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August 2005
Montague Harbor, Galiano Island, British Columbia, Canada
Where did the month go???? It seems like I just finished the July Part II Log (I did a week ago!) Life has been mostly idyllic, as we've enjoyed exploring the San Juan & South Gulf Islands this month. We've been surprised at the number of boats and amount of human settlement, but when we stopped to realize that we're close to several major metropolitan areas, it made sense…our preconceived ideas were just off.
Let's continue with the snapshot sketches of the cruisin' life this month….
Westcott Bay, San Juan Island, WA - After leaving Friday Harbor, we went through the Haro Strait and Mosquito Pass on our way to Garrison Bay on the west side of San Juan Island. However, upon our arrival we counted more 26 boats already anchored there...Gary's comment: "talk about sheep!" Luckily Westcott Bay is connected to Garrison Bay and there were only a few boats along with lots of crab-pot floats, so we dropped the hook in Westcott Bay. This is where we caught our first crab!!!! I'd bought crab bait from the fish market in Friday Harbor and we decided to give it a try, adding to the number of crab-pot floats boaters had to avoid. We are using a crab ring instead of a crab-pot and it has to be checked about every 30 minutes so the crabs don't crawl out of the ring. Gary is the official "crabber" as his name is on the license. I rigged the bait bag and he rowed out in the dink to drop the ring and then rowed out half hour later to check it. During the afternoon he "caught" 6 crabs, but only one was legal size & sex. You can tell by this picture that he was pretty pleased with himself. We cooked it for dinner and calculated that it was a $60.00 crab dinner...the cost of the ring, float, license and bait. Luckily we have caught more crabs so the cost is being amortizing over the total catch! Did you know that the US almost went to war with Great Britain in 1859 over a pig? The ownership of the San Juan Islands was in dispute between Great Britain & the US and when an American shot an Englishman's pig, it became a diplomatic incident. Troops from both countries were deployed to the island; both camps have been restored are part of the National Parks system. On Wednesday we dinked over to the English Camp in Garrison Bay and enjoyed seeing and reading about the history of the “Almost War”. (The June 2005 Smithsonian Magazine has an article entitled Boar War if you'd like more details.)
Roche Harbor, San Juan Island, WA – We only spent one day anchored here, as it was SO BUSY & CROWDED! The only reason we added this to our itinerary was that our mail was being forwarded to the small, closet-sized Post Office and we needed to pick it up. There's a resort & large marina in Roche Harbor and we went ashore to get the mail, enjoyed lunch at the Lime Kiln restaurant, had ice cream cones, (We have a freezer aboard, but it won't keep ice cream frozen, so we indulge when the opportunity presents itself!) and bought some scrumptious cinnamon bread. Seaplanes landed and took off approximately every 10 minutes throughout the day – this definitely did not qualify as a quiet, scenic anchorage and we left the next day!
Reid Harbor, Stuart Island, WA – This anchorage is only a 15-minute dink ride from Roche Harbor, but is entirely different. To make our trip more interesting we motored around Spieden Island, which has an unusual appearance as one side of the island is wooded and the other side is barren. We also experienced strong tides as we rounded the island. As we passed the eastern point of the island, the currents were increasing our speed by 3 Kts.;  halfway down that side the currents switched and were now slowing our speed by 2.5 knots. There were many whirlpools where the two currents collided, the stuff of old sea tales! When we got to Reid Harbor more than 60 boats were anchored but it's a large harbor and by anchoring near the mouth of the bay we had plenty of swinging room. Shortly after anchoring we noticed a small pontoon boat, the Boundary Pass Café, making its way around the harbor selling slushies & ice cream. It's operated by Jessell & Ariel and we enjoyed treats several times while here. We also had the pleasure of meeting Deb & Tony on S/V Kelpie , a 1980 33' Hans Christian sailboat. They are the original owners so it was nice to talk with them about what the boat was like when new. They've been sailing in the San Juan & Gulf Islands for more than 20 years and generously shared information on favorite anchorages & sights. They also were kind enough to mail letters & bring us another loaf of the cinnamon Bread from Roche Harbor when they dinked over one day. This was a very peaceful anchorage and we spent six nights here before heading into Canada on August 12th . We still hadn't seen any whales since arriving in the San Juans and started  listening to the VHF channel used by the whale-watching boats to get an idea of where the whales were. After spending a few days trying to figure out the “code names” for certain places, we discovered that Orcas were in the area we'd be going through on our way to Bedwell Harbor. Sure enough, we saw whales within 45 minutes of hoisting the anchor! It's an amazing sight to see Orcas whales within 50' of your boat! Gary was able to get some pictures, but it's really difficult to know where they'll surface next. He was so excited when he saw Ruffles of J Pod; so named because his dorsal fin is “wavy” and very recognizable. We crossed into Canadian waters at 15:00 and cleared Canadian Customs at Bedwell Harbor.
