Fiords and Remembrances

When Jane first mentioned that she’d love to sail with us sometime, I emailed her our itinerary never expecting that she’d be able to make it. After all she was just returning from a 6-week trip to Ecuador that included a Habitat for Humanity build. There’s just so much traveling to and from Australia to anywhere that a body can take, but Jane emailed back with a request for the Misty Fiords' leg. You could almost hear the static of excitement going back and forth on our email waves. We’ve been friends since we were 12. Jane was in our wedding. She married an Australian doctor and moved there to set up home and raise her two girls. We’ve stayed in touch over the years first thru letters and later thru email. We’ve seen each other so very infrequently and only for short periods. Now, a whole week plus sailing, too, in this wonderful wilderness. It’s just too good to be true.

June 13th – Jane is aboard, and we set off. The early morning scattered clouds dissipate, the wind picks up, and we raise sail under a bright sun and blue sky. The big event of the day is our first fish. A Chinook. It exceeds size requirements and there’s no concern about sex. It’s ours. On ice and awaiting dinner!

Misty Fiords is our destination for this leg, but we first have to clear US customs in Ketchikan before we can cruise those waters. Ketchikan proves to be a somewhat uninteresting, struggling cruise ship town. The mega ships pull in during the day, disgorge their multitudes to shop or to go on excursions and then pull up anchor in the late afternoon leaving the place totally dead. Jane and I take a taxi to Walmart to replace my camera that succumbed to too much moisture. The taxi driver reminds me of the attitude one hears in Telluride. The guy, who had lived in Ketchikan since the 70’s, bemoaned the growth, castigated the cruise ships, and benightedly ignored the fact that he owed his living to their arrival. We eat dinner at Steamers, an establishment recommended to us as the best fish in town. We end up thinking we should have eaten on Avante.

We head off to Misty Fiords. The day again is bright blue and sunny. The mountains, pulling us like magnets into the area, are strikingly white against the blue sky. We anchor in Alava Cove. On shore, there’s a Forest Service hut that Jane and I want to explore. Knowing that he’s pushing me, Bill says that Jane and I should take The Dingbat ashore. I guess it’s now time to introduce The Dingbat. I’ve not done so before because the subject is embarrassing. The Dingbat is my collective name for both the tender and its motor. (Bill thinks of it as the name of the female driver) From our first introduction, we have been at war. It’s a seesawing battle for control, and, after more than a year, The Dingbat still has the upper edge. The thing hasn’t dumped me in the water yet, but it’s been close. I think it’s all about Physics again. Directional control is counter-intuitive to me and so is speed control. Speed control? Heck, it’s taken me a year just to find the right pull motion to get the thing started. If ever an inanimate object had a mind of its own, this is it. I speak softly, endearingly, to it. I curse it and tell it it’s going to a watery death. No matter what I say or how I act toward it, it rebuffs me. For me, it will start when it wants to start, and that’s it. For Bill, it purrs into acquiescence. I’ve learned that the safest speed for me to travel at is idle. Anything more than that and I’m a danger to myself and society. So, I putt around like an idiot, but, after barreling full force onto a pile of rocks when I meant to put it in reverse and slowly back up, The Dingbat doesn’t like me anymore than I like it.

To add insult to injury, the motor may battle me, but the boat itself is out to get me.. The non-skid on the sloping floor of the boat works for everyone but me. My feet slip and slide. I end up in a bone-bruising heap on the floor. I get so tangled up with feet and arms, I can’t tell which way is up. “Keep your center of gravity low,” Bill says. Low? It is low. I can’t stand up so how can it be anything but low? Bill and everyone else agilely climb in and out moving around with ease. My personal rule of locomotion is that 3 of my 4 appendages have to be firmly centered before I move in any direction. I look more like a crab clawing its way over unknown terrain. There is no dignity or pride left in my dealings with this thing. I do, therefore, believe that “The Dingbat” is a perfectly good name for the whole mess.

