Gorge Harbour to Rebecca Spit

Gorge Harbour to Rebecca Spit: 9.2NM

I always title these blogs as to what day it is. I force myself to do this because without it, I would have no idea whatsoever where we are on the calendar. Not important to myself, Karen or this trip, but we need such information when contacting the outside world in those infrequent sojourns back to reality.

Speaking of which, the paper, Vancouver Sun arrived today at Gorge Harbor, a twice-weekly event. Normally I never look at newspapers, no matter the title, location nor scarcity in this case. However, the pictures of New Orleans under water that were emblazoned on the front page caused me to stop and add it to my purchase of orange juice.

Having spent the first fourteen years of my life on the Gulf Coast, only one wooden bridge down the road from Louisiana, I remember tracking hurricanes as a boy with my map torn from our local paper. The blank tracking form was provided by the publisher for just such a purpose. I never experienced the likes of a storm of this magnitude when I was a boy. In fact, I would often go out in the hurricanes and pick up shingles as they were blown from their appointed places on roofs unknown. I distinctly remember the sting of the horizontal rain. It felt like small needles on your skin. The drops of water were harmless and somewhat exhilarating for a 10 year old boy.

Unlike those in the path of Katrina, today was going to be a lazy one for the crew of the motor vessel Best of Times. I awoke at the usual time, 6:30, urged on by my internal alarm clock, better known as my bladder.

Karen, however, was cocooned in the berth and was not to be disturbed. So I passed the time reading such things as Yachting and Blue Water Sailing. Appropriate enough given the circumstances. When “it” arose and gave a cackle, the signal had now been given to all that now the official start of the day was upon us.

In a previous edition of this blog, we mentioned that it appears that not much to nothing had been done to address the list of problems with this boat one year ago. One of my favorites is the locking pliers I use for the left burner control on the cooking range.

 

Vise Grips to the rescue. By the way, the bacon up here is great!

As the picture illustrates, it is necessary to remove the quintessential black plastic knob and replace it with a pair of locking pliers if you want to maintain control of the temperature. It seems that as soon as the burner heats up, so does the metal stud the knob fits on to. The result is that the plastic knob expands just enough to prevent it from gripping the metal stud, thus rendering the assembly useless.

The day was a lazy one and the weather had adopted the same attitude. It was dead calm in Gorge Harbor. With the dock clear of other boats and the weather and wind on hiatus, it was time for Karen to captain the boat as it left the dock. This would be her first time. A skilled navigator and comfortable at the helm while in route, she had not tackled the duties of the captain while arriving or departing from the dock. It is the most challenging part of the helmsman’s job, navigating tons of floating fiberglass next to an immovable structure.

As I was certain would be the case, she commanded Best of Times off the dock at Gorge Harbor with aplomb. I on the other hand, taking Karen’s role as first mate, was on and off the boat securing the shore power cord, untying lines and tending to the proper stowage of the fenders. I’ll be resuming my Captain’s duties soon; it’s always warm, dry and comfortable in the helm chair.

Karen took us out of Gorge Harbor, a wonderful place, a harbor enclosed on all sides, save for a small passage between sheer cliff walls.

Narrow entrance to Gorge Harbor. Looked very small the first time. This year it seems much larger.

Some things are universal, no matter your latitude or longitude.

With lots of room inside, you can always find a comfortable refuge for the night. The harbor is also home to football field sized aquaculture farms. Nothing much more than floating cages with fish inside, the aqua farmers dance across the tops of the tethered structures tending to their “crops”.

Aqua-culture in Gorge Harbor

Captain Karen took us over to Rebecca Spit. This large but tranquil bay was to be home for the night. Drop anchor in 18 feet of water and into the dinghy to set the stern line. While the pictures you will see are of our stern lines set in place, these images are the result of quite a bit of finagling, and engineering. We must launch ourselves in the dinghy, dragging a 3/8" polypropylene line with us. The line held by Karen wants to turn the dinghy around while I try to make headway to beach the dinghy. Now beaching the dinghy requires that you get up a full head of steam and aim the rubber vessel square at the rocky beach. At just the right instant, so as to not lose all your momentum, you must stop the engine and raise it out of the water so as not to drag the prop on the rocky shore. Miss your timing, and the dinghy stops about two feet short. Now, the embarrassed captain must paddle back a little, lower the motor, restart and take another crack at his target. Somehow I think if Columbus was burdened with these modern inventions, he world have sailed on to Cuba rather than risk an unsuccessful landing.

