Guide · The sights

Rudyerd Bay in Misty Fjords, Punchbowl Cove and New Eddystone Rock

The bay, the cove and the lava spire that every Misty Fjords trip is built around: where they are, what the rock is made of, and how they look from a floatplane window.

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Editorial team, mistyfjordsflightseeing.comUpdated October 25, 2026Reading time about 7 minutes21 sources

The tour for this guide Misty Fjords floatplane flightseeing from Ketchikan 4.4 (303 reviews) 2 hoursWindow seat for every guestVan from Berth 2 and back from$349per person Check availabilityCancel for free up to 24 hrs ahead

What to look for

01Rudyerd Bay: Branches east off Behm Canal; reached only by boat or floatplane.¹
02Punchbowl Cove: Near the bay's mouth: gray granite on the north side, basalt at the head.² ³
03New Eddystone Rock: A 237-foot plug of hardened lava in Behm Canal.⁴ ⁵
04Upper bay: The owl's face rock at the narrows.⁶
05Busy skies: Heavy floatplane traffic from May through August.⁷

Rudyerd Bay in Misty Fjords, the heart of every trip

Rudyerd Bay in Misty Fjords is the place most visitors picture when they hear the name: a long arm of the sea that branches east off Behm Canal into walls of granite.¹ Access is by boat or by floatplane only, and both kinds of trip head for it.¹ The flight this site features passes over Rudyerd Bay without stopping, and a boat cruise from Ketchikan names it as the heart of its day.

The proclamation that created the monument named Rudyerd Bay and Walker Cove together as fiords surrounded by high, cold lakes and mountains reaching east to Canada.⁸ It spelled the bay Rudyard, but the Forest Service writes Rudyerd today, and the maps follow. From the air the description fits exactly: the bay is the water, and the lakes sit in the hanging valleys above it.

Inside the bay the landmarks come in a clear order. Near the mouth lies Punchbowl Cove with its two kinds of rock, further in the walls close up at the narrows, the north arm leads toward Nooya Lake, and the bay ends at its head between rivers and flats. Outside it, in Behm Canal, stands the lava spire of New Eddystone Rock, the first sight most trips reach.

Mouth to head

Landmarks from Behm Canal into the bay

Behm Canal

New Eddystone Rock

A 237-foot lava plug standing alone in the canal.⁴
Bay mouth

Punchbowl Cove

Gray granite on the north side, blackish basalt at the head.² ³
On foot

Punchbowl Lake

A trail of 1.0 miles climbs from the cove to the lake.⁹
Upper narrows

The owl's face

Peeling sheets of granite form the face in the rock.⁶
North arm

Nooya Lake

Under the floatplanes' sightseeing path in summer.¹⁰ ⁷
Bay head

Rivers and flats

The bay ends at 2 rivers and 2 flats.¹¹

Punchbowl Cove: granite on one side, basalt at the head

Punchbowl Cove lies near the mouth of Rudyerd Bay, and it is the cove that boats and floatplanes show off first.¹ On its north side rises a spectacular gray cliff of granite, a once-molten rock that solidified under great pressure.² At the head of the cove the cliffs turn blackish, because they are basalt, a lava that can cool into strong, pillar-like columns.³

Radiometric dating puts the Punchbowl basalts at about 400,000 years old.¹² That makes the cove a record of very different events: the ice that carved the fiord and the lava that later flowed into it. Seen from a floatplane, the line between the pale granite and the dark basalt is easy to pick out, and it is a place where you can read the geology without a guide.

Punchbowl Cove in Misty Fjords is also a starting point on foot. The trailhead sits at the head of the cove, to the right of the creek, and the Punchbowl Lake trail climbs 1.0 miles to the lake.¹ ⁹ It begins easy, on boardwalk and natural tread, and then turns steep.⁹ The area around the lake has steep granite cliffs, glacially carved valleys and dense rainforest.¹³

Landmarks

What you are looking at around the bay

Landmark	What it is	Age or size	Best seen from
New Eddystone Rock	Lava plug	237 ft tall	Boat or plane
Punchbowl Cove, north	Granite cliff	Gray wall	Boat or plane
Punchbowl Cove, head	Basalt cliffs	About 400,000 years	The water
Upper bay narrows	Owl's face rock	Exfoliated granite	The water
Punchbowl Lake	Lake above the cove	1.0-mile trail	The air
Bay head	Rivers and flats	2 rivers, 2 flats	The air

