Trees are freakin' rad

I went for a walk in the woods by myself today.  It was the first time I'd done that in quite some time, and I realized I missed it.  Anyways, I brought my camera along with me and took some pictures of some of the crazy tree-related things I saw.

Sure I could have put these in with the Day 4 post...but ya know what;  I like trees THAT much, so they get their own post. 

Oh hey.  Look at that disturbance-caused gap (or is it a patch?)  

I need to get back into the woods more often.  Forgot how much I like it.

Thursday May 20 - Day 4

 When we woke up this morning, the storm was still raging on.  We made the early decision that we would wait out the weather at the dock, so for the first time this trip, we all slept in...and by that I mean slept past 6:30am.

The picture above is of the wind speed indicator located in the cockpit.  The small gold needle is for recording maximum recent wind speeds.  As you can see, the storm last night had a few gusts upwards of 45 knots (51 mph/83 kph).

So as we decided to stay put, the rest of the day was spent working on projects around the boat and exploring Blind Channel resort.  Overall a pretty lazy day, but good.  I don't really feel like writing much, so here are some pretty pretty pictures to look at instead.

Image by Nick Chow

Back on the road...err, water tomorrow.  Heading north still.  Excited for the Broughton Islands.  Probably won't have internet again for a bit, unless one of the docks we stop at has wi-fi like this one. 

 Sunshine!!

Wednesday May 19 - Day 3

“Have abundant expectancy but not specific expectations.” 

We left Sonora Resort at around 8:30am after a stretch of time staring out into the channel, literally “waiting for our tides to turn.”

Our motor through the channel felt like a rush hour as a number of other boats joined us, taking advantage of slack tide.  Some of the passes we’ve gone through have been somewhat mind-blowing in the sense that you can be 100 ft from shore in a pass, but in over 600 ft of water.  Pretty mind-boggling if you think about how far down you would sink if you fell overboard.

Any dogs I see on this trip make it into the blog automatically...especially ones with life jackets

As we passed Phillips arm, we saw a helicopter logging show in progress.  Big old Verotol twin-rotor helicopter with a giant pincer on the end of a cable.  Pretty awesome to watch.

Further along we came across a large log landing, as well as some living quarters on a huge barge.  All through the area you could see old/new cutblocks and evidence of industrial forestry.  I can kind of see how people would say it’s an eyesore on the landscape.  But for me, I find it fascinating.  Even Nick was enjoying my explanations of how sort yards worked etc.  Likely my forestry background shining through though.

We stopped at a place called Blind Channel resort to top up on fuel.  The weather was quite nice, as it had stopped raining.  The initial plan was to buy a tidebook, get fuel, ask for some advice on where to stop next, and leave.  However, after taking about our options and listening to the weather forecast, the Captain thought it best to just stay put as there was some significant weather forecasted.

 Falling barometer...sign of bad things to come

Rest of my day was spent writing these blog entries and sorting through my pictures.  As the hours went by, the weather remained pretty nice and the Captain wondered whether me made the right call to play it safe.

Life jacket dog stopped at the same harbor as we did.

However, that evening the weather we had anticipated rolled through and we were reassured that we’d made the right call.  The excitement started around 9pm with increasing winds and some lightning/thunder.  By 10pm everyone was heading to bed but the weather was just getting started.  Winds picked up significantly, with gusts rocking the boat back and forth.  The wind gauge in the cockpit recorded a 45 knot gust (that’s around 51 mph or 84 kph!).  Thankfully someone had the foresight to take the awning down before the storm.  That thing acts as a giant airfoil and in winds like that “it woulda picked us right up and thrown us over that ridge,” according to Admiral Brewer (joking obviously).

I went up into the cockpit at about 11:30pm to watch the storm for awhile.  I meant to take some video of the noise of the wind and the size of the waves rolling into the harbor, but I couldn’t find my camera in the dark.  Quite impressive to say the least.  Gives you a bit of respect for the strength of mother nature.  I was mighty glad to be tied up to a concrete dock during all of that.  Definitely and interesting night.

Tuesday May 18 - Day 2

“We have interesting days...”         - Admiral Gerry

Day 2 started early, leaving the dock in Westview Harbor at around 7:00am.  Best part about our stay was that we arrived after the harbor master was gone and left before he arrived, so no moorage for us.  Score. 

