Monday Anchorage to Pearl Pass

We had a good night in Monday Anchorage. There is some fetch that can be felt, but it was minimal and did not bother us.

Today we are off to anchor in Pearl Pass and visit Mimkwamlis , an abandoned First Nations site on Village Island.

Pearl Pass is an unusual “anchorage”.  We have visited often, first learning about it in the Dreamspeaker guide. We have never found another boat in this anchorage. It simply does not look like your typical place to set the hook. With Crease Island and Mound Island anchorages close by, it’s easily overlooked. Pearl Pass became a favorite before Starlink because it had reliable cell service. We would anchor here and catch up on work, back in the day.

the view to the west from pearl pass

The obstructions are well marked and if you enter at low tide, you get a better look at the kelp patches. Anchor in 15-20 feet with good holding, although set your anchor with a soft tug.

The biggest problem with the anchorage is finding a spot amongst the crab pots. We’ve always made it work, but it takes a moment to scope out all the parameters. So be patient, and you’ll find your spot.

The views in all quadrants can be spectacular on a clear day like today.

loooking east into pearl pass

Pearl Pass is also a great base to visit Mimkwamlis [“village with rock and island out front”], most often referred to as Mamalilikulla, which is really the name of the First Nation tribe associated with the uninhabited village. It’s their ancestral home. It’s only about a mile away from Pearl Pass by dinghy. You could also anchor the big boat in the bay off the docks.

very nice dock at Mimkwamlis

Visiting Mimkwamlis requires permission, as the uplands are protected Indian Reserve land. You can get permission via an online request to the Mamalilikulla First Nation Band office. There is a fee to tie up your dinghy ($1/foot) and a $20 fee per person to visit. Most of the remains are from the early twenty century when the village was abandoned. So, no ancient relics, but we nevertheless always find it interesting to visit historical places.

it an easy process to gain permission to the site

As you walk along the path with the falling structures  and longhouse remains on your left and the drying bay on your right you can use your imagination to see what this settlement must have been like. Like many settlements,  they have a defense against raiding parties making a surprise attack. In this case it is a large drying bay that helps protect vessels from landing on the near shore in all but the highest tides.

mother nature is winning the battle on the man made structures

loooking back toward the bay in front of Mimkwamlis

counld not find out if this is a modern structure or has an older history

Our one disappointment was that there was no information about the the history of Mimkwamlis on-site. We hope this is added so visitors understand more about where they are.

large beach reveals as the tide goes out. eventually the whole bay dries

abanoned engine is becomming part of the beach

a guided kayak tour visits Mimkwamlis

the drying bay in from of the settlement

As we were leaving, the Band’s guardian boat docked. We spent a while chatting with the lead guardian who is running the program. He lived in Mimkwamlis as a child and has some great insight about life there. We enjoyed speaking with him, as it added much needed history to our visit.

We took the dinghy in a narrow rocky passage in an attempt to approach the beach in front of the village. Like Haida raiders in the past, we were kept away by rocks and very shallow water!

Sullivan Bay to Booker Lagoon

It’s been a long time since we visited Booker Lagoon – about 17 years –  so this year it is on our list of stops.

nice ride on the way to booker lagoon

The lagoon is guarded by a narrows. It’s short but has a dogleg approach from Cullen Harbour, making for a blind entrance until you make the 90-degree turn. Therefore, a Sécurité call is in order going both ways.

To predict the slack water, we use Alert Bay about ½ hour after either high or low.

We accidentally miscalculated slack, and entered with about 2kts of adverse current, with enough swirlies that we needed to add a bit of power. We saw 14’ at 11:59am on an 6-foot tide.

We had our choice of lagoon “arms” to anchor in,  but we went with our previous favorite, a one-boat cove in the NNW corner, protected by a small islet and drying area.

out spot in the one boat cove

looking our from our anchorage

another view shows two of the other arms in booker lagoon

one more view

cozy in booker lagoon

Eventually all the arms had a boat or two in them, but because they are so large, no one was lacking enough space.

We did our typical circumnavigation to check out our neighbors and scout for other locations we might like to try on our visit. The only other spot that appealed was the small cove just around the corner from the narrows in the SE corner. It has the added feature of looking out to the narrows so you can watch boats pass in or out. It is also seems to offer protection from SW winds, which our favorite spot does not. It also hangs on to the sunshine later into the afternoon. A smaller Grand Banks was anchored there, and we chatted about the Broughtons for a while before moving on.