Descriptions from the Forest Service geology guide and trail pages; best viewpoints are our advice.⁴ ² ³ ¹² ⁶ ⁹ ¹¹

Three sights

The bay's three landmarks

Lava spire

New Eddystone Rock

In Behm Canal

Height: 237 ft
Made of: Hardened lava
History: Vancouver, 1793

Fly over the bay

Two rocks

Punchbowl Cove

Near the bay's mouth

North side: Gray granite
Head: Blackish basalt
Trail: 1.0 mi to the lake

Fly over the bay

Quietest

Upper Rudyerd Bay

Narrows and north arm

Look for: The owl's face
North arm: Nooya Lake
Ends at: Rivers and flats

Fly over the bay

Decision helper

How do you want to see the bay?

Pick what matters most on your visit

I want the whole bay and its lakes at once I want to stand below the cliffs I want to touch down in the wilderness I want to walk to a lake I want quieter skies

From a floatplane

From the air the channel, walls and hanging lakes appear together.

From a boat

A boat cruise names Rudyerd Bay with cliffs up to 3,000 feet.

A landing flight

2 listings land on a lake or a calm bay, at a higher price.

Punchbowl Lake trail

A trail of 1.0 miles climbs from the cove to the lake.⁹

Avoid peak summer

Plane traffic is heavy from May through August.⁷

Travelers passing the upper portals of Rudyerd Bay enter the bay head, which is terminated abruptly in two directions by two rivers and two flats.

US Forest Service, Alaska RegionSource 11

The narrows, the owl's face and the head of the bay

Further in, Rudyerd Bay narrows. At the narrows of upper Rudyerd Bay the Forest Service geology guide points to the owl's face, a shape in the rock left where curved sheets of granite have peeled away like the layers of an onion.⁶ It is easiest to spot from a boat, which can slow down beneath it; from the air it passes quickly, so ask the pilot or the guide where to look.

The north arm of Rudyerd Bay leads toward Nooya Lake, which sits in the floatplanes' sightseeing path.¹⁰ ⁷ A Forest Service note for the shelter there warns of heavy daytime plane traffic from May through August, a reminder of how many visitors share this view in summer.⁷ Early and late in the season, the sky over the bay is quieter.

At its head, the bay ends abruptly in 2 directions at 2 rivers and 2 flats.¹¹ From the air, the flat green valleys at the end of the steep walls show that you have reached the end of the fiord, and they mark where the rivers come down from the mountains into salt water. Beyond them the land climbs again toward the high, cold lakes and the border country.

Map

From the Ketchikan docks to Rudyerd Bay

Where the floatplanes leave from, how far the fjords lie to the east, and the bays and lakes the flights pass over.

Map of the Ketchikan area with Revillagigedo Island, Behm Canal and Misty Fjords National Monument Wilderness to the east, pins on Berth 2, Ward Cove, New Eddystone Rock, Punchbowl Cove, Rudyerd Bay and Walker Cove — Ketchikan and Misty Fjords

Map of Behm Canal and Rudyerd Bay with New Eddystone Rock, Punchbowl Cove, Punchbowl Lake and Nooya Lake — Rudyerd Bay up close

1
Berth 2, Ketchikan
Where the flight meets, by the bronze statue called The Rock; same-day tours are also sold at the Visitors Center here.¹⁴
In Google Maps ↗
2
Ward Cove
Cruise berth outside town, some 5.5 miles from the downtown docks.¹⁵
In Google Maps ↗
3
New Eddystone Rock
A plug of hardened lava standing 237 feet tall in Behm Canal.⁴ ⁵
In Google Maps ↗
4
Punchbowl Cove
Near the mouth of Rudyerd Bay, reached only by boat or floatplane.¹
In Google Maps ↗
5
Rudyerd Bay
The bay that branches east off Behm Canal into the granite walls.¹
In Google Maps ↗
6
Walker Cove
A second fiord north of Rudyerd Bay, surrounded by high, cold lakes and mountains.⁸
In Google Maps ↗
7
Punchbowl Lake
At the end of a 1.0-mile trail from the cove, with a three-sided shelter.⁹
In Google Maps ↗
8
Nooya Lake
In the north arm of Rudyerd Bay, under the floatplanes' sightseeing path.¹⁰ ⁷
In Google Maps ↗

Open the map in Google Maps

Spotter's list

What to watch for around the bay

In the rock

The gray granite wall of Punchbowl Cove
The blackish basalt at the cove's head
The owl's face at the upper narrows

Living things

Mountain goats high on the ridgelines
Seals at the foot of the walls
Bald eagles in the shoreline trees

Video

Into the bays and coves of the monument

The video plays from YouTube only after you press play.

