Port Hardy to Nanaimo

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August 18: After 4 days in Port Hardy getting caught up, we headed for Bull Harbor on Hope Island at the west end of Goletas Channel to stage our rounding of Cape Scott and start our cruise down the west side of Vancouver Island. As we approached Goletas Channel from Hardy Bay, I switched on the weather channel to get the latest report. Gales, gales, nothing but gales being forecast on the west side for the next week to ten days. A couple of days ago they were forecasting moderate northwesterlys.

We turned back to Port Hardy to re-think our plans. Not willing to spend a week or more at Port Hardy waiting for a weather window, we decided to head for Port McNeill the next morning and spend the remainder of our cruising season in the Broughton Islands.

While at Port McNeill we met up with the folks on Mist Approach (pictured) and rafted to at Shearwater.





We met Emerald Sea (pictured) at Duncanby Landing. We also met a single-hander on the Nonsuch 33 “Pilgrim” from Bellingham, that was heading out to the islands to do some fishing and thought we might meet up again at Joe Cove.

August 21: We headed for Joe Cove, but along the way took a different route than we did the last time. When we got to Blackfish Sound instead of heading into the 2 + flood current, we fell away from the current and shaped our course to White Cliff Ilts. and into Retreat Passage, then through Blunden and Misty Passages. We set our traps near the inlet to the cove and went into the anchorage to find two large power boats already tied to the float. We anchored at the north end - in the same spot as last time.

The next morning we hauled the traps and collected no prawns but six crabs. We kept the four largest and then fished Misty Passage for salmon without any action. We went through the narrow passage between Eden and Insect Islands and into Eagle Cove for lunch. We fished along Eden and Fly Islands before calling it a day and returning to Joe Cove. In the cove, we found Pilgrim tied to the float. We tied to the other side, and after landing, we visited with Phil while he was filleting a couple nice looking Coho salmon.

I fixed bloody marys, Phil brought fresh Coho steaks, and we had a great visit over dinner. The next morning he shared where he had all the fish action the day before, his trolling speed, and gave us the identical lure that he caught fish with, a hoochy named “army truck”.

We headed up Return Channel to fish in Fife Sound where Phil had the action the day before. We trolled along the Baker Island shore and by the time we reached Fife Rock, we met Pilgrim trolling the other way. We signaled each other that we each had the big zero, but before Teal reached the west end of Davies Island the rod went down and we had a fish on.

After landing, bleeding, and cleaning the 29-inch Coho, we headed for Shawl Bay Marina for the night, and filleted, and vacuum packed our catch for the freezer.


The following morning after the Shawl Bay traditional pancake breakfast on the patio, we were visiting with Bruce and Alekxos of SV Cavolina, only to discover they are neighbors of our friends John and Cheryl from Spruce Harbor in Vancouver. That was a fun surprise. Bruce shared experiences of growing up on the west side of the island. Stories of the old days when his dad was fishing and the fish were abundant and the canneries flourished and fishermen were able to make a good wage and provide for their families.

At Shawl Bay was the first we had heard of water shortages in the Broughtons. Loren the owner told us that Echo Bay hadn’t allowed laundry for the last two weeks.

As we were coming out of Shawl Bay headed for Pierre’s Bay Resort, we heard a woman from the Echo Bay area on the radio calling for help. A cougar had left her dog in very bad shape and she was pleading for someone with a gun to come to her place and shoot her dog. There was follow-up chatter on the radio from Bill Procter and concerned folks from the area. They apparently have a similar problem with mountain lions that we do on the Klamath River.

As we approached Pierre’s we heard a fellow from the adjoining resort calling the Coast Guard about the cougar that had attacked the dog. The cat had come back and had the guy pinned down in his boat and his wife and kids in the house and was prowling freely mid day in his yard (more than likely looking for his kill – the dog). He was calling the Coast Guard out of frustration trying and failing to get a hold of the “Conservation Officer” to come out and take care of the cat. They said they would do what they could. Later that afternoon, we were told that the authorities had flown in with dogs. They tracked and shot the cougar.

As we approached the entrance to Pierre’s Bay a humpback whale surfaced off our starboard bow. Pierre told us several humpbacks had been hanging around in front of his place for several days. But we only saw that one quick roll. Even though we met Pierre last year at Port McNeill and have run into him on several occasions there, we had never been to his resort. We looked forward to this fish and chip dinner as we heard so much about his resort last year. We no sooner got settled in when “Mist Approach” (Brian & Patti) and “Emerald Sea” (Lee & Waunell) came in from Port Hardy.