So Jane and I head off. Jane, little aware of my ineptitude, happily takes in the scenery around her thinking nothing of the very cold water just inches from her body. We drop the crab trap in a promising location and head to shore. We explore the island and head back to The Dingbat which has all of its 200+ unwieldy pounds nestled in a rock pile in the receding tide. We lug and curse the thing back into the water, trying not to scratch the bottom because that would upset The Captain.

The next morning, Jane and I discover that we had not planned enough for the tide. There’s something like a 20’ tide in our bay, and our crab trap is now on the beach. There are 2 sea gulls squawking around it waiting for the tide to recede a little more so they can get at the poor undersized crab enmeshed in the trap. Bill thinks this is hilariously inept. I do not.

We head to the Punch Bowl, a beautiful and therefore popular fiord area. Anchoring in the Punch Bowl itself will be very difficult due to its extreme depth and quickly sloping sides. Thinking we would not be able to do much more than motor in and out of the bowl, we find ourselves the only boat in the area. There’s a hefty looking mooring ball which we pick up. It’s warm, and we sit contentedly in the sun eating lunch. The steep, chiseled sides of the rock walls are impressive. The distant snow covered mountains draw our eyes. As Jane says, “Who would have thought two little girls from Rye would be doing this? We talk about our lives, our joys, our sorrows, and realize that we’ve been blessed with love and good fortune. We are at peace in the solitude of this magnificent wilderness.

















Agreeing that this location can’t get much more perfect, we decide to spend the rest of the day and evening here. We go ashore to hike to the waterfall and lake. The Park Service has a wonderful trail cut and maintained. The wooden steps and bridges remind me of the fairy kingdom from the Lord of the Rings, and I expect the whole cast of characters to appear at every turn. This is heavy rain forest vegetation, thick with shrubbery, moss and vines, brooding and mysterious. Occasional flowers bloom sprightly as if to brighten the atmosphere. We reach the waterfall with its torrent of water cascading thru the overgrowth. Bill, walking ahead of us, startles a black bear as the animal ambles across the stream temporarily deafened by the sound of the waterfall. The bear retreats, and the Great White Hunter continues on. We climb on to the lake and rest by the shore. Knowing that the way back is going to be slippery wet and moss covered, we reluctantly head back down in the late afternoon.




























Back at sea level, we find The Dingbat has itself securely beached again, but at least Jane and I have a third hand to help haul the thing.








June 17, we wake up to rain and mist --- perfectly appropriate for Misty Fiords. We journey down the long fiord arm yet again marveling at the steep cliffs. Massive trees grow impossibly out of rock ledges. Waterfalls appear at every turn.










As we continue our journey north, days are noticeably longer. Sunsets are later. Twilights seem to last for hours. This photo was taken at 11:00 one quiet evening anchored in Misty Fiords.






June 18 is our last night in Misty Fiords. We anchor in Shrimp Cove, a picturesque spot with a magnificent double waterfall. In the morning, we find 2 very large crabs in our trap. Jane can’t believe how lucky she has been. Fresh caught Wild Salmon at the beginning of her adventure, and fresh trapped Dungeness Crabs at the end.










The last night on Avante we feast on crab. The talk, the stories, the catching up continues unabated. We’re intrigued by what each of us recalls, and we add to and enhance each other’s remembrances. It was a very special week in a very special place. It will be for me the week of “Fiords and Remembrances”.

The Intrepid Mariner

There’s no question about it. I was not born to sailing. Though I have become what might be classified as an enthusiastic, though not very adept, sailor, every step has been fought for and hard earned. Where others exalt over a 25-knot wind screaming thru the shrouds and think what a fine day for sailing, I quake. I can get seasick just watching the America’s Cup Race. Those boats careen thru the water at angles that defy gravity and all common sense. Bill maintains that my problem is just that: reduced common sense due to the fact that I never took Physics. That’s right. I went thru high school and university earning a Bachelor of Science Degree without ever taking a Physics course, and that feat was manipulatively intentional. Physics has Laws, and, though they make perfectly good sense on paper, in my physical world, they often do not. Therefore, I knew I’d better stay away from Physics. That’s why I majored in Psychology. Did you ever hear of a Law of Psychology? --- I rest my case with my common sense perfectly operational.

