Tag: Alaska

We were supposed to go to Bootleg Cove. However, Bootleg is only big enough for one boat and someone else was there before us. Oh well, always have a plan B, right? Turns out that Plan B is pretty darn nice too! There were about 7 boats already anchored when we arrived. Quijote arrived soon after us and became the anchor boat for our little raft. It seems we are pretty much alternating nights as the anchor.

We – or rather Sam, Matt, and Kay – hauled the dinghy onto the deck to have it dry out in preparation for being repaired. It has a slow leak of water into the interior. No danger, but it’s uncomfortable. We like our feet to stay dry, darn it! There are a few other repairs to it that need to be done as well. None of them a safety issue, but it still needs to be done. Basically, I have to glue some pieces back on or at least back together.

The trip to Waddington was our best for animal sightings yet! A few bear, a whale, and porpoises/dolphins (I can’t tell which is which. Some day I’ll learn animal identifications!) on two separate occasions.

Lunch was a smorgasbord of crackers, cheese, pickles, and various other tidbits for us to pick over.

Weather-wise, it was a bit dreary to start, but turned beautifully sunny and warm later.

In the evening, we met another sailboat who has a boat cat with its own instagram account. “Fathom the boat cat”. I’ll have to look it up when I get the chance.

Left Squirrel Cove 8-ish this morning as I was concerned about the strength of the flood tide outside Campbell River and wanted to get there before the tide reached maximum flow. There’s little more frustrating than to have the engine running at full power and sitting still or, even worse, going backwards. That’s a fate I wished fervently to avoid.

We rode the ebb tide for a while but it wasn’t as strong as predicted – we didn’t get as much of a boost, and then it turned against us as we turned into the last passage to Campbell River. I was watching our speed over ground drop, and slowly notching up the throttle, eventually pushing it to max cruise RPM. We did make it, though, and it was a relief to turn into the protected waters of the marina and out of the current flowing down from the north.

We fueled up at the dock, putting a bit more than 1/4 of a tank + 1 jerry can of fuel (5 gallons), which yielded a fuel burn of about 0.71 gallons/hr at 2500 RPMs (cruise RPM). That’s a big relief as I was worried we were burning a lot more fuel than that per hour!

Discovery Harbour is quite nice. The best part is that the showers are “free” or at least come with the price of the slip. Wave your card and you get 15 minutes. If that runs out, wave the card again and you get another 7 minutes. I’m not sure if you can extend again… and again… and again… I didn’t need more than 20 minutes of hot shower. Laundry, though, is expensive. $3.00 for wash and another $3.00 for dry. Slip was expensive too. Guess they have to pay for the free showers somehow.

It’s conveniently located near shopping for provisions, restaurants, and a well-stocked chandlery. Dropped a fair bit of cash there getting supplies to continue the repairs and upgrades to Opus that I hadn’t had time to do yet.

We tried to find storage for the stuff we didn’t want to haul to Juneau. Due to our rushed departure from White Rock, we hadn’t had time to put it ashore there as originally planned. Unfortunately, Campbell River was asking several hundred dollars for a few months of storage, so we decided to haul it anyway.

Dinner was at the restaurants both nights. First was at an upscale pizza and beer place and second was at a fine dining called Moxies. Good food each time.

Spent a lot of time cleaning the bilge plus other work and hiking all over the town getting supplies. The bad news is that while fixing (failing to fix) the hole into the engine room in Kay’s berth, I ended up re-injuring my hip. It was either take the fall on my hip or else drop the still-spinning radial power saw on my foot. I took the fall and held on tightly to the saw.

We almost didn’t get here today. That wasn’t due to any failure of anything, we simply almost decided to sit for another day in Melanie Cove. However, let’s start at the beginning.

I had intended to declare yesterday a “No Boat Chores” day and thereby give myself a day to get ashore. Unfortunately, yet another “need to deal with this today!” event occurred precluding me from any excursion. This morning, when Kay and Sam announced they were going for a hike with Matt, I hopped on the opportunity to go as well.

