough heat to take the chill off the cabin in the Alaskan summer. The lamp is gimbaled in both directions. There is a clever heat deflector and headliner protector above the chimney.

And now for a really interesting piece of engineering. The saloon table stows vertically against the bulkhead.

As it is lowered into place the longer aft section is supported by an angled brace to the bulkhead. Look at the forward end of the table and you will see a short horizontal section. This provides a lock to keep the after section from going too far.

The table ready for a party.

And finally, the much traveled cutter Freydis. She has a steel hull, with a pivoting keel and protected rudder, both of which aid when Freydis has to be beached (or is pushed onto the ice if she is trapped).

Erich Wilts and his wife Heide have cruised Freydis 300,000 nautical miles in the last 30 years, much of which has been in the high latitudes. When we met Eric he was getting ready to head out the next day for Kodiak, and eventually the Bering Sea and points north. We chatted briefly, and as it so often turns out, have many places and people in common. Eric and Steve have even had falsiparan malaria in the same part of the world.

Freydis is all about function. There is a workboat-like air about her. She is optimized for cruising in hostile environments. We were interested to see she had a German version of the ROCNA/Spade anchor – which they really like.

They have two heating systems: an Eberspacher boiler (similar to the Webasto) and this drip-type diesel heater in the saloon. That pot on top is the "watermaker" in which they heat ice to melt it. Simpler than carrying a watermaker.