Civilization

We are currently in Heriot Bay Marina for the night.

 We are docked near the BC Ferry so we feel the wake of the ferry coming and going.

 Luckily the ferry only runs till 5:00 PM. We picked up a few things at the local grocery store and had a nice dinner at the Pub.
 There is free Internet access on the dock so we are catching up on e-mail, blogs and paying a few bills online.

Max and Me

Max and I went for a really long kayak ride today while Chris did some painting on the back deck.


 He wanted Max away from the wet paint for a few hours so we kayaked to five or six different islands.

We were gone for about three hours.

 It was fun but we are both tired.

 The wind came up on the way back and it was quite a paddle getting back to the boat.

Pizza night on Steel Tiger

August 26th-Tonight we were invited to a Pizza party on Steel Tiger along with the crew from El Capitan. It was a lot of fun and the, hand-made pizzas were delicious! It’s hard to believe, but we were all ready for a meal that did not include seafood! Actually, we had meat loaf on Sea Mist the night before and considered that a treat!

August 27th- It rained during the night but seems to be clearing this morning. The plan is to do some kayaking today.

Yesterday at low tide we found a great beach tucked away between two islets.
 The water was warm and we found lots of neat shells. Chris even found some sand dollars.

 There was a shed nearby, similar to the one on Wallace Island, where boaters design and hang mementos with their boat name and date.

This one was easier to get to and better maintained than the one on Wallace.

Friends from Oly

As we were coming back to the boat from our hike we saw Snow Hawk II from Olympia cruising into the Bay. We had not been able to connect with Dennis and Glenda since leaving Olympia. Once they dropped anchor and got settled they zipped over to Sea Mist in their tender with a nice bottle of Merlot. We had a good visit while Max and Sockeye

Busy day

August 25th- Today Chris went out fishing with Stephan, from It’s a Good Thing.

 They took Stephan’s fishing boat/tender out to the rapids at the end of Hole in the Wall and were back in less than an hour with two lovely Lingcod.

 Chris was all smiles.

Linda, Stephan, Chris , Max, Uboo and I went for an afternoon hike up to Newton Lake. It was a steep, three mile trail to the lake and back but it was beautiful and well worth the effort.

 The water was crystal clear and according to Stephan, not too cold. He was the only one brave enough to go for a swim. Uboo would have loved to have joined him but had health issues that prevented him from being in the water other than to wade and cool off.

laundry island style

August 23th -Today was a day to catch up on chores. I did several loads of laundry with Max’s help. You can see how exciting that was. Chores on the boat are not that much different than chores at anyone’s home. I would however have to argue that the view from my “laundry room” would be hard for anyone to beat.

 Chris and I took turns in the galley today. I baked bread and then he canned salmon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After chores we took the dinghy ashore to do some beach combing and hiking around on the different islands.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 We came across several streams and Chris spotted this rather large frog.

Octopus Islands

Monday we got underway pretty early to hit the rapids at Dent near slack and then make it to Hole In The Wall by slack. We arrived in the Octopus Islands around dinner time and found a nice anchorage.

German dinner

We reached Cordero Lodge and took moorage at the dock for the night . The Kuppers ( Doris and Reinhardt) own and operate the small but nice facility including the six table restaurant. The Kuppers are German and the restaurant serves wonderful food in the German style. We were given menus at check in and asked to place our dinner orders. At 6:30 we were seated, served our cocktails and dinner was ready! Dessert was fabulous, apple strudel and ice cream. The lodge and restaurant are so popular, people fly in by helicopter.

Orca experience

August 21nd-We spent a phenomenal day in Johnston Strait on our way to cordero Lodge just east of Whirlpool Rapids. The best whale watching day ever! We started seeing Orcas chasing salmon as soon as we entered Johnstone Strait.

We stopped the boat and watched for about an hour. I have read that Orcas hunt in groups, but had never observed it until yesterday. It was amazing.

Groups of three and four would begin working their way towards each other forming a circle. As they got closer together the salmon would become trapped. The Orcas were vocalizing as they were herding the salmon and we could hear them clearly. Once the circle was small enough a feeding frenzy took place. At times we had full size Orcas within five feet of the boat.

There were also groups of juveniles accompanied by one or two adults feeding. They were basically chasing salmon. The terrified fish were literally flying out of the water ahead of the charging whales. We felt like we were experiencing one of those, “once in a lifetime”, opportunities. We were a bit surprised by Max's reaction to the Orcas.
He loves it when porpoises swim up to the boat but was very upset by the whales being so close. I did get video of the herding process, very cool.

