The road continues along the shores of the bay to the Indian River, a broad rapid stream, foaming in places over ledges of rock; the ground in its neighbourhood has been reserved as a sort of public park, and, though wild and uncared for, presents pictures of great beauty. But though beautiful, the town is very diminutive, and its permanent white population does not, I should think, amount to more than one hundred souls. We had a letter of introduction to Mr. Vanderbilt, one of the Sitka merchants, and, after securing rooms at the aforesaid hotel, went to interview him with decidedly satisfactory results. His partner, Mr. De Groff, was at that time at Yakutat, where he had established a small store, and was supervising some gold mining that had been commenced in the black sand on the shore. His small schooner, the ‘Alpha,’ was expected back every day from sealing, and as soon as she returned she would be sent up to Yakutat with stores for his partner, and could take us as passengers. At that time we did not intend to take any white men, trusting that we should be able to get canoes and porters at Yakutat, Dick being the medium of communication.
We then decided to go on a little training expedition, and selected a sharp peak we had noticed from the steamer in approaching Sitka, and had set down as between seven and eight thousand feet high. To reach this we departed one afternoon in a fair-sized canoe with its owner and Dick, and rowed (for most of these large canoes are fitted with oars) in a northerly direction for about six miles, till we reached the mouth of a narrow bay known as Nusquashinsky or Nushanitzky. Here the wind, though light, was in our favour, and we sailed peaceably up it, reaching its head about seven o’clock, and camped by a broad stream, along which we had at first thought we could make our way towards our mountain, which the Indian informed us was called Sha-klokh, or Spear-peak, but the bush in the valley was so dense that we struck straight up next morning, till in about four hours we got above tree-level, and pitched camp at a height of about two thousand feet close to a big bed of snow. Next day we climbed our peak triumphantly in about three hours, and even put on the rope to cross a big snow-patch hanging on the face, but its height proved to be only 4,300 feet, so easily is one deceived at first in a new country. We built a big stone-man on the top, which we afterwards found was visible with a glass from the bay, and returned to the tents, where we spent most of the afternoon in slumber. At this camp we got one or two deer, and took a lot of venison back to Sitka, intending to dry it and take it north, but unfortunately it all went bad in that moist atmosphere.