We hiked over the great divide, through the old forest, to the far shores. Ok, that sounds like some Lewis and Clark expedition, though the reality is nowhere near as grandiose as the round trip was, maybe, 2 hours long.

I loved the walk through the old forest. Branches generally started 20, 30, 40 feet in the air and the dense leafy roof keeps underbrush from getting too much of a hold. This makes the walk quite pleasant, especially when you add in the footpath that has been etched into the forest floor by the countless feet following the blazed trail before us. Still, there were many downed trees across the path which necessitated some scrambling, including one area where there were so many that I named it the log maze.

Along the way we saw stumps that bore evidence of logging activities at some point – places where springboards had been used, or fallen logs with smooth, flat, “breaks” where they had detached from their trees.

It is interesting, to me, how different people experience the forest. With my loss of hearing, my experience is very different than my crew’s. For me, the forest is experienced visually and through touch, the feel of the air in qualities such as humidity and temperature, or sense of footing along the path, the roughness of the bark of the trees that we are passing or clambering over. It is populated with the ghost of the bear and spirit of the animals and people that have passed through it over the centuries, as well as the more fanciful inhabitants such as branches that looks like dragon heads. My companions spent a lot of their time with their cell phones out running an app that identifies the various bird calls that they hear but I do not. They hear the birds or the snap of the twig underfoot, the rustle of a breeze through the canopy. I’m sure that they also sense the things I do, the tactile, but perhaps to a lesser degree since it occupies a smaller part of their senses, proportionally.

I had resigned myself to our staying in Melanie Cove again that night, but Rod called and proposed that we move on to Squirrel Cove that afternoon. We agreed and the process of bringing up the anchor commenced. This time I brought it up (almost) solo, just to prove that I could since it will be necessary when Kay and I are two-handing Opus back from the north. It was a long, drawn-out process, but we proved it possible. In the end, when the anchor came up, it turned out to be more mud than anchor, which made it quite heavy, so we steamed around Melanie Cove with it hanging in the water in order to wash off a lot of the mud before recovering it fully.

Sam was at the helm and she took us back out the way we had entered. Today was a day for me to keep my hands off and let them handle Opus, which they did all the way into Squirrel Cove. My only criticism would be the speed at which they took Opus through the narrowed entrance. They place a lot more confidence in the charts than I do, so I take it a lot more slowly just in case something has shifted and we strike bottom.

As Sam and Kay are new to determining an anchor spot, Quijote was first to drop anchor even though they were behind us entering. In the end, it was decided to raft up to them and I took over helm for the last bit of the approach and docking. Tonight is going to be a bit of a talk about low-speed boat handling, i.e. prop wash and prop walk, although those are something that have to actually be played with to truly understand.

Dinner was a communal affair again, with a round of the Monopoly card game to introduce Rod. Kay, present, refused once again to join in the game.

Our original plan was to go to Otter Island this morning. However, last night, during our evening talk, Rod offered up another cove he knew about. It’s a bit further away, but it’s more secure and, with a wind warning coming, that sounded like a good idea.

There wasn’t much about the trip to write about – it was relatively short at about 2 1/2 hours long, and rather uneventful except for the arrival. Melanie Cove is nestled in behind some islands, which offers a few ways in. Using the Canadian Hydrographic charts, I picked one route. However, as we approached, Navionics said that a section was not passable. I still think that it would have been OK – we were at the top of a 14 foot high tide, but prudence dictated that we be cautious. We elected to turn around and use a different entrance that both Canadian Hydrographic and Navionics agreed was navigable. It required that we thread our way through a narrow opening, thence through a bay, through another entrance that was wider than the first (and that we would have had to thread even had we gone along our original path), ending up in Melanie Cove.

