Our final rest day in Garden Bay was 6/19 - the heater finally arrived at around 5p. We started the day with a provisioning stop at the local IGA - this was our first grocery shopping by dinghy, kinda fun thing to do. We went on a hike to the nearby park (Garden Bay Provential Park) and found a fun loop trail & beach hike. We also spent a few hours up in the Sunshine Room, doing watercoloring and playing games.
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Quick side note - Angela has been an amazing provisioner and cook. Our meals on the boat have been amazing - not an easy feat when our space for refrig/frozen goods is small and most of our provisions need to be shelf stable. Our dinner was lettuce tacos with a side of baked sweet potato - Amazing!
Tuesday (my birthday) we left early - eager to continue our journey. Our goal was to make it to Westview - about 25 nm. This was our first experiment with leaving pre-breakfast - pulling docklines and fenders at 7:30a. Our aim was to get a couple of hours in before Sara awoke and it only mostly worked - She woke up about 30 min into our travels but she ended up going back to bed for about an hour long nap mid morning. We made it to Westview around 11a and decided we were going to continue after a quick break and make it to Cortes Bay in one day (a 45nm push, our longest yet). We went to the nearby park (which had a playground for Sara) and stopped off at a bakery & marine store. All in, we were at Westview for about 2 hours, but it was a welcome stop. We filled up on diesel and were on our way by around 1:30p. We had great wind and ended up killing the engine for a full sail for about 2 hours - after that we did a bit of motor sailing as the winds started to die down. We pulled into Cortes Bay a little bit before 5p - spectacular push!
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I also discovered a spectacular hack today that makes the cold morning far more tolerable. We have windscreens that we only really put on when we have full canvas on the boat (meaning the bimini to dodger piece is installed). I don’t love putting on the roof part because you can’t see as much, but turns out you can install the windscreens without the roof and it does an amazing job of blocking the wind and still allows you to see out. This may not seem like much, but it’s huge!
Cortes Bay is an amazing marina - all the usual amenities and a pea patch with fresh leafy greens for you to pick! We were pretty happy we made all the way to Cortes in one day so we could have an extra “rest” day here.
Sara and I immediately went off to play at the beach and we met the neighbors (the actual neighbors that live across the street from the outstation - not the boat neighbors). There’s a nearby hike called the “Red Granite Peak” and we saw conflicting information about whether or not it was open to the public or not - Manda and Slovak informed us that it is open to the public but there is a conflict going on between the SYC and the land owners so SYC members aren’t currently allowed (I don’t fully understand why - more research needed. Still, they offered to escort us up and we walked up with them. The hike was quick and uneventful but the view from the top was truly amazing!
The top of the peak has these strange structures built on it - which Manda informed us was an architecture project by the land owner’s architecture school to create these canvas covered shades. The canvas only lasted one season - so only the structures remain. There was also some cleats attached to a concrete foundation up there - which we were informed were for launching hot air baloons. Neither of these were used anymore - so “funky structures” are all that remain.
Sara and Angela presented all of their birthday presents - Sara spent most off the day crafting presents for my birthday - including two cards and a small cutout sailboat of Onward. She also made me a crown! We had a delightful dinner of steak, asparagus, and roasted potatoes at one of the picnic tables overlooking the bay. Happy birthday to me!
We got back to the boat late - almost 9p and the sun was just starting to set. Our boat neighbors (Shatzi) played Reveille on a shell horn and lowered their flag (we did the same). A perfectly nautical way to end the day!
The following day was a rest day - with the primary task being installing the new heater that we picked up in Garden bay. The new heater is fancy - complete with an app and bluetooth so you can start the heaater while you are still in bed… :). Unfortunately, the control panel was a different size than the old one so we are left with a hole in the panel which I have no real alternative to just duct taping over it…
Sara and I went on a mid morning walk to Oyster Beach. We had heard about it from the caretaker who also showed us how to research if an area has healthy shellfish or not (via the BC website). We saw several people (including locals) on the doc with oysters - so we decided to go for it. You can take a max of 12 under our fishing license, so we headed over with a few bags of ice to get ours. The oysters ended up being huge, so we only ate like 6 (I ate 5, Sara 0 after much to-do wanting to eat one but not being able to, and Angela ate 1) of them and returned the rest to the sea. Super fun lunch!