After much self-analysis, I have decided it is simply my exceptionally sensitive inner ear that is the cause of my problem. My overdeveloped sense of equilibrium needs to see the world as balanced and upright, and, like a phobia, things go awry when the ear gets pushed too far. However, I have been able to train and de-sensitize the ear, and, I can now watch the America’s Cup and enthuse with the sailors on the boats – glad that they’re there and I’m secure on my couch in front of the TV. Fortunately, Bill has no wish to race and has learned we can sail quite happily and nicely together within my limits which have nothing to do with wind speed but everything to do with angle of boat tilt. My ear seems to register every rock, every nuance of roll. I may not be able to do tell where the wind is coming from by feel, but I sure can tell which way we’re pitching and rolling. Most of the time I’m okay with it. I feel one with it (kind of), but occasionally it gets the better of me.


We have this instrument on the boat which measures the angle of boat heel. It’s called a Lev-O-Gage. I don’t need a Lev-O-Gage to tell me what angle the boat is at or how I feel about it. Bill, being mistakenly clever, calls it the “squawk meter”. He can call it whatever he wants, but, if he wants a responsive first mate and not a mutiny, he’s learned to listen to the “squawk”.




Leaving Port Hardy, we have about a 60-mile crossing of Queen Charlotte Strait ahead of us. Like the Rapids, the books have nothing good to say about this crossing. It can be treacherous and uncomfortable. They talk of escape anchorages along the way. For days preceding our anticipated crossing, nothing but gale force winds have been blowing across the Strait. I’m not a happy camper about this. The “squawk meter” is about to go into overdrive. Bill assures me we will not start out in gale force winds. We may end up in such winds, but we wouldn’t start out in them. Is that supposed to be reassuring? After another restless night for the first mate, we leave to an anticipated 15 – 18 knots, not gale force. It is overcast and foreboding. I drive us out of the harbor and motor down the channel of islands leading to Queen Charlotte Strait. Winds hit 21 – 27, but that’s because we’re in the funnel created by the islands I am told. Bill doesn’t want to raise sail then because the direction of the wind is not helpful, right on the bow, and we’d have to put in reefs immediately. He has enough going on at the moment navigating us around islands, rocks and shoals in the light rain and low visibility. When we finally enter the Strait, I go below to add more layers of clothes. Bad mistake. The wind has lessened a bit in the Strait, but the boat is rolling with the wave swells. Not a good combination for me. In fact, I have now learned a killer combination for me. Seasickness hits like never before. The ear has gone berserk Bill keeps telling me to get up on deck. I know that. Get on deck, look at the horizon, get the wind blowing across you. I know all that, but how can I do that when I can’t even lift my head up and my eyeballs are rolling around in their sockets? The dizziness defeats every effort to stand. I’m in close personal contact with the head. Thank God, I’m paranoid about cleanliness on a boat! Oh, what a miserable day it was! If I could have helped Bill to raise the sail and put in the reefs, having the sail up would have decreased the rolling around in the swells, but I couldn’t help. It was so bad I couldn’t even groan. If the boat had suddenly hit a rock and sunk, I would have gone down without complaint. I was unwell totally and completely. So much for the intrepid sailor.