Just north of Westview is Powell River, which houses are rather large pulp mill built back in the 1930s.  The mill is pretty much the reason Powell River exists.  Anyways, in order to protect the shipping traffic in and out of the mills, a number of old container ships were sunk just out from the mill, forming a breakwater.  It was almost creepy to see all of those old ships, left there to die in a line.  But at the same time, it’s a pretty clever way to make a breakwater.

The seas were pretty choppy with scattered rain showers.  Definitely not the “dream cruise” conditions, but at the same time, very typical for the coast of BC.  It is a rainforest after all... 

The “raincoast” indeed

The waters just north of Powell River were a scurry with crab and prawn boats, zipping this way and that with no concern for fuel consumption.  Must be an interesting career.

A little while past Powell River, we sailed off the end of the world...

...errrrr, I mean map.

At around 11am, we encountered a favorable wind shift that allowed us to throw up the genoa...AND TURN OFF THE ENGINE!  Boo-yaaaaa!

Unfortunately, the wind was almost a dead tailwind, which anyone who sails will know, is rather a pain to sail with.  For you land lubbers (this is officially a sailing blog now that I’ve used that term by the way...), the reason it’s a pain is that with the wind coming from straight behind you, any minor change in wind direction or course causes the sail to want to switch sides of the boat.  If you’re using the main sail, you can prevent this from happening by using a (wait for it...) “preventer” vang which holds it over to one side.  However, this isn’t really available when using just the genoa.  So it’s a pain.

BUT, regardless of all that, we were finally sailing, spending $0.00/mile on fuel consumption, enjoying the peace and quiet and making almost 5.5 knots to boot (almost as fast as we were motoring previously).  The further north we sailed, the more epic the views got.  The rainy/foggy conditions almost added to the mysticism of the whole thing.  Sure sun and blue sky would have been nice, but in a lot of ways it feels like this is the way you should see Desolation Sound.

While all the sailing wonderfulness was happening, we continued to have troubles with the water system down below.  The tubes we “fixed” the day before started leaking once again.  More tubing, more clamps, more leaks popped up. 

As we approached the Yucalta Rapids, we realized that we did not have an accurate tide book on board.  This is a serious problem when trying to sail in this area.  There are a number of channels and passes that experience some significant (to say the least) changes in tide level from low to high tides.  In areas like the Yucalta Rapids, these tide changes can cause strong currents, whirlpools and rapids making them very hazardous to pass through at the wrong time. 

Approaching Yuculta Rapids and Big Bay, BC

Our plan was to make it to Big Bay to tie up and purchase fuel and a tide book, as well as get more freshwater.  When we arrived at the Yucultas, we guessed by the shore line and currents that we had just missed slack tides (when it’s neither flooding nor ebbing) and the flood was just starting.  For this particular channel, the flood caused southerly currents of up to 10 knots.  Now, in a sailboat with a whatever horsepower engine (some small number), this presents a problem as we can only make 6-7 knots in calm water!  The result was a hopeless attempt to make headway up the current.  Imagine a person on a treadmill or someone trying to run up a down escalator.  Now imagine that person is a boat.

Not going to happen...

We decided to tie up to a private resort dock just across from Big Bay in hopes that they would have a tide book for us to purchase.  Now usually tying up to private docks is not an option.  However, when you have a Captain as charming as Captain Peter, it’s not a problem.  He explained our situation and offered to pay for moorage, which turned into the resort organizer offering us to buy dinner at their 4-star restaurant as payment.  Peter talked her down from $190/person to $190 for 4 people, they bought the wine. 

So in the end, we spent the night at Sonora Resort and got an amazing meal consisting of (from what I remember) quail eggs, asparagus soup and prime rib.  There was also rhubarb crisp which I forgot to get a picture of.  Amazing meal.  The resort is HY Louie Company, which has ownership of KingAir airlines, IGA Supermarkets as well as a number of other companies throughout Vancouver and Canada.  The is primarily used for entertaining clients and other such expensive endeavors.  Classy place to say the least.

Slacktide was 9am the next morning, so we had some downtime to kill.  Downtime = time to play with my camera(s). 

Pretty impressed with my new Sony so far...