We lounged around mostly in the afternoon and planned our route for the following day. The next three days will be tricky - starting with the three rapids (Yuculta, Gillard, and Dent). The biggest challenge is you have to make it through all three in one push - which means that two of them need to happen before/after slack. We figured out our timing and fingers crossed tomorrow will go off without a hitch…
We left early the next day - around 7a - making sure we had ample time to get to the first rapid before slack. Guidebooks/locals generally agree that if you are going northbound, you should hit the first rapid (Yuculta) 30 min before slack such that you hit the last rapid (Dent) right at slack or slightly after. Dent is the worst of the rapids, so it’s better to fight the other rapids than that one. We had about 30 nm to go to get to the first rapids, so we left 5 hours before we wanted to transit the first rapids. What we didn’t take into account was a 1.5-2 kn currrent in our favor basically the whole morning - so we actually arrived an hour and a half before we wanted to transit… There is basically no place to anchor here, so we waited patiently and had a little snack/early lunch. The journey, however, was breathtaking…
As we approached the time we wanted to depart, 6-7 boats pulled up and also began the waiting dance. Most of them were about 1 nm behind us and as we approached our departure time, none of them were moving. We were getting worried, but Angela kept reassuring me that we should trust ourselves and our work. We did, and we turned into the rapids at 1:09p exactly - Lo and behold, every one of them turned to follow us. I guess none of them wanted to go first!
We got through Yuculta with about 2 knots pushing us and Gillard was basically calm. Dent was relatively calm as we started to pass through it, but we could see rapids building on the other side. We were about 10 min after slack, and they were already moving about at about 2 knots. You could easily see how minutes matter here - had we been 15 min later, they probably would have been moving at over 6 knots…The pictures don’t do it justice, but here is Dent rapids as they are building. The last one is our speed gauge vs gps speed - the rapids were pushing against us considerably for 10 min after slack!
The next 3 hours or so were spent in some very calm waterways (I believe Calm Channel was the name of one of them). We saw some helicopter logging and you could see the high water mark in the treeline - these channels do not see rough seas!
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We arrived at Blind Channel right at max flood - which meant we were battling a 3 knot current for the last mile (our boat speed is around 6-6.5 knots, so we were effectively going half speed) with eddies all over the place. The Blind Channel Resort owners are well aware of this challenge and they have someone waiting at the dock for every boat that comes it. We docked quickly and without any hicups!
The resort itself is pretty cool - there is a resteraunt and a well-stocked general store with some fresh produce. They also had some amazing fresh baked bread! They also have some great hiking trails - to a view point and to a large cedar tree (900+ years old and 16 feet in diameter). We saw a huge pile of bear scat on our way - be bear aware!!!
Sara and I did the trails while Angela got the lay of the land at the resort iself. My favorite quote of the day from the hike was:
“Daddy, we really should have brought the headlamp” - Sara, as we were approaching the tree covered part of the hike. “Why don’t you just take your sunglasses off” - Dad “Oh - that’s so funny!” - Sara
Today was unfortunately the final stand for the second “Diane” braclet. It lasted well over a year of nearly constant wear, but it finally bit the dust. We will have a burial at sea with full honors.
We had dinner on the boat and then went to the restaurant for desert - Which was the right decision, desert (apple struedel and chocolate mousse) was amazing. Then off to bed early to get ready for an early morning - slack at our next rapids is at 7:52a, so we are aiming to be on the water by 7:30a.
The following day was to be a short day - transit the last of the two rapids and anchor up on Forward Harbour for the night - a hot tip we got from some other sailors. We left at 7:30a on the nose and hit the first of the rapids (Greenpoint) at slack. The second rapid (Whirlpool) was about 10 nm away and the guidebook suggested this one was ok to hit in during the ebb - it was navigable when the current was pushing you through. All of this turned out to be true - although a bit scary as we shot through the second set of rapids at over 10 knts… But we made it unscathed.
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We started to see them yesterday, but we are seeing snow-capped mountains more and more often. They are quite stunning to see from the water - and they make me happy that I installed that heater… :)
Another thing I’ve noticed as we get further into these narrow channels - the trees come right down to the high tide water line. My only explanation is that the water stays pretty calm here year round, so the trees rarely get hit with waves at high tide. The effect is a perfect line of trees just above the water - which is pretty cool.
Our anchorage (Douglas Bay in the Forward Harbour inlet) was fairly remote - no civilization to speak of - and our guidebook mentions a trail from the bay to a pristine white sands beach. As we arrived, we found 5 other boats in the anchorage! We found out later that they were all in the same group, so not as surprising to see. We dropped the dinghy and took it ashore and we were off to find this beach… It was a short walk, but the trail was seriously overgrown and most of it was bushwacking. We did make it however and we were greeted with an off-white fairly cluttered beach - not the pristine white we were expecting. Still, it was beautiful and we were happy to have made the journey.
