The ferry to here from Bellingham, Washington, takes 36 hours. It passes on the eastern side of Vancouver Island up the Strait of Georgia and though a maze of tiny islands. It then passes via the Johnstone Strait, Queen Charlotte Strait into open water before entering the relative calm of the Fitz Hugh Sound. 

The ferry takes the upper left fork and passes the small settlement of Bella Bella, on the east side of Campbell Island. Heading west down Seaforth Channel it avoids open water by running up the east side of Dowager Island and across the top to enter Finlayson Channel. Part way up this a narrow channel leads off the the left and a pilot boat guides the ferry up this into Tolmie Channel, which in turn leads into the Princess Royal Channel, a narrow waterway which separates an island of the same name from the mainland.

After a relatively open stretch of water, Whale Channel, the ferry takes the very narrow Granville Channel which runs northwards between steep slopes which run up to 4000 feet high peaks. At times this waterway is less than 400 yards wide. Unfortunately we passed through this section during the hours of darkness, indeed we awoke at 5.00am when the ferry was virtually at Ketchikan.

Ever tried pitching a tent on a steel deck? Not me, but many travellers do just that. The tents must be weighed down with something or they would blow away!

Below is an extract from my daily journal:
Woke at 5.30am, bright sunshine, fantastic views – hard to describe. We are sailing up a channel between the mainland? And offshore islands. Both are covered by trees (pine/spruce type – impossible to say from here) The mountains go very high from sea level, heavily forested with snow on the tops, The channel is about 2-3 miles wide and occasionally pass other small boats. I can only liken it to cruising down Loch Sunart in Scotland, but with higher mountains and largely uninhabited shores, except that it goes on and on; we are now about 12 hours into the journey. ETA at Ketchikan is this time TOMORROW.
Wow, the scenery just keeps on changing, suddenly the boat turns east, passes down a narrow channel and then north again. The mountains are now to our south, we are in a much wider channel with many lowish islands to the east. Later still we are in open sea with a fair swell.
The further north we go the better the scenery gets, mid afternoon we are in a narrow channel some 600 yards wide lined with forested hilly shores. The ferry suddenly goes hard into reverse, we have been “buzzed” by some small motor boats – a dangerous thing to do. We sail past Bella Bella, the captain says that at one time the generators broke down and they couldn’t dry their washing and so had to dry it on lines and somehow got used to doing that way; everyone laughed. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN – WE STILL DO IT THIS WAY IN ENGLAND!" More laughter, what, no tumble dryers?
At tea time we are now once again in narrow channels, but this time it is a maze, we have a pilot ship in front of us to guide us, the shores are still completely tree covered, but now they rise steeply up and up to snow covered tops.
 

Ketchikan is a popular calling for all the west coast cruise ships, the moorings are close to the church we were based at. When we arrived there were 2 tied up and 1 moored in the channel. 1 arrived & 1 left. Ketchikan population 8000, when the ships are in the population doubles or trebles each day! Its noisy here, float planes take off and land every few minutes carrying mainly sightseers.

The channel seems a dangerous place; the float planes take off and land every few minutes taking tourists from the cruse liners. The planes takeoff/land up and down the channel and small motor boats ferry passengers from the cruise liners to the shore across the channel, plus all the fishing boats, ferries, small cargo ships etc.

There are lots of Bald Eagles here, you can see them soaring over the forests and sea. From the lounge window of my host family's house you could see them sat in the trees 50 yards away, but they spent all their time looking out to sea and all you could do was photograph their backs.

The houses are built on the steep hillsides supported by elaborate trestles made of wood, which is the cheapest building material here. Most of the houses are built out of wood and sometimes long wooden stairways lead from the road to the door. The roads run around the hillsides and sometimes they bridge across a gully or stream, the only give away clue is a sign giving maximum axle weights, and occasionally a small sign further on saying "No Parking on Bridge".

Crime is rare here, people go out and leave their windows open and doors unlocked. With such a small population word gets around quickly. I was told that a comment someone made about someone else in a local shop finally got to that person. If in doubt - don't gossip.

We were all blessed to be given a short ride in a float plane, flying up towards the north of the island and back over Tongass Narrows which separate Gavina Island from Revillagigedo Island. The views were fantastic, but hard to photograph due the the propeller!