We then went back though the narrows to check the current flows closer to max. We went through just fine in the dinghy. The outer harbour, Cullen, was full of boats. While views from there are pretty, we aren’t sure why boats prefer to anchor in a crowd out there and be exposed to fetch. Next, we explored the other “entrance” to the lagoon. It located between Long Island and Broughton Island. At 3:40pm we saw 13’ on an 8.7-foot tide. It is narrow and best transited in a small shallow draft boat or dinghy. But fun to explore, nevertheless.

The lagoon is large – our tour was 8.6 nautical miles and took us about 2 hours to complete.

Sullivan Bay Lay Day

The big event this morning is cinnamon buns. We placed our order yesterday. Scoping out the general store door via binoculars, Karen was at the store right at 9am, harvesting the sweet treats as the trays were brought into the store from the restaurant.

They were much better than we remembered from two years ago, and rank them at the top of all marina cinnamon buns. A quick nuke, some butter, and all is well with the world.

cinnamon buns on board this fine morning

Our decision to stay a second night was driven by the opportunity to eat off the boat. Karen had reached out to Sullivan Bay earlier in the year to learn the days the restaurant was open. We signed up for dinner when we made moorage reservations, and were happy to find out Friday is prime rib dinner. Rumor has it that we will not be alone as they are sold out tonight for dinner.

In the afternoon, after completing boat chores and walking the docks, we were sitting in the saloon working on the blog when Karen called out “whales breaching!”

Sure enough, out in the bay were two whales breaching. Not once, not twice but both continued multiple times. After a prolonged display of breaching, they turned to flipper slapping. Again, many, many slaps were made by both animals. Next came tail slapping, as one whale started to swim off the other followed in a nose down attitude and gave a continuous display of tail slapping. We lost count at 20. Crowds formed on the docks to watch the action.

In 21 years of cruising the PNW, that was undoubtedly the most amazing display of breaching, flipper and tail slapping we have ever witnessed.

To top off the day, we enjoyed the prime rib dinner held every Friday in season. It was a full house and the meal was very, very good. Even Karen, who is not a red meat person, really enjoyed her meal. The menu was prime rib, mashed potatoes with gravy, green beans or broccoli, Yorkshire pudding, Caesar salad and a dessert of fig cake, with a creamy layer topped by a toffee glaze. Kudos to Chef Mark!

great service and great food at sulivan bay

sunset view from sullivan bay

Muirhead Islands to Sullivan Bay

It’s a relatively short hop over to Sullivan Bay, and we have reservations for two days. The only navigation consideration is timing Stuart Narrows to pass at or near slack. Our exit timing confirmed slack is 10 minutes after high or low tide at Alert Bay.

We had a non-eventful run up Drury Inlet and through Stuart Narrows. As soon as we emerged, we started to see lots of other pleasure boats.

We were joined by four other boats on the approach to Sullivan Bay. Seems most cruisers leave before noon and the new arrivals show up between noon and one. There were a few more arrivals in the afternoon, but not many.

Sullivan Bay Marina

We wanted 50amp power and things were busy, so Bill, the dockmaster, wanted to put us on the outside of dock 1, which is too exposed for Karen’s tastes. So we ended up at the outer end of Dock 3, in front of a tidy, vacant float home. We were basically alone on this dock for our entire stay and we liked it! Views were great!

Oceanflyer all alone on dock 3

Bill reported that the season had been a little slow, but it’s picking up and they are sold out for Friday Prime Rib dinner tomorrow.

We checked out the store, bought some odds and ends, did laundry, off-loaded recyclables and put in our order for cinnamon buns to be picked up tomorrow morning.

We always make it a point to walk the docks and inspect the float homes. They typically are quite nice and well kept. The big surprise this year was a bright red helicopter on a floating landing pad, moored behind one of the homes. Nice way to travel!

if you have a helicopter, why not make it red!

Muirhead Islands Lay Day

We enjoyed a pleasant morning working on long term route planning as we start to get serious about heading south. We need to be back in Bellingham in early August.

beautiful morning loooking east from our muirhead anchorage

After the tide turns and begins to rise, we are going to do a dinghy explore of Acteon Sound. We have taken the big boat in there before, but the Muirheads are perfectly positioned to allow an easy dinghy excursion all the way back to the entry to Tsibass lagoon.

the view to the west toward sutherland bay

Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other ideas. Though sunny and bright, it was quite windy. There were whitecaps everywhere we looked and a few even in our anchorage.  We waited patiently for the winds to lay down, but it was late evening when that finally occurred.

Instead, we chilled out and did some boat chores, enjoying being the only boat in the Muirheads.