We had a great dinner under the tent, with Pierre and Lady Di (the resident baker) serving. After dinner he showed a whale/grizzly bear DVD in his, new this year, movie theatre. That Pierre! He and his wife dream up gimicks that keeps cruisers coming back multiple times during the cruising season. His popular Pig Roasts on Saturday night have a theme, ie, Christmas in July, Circus Night, St. Patricks day in August. Pierre’s is clean, neat, and fun to spend time at.

No showers. Pierre had water, obviously not an over abundance, (attested to by the sign over the toilet: “If it’s yellow, let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down”). Their public showers are on the fritz, and he offered the one in the house, but we decided to wait til the next stop. We parted ways with our boating buddies and agreed to meet at Lagoon Cove the next night.

The mornings have been overcast with marine layer turning to “sunny breaks” and 80-degree temps in the afternoons, August 25 was no exception. We cruised to Lagoon Cove, arrived 3-ish and were greeted by Bill, the resort owner, and Lee from Emerald Sea.

Bill laid out the particulars: cocktail hour, burn barrel, trails to hike, book exchange, and showers – AFTER 4pm when he starts the boiler back up again. Bill serves generous amounts of large prawns EVERY night at the cocktail potlucks. How does he do it? Guess he knows the hot spots. We bought the Lagoon Cove cookbook and had Waunell and Patti autograph their recipes. AND we got our showers.

The next morning we had a great ride down Johnstone Straight. We thought we might stop at Port Neville, but we were making such good time on a flood with the wind at our back, (moving 8, 9 knots, and even a 10.1 at Current Passage) that we just kept on going. Arriving at Blind Channel around 4 PM.

August 27: We headed to Heriot Bay. Made it through Okisollo and Surge Narrows at the appointed times. We actually went thru Surge Narrow with a rower who was keeping up with us most of the way (6.2 knots). George remembered him from when we were coming into Shearwater a couples weeks ago. We waited for him to come out of the rapids and had a nice little visit. He had made the cedar-strip rowboat himself, which was a beauty. He complimented us on what a nice looking boat we had also, and then he invited us to come for dinner at his new place in Okisoalo channel that he’s taking a lease on, next time we’re thru. What a cordial Canadian!

We arrived at Heriot Bay’s Taku Resort on Quadra Island around 3pm. Again it was strip off the polar fleece and put on the shorts. We’ve had sunny weather, but not really high temps until now. And not rain-filled days on end like last year. We’ve had only 3 days of rain in the last two months.

Free showers at Taku! You can bet we took up that offer. We visited our favorite little grocery store before turning in. We were moored next to a big sailboat from New Zealand, which has been cruising around BC for the last 10 years.

We headed to Comox the next morning on the same route going north . As we pulled in, there were seals sprawled all over the log breakwater, not unlike Pier 39 in San Francisco.


They seemed to have run of the place. We had a nice stop over at Comox. I did laundry and got calls in to the family before we left.



August 29: We anchored at False Bay on Lasqueti Island just about equal distance from Comox and Nanaimo. We had a smooth sunny crossing from Comox. We got settled, George got the crab trap set, and lo and behold, it started to rain. While we were fixing and eating dinner, it came down in buckets. It was amazing how hard it rained at times.

Then the boat started to rock, pretty hard. George put out the flopper stopper, which really helped, but it was still rocking a lot when we finally fell asleep.
We awoke Wednesday morning to full bright sunshine. Another beautiful day in B.C.! However, we heard on a local radio station, Tofino, a resort town on the west side of Vancouver Island, has had to cancel reservations of incoming tourists, at the directive of the town’s mayor, due to a water shortage. They are afraid that if a fire breaks out they won’t have enough water to fight it. What a bad break, as this is the Labor Day weekend – in Canada also. Reportedly based on the great weather this summer, they have had a better than average season…. What an unfortunate finale.

August 29: We left False Bay against wind and wave to go around the north end of the island. We went into Scottie bay to take a look, as we did all along the east side. We explored the island in Bull Passage, and chose Boho Bay to anchor for the night. This anchorage was much mellower than False Bay; we enjoyed a very tranquil night with about six other boats. The Bull Passage area of the Island is very picturesque with numerous anchorages.

The next morning we had a smooth passage across the Strait of Georgia to Nanaimo under warm sunny skies. We will be here for two days getting caught up on posting to the blog and all our other domestic chores.

We apologize for the delays in posting to the blog. Internet connections in this part of the world are iffy and slow at best. We appreciate the tireless efforts of our daughter Jennifer fixing our posting errors and doing the final editing. Without her help we would have had to abandon the blog early in our cruise. The blog took on a life of its own and threatened to interfere with our cruise schedule.

We will do our final post to the blog in a few days after going into the San Juan Islands to re-enter the US and returning to Bellingham.

George and JoAnne

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© 2006 George Benson. Reproduction of any of the material on this log without written permission from George Benson is prohibited.