New Eddystone Rock, the spire in Behm Canal

Outside the bay, in Behm Canal, stands New Eddystone Rock. It is a plug of hardened lava occupying a former volcanic vent, and its volcanic core is about 15,000 to 13,800 years old.⁵ Wave action and the land rising after the ice melted have left a landmark 237 feet tall, standing alone in open water.⁴

The rock has a place in history too. George Vancouver explored the area in 1793 and is reported to have stopped for lunch on New Eddystone Rock.¹⁶ Opposite the rock, on the eastern side of Revillagigedo Island, the geology guide describes carbonated soda springs whose water was once bottled and sold locally for a short time.¹⁷

From a floatplane, New Eddystone Rock is a single dark column standing in open water, and the flight this site features names it among the sights it passes. Boats pass close enough to see the texture of the lava, and the boat cruise compared on this site lists it on its itinerary. Either way, it is the landmark that tells you the fiords are close.

Wildlife around the bay

The waters of the monument are a prime feeding area for humpback whales, Steller sea lions and harbor seals, and bald eagles nest in the trees along the shoreline.¹⁸ In Rudyerd Bay, look along the base of the walls for seals and up in the trees above the water for eagles, which are easier to pick out than any mammal.

Mountain goats patrol the ridgelines above the bay and can be seen through binoculars or from the window of a floatplane.¹⁹ Look for white dots on gray rock, often high on the walls where nothing else seems able to stand. Ask the pilot or guide before you reach the bay where to look, and keep looking up while everyone else looks down at the water.

Birds are fewer than the cliffs suggest. The geology guide explains that very few of the cliffs here have a jointing pattern that produces nesting ledges, so there are few bird colonies in the monument.²⁰ Where you do see gulls or other seabirds gathered on a wall, the rock there has broken into small ledges, and the birds stand out clearly against the granite.

Light, rain and cloud over the bay

The bay looks different with every sky. On a clear day the granite is pale and the water dark blue; under cloud the walls turn gray and the waterfalls stand out. At Ketchikan's Beaver Falls station, 12 days in an average July reach 2.5 mm of precipitation, and 18 in September do, so a grey or wet visit is normal rather than bad luck.²¹

Rain has one advantage: it feeds the waterfalls. After a wet night, threads of water run down walls that are dry in a sunny week, and the bay's sound changes from the boat. Low cloud is the real problem for flights, because it can cover the upper walls and the lakes above them, and the operator can cancel a flight for bad weather.

Daylight is long in the season. In mid-June the sun stays up for 17.4 hours, and in mid-September still for 12.8 hours.²¹ In a deep fiord the walls shade each other, and the time of day decides which side is lit. A midday departure tends to light more of the bay than an early morning one, while evening light warms the eastern walls.

Seeing the bay from the air or from the water

From the air, Rudyerd Bay is a shape: a long blue channel, steep walls, lakes in hanging valleys and the flats at the head. The flight this site features passes over the bay without stopping, in a trip of 2 hours from Berth 2 back to Berth 2, from $349. Every guest has a window seat, but which side faces the cove at any moment depends on the flight path.

From the water, the bay is a sequence of close-ups. The boat cruise compared on this site names Rudyerd Bay with cliffs of up to 3,000 feet and New Eddystone Rock on a trip of 5.25 hours, from $232. You see the owl's face, the waterfalls and the seals at their own scale, and you see less of the lakes above.

If a landing in the bay's country is what you want, 2 floatplane listings include one: a 20-minute landing on a mountain lake or saltwater inlet, and a landing on an alpine lake or a calm bay with time ashore. Both are non-refundable, so book them only when your plans are fixed and your ship's time in port allows it.

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