Cutts Island Evening Tour

This weekend Theresa and I had the opportunity to lead a small group of teenagers on an evening tour to Cutts Island. We met our clients at the put-in which was the public boat ramp at Horsehead Bay. We had a diverse group as two where from Fairbanks, Alaska, one from Seattle, and one was an exchange student from Japan. Fumyi was certainly eager and all smiles, but spoke no English. We eventually overcame this language barrier through a series of pantomimes, and although he probably had no idea why he was doing what we asked, he quickly mimicked our gestures and seemed to have no issues.

We hit the water at 6 pm, and as the wind was out of the SW quickly made our way out of Horsehead Bay and over to Cutts Island, which lays just off shore from Kopachuck State Park. The name "Kopachuck" originated from "Chinook Jargon," the trade language of the Pacific Coastal Indians. Kopachuck is a merging of two words: "Kopa" meaning "at," and "chuck" meaning "water." This scenic park was once a seasonal fishing and clamming site of the Puyallup and Nisqually tribes.

Cutts Island is also known as "Deadman's Island." The latter name derives from the belief that the island was used by saltwater tribes who buried their dead in canoes placed in the forks of trees. It is unknown how the island acquired the name "Cutts Island." Prior to its current popular names, the place was called "Crow Island," for the large quantity of crows explorer Peter Puget discovered there in 1792, and later "Scotts Island," in honor of Thomas Scott, quartermaster of the 1841 US Exploring Expedition commanded by Lt. Charles Wilkes.

As we had unpacked our dinner from the boats we noticed that we did so under the unblinking stare of two mature Bald Eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus). They seemed to take little notice of our presence and certainly had no appreciation for our croissant sandwiches. Luckily the boys were nowhere as picky and it didn’t take them long to finish the meal. During our break, Theresa took the opportunity to ask the boys from Alaska what they thought of their home state and what their plans for the future where. We had to laugh when the announced that on their 18th birthday they where promptly leaving; one to Nevada, the other to Florida.

After dinner, and while Theresa and I packed the boats, the boys explored the island and quickly found the rope swing suspended from the bluff on the west side of the island. It took a bit of convincing, but we managed to get them back in the boats and returned just as the sun slip below the horizon. A great way to spend the first weekend of summer.