We make it across the Strait into the calmer waters of the channels again. Slowly, a desire to live is returning. There’s hope rising anew. Bill has chosen the first available anchorage for us. Though it isn’t a very pretty one, he figures his crew has had enough. I’m actually up on deck and telling him that it’s okay to press on another hour to a prettier anchorage. We end up in Green Island Cove. It’s one of the prettiest and coziest coves we’ve been in so far. There’s a hump of land covered with spreading bushy shrubs sprinkled with tiny white flower buds. We’ve not seen anything like this anywhere else up here. We wonder how it came about as everything else is densely covered with forest. It seems like such an anomaly, but it’s all perfectly beautiful and just the soft touch this battered body needs after one hell of a day! I’ve learned my lesson, and, from now on, will fortify ahead on such possible days with the proven anti-seasickness cocktail our friend, Bob Trenary, uses: 2 Bonine and 1 NoDoz an hour or so before sailing. It worked on the trip north from San Diego. It will work again.

The next day surprises us with its boring and monotonous passage. The islands are all low lying and the distant snow covered fortresses have all but disappeared. At least, the waters are peaceful and the winds quiet, but we spend the day listening to weather reports of a big low-pressure system moving in. The next morning, the reports are worse. After studying all the charts, Bill finds that the best anchorage for us to sit out this storm is only 10 miles up the road. Anchorages further on don’t provide us the safety we need from the winds. We know we’ll be losing a day, but we’ve got weather delays programmed into our schedule. We head to Rescue Bay, a very secure harbor as the name implies. Expecting to spend the night there while this storm blows thru, we end up there for 2 days. After the pace we’ve been at, it’s nice to have the down time, but we know we’ll be eager to sail as soon as we can. Prince Rupert awaits.

Sunday, June 10, we leave and head north into an area called Fiordland. It’s still raining, but the winds have died down. Visibility is good so at least we don’t have to engage the radar. We motor down a short fiord for a good view of a waterfall. How we wish we could fully see the landscape around us. It’s got to be magnificent.
















Fiordland: for us, a land of shadows, misted mountains and waterfalls too numerous to count.

Monday, June 11, I wake up dreaming of ducks. That’s right – ducks! Could it be that the constant sound of the rain on the cabin roof (not 18” above my head) has brought up images of ducks? Both of us are tired of the rain and the damp chill that comes with it, but we tell ourselves that this is probably more the norm from now on as we get nearer to Alaska. After all, Misty Fiords, the next leg of our trip, didn’t get its name from bright sunshine pouring over the area.

We have 120 miles to cover in the next 2 days to get to Prince Rupert as scheduled. That doesn’t prevent us from a slight detour to Bishop Bay Hot Springs. Oh, heavenly, now this is water I can get into! There’s a motor boat at the dock ahead of us, but, as we approach, they fire up and leave. We have the place to ourselves. The natural hot water from the springs has been channeled into a bathing/soaping area and two hot tubs - indoor and outdoor. There’s a peaceful view across the bay. We leave cleaned, refreshed and invigorated --- and the SUN is shining. There’s blue sky. This is more like it!

And “more like it” lasts for about an hour and a half before the rain hits again, but it was enough to lift the spirits.









June 12th - The Captain's birthday!



Is this not a picture of a happy man?







We woke up again to rain and motor to Prince Rupert whose local nickname is “Rainy Rupert”. However, it’s not raining when we approach, but the harbor area is jammed with boats. We have to triple raft to two other boats. Getting laundry and groceries over 2 big motor cruisers to our comparatively smaller sailboat was a feat of balance and dexterity.


We meet up with a high school friend of mine, Jane Minor. She has flown in from her home in Australia to join us on the next leg of the trip: Misty Fiords. Rested, cleaned up and reprovisioned, we leave Prince Rupert under scattered clouds. We round the point. The sun has broken thru. Looking back at Prince Rupert, we see that “Rainy Rupert” is indeed sheltered by its own lonely, grey rain cloud. We sail on happily under the sun.

How to Catch Crabs - Part 3

Mound Island – June 2, 2007 – the first crabs are trapped! We finally are in crab country. Our haul is 2 crabs both male and both just over legal size. We’re on a roll, and I’m happily planning a variety of crab menus from simple steamed crabs and butter to crab quiche and chowder. Oh, the delights I have planned! Will our refrigerator and freezer hold it all?






