Leaving Prince Rupert, we push through Grenville & Princess Royal Channels. Some long days, but we made some tremendous progress towards our Pruth Bay on Calvert Island- our last anchorage in north BC and a location that we both very much enjoyed.
8/28/2023
We had a lot of provisioning/refit to do this morning - but we couldn’t very well visit Prince Rupert without the obligatory Cowpaccinos breakfast and back in the afternoon for ice cream. We departed the dock around 2p, and after a very frustrating 45 min wait for the fuel dock to open up, we were off just before 3p. We were hoping to make it to Gunboat Harbor (the anchorage just north of the Grenville Channel), but a nasty headwind was building and it wasn’t looking likely that we would make it to Gunboat before dark. We ended up pulling off about 10 nm short of Gunboat with a 15 knt headwind - still 20 nm day leaving at 3p isn’t bad.
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Kelp Passage Cove was the anchorage we stopped at before Prince Rupert on the way north. There are some great (rocky) beaches to explore and Sara/Oakley/I did our best to explore them again. Sara has informed us that she “used to live” on most of the beaches we have explored and that’s why she knows where everything is. This beach was no exception - except that she had actually been on this beach (a month and a half ago) before which did make it somewhat unique. Sara had a great time telling stories as we explore different beaches - there is really no limit to how much enjoyment she can get out of exploring a new beach.
Turns out, I was able to find a new key cylinder in Prince Rupert! I installed it when we got to the anchorage - It’s a small thing (we still don’t have the autopilot which is a big thing), but not having wires sticking out of our engine pod just makes me feel better.
Off to bed with us - tomorrow is the Grenville channel… Let’s see if we can redeem ourselves!
8/29/2023
We did it! The Grenville Channel, which took us 4 days to get through on the way north, was completed in a single - very long - rockstar of a day. This was our biggest day of the entire trip - 59 nm over 11 hours with a quick 30 min break in the middle to stretch legs and let Oakley potty.
We got going at 7a this morning after going ashore to stretch legs and let Oakley potty. It took us about 3 hours to get into the Grenville channel and thankfully we had the current at our back. It was weaker than our hope - only 0.5-1.0 knts - but it started to build during the day. We did a quick stop at a place called Nabannah Bay, which is right next to Evening Point at the mouth of Klewnuggit Inlet where we did our third night in the Grenville on the way north. It was a very exposed anchorage and not a good overnight spot, but weather was calm and it was a great place for us to spend 30 min whil taking Oakley ashore.
Passing Evening Point, the current picked up (as anticipated) and we had 1.5 knt push building to a little over 2 knts in places. We had 3-4 knt currents in this same spot last time, so this was less than anticipated but we were still making great time. In the last few miles of the Grenville, we were blessed with whales. I watched them bubble feeding in the distance for a little while and then one popped up no more than 15 feet off our bow - I thought we were about to hit it. I immediately depowered the boat and the whale dove just in time - all good. We coasted in idle while the whales came up a few more times - I grabbed a couple of pics with my phone before we passed through their spot and continued on our way.
We pulled out of the Grenville channel at 7p, dropped anchor at 7:30p, and let out a big sigh of relief. We made it!
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We took Oakley ashore and did a big walk along the beach for a little over an hour. We found the biggest barnacles I had ever seen - each one was just slightly smaller than my fist! We had a lovely walk along a shell beach - on it’s way to becoming a sandy beach as all of the shells broke up over probably the next 10 years. The sun starting to set was the only thing that finally pulled us back to the dinghy and the boat.
We were hoping for another early start tomorrow, so it was off to bed for us!
8/30/2023
We pulled anchor at 6:15a and headed for Hartley bay to fill up on water. The fuel dock full, so we tied up to the brand new public dock (it was under construction on our way north). The fuel dock was supposed to open at 7a, but I saw no sign of life when we pulled up to the dock. No worries, we were at 3/4 of a tank plus all 4 jerry cans - we didn’t really need fuel anyway as we will be pulling into Klemtu tomorrow. I even saw a sea otter on the dock - about 20 feet away from me. He is in the pic below - sticking his head out from the side of the dock.
After a brief go ashore with Oakley, we pulled out and started making our way towards and then into Princess Royal Channel. Around 10a, the weather turned on us. It had been raining all night, but the wind was calm and the seas calm. Now, we had a 15 knt headwind and our progress had slowed to a crawl - barely hitting 4 knts. Bummer!
Given the calm seas, we decided to continue to Butedale. This was an old cannery and it was mentioned in a book we were reading - in the 70s, there was a caretaker and he offered showers & a place to sleep to passing fishermen. Even that is no longer available - the dock is still public and in good repair, but the inland areas are private and in collapse. There are signs of life - some recent construction, large solar array, recently chopped wood, etc - but it’s a long ways from being an oasis…
We left Butedale behind - there was not much for us there outside of the small patch of land for Oakely to go potty before the no tresspassing signs. We saw more whales - all morning they have been all around us. All swimming in our direction. I think these must be the early migrators - starting their journey to Hawaii(?). Turning out into Graham Reach, we had a 2 knt current on the afternoon ebb. It was almost too good to be true and we just had to take advantage. We passed our target anchorage, then we passed our revised target anchorage - we were making such great time we just had to keep going. At one point, when heading through Heikish Narrows, we topped 3 knts of current - Amazing! Our final stretch anchorage was Work Bay - a small fingered bay on the east side of Sarah Island. It was another long day - almost 13 hours from 6:15a til 7p - but it was worth it. 58 nm covered and we only have a few days left until we reach Pruth Bay.
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We dropped the dinghy and went ashore right away - the bay has a large tidal flat and Angela found the biggest Sea Urchin shell we had ever seen! Unfortunately, it broke as she was cleaning it - but it broke in such an interesting way (almost like a jigsaw puzzle) that it made it all the more interesting.
We spent about an hour exploring on shore before the sun started to set. We saw several Sea Cucumbers (I’ve not seen them on the tide land before - only while snorkeling) and this beach was particularly full of a very whispy sea algae that looked like old man’s beard moss. As the sun started to set, we made our way back to the boat and flicked that heater on to recover ourselves from our very cold/rainy, but very productive, day.