Karen "pumps up" the dinghy in preparation for our sojourn. 

The landing party prepares to attack the beach at Rebecca Spit.

Speaking of miscalculation, our typical procedure for stern tying is to take one end of the line ashore, wrap it around something that will not move and return the bitter end to the yacht. That way, when you’re ready to depart, one simply lets one end go and pulls on the other end, returning the yellow line to its rather large wooden spool. The beauty of this is that there is no second round of beaching of the dinghy required.

So as I walked the line toward the nearest sturdy looking tree, it became apparent that we were, as the passing smart ass remarked to me, “about ten feet short, eh?”

Plan B; tie the stern line to the tree, thus requiring only half as much line. That’s what we did, knowing that sometime tomorrow, we would have to launch the dinghy, throw ourselves onto the rocks and untie before we could ride the tide to our next port of call.

Dinghy after a successful beaching and stern line mission.

Stern tie in place at Rebecca Spilt as the kayak stands guard. 

Best of Times safe and secure, stern line and all in Rebecca Spit. 

On of the many B.C. Ferries as it passes Rebecca Spit on its regularly scheduled stop at Heriot Bay.

Garden Bay to Gorge Harbour

Garden Bay to Gorge Harbor: 52.3NM 

It’s one of those mornings when I’d like to laze around but our float plan has us going over 52 nautical miles and the weather doesn’t sound like it’s going to be that great in the afternoon.  

 

The clouds give the pine trees a morning hug in Garden Bay.  

So up with the anchor and out we go, turning right to head up to Desolation Sound and beyond. 

 

Karen practices her twin screw maneuvering techniques. 

 

A classic yacht heads south and we make our way north. 

 

Passing Grief Point marked by the red and white tower. Appropriately named, today it provided no grief at all.  

This is a long stretch in Malaspina Strait, adjacent to the Strait of Georgia and occasionally just as mean, something we found out last year to our dismay. Anyway, the forecast was for Southeasterly Winds, which are always worth keeping a close eye on, but Bob was confident we’d be fine. We started off with beam seas, which made us roll a bit and caused Bob to turn off the autopilot, but after a while it settled down. I skippered for about 2 hours while Bob took a catnap.  

 

Karen at the helm.  

The most interesting thing we heard was a mayday call from an 85-foot motor yacht that struck a rock near Cortes Island. It is very rocky around here and constant vigilance is required. Anyway, the Canadian Coast Guard didn’t mess around, the boat was taking on water and in danger of sinking. They put out the mayday, and within a few minutes, a dive boat was on the scene with a pump, helping keep the boat afloat. We saw the boat later in the day, being towed to Lund by the Coast Guard for repairs. While striking a rock and holing the hull is everyone’s worst nightmare (especially in this 58 degree water), it was really good to see the quick response and how all the nearby mariners pitched in to help.  

Our day was to end in Gorge Harbour, a fabulous anchorage on Cortes Island (but away from that rock I mentioned earlier) that is completely protected from winds. 

 

Nice trawler style yacht resting in Gorge Harbor. 

We stayed here last year and found the restaurant, the Old Floathouse, to be so good, we decided to return. We took a spot at the docks, met the owners of a lovely Krogen 42 trawler and were invited aboard for a tour. They had a kitty on board but I didn’t see it, I think it was hiding in the flybridge when we were there. We did some laundry and met two nice people who kept feeding money into the dryer for us so we didn’t have to stand there all afternoon and watch the moss grow while hoping our clothes would eventually get dry. 

 

Rainy walk back from the laundry at Gorge Harbor.  

That was really nice of them, because it rained during the afternoon and then a giant rainbow appeared, which we would have missed if stuck in the laundry room. 

 

Rainbow over Gorge Harbor dock.  

Had a superb dinner at this small restaurant away from civilization, with cuisine that could hold its own with anything Philly has to offer. I had the best wild salmon in orange confetti sauce (Grand Marnier and orange zest) and Bob had fresh halibut. It was great, and our friends from the laundry were there too, so we bought them dessert and swapped a few stories. 

Wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Ganges Harbour to Garden Bay

Ganges Harbor to Dodd Narrows: 27.9NM

Dodd Narrows to Garden Bay, Pender Harbor: 33.7NM

Best of Times happy to be in Ganges Harbor.

We awoke in Ganges feeling rested and ready to take on a crossing of the Strait of Georgia with a dry companionway. We decided to make one more quick trip into Ganges before departing, given that we had to time our trip to occur at slack at Dodd Narrows. So we walked around, bought some killer cookies and hand cream at the grocery store, and ended up standing in line waiting for the liquor store to open. It’s a bit scary, seeing yourself waiting impatiently on a Monday morning for the liquor store to open. I shared the sidewalk with two…gentlemen who seemed far more desperate than I for the unlocking of the door! All I was trying to do was replenish our wine supply, as it can be difficult to do so once in Desolation Sound and beyond.

Walking the docks at Ganges. "No Karen, you cannot take it out for a spin".

Anyway, we had a nice ride to Dodd Narrows, a passageway that we had to get through at slack. It’s a very narrow spit of land where all the water needs to flow through a few time a day, so it makes for some impressive rapids. We arrived early, and had to wait for all the southbound traffic to come through (one at a time, single file) before we could be on our way.

Our wake on the way to Dodd Narrows. The wise mariner makes a quick passage when the weather is this nice.

The weather forecast was so good for the Strait of Georgia that we decided to skip Nanaimo and just keep on going. The winds were out of the Northwest and we had 1-2 foot chop with swells, but mostly it was just a great ride to Pender Harbor.

On the lookout! There is lots of tugboat traffic. The tugboat is just above the orange arrow and its tow is noted by the yellow arrow. Between the two is about a quarter of a mile of steel cable hidden below the surface waiting for the mariner that does not give these vessels a wide berth. 

Bob and I like Pender Harbor with its miles of shoreline. We decided to anchor in Garden Bay for the evening. Imagine my surprise when the anchor windlass decided to jam. Bob was telling me to move the cam lever to loosen it. I couldn’t budge it, and he got all grumpy and came charging down from the pilothouse only to find he couldn’t budge it either. A few bangs from the boat’s rusty hammer and we were back in business, with anchor set and lovely views abounding. It had been a long day in terms of hours underway and miles traveled, so we took it easy, ate aboard the boat (Bob’s killer Thai peanut butter chicken and roasted potatoes!) and had a peaceful night.

Safely at anchor in Garden Bay. 

Sportsmans' Lodge in Garden Bay. Good eats if you're in the neighborhood. However, tonight, Chef Bob is cooking.

Annette Inlet to Ganges Harbour

Annette Inlet to Ganges Harbour: 4.9NM

As the light of dawn shone upon beautiful Annette Inlet on Prevost Island, we find the M/V Best of Times still floating. Low tide at 7AM still left almost four feet of water under the keel. So we’re feeling pretty good about the computer tide prediction as well as our ability to read the printed tide tables.

Unfortunately, during my by 3AM trip to the head, I was rudely awakened by my toes as they felt the cold damp carpet in the companionway. Given our experiences last year, I knew what was going on. So familiar was the feel and sound, I did not even let out the expected “Oh Shit!" I just went about my business, returned to bed realizing that the better part of valor was to get some more sleep and store up energy for the morning plumbing chores.

After taking her shower Karen, picked up the coffee pot and began to bail. By now the water was “6 inches deep”. Editor’s note: That’s about an inch in the real world. However, it is backbreaking work and all Karen’s efforts did was to keep the water from rising more.  It was not getting any shallower in the estuary known more familiarly as the companionway (from master stateroom to the main salon).

Now you have to remember that we went through this exact same problem one year ago. Therefore, it was time to jump into the Way-Back machine and see if we could come up with a fix. Off with the hatch and sure enough, in the forward bilge stood about “six inches” of water. Editors’ note, since that’s a Bob measurement, he IS talking about six inches. 

The float switch appears to be in working order. Moving the master control switch in the helm from automatic to manual brings the pump alive. After pumping the bilge dry, my troubleshooting confirms my memory that the switch is wired so that when “manual” is chosen, it is really automatic. This counter intuitive wiring was the jury rig solution the charter company came up with last year just before we departed. So after a full year, nothing has been done to correct the wiring. Confident we know now how to keep the sump and our “piggies” dry, this chapter of the D.Y.I. Boat Channel comes to a close.