Upper crab is a Dungeness. Lower crab is a Rock Crab. I was not too pleased with the Rock Crab because when dumped in the orange bucket he proceeded to attack the Dungeness and pinch off one of its legs. They’re both in the same stew together. There’s no reason to get aggressive about it.

I eagerly await the next morning and the next haul. Three large female Dungeness. You are not allowed to keep females. Back in the water they go because of their sex. Now, you’re probably wondering how does one tell male from female crabs. You turn a crab over to examine its belly. The male’s abdomen is shaped roughly like a lighthouse. The female’s, in contrast, is wide and broad. (Another one of Mother Nature’s absurdities). I watch a crab boat come in and haul a few traps. I’m dismayed to see their traps seemingly heaping with crabs, but then I notice that most of them are being thrown back in the water due to undersize or sex. I feel better.

Next morning, only 1 undersized crab. I don’t care if it’s male or female because size is also a determining factor in keeping a catch.

June 6 finds us in a delightful anchorage called Green Island Cove. We drop our trap in a promising looking place. I’ve sweetened up the bait trap with squid and salmon skin. That ought to bring the crabs running. Instead, to my shock, dismay and revulsion, we bring up a monster from the deep. It’s a creature neither of us can identify. It looks like a cross between a starfish and an octopus. It’s got more arms than either of us can count. There’s one undersized crab in the trap with him, and the poor thing looks about ready to die of fright. This creature probably eats crab for breakfast and burps out the shells. We (notice the “we”) gingerly disentangle it from the webbing, drop him back in and hope never to see another one except in a picture book of odd creatures of the deep.


The next haul is an even larger one of those things. This one has itself clued to and wrapped around the bait trap. We now figure that, if one of these things gets anywhere near the trap, any crab in its right mind is going to head in the opposite direction. I can’t believe my luck. How do you discourage these things and bring on the crabs? Bill says that the next one we catch we’re going to cut off one of its legs and stick it in the bait trap. He remembers vaguely some one talking about these creatures and saying that, since they don’t eat their own kind, they will avoid a trap with one of their buddy’s body parts in it. I can’t believe anything this ugly would be so particular, but I do know for sure that the “we” that cuts off one of its legs is not going to be “me”!

In between all this unsuccessful crabbing, I continue with fishing. Bill finally takes pity on my efforts or else he just can’t stand watching what is going on in the name of fishing. He picks up my “103 Fishing Secrets” and quickly realizes that the reason I can’t make sense out of it is that it assumes the reader is already a fisherperson, which, as we all now know, I am not. He tells me that my knots aren’t right, and, when I lose a lure at the first tug, he tells me that he knew my knot wasn’t right. I tell him that, if he knew my knot wasn’t right, why didn’t he fix it? He says because he wanted to teach me a lesson. Realizing that wasn’t the correct thing to say at that moment, he sits down and rerigs the whole contraption for me using the right knots according to Bill Grun.

At a rainy day lunch stop in Sullivan Bay, we talk to a great fisher person. Bill buys me several different types of lures and something that looks like part of a baby’s crib mobile that can be made out of a coat hanger the fisher person tells us, but Bill figures that for $4.00 he’d rather buy it than make it. It’s supposed to be used to go “jigging” for Halibut. Sounds like we’re off to some country barn dance or something!

So, we continue to crab and fish, unsuccessfully, but hopefully. At least now, we are in it together – for better or worse, for richer or poorer, etc., etc.!

The Rapids - Campbell River to Port Hardy

Ever since I began reading about this trip, I’ve been worried about the series of rapids that come shortly after leaving Campbell River. Rapids, to me, occur in rivers, not oceans. They’re down hill runs with rocks (operative word for rapids) caused by joining of rivers, curve in rivers, squeezing of rivers or drops in ground covered. They have nothing to do with ocean sailing. They are traveled (if traveled at all) by flexible rubber rafts like the kind one uses on the Colorado River and other such RIVERS. They are not traveled by 52’ fiberglass sailboats with 9’ keels. So, what’s all this about?