Bedwell Harbour, South Pender Island, BC, Canada - When entering Canada the captain of the boat is the only person who may leave the boat until it has cleared Customs, so Gary  went ashore to call for clearance. As it was our first time in Canadian waters, the Custom officers came aboard. They were very polite; all went well and we have our Canadian Customs Clearance number for 2005. We left the Customs Dock and anchored in the harbor for two nights. On Saturday we took a 2-mile dink ride to North Pender Island and guess what we went to??? You're right ….a Farmers' Market! There wasn't much produce, but we did enjoy some of the local baked goods! August 14th was our 6th wedding anniversary and we had a reservation at Poet's Cove Marina for Sunday night. We hoisted the anchor Sunday afternoon and motored for about 15 minutes to get to the marina. It was nice to be able to drop off 15 days worth of trash and do laundry as well as enjoy the great restaurant and pool! Monday evening we celebrated our anniversary with a delectable dinner featuring local foods and were treated to a spectacular sunset. Poet's Cove is a fairly new upscale resort with a marina and has a beautiful setting.
Lyall Harbour, Saturna Island, BC, Canada – After enjoying the luxury of Poet's Cove, we set our course for Lyall Harbor, another large tree-lined bay and were treated to another  awesome sunset! Gary is becoming fixated with sunset pictures and the results are stunning. He printed off a copy of this picture and dropped it off for the folks on S/V Irene & they were very appreciative - inviting us over for cocktails & conversation. The second morning we were here, I woke up early and was treated to two black tail deer gingerly picking their way down to the water's edge to browse, a pair of raucous kingfishers, and a blue heron…all while enjoying my morning tea! I had read about a winery on Saturna Island and discovered it was only a dink ride away, so off we went to Breezy Bay & the Saturna Island Winery. We enjoyed a lunch on the patio overlooking the vineyards and Plumper Sound. After lunch, we sampled the wines and bought a case! Luckily, the staff gave us a ride back to the dink, as it had been a 15-minute, up-hill walk to get to the winery! We celebrated our 2nd year Boat Anniversary with Saturna Island wine and crab cakes while in Lyall Harbour. After dinner we each completed a “Top 10 List” of the “Best” & “Worst” things of the past year. It was a little surprising (or maybe not) that 6 of the 10 things on each list were the same for each of us. Here's a sampling:
Some of the Best Things about this past year (not prioritized)
Going under the Golden Gate Bridge
Getting to see the natural world close up & personal
Enjoying the creature comforts of the boat & ease of operation
Meeting nice folks & hearing about their travels
Spending time at anchor
Time to do anything
The sea otters & seeing Ruffles
Not knowing what tomorrow will bring
Gary – time to photograph & Transderm Scop
Dorothy – finally understanding (?) the charger/alternator/electrical system & knowing that I can do more on the boat, overcoming some fears
Some of the Worst Things about the past year (not prioritized)
Being away from family & friends in Michigan
Leaving new friends
Not sailing more
Hassles with the telephone, modem, computers
Trying to figure out how much this really costs & doing a budget
Murray falling overboard
Leaks
Knee problems
Gary – “the Black Hole” aka the refrigerator
Dorothy – the Engine Block fiasco
When we moved aboard we said we'd give ourselves three years to see how we liked it, and so far neither of us is even remotely considering the possibility of a land-life in the near future! If you are considering making a major life change, our “words of wisdom” are “Do it NOW!”