Inside Melanie Cove we had another experience at stern tying, though this time it had nothing to do with procedures on Opus. There are chains that have been anchored into the rock wall shore though which the stern tie line must be passed and, apparently, this did not go smoothly for some reason.

In the afternoon, crew went ashore for a hike and/or nature walk while I stayed aboard to, yes, do some more boat chores. After dinner we dinghied over to Quijote for a little more socialization before turning in.

We may be back to our previous weather pattern again. Clouds started moving in late yesterday and we are in solid overcast this morning. I’m hoping it’s just a marine layer rather than presaging more rain.

Breakfast this morning will be a Dutch Baby, our first try at baking aboard Opus. While the oven is hot, Kay will bake muffins and brownies in order not to waste propane heating up the oven again.

Rod and I have a radio net every night at 20:00 on channel 69 to arrange the details of the next day. Of course, if we’re rafted, it’s easier to just hop over to the other boat and have a conversation face to face.

Dutch baby came out undercooked and didn’t rise. It was more of a breakfast cookie than a fluffy pancake, so we’ll have to try something different. First thing is to cook it longer so that it’s more done all the way through, though that doesn’t solve the rising problem. For that, I think more air needs to be beaten into it.

Grace Harbour is another idyllic place. No one was here when we arrived, so we had the lick of anchoring spots. Quijote entered as we were testing the set of our anchor and rafted up. Our turn to host the anchorage!

Crew is headed to hike the trails. I’d love to go, but there is plumbing that needs attending to. My boat, my job, I guess. It’s been 6 days and, except to refuel, I’ve not been off the boat yet. Each time the crew goes for a shore excursion, there is always something that needs doing on the boat. However, the number of boat chores is dwindling and I think I’m due for some down time myself. Maybe I’ll declare tomorrow as a no-boat-chore day and go ashore to do some hiking myself. I certainly could use some exercise!

Opus hosted dinner last night. What was originally going to be a simple hotdogs meal became something far more elaborate. Yes, there were hot dogs done on Opus’ grill. There was fresh made potato salad. There was grilled onions. There was Caribbean Chili. There was steamed vegetables. For dessert, there were brownies and oranges. A feast!

Afterwards, Sam, Matt, and I played a monopoly card game. It’s a lot faster than the monopoly board game, as we got two games done in the space of an hour or so, and yet it’s influenced by the popular, but time consuming, board game.

Left Dol Cove early this morning, although not as early as we had planned. The windlass is giving us problems hoisting the anchor. In the end, we ran the rode back to the winch on the mast and hauled it up until “some” chain was on deck before transferring the load to the windlass gypsy. Even then, the breaker popped twice. We’ll be working on this procedure in the coming days.

However, the rest of the trip to Lund went quickly, arriving just after noon. Docking in Lund also went well – I’m really getting the hang of docking her, although conditions were nearly optimal so it wasn’t much of a challenge, truth be told. Only the breeze pushing us off the dock prevented it from being completely optimal.

Sam and Kay went to the bakery and store to get cinnamon rolls, some fresh meat, and fruit pie. However, it seems the store doesn’t have what we wanted, as they returned with cinnamon buns, Nanaimo bars (as a thank you to Quijote for previously hosting us), and hot dogs. Maybe some fresh vegetables too – I lost track.

Meanwhile, I tended to boat chores such as enlarging the holes I previously had drilled into them the day before.

We pulled out of Lund and was clear of the entrance as quickly as possible since we only get one hour of grace period before we’d have to pay for 1/2 a day of moorage. Once out into the channel, we shut down the engine and drifted while attending to the urgent business of unconsumed cinnamon buns, with side notes of apple slices. A true sugar shock to the system, but one we happily endured. It was nice, drifting with the waves, sun on my back, sugary snack on my plate.

Just as we were finishing, Quijote was coming up from the south, for they had left later than we. Sam saw them first. I didn’t think it was them, but after a bit, Kay was also convinced it was them, so we checked the AIS. Never bet against the ladies, for it will burn you a majority of the time. It was Quijote.