Reading on, I learn that these rapids are not down hill or up hill. They occur in a long stretch of water roughly between Campbell River and south of Port Neville where the water flow is restricted by Vancouver Island on one side and a buffer of islands and the mainland on the other. On a map, the stretch shows up about the width of a pencil and doesn’t look like anything bigger than a canoe can get thru, but, in reality, it’s several hundred feet wide – big enough for cruise ships, barges, log booms and Avante. Winds can be a big factor as they roar down the funnel created by the land masses, but how the rapids run and the danger they present depends predominantly on which way the tide is running and how strong it is. It’s all about the currents, whirlpools and tidal pulls created.. Rapids can also have rocks, but that’s not a concern with my rapids – or at least it no longer is. Fifty years ago, there was a monolith in the middle of Seymour Narrows, our first set of rapids. It had the innocuous name of Ripple Rock. It should have been Death Rock or something like that. It had earned the reputation of having the ability to suck boats into the swirling vortex at its base. In 1957, a group of engineers drilled into it, packed it with enough explosives to destroy a small city and blew the thing to smithereens. Ripple Rock was ripped to shreds. That doesn’t mean the rapids went away; just the rock. Seymour Narrows is still a dangerous stretch if you go thru at the wrong time. Even the big cruisers respect it. Everything is about timing. Slack tide.

Friday, June 1, we say good bye to Judy and Warner. Bill and I spend the early morning working around the boat. At 10:30 (timed to catch the slack tide in Seymour Narrows), we head off. I’m not exactly feeling in my prime having slept badly last night worried about these rapids ahead. I’ve had 2 cappuccinos and a slice of watermelon, but that’s it. I’m sure that anything of substance would just sit like a brick in my stomach. My insides ache. They feel in knots. At the moment, I don’t know whether I’m going to be sick or just “gotta pee”. I’m on a continuous 5 minute pee break. Bill finally has enough and tells me to stop it and hold it. Normally, I have the utmost faith in Bill’s judgment, and I do now – but these are RAPIDS.. All the books talk in awe or dread of them. What if he’s misread the time tables? What if the propeller falls off? That just happened to the boat of friends of ours. It does happen. The tiller also could fall off. Then we’d go spinning out of control down these rapids. What am I doing here?

We round the corner and enter Seymour Narrows. It is slack tide. From a distance, things look calm, but when you look down and around the water near the boat, it looks like swirling black ink. You can see the whirlpools and currents. You can feel the pull on the boat. There’s constant adjustment at the helm. Depth is not a concern as long as we stay in the middle of the channel, and it’s a wide channel. The concern is just keeping the boat on course against the pull. I wonder for an instant what would happen if we let the wheel go free. Where would the boat end up and in what shape? The prop stays on. The engine doesn’t fail, and we get thru the first set of rapids. (I really should not include this picture. Blue water and blue skies make the entrance to Seymour Narrows look like a "row in a bath tub". Believe me, it wasn't quite as pretty from the deck of Avante.)

Two more sets await us, but I’m an old hand now. Instead of being the passenger, I assume the helm and steer us thru both sets. There certainly is no doubt that these rapids need respect, but, as the books say (after they first scare you to death), run them at the right time and there’s no problem. My stomach eases. I make lunch and eat since all is once again right with my world.

We continue down to Johnstone Strait. The weather is great. Everything is shades of blue and green. The land is thickly covered with evergreens, and, as we proceed north, there is more logging activity. Yes, there are great swaths of trees cut down, but the logging is done in a weaving jig saw pattern. Everywhere also there is evidence of reforestation and new growth. Other than a few fishing vessels and a barge or two, we pass no other private boat all day. We had expected a boat or two to be going thru the Narrows with us. It was either then or not at all today, but no other boats are with us. We pull into an isolated harbor for the evening and, and to our surprise, there are 2 motor boats ahead of us. We’re just so all alone up here on these waters that it really does come as a surprise when we see other boats.