Angela and I committed ourselves to staying fit on this trip and have been exercising 3x days per week - and today was a workout day. We purchased these kettlebells that are essentially bags that you fill with water - depending on how much water you put in, you can get up to 30 lbs in them. We have been using them regularly on the trip but I decided to use a different weight today…
After our workout, we came back to the boat for showers and naps - both of which were lovely. As I was waking up from my nap, I started playing a little phone game and Sara interrupted me to say “Daddy, can we have less device time and go see nature”. I have never been more proud of the little lady.
The dinghy was still in the water, so Sara and I hopped in for a little tour of Forward Harbour. The inlet is quite large so we only went halfway up and then crossed it to come back the other side. We didn’t see much in terms of wildlife, but we were able to pop into several small caves on our way. The edges of the inlet are rocky and steep - so no really good place to go ashore. I discovered two sort of cool dingy hacks over the last couple of days. The first is that we basically go the same speed when we are at half throttle vs full throttle - so I’ve effectively doubled our range on one battery. The second is dinghy cup holders!!
Tomorrow we head to Lagoon Cove - which was also reccomended to us. Apparently they have a potluck happy hour that cannot be missed!
The trip to Lagoon Cove was a rough day. The day before was so magical that it seemed hard to live up to, but this day really proved how great the prior day was. We knew we had the small strech of the Johnsone straight today and looking at the weather window it looked like we had a short window in late morning before the winds really started to build - and remained high (gale force) for the next two days. The stretch was 13 nm long and we had about 5nm of an open channel before we go there - all of it was rough - kinda like riding a bull for 3-4 hours… When we made the turn into Havannah Channel, we were well and truely smoked. Thankfully, we did get respite after the turn and we had smooth water for a while. After smoothly passing through Chatham channel, I gave Lagoon Cove a call on the radio and it turns out they were all booked up for the night. We were told this could/would happen and that you needed reservations - but we were unable to get ahold of them early enough. Bummer…
Instead, I saw that there was a large cove on the charts called Cutter cove. This looked like the ideal place to anchor and our guidebook confirmed it. It did mention that there was little protection from westerly winds, but winds were light so we decided to go for it. Not long after anchoring (and taking Oakley ashore in a large tidal flat which ended with water completely flooding my boots), the winds started to build and build. By the time we sat down for dinner you could hear them howling and I was seeing 20-25 knts on the wind guage. I went back to the charts and found a public float - the Minstrel island harbour - which used to be a resort, but was abandoned. The floats are maintained by the fisheries department to give give boats respite in storms - sounds like the ticket. It was a quick 2 nm away, so we pulled anchor (which was a huge challenge in the wind - and a painful one for one of my fingers) and made for the floats (about 2nm away). After some small challenges docking (we were very tired at this point), we tied up - finally feeling secure for the night… Tomorrow we make for port McNeil - an early start that we hope to finish off by noon for some much needed time in a real town to rest/refit.
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Our trip to Port Mcneil was easy and uneventful - something we were quite thankful for after the day before. We departed the dock right at 6:00a to catch a favorable current to carry us out Baronet Passage and into Alert Bay and Port McNneil. It was a cold morning - with a bit of fog for good measure. We put up full canvas and watched the charts/AIS closely to avoid rocks/other ships. About an hour and a half into our trip, Clio Channel narrows into Baronet Passage and the current push went from half a knot or so to 3 knots! We spent the next 2 hours flying at 9 knots and quite comfortable in the process. Weynton Passage and Alert bay were calm and easy motoring and we made it into Port McNeill just after 11a. Nice!
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Right before we made it into Port McNeill, we spotted a group of at least 30 sea otters - they were swimmiing around playing, chasing the boat/swimming along side it. It’s so hard to take pictures from the boat, but hopefully you can see them a little here…
There are 3 marinas in Port McNeill, and all were quite full as we pulled in. Thankfully, I made reservations at the North Island Marina right as we got cell service as we were coming out of Baronet Passage and we pulled right into our slip as soon as we arrived. We headed ashore for lunch and arrived at Devils’ Hole Brewery right as they were opening. Sara got busy right away and painted a picture of her momma and wrote (spelling herself) “Mom is fun!”.
We did a quick walk around town and stopped at a few shops to get some more pants for both of us - for some reason I thought there would be more shorts on this trip! We also did some hunting for a used book store - which turned out to be closed - and got some ice cream at the coffee shop as well. When we got back to the dock, guess what we found? M5!! Apparently they have been following us north!
Based on the forecast, it looks like we will be in Port McNeill until Tuesday - when we make our way around Cape Caution and into northern BC!