We joined in trail and approximately 15 minute later arrived at the intended anchorage. Quijote went in first and dropped anchor. Meanwhile, Opus hung back to let some kayakers pass between us. They were politely waiting for me to pass, but I wanted to wait for Quijote to set up, so it was polite to let them go by.

After looking the place over, I didn’t like what I saw. The bottom was very, very steel, going from 75 feet to 25 feet in a heartbeat which would have made it very difficult to get enough scope on the anchor. The mouth was wide and opened into a busy channel. We were likely to be hit with the wakes of passing boats throughout the night. There was also a low island or big rock, cliffs all around. No place for a stern tie in a congested (due to the rock island) spot.

I decided this was a big “nope” for Opus. Meanwhile Sam was talking to Rod on the radio. He also decided it was better to haul up the anchor and try elsewhere. Off we went to the next anchorage north.

This one is more protected, but it was smaller and there were already three boats there. However, we inserted ourselves in between two others, dropped anchor and backed up to start stern thing. Sam, volunteered to be the one to row in the stern line. Unfortunately for her, a huge tangle ensued and it took us forever to detangle it while she was standing ashore. Eventually we got it done, but the procedure still needs some work, to be certain.

This afternoon Kay and Sam went ashore while I did boat chores, mainly line repairs. I would also have sealed the decks, but the skies were clouding up and I was concerned about it raining, so that particular job is off for another day.

Dinner tonight is more of Sam’s delicious dinners. Guess I’m on dish duty.

I realize I’ve not written much about the scenery, the feelings, the impressions. Mostly that is because I’m not really yet into the mindset for that yet. I’m still worried about what will go wrong next. For instance, there’s oil in the bilge and I don’t yet know where that is coming from.

Engine might be using more oil than it should (is that where the oil in the bilge is coming from?) and I’m not sure about fuel consumption either. I’m glad for the extra 25 gallons on deck just in case.

Still, there is the excitement and challenge in undertaking a voyage of this size. Even attempting it is significant. I am glad, though, for Quijote’s presence.

Mmmm dinner smells good, time to go,

Absolutely gorgeous weather today – sunlit, clear skies. Scenery was, to use an all-too-common adjective, “majestic”. It was all motoring, though, at a cruise setting of 2500 RPM.

We arrived at Dol Cove in the early afternoon. Kay helmed us as we looked for a good spot. Finally I decided to settle us into a nook and we dropped anchor in 35 feet. Unfortunately, due to the necessity of a stern tie, we could only let out 140 feet of scope. However, we were in a tiny but well protected nook, inside a larger, protected bay, both well safe of major currents, so 4:1 scope would have to do.

Running the shoreline turned into a major production. The line did not unreel very well. We will have to work on that process some more.

We dinghied over to Quijote for a bit more socializing. Sam and Kay both had Pina Colada, while I stuck to water. 2 games of cribbage ensued, split with one game going to Opus and one game going to Quijote – a very satisfactory way to game. After social hour, it was back to Opus for dinner, Yummy leftovers!

Our bilge pump seems to be oily. For now we have turned it off and will manually clean out the bilge when we get to Camp ell River where there are, hopefully, facilities to dispose of it safely. That’s going to be a messy, thankless, job, but it has to be done.

Tomorrow is another early start so we can stop off in Lund for some stocking up on treats and fresh food stuffs like meat.

Another task done today was radical modification of the oars that West Marine sent to me. They were oars for oarlocks instead of oar posts. However, a bit of modification with a hand drill (thank you for the loan, Rod!) and the oars… still didn’t work. We need a bigger drill bit. That will be a task for Lund, however, as a second round of aluminum shavings in the cockpit is not at all appealing.

2030, time to go to sleep despite my nap this afternoon on the long settee. I proved you can sleep there, though I don’t think it would be all that comfortable for the night.