We leave at 6:00 the next morning with plans to sail the entire length of Johnstone Strait with the tide. The winds are low to moderate which is a relief because the whole week before they had been running at gale force down this channel. As we round the corner, a log boom suddenly looms into view. It had pulled in off the Strait after we did, and at first appears to be blocking the whole channel back into the Strait

As it is going in the opposite direction back toward Campbell River, the tug captain had pulled in off the main channel to wait for the tide to turn. These log booms are immense floating log platforms. The logs are held together within a log frame work and then lashed together with wire. Like a barge, one doesn’t argue with this thing’s right of way. It has it!

We sail thru Johnson Strait with no problem and know we are lucky. We may have chosen the right time according to the tide tables, but we had no control over the sun which was shining or the winds which were nil. We motor into Blackfish Sound. It’s a maze of islands and canals. There are fishing boats all over as well as what look like crab and prawn traps. Eureka! We drop anchor and drop the trap. It’s warm and sunny. We set up the awning and have a pleasant afternoon in its shade. It’s the end of another warm, sunny, gorgeous day. Could this be first timer’s luck?

Our plans are to spend the next 3 days exploring the islands and channels of Blackfish Sound and the Broughton Archipelago. The further north we go, the wilder the land feels and looks. Though this is a popular summer area, it’s not summer season yet, and we seem to be alone. We’re pressing further into the wilderness. We catch our first crabs. We see our first black bear on the shores. Bald eagles are being spotted more frequently. We enjoy our exploring and are delighted that we will be coming back thru this area on our return. We know, too, that next summer when we circumnavigate Vancouver Island we will plan more time among the islands and channels up here. I know a lot of people have done this trip before us, but to be exploring this immense area on our own little boat with almost nobody around us is exciting and filling of wonder. Each day is an adventure.

We pull into Port Hardy on the morning of Tuesday, June 5th. We plan the afternoon to provision, attend to boat needs and do my least favorite chore: babysitting the dirty clothes at the Laundromat. Port Hardy proves to be a rather dull place and not all that picturesque. Its one redeeming feature was the number of bald eagles flying around the harbor. We enjoyed watching their flights. Our plans are to leave the next morning with an okay weather window to head across Queen Charlotte Strait and further north to Prince Rupert.
To end this entry, here are a few pictures of the area.

Lighthouse near the entrance to Seymour Narrows

What a difference a few feet further traveled makes! Look at those mountain looming into view.

Just to give an idea of some of the weaving thru rocks and islets. All those little circles are obstacles to be avoided at all costs. In between the dots are passages either with deep water or some not so deep. The blue dot is Avante on track.

Interesting passage thru the rocks and islets. Just stay in the deep part to avoid the hidden rocks and the ones that can be seen

First rainy day - the clouds, mists, mountains and water were beautiful

Sullivan Bay – a float town left over from the logging hey days now turned into a quaint summer retreat. The land is so thickly forested and impenetrable that it was easier and quicker to build these floating towns. We dock and have lunch here.

Telluride's season for businesses to turn a profit is tremendously long compared to the scant 8 weeks a year these people have.

Site of old floating logger village camp

Thick overhanging vegetation -- impenetrable forests

Only the bears make it thru this vegetation!

"How to Catch Crabs" - Part 2

There are no crabs in Desolation Sound!!! That’s what I am told. How can there be no crabs? There’s every other kind of fish. What is there – some kind of “Do not enter” sign out there that only crabs obey? Doesn’t make sense to me. So, I’m going to crab.

In Tenedos Bay, with Warner’s help, I clumsily rig up the trap. For bait, I use sliced bacon. Bill is absolutely incredulous. That’s his breakfast going to the crabs! We drop the trap being careful not to drop it in an area deeper than my sinkable line (about 75’) or else that will be the end of crab trap, bait, line and float. Next morning – no crabs.