Fish On !

We have been busy since Echo Bay. On our way to Mound Island to meet up with some friends, Chris and decided to take our time and do a little fishing. We slowed down to 2 ½ knots and threw the trolling lines out. It was getting late in the day, the wind was kicking up, we had some pretty strong chop, and it was an out-going tide, none of which make for great fishing according to the rule books. Luckily for us, Salmon aren’t prolific readers and we each hooked a beautiful Coho. A ten and a fifteen pounder! Since Chris and I are not terribly fond of salmon, we gave one away to friends.

Salmon/Halibut bake

We spent three days and nights at Mound Island and had some friends over for a Salmon/Halibut dinner. I braided strips of Salmon and Halibut together and put it in the oven to bake for half an hour. Before serving, I covered the fish with Hollandaise sauce and sautéed mushrooms. Along with the bread and brownies baked earlier in the morning, it was pretty good if I do say so myself.

Echo Bay Marina

We arrived here in Echo Bay Marina and took a slip assignment around noon.  There is a little store, cabins for rent, a family style restaurant with very limited seating.  

We fixed a bite of lunch and took Max for a hike across a very questionable foot bridge, up a very steep trail in the woods (by steep, I mean climb by using ropes that were hanging from trees farther up the trail steep!) and through a meadow to a quaint museum and gift shop. Max thought is was wonderful and ran back and forth ahead of us adding an extra mile or more to the hike.




 The museum and shop are owned by, Bill Proctor, the author of a book that Chris is currently reading called, Full Moon, High Tide. Bill was at the museum and he is quite a character. We purchased his newest book, Heart of the Rain coast, a Life Story.

Last night in booker Lagoon

We had a great potluck last night on the boat, El Capitan, along with crews from Divonnasea, It's a Good Thing, and Steel Tiger.
First thing this morning we pulled our prawn traps and left our anchorage at Booker Lagoon. We had been in the lagoon for a week and had had a great time. We watched black bear on the shore, met lots of new friends, kayaked, and filled the freezer with prawns and shrimp.

After setting a course for Echo Bay Marina and heading out, we passed what looked like a Sea Lion slumber party on these rocks. They were very large and truly sounded like a pride of lions growling when we got close to them.

Week in Booker Lagoon

 After retrieving our mail at Port McNeill on the 11th, we joined our friends on the trawlers, Y-Knot and Divonnasea in Booker Lagoon.

You can only enter the lagoon through a narrow passage at slack tide, but once you are in it opens up to a large area with several arms offering good anchorage and plenty of room for several boats. The "Stone Man"guards the opening to the passage. 

The middle of the lagoon is deep and great for shrimping and prawing. We have been setting our traps in about 250 feet of water and pulling them twice a day. We haven’t done much fishing or crabbing for the last week but we have eaten lots of prawns and have about 300 in the freezer.

 The weather is absolutely beautiful. It has been hot and sunny with a light breeze and we haven’t had a foggy morning in days. The Divonnasea has been catching Dungeoness crabs for the last few weeks and holding them in their live well for some friends. The friends flew into the lagoon by float plane today to pick up the crabs. Evidently the friends are having a party and fresh crab is on the menu. It was quite a sight seeing the plane land in the lagoon and taxi right up to Divonnasea’s swim step.



August 14th- At low tide this afternoon a large black bear meandered out of the woods and wandered up and down the shoreline just off our stern. Our presence didn’t appear to be of any concern as he turned over rocks and climbed over logs. We watched him for about an hour.

August 13th-We had a potluck dinner on Divonnasea along with the crew from Y-Knot tonight. We took our blender and all the makings for strawberry Margaritas. Even with frozen strawberries, Chris makes a terrific Margarita. We had shrimp and pasta, coleslaw, carrot cake and lots of cruising stories.

Mail!

Yeah!!!! We finally got mail from the Olympia PO Box. It took 21 days to get to Port McNeill, BC.

Sunset

"Red sky at night sailor's delight...."

There was a beautiful sunset at Port McNeill last night.

More porpoise interaction

These guys came out of nowhere and began playing in our wake. They were smaller than the ones up north and incredibly fast.

Humpback

Around seven AM this morning we saw this humpback playing in the fog as we headed to Queen Charlotte Strait..