We take a short hop over to Ganges, one of our favorite harbors.

Karen, a.k.a. "The Lounge Lizard" finds the most comfortable place in the pilothouse to rest up from the being the human bilge pump.

We chose Ganges as the place to meet the people who are going to rent us a two person Kayak for the trip. It is going to be an adventure, with some learning curves and some physical acrobatics to master, but they gave us a great, in-depth briefing so we have the knowledge, now we just need so see if we can apply it. (Karen’s Note: This kayak is BIG. It is over 17 feet in length and we are having one heck of a time finding a good place to stow it. Did I mention it weighs over 100lbs? Not easy for us to move.

Best of Times is not certain about the new addition of the kayak.

We had also planned to do some last minute “I forgot” provisioning” at Ganges. The trip to the local “everything” store resulted in the purchase of cream cheese, a few more boxes of Zip-Lock bags, another loaf of bread and a wet dry vacuum. Given the long list of things that need to get done, we vacuum the carpet as dry as we can, get the computer/internet/cell phone/satellite phone interfaces working, create a revised script for a client that needs to get out…so, though we didn’t plan it,  Ganges is going to be our overnight stop. We were both really tired. As Karen said; “when you start to operate only in the reactive mode, that’s when something major bad happens”. Needless to say, we did not want that to occur. 

I always like Ganges because it has almost as many seaplanes coming and going as boats.

Ganges International Airport

So we got caught up on chores, and had a nice dinner on shore at a great little bistro named Calvin’s (run by a Swiss émigré) and recharged our batteries. Tomorrow we’ll be off to have fun, on our terms, not at the mercy of the Gods of the Sea nor the gremlins of the Charter Company.

Friday Harbor to Annette Inlet

Friday Harbor to Bedwell Harbor: 15.9 Nautical Miles (NM)

Bedwell Harbor to Annette Inlet: 10.7NM

(Karen writes) Friday dawned to a lovely day. We were up early as our bodies were not accustomed to Pacific Daylight time, and we (having previously rented a car) headed off for Roche Harbor, a pretty little town not too far from Friday Harbor. Had a nice breakfast, and then headed back to Friday Harbor to start provisioning for the boat at Kings, the fabulous but expensive island supermarket. $500 later, we were off to our boat, Best of Times. 

Up early Saturday (still glorious weather) to work with the charter company to fix all the problems we found the night before. We were rather disheartened to discover that nearly all the problems we squawked last year on this boat were still there. We held our ground and got several things fixed before we left, though not all. We didn’t get away from the dock until 1pm or so.

We headed off, determined to capture the rhythm of vacation. First stop was Bedwell Harbor and Poet’s Cove, where Bob had to clear Canadian customs. We could take some lessons from our northern neighbors. Clearance is by phone, very civilized, done in about 3 minutes. It will take many times that amount of time to clear back into the U.S.!

Poet’s Cove is co-located with the Customs dock, and is a lovely 5-star resort that happens to have some nice moorage for us boaters. We didn’t want to stay long, just snoop a bit, so we tied up at the transient dock. This is more appropriately called “The floating dock that is attached to nothing so that you have to launch the dinghy to get to shore” dock. The wind was fighting us as Bob docked the boat, but between his skill, the nice people on the dock who caught our lines, and the trusty bow thruster, we were home free. A short dinghy ride took us to Poet’s Cove, which is really nice. Certainly we can vouch for the fact that the pub was nice, as we taste tested some of Canada’s finest brew.

After some more snooping, we set off for our first night’s anchorage, Annette Inlet on Prevost Island. I had read a lot about it, and wanted to try it out.

Lots of Canadians in B.C. make their home where the granite meets the "ocean".

The entrance to the inlet is guarded by a few well-placed and unmarked rocks, so we went carefully. It is a lovely pastoral inlet that is quite shallow and requires serious attention to the depth finder. Most of the great anchor spots were taken, but Bob kept at it and found a good spot with just enough depth for us to still be afloat (we hoped!) when the tides went out around 7am (just a small 10 foot drop).

Tranquil evening at Annette Inlet.

We had a great dinner, courtesy of Bob and some red wine and we were sure that our vacation was on track and that we were off to a terrific start!