A Short Trail to a Large Lake

We're in Turnbull Cove tonight. So named for the tractor sized piece of machinery at the head of a short trail to a large lake.

The trail was the reason for diverting here rather than to Clayton Bay in the itinerary. It's steep so it gets the heart going, which was just what I needed. Mick jumped into the lake from a small dock leftover from the days of forestry.

Then we returned to the boat and took showers on the back deck. We're headed into Port Hardy tomorrow, and we have water to burn.

King Fisher Chatter

Every night we're anchored in another beautiful spot. This is one of the prettiest of the pretty. We wound our way through the mist, passing between islets shrouded with scraggy trees and tendrils of fog. We're near the head of Viner Inlet and the scenery is breathtaking.

Will left us this morning and we are sad to see him go. Life drags us all back by the scruff of the neck eventually. After tonight we have one more night before Port Hardy and the end of leg two.

Kay would love this cove. It's very birdy. King Fisher chatter along the shoreline. As soon as I bring up the Merlin app to identify others, the birds go silent. Insufferable cretins.

We have this cove to ourselves tonight. We're swinging on a mooring ball of unknown quality. If the weather forecast is right, it shouldn't matter how well it's built because we'll just be floating placidly next to it.

Upwind Fun

We covered about nineteen miles today, going from last night's anchorage to tonight's in Wadington Bay. I wonder who Wadington was.

It was upwind all day, but the mileage was light enough that we felt free to do some upwind sailing. Sailing in sunshine with 12 kt breeze in the Broughtons. It doesn't get much better.

There's only two other boats so far. I've been in here with over a dozen.

We saw a bear yesterday. Mick spotted the black bear cub ambling along the shoreline. They're easy to spot when they're moving. It's not easy when they're just a dark shape in a field of many.

unsullied

Today and tomorrow are short days, each less than twenty miles. We're in Port Elizabeth tonight. That's a somewhat pretentious name for a geographical feature that is completely without human influence. Okay, not completely. There is the odd abandoned crab pot.

This is the first time this trip that we're anchored in a place that I've never been to before.

The problem with this anchorage is that while there is plenty of room, most of it is too shallow or too deep. I located a place that looked promising on the chart, but when we motored through, it was much deeper than the chart said it would be.

When I look for anchoring spots, I can tolerate 7' to 60'. Generally shallow is better if it doesn't get too shallow when the tide goes out. We end up in water that's 20-40' most of the time.

So what should have been 40' turned out to be 65'. I decided to look for something else. If 40 is actually 65, what will 16' be? It turns out 36'. Sold.

So that's where we are. Floating in 36' of water where the chart says there should be 16'.

Will pulled the standup board out of storage and paddled around the islands next to us. Two miles by his count.

Billy Goat Cove Fly By - Port Harvey tonight

I was expecting sunshine and rough conditions underway today, but saw neither. We rode an ebb tide northwest through Johnstone Strait. It was a gray day, cloudy bordering on cold.

I set the rpm for a steady slog. And flew. We kept up 7-8 kts all morning.

The wind was forecast for 15-20 in the morning. We saw all of that. It died shortly before we arrived at the anchorage. It's supposed to pipe up again this evening, but has yet to get going.

I just rechecked the weather and the afternoon forecast has changed, essentially from windy to calm. A high pressure system is building over the area, so that'll bring sunshine and warm, calm days.

We have a late departure planned for tomorrow. There's eight miles to the entrance of Chatham Narrows. The Narrows have 16' of depth at zero tide and barely enough room to pass if you meet a boat coming the other way.

There are patches of kelp along the way to make things interesting. It is sometimes necessary to choose between steering into shallows or into kelp beds. Tomorrow's slack is mid way between low and high tides at 3' and 13' respectively, which will add 8' to the charted depths. That'll make the shallows a little less... shallow.

That's not to say the transit won't be challenging. In late summer the kelp beds can be huge. I've always made the trip in early summer, so this will be my first look at the late summer kelp beds in Chatham Narrows.

The current in the narrows is slack at three times tomorrow: early (too dark), noon, and late (too late). Noon it is (11:52am). To get there at that time we'll pull anchor at 10:30.

Banana Mojo

We transited Seymour Narrows without incident today (thanks to our lucky bananas,) arriving in Thurston Bay well behind the Motor Vessel Molly, a friend of Will's. We threw our anchor out next to where we imagined theirs to be and backed up along side of them. A certifiable boat raft. Molly is stern tied to shore, but the weather is forecasted to be fair, so we didn't bother, relying instead on theirs.

Kevin and I rafted up in this bay a couple years ago. I regretted the move when the winds and waves kicked up over night, but we survived to tell the tale.

This afternoon, the two crews are scheming to hike a possibly defunct trail to a lake. It isn't clear which side of the island the trail is on, so some exploration is expected. I'm thinking I'll pass that. It sounds somewhat fruitless. I'll do some walking on the beach instead and help Yoshi make dinner.

It's tortellini pasta tonight. I bought two "family sized" bags of tortellini for the last leg as a fall back for any unsuccessful meals, but all were fine, so neither were needed.

We were told by a crew member that it was folly to bring bananas aboard a boat. He has stories of calamity to support his claim. It's the kind of superstitious dread that you can forget if nothing happens to the boat, but when something eventually does, allows him to say "I told you so," adding one more story to a lengthy lore of nonsense.

I dismissed the claim by insisting that bananas bring luck to Quijote. I never go anywhere without my lucky bananas. That apparently didn't mollify him because it was with some relief that he brought over a pineapple from the other boat, claiming that the pineapple counters the bad banana mojo. Right.

Ready

Seymour Narrows is slack at 11:41 tomorrow morning. We'll untie our dock lines at 10:00 for the 8 mile transit. Then 16 more to Thurston Bay. We'll get to our anchorage at about 2:30. On Tuesday we'll sail into the wind in Johnstone Strait.