Also, next morning, to appease Bill, I make him bacon and eggs. He’s somewhat mollified.

At a local store where I finally find and purchase an 8 oz. weight, I’m told again that there are no crabs in Desolation Sound, but it is prawn season. My one year license covers prawns, but no way can I ask Bill to buy a prawn trap, bait trap (they like cat food) and 200’ of sinkable line! With envy, I watch all the prawn traps glide by.

Two days later, we decide to try crabbing again. The word is that if any crab does head into Desolation Sound, he migrates to Okeover Bay. Shortly before arrival at the bay, I pull the trap out of the aft locker. There’s a horrible smell. It’s the bacon from 2 days ago. There’s no way we can use that, but Bill says that old and smelly is what crabs like. I say no. “How to Catch Crabs” says that crabs are gourmands. The better the food, the bigger the crab. So the bacon goes over the side with Bill insisting that all the crabs, if any are around, will be screaming after that bacon. I fill the bait trap with saved chicken fat and fish skins. Yum-m-m. Over the side it goes, and we go off to anchor elsewhere for lunch. Hours later – no crabs. Bill gloats that that’s because all the crabs went after the bacon.

Between day 1 and day 2 of crabbing, we try fishing. Warner and I practice our fish line knots, following the drawings in “103 Fishing Secrets”. Got that down. Now we rig the contraption plus weight to the fishing pole and throw it overboard. As the line goes zinging out, we somehow keep our fingers from being sliced in two by the line as we let it out without creating a tangled mess. We’re not sure how to determine how much line is out, but eventually we decide that it’s enough. I sit and wait for a fish to bite. As suspected, no self respecting fish would go after that thing. Time’s up. I reel in the line. You can see the flasher being pulled thru the water as it flashes its way toward us. By the time, it’s back on the boat, the flashing has been abraded off. New flasher needed - $14.00.

Every harbor we’re in, anyone I can ask, I drill about fishing and crabbing techniques. I’m told that once we’re past Campbell River and the Rapids (The Rapids? That’s another story), I will find crabs and fish. Port Hardy and north is the key. One kindly gentleman tells me of a bay across from Port Hardy where if I anchor at night, throw out a line, I’ll have a halibut by morning. Wow, that’s just what I’m hoping for! I go to bed dreaming of halibut.

Around 2:00 am, I wake up suddenly with the thought that a halibut isn’t going to be patiently waiting for me with a hook in its mouth at the end of a line some morning. I don’t expect a salmon to come along nicely when I reel him in so why should a halibut? The whole idea strikes me as hilarious. It’s 2:00 in the morning, and I’m lying in bed with tears running down my face. Fortunately, Bill sleeps thru the whole episode. The next morning I tell the guys about my mistakenly naïve ideas. They both look at me with incredulous bemusement. I’m still laughing at my gaff, and they know now for sure I’ve lost it. Guess I don’t blame them. Bill wants to know if I know what a halibut looks like. No, why should I? The closest I’ve come to a halibut is slices in a fish store. So, out comes a book with a picture of a halibut, and it is not anybody’s idea of good looking! As I look at the picture, I can’t help thinking that when Mother Nature was into fish creating, she must have run out of inspiration. After all, there’s only so many things you can do with a basic fish shape. So she gave a lump of clay to her 3 year-old daughter and said, “Sweetie, make Mommy a fish”. She got what she asked for, and not wanting to squash her daughter’s budding creativity, she kept the thing. And that’s how Halibut came into being. Only she called it “forthehellofit” which changed, as words do over time, to Halibut. (Origin Story: Grun First Nations tribe)

The guys tell me that a halibut can weigh over 100 pounds and really isn’t something I want at the end of my line. No, I think not. I’m not greedy. At this moment, any ole fish will do as long as it meets the size limits, is edible, and I can get it in the boat!