One of the items on the Worst List was hassles with phone & modem service. When we originally signed up with Cingular & bought our current phone we were assured that it would work as a modem for the computer & eventually that did occur (after more than 6 months of trying!) After getting it to work we notices a degradation in our webpage graphics? We think that in order get get all the graphics to download at a reasonable rate Cingular compressed them. This compression is a lossy format; which meant that there was a loss in quality and all the webpage graphics were really bad when we looked at them using the cellphone modem. After checking the webpage with a regular connection, we determined that there really was no problem, it was just the cellphone modem. Now that we're in Canada, it brought a whole new set of communication challenges. We were able to switch phone plans to a North American Plan, so we didn't have to pay roaming charges to keep in touch with the folks back in Michigan. When we made the change we asked about our Data plan (for which we pay an additional $80/month) and were told that it would work fine with no additional charges...silly us to believe such a thing! Cingular is partnered with Rogers here in Canada to provide service to its customers, so we're now using the Rogers network, except that roaming charges are applied to the data connection at the cost of $.02/kilobyte, that gets pricey really fast! Needless to say, we decided that that wasn't a good use of our monetary resources and we've given up the modem. Luckily, there is a wireless internet service, Broadband Xpress, available in many marinas that allows us to sign up for a day or several months at a time and that's how this log got uploaded (finally in late September)!
Glenthorne Passage, Prevost Island, BC
Deb & Tony who we met in Reid Harbor said there were great sunsets in this narrow little  anchorage & were they ever right! It was quite narrow and anchoring was a challenge, but eventually we got it right. Every night Gary climbed in the dink after dinner as he had more options when choosing where to capture the sunset. This little house was on the point and we  wondered what happened to it at high tide; it looked a bit precarious. After spending three days in Glenthorne, I was really surprised when I hoisted the anchor and discovered a crab-pot firmly attached to it! Because the anchorage was so narrow, we opted try removing it once we got in deeper water and after several attempts Gary was able to pull the anchor off the crab-pot. Unfortunately we weren't able to free the crabs before the crab-pot fell back into the water.
James Bay, Salt Spring Island, BC
This quiet bay is part of the Gulf Islands National Park and we explored by dink & kayak. We enjoy going ashore and hiking some of the trails. Folks from the Park Service came by and asked if we'd be willing to answer some survey questions that would be used to ascertain park usage & help with future planning…so we did! We have visited several of the Gulf Island National Park & Marine Park sites, finding all well maintained.
Ganges, Salt Spring Island, BC
We pulled into the Ganges Marina for the weekend with no problems and quickly disposed of trash! Gary's been frustrated in marinas up here because he can't wash the boat due to water restriction. Water may only be used to fill water tanks and this marina was no exception. Ganges Marina is close to town and it didn't take us long to scope out the local ice cream store & a place for dinner. I made a great discovery when doing major grocery shopping at Thrifty Market; the cruising guide mentioned that the store would deliver orders over $25 to the marina & I figured that meant that it would drop the bags off at shore. Was I ever surprised & pleased to find out that “delivery” meant right to the boat! Not an easy task given the unevenness & maze-like quality of the docks! Ganges is known for its Saturday Market & after spending 3 hours there, we know why! Lots of handcrafted items from local artists, lively musical entertainment, and local cheeses & baked goods, along with produce…what more  could we ask? This was just a quick stop and we left Sunday morning with 15-knot winds that made leaving the dock interesting to say the least. With the use of a spring line and folks on the dock, we were able to get out of our slip after being blown sideways into another dock. Open water looked good as we set our course for Montague Harbour on Galiano Island, spending 3 nights before heading to our current anchorage on Portland Island.
Summer is coming to an end as the evenings are becoming cooler (we've even turned on the heat a couple times) and we're looking forward to another 4-6 weeks of cruising up here with less crowded anchorages and brilliant blue skies. We still haven't decided where we're going to winter, but eventually will have to seriously start narrowing down our options.
Quotes for the Month
Smiles,
Dorothy, Gary & Murray the Cat
Last updated on
August 31, 2005
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