This shot took waaaaay too long to get (note the jumping fish)...

Unfortunately I wasn’t quick enough to get a good shot of the porpoises we saw out in the channel.  Here’s an embarrassing blurry image to prove I’m not making it up...

It’s now a goal of mine to get a better picture of a porpoise by the end of this trip...

Monday May 17 - Day 1

Monday morning, Nick and I took a bus from downtown Vancouver out to the dock in West Vancouver, aiming for a 9am arrival.  We took the 255 from downtown, which might as well be called the Philippino Maid Express, as Nick and I were pretty much the only “non-maids” aboard.  At every bus stop another mid-aged Latin woman got off and made her way to a nearby mansion.  As Nick mentioned, if that bus ever crashed, a lot of large houses would go uncleaned.

After some final cleaning/packing, we left the dock around 9:45 am.  On board were Captain Speck, Admiral Brewer, Nick and myself.  As a result of our desire to get sailing, we almost immediately put up the mailsail and the unfurled a handful of genoa. 

Unfortunately for us, the “stiff breeze” we had seen from the dock was blowing from the Northwest, in the complete opposite direction from what we needed.

Sailing 101:  You can’t sail straight up wind...

So we quickly realized we’d just have to wait to “get our sail on,” dropped both sails and and continued motoring along with the diesel.  Even if the wind was cooperating, the sun was shining and we were all excited to be underway.  Plus, conditions were good for motoring with small swell and relatively smooth going.   

HOWEVER, when it comes to traveling across water, sailing is far superior to motoring (in my humble opinion anyways) and here’s why:
    Reason #1:    Water/wind noises >>>> Engine noise
    Reason #2:    Free (aka no gas consumption)
    Reason #3:    No/less boat vibration (see below)

Reminded me of that scene in Jurassic Park with the cup of water + dino footsteps.

As we putted along at 6 knots, pretty soon Vancouver was almost out of sight.

The Captain wanted to cover as much distance the first day as we could, as he said the first days of trips are typically the hardest.  Much of the route we covered that day was the same as our earlier Princess Louisa trip. 

Welcome Pass, NW of Sechelt, BC

Welcome Pass, NW of Sechelt, BC

Welcome Pass, NW of Sechelt, BC

Oh, as a random aside, don’t be surprised to see a lot of panorama shots like the one above.  I just got a new Sony H55 point/shoot camera before this trip which has a pretty nifty panorama setting where you just pan the camera and it captures/stitches the image for you (subtle plug for Sony; please send advertising $).  So, being as it’s brand new to me and I’m all overly excited about it, I’ll likely use it far too often, and you’ll all get absurdly sick of them.  But  hang with me.  It’s a phase and I’m sure I’ll get over it soon enough. *end random aside*

As we were happily moving along, we started looking for projects.  My grandfather always had his “10 minute projects” for my sister and I to work on whenever we visited his cottage in northern Michigan.  These “10 minute projects” routinely turned into “10 hour” if not “multiple day” projects, much to our dismay.  Some of tasks of the boat have have been known to go that way in the past.  However, so far they haven’t been bad at all.  Nick and I decided to get the two brass winches a good polish. 

I’m always amazed at how much of a difference a little polish + elbow grease can make.

I also spent 20 minutes “whipping” the end of a line to keep it from fraying.  Process basically involves winding thread around the end, using a nifty little loop tactic to tie it off, then melting the thread to make a smooth tip.  

This one turned out pretty well if I don’t say so myself.

One unexpected project that turned up was the hot water system springing a leak and blasting water all over the saloon.  I had JUST laid down to finally take a nap (we have a watch system and it was my turn to go below and relax) when we heard a strange hissing noise and see water spraying everywhere. 

Turns out one of the hoses and blown.  Gerry and I attacked it with some new tubing and clamps. 

                                                        

I didn’t get my nap...but this was almost as good.

We continued motoring for about 12 hours in total, finally arriving at Westview Harbor, just south of Powell River, BC. 

Westview Harbor, BC

We were all pretty exhausted (me in particular from my lack nap) so we had a late dinner and decided to call it a day.  Nick, Gerry and I did wander through “downtown Westview” before having a beer on deck and turning in.  Tiring but satisfying 1st day.