As luck would have it, as soon as we dropped Ken and Cherie at the ferry terminal, the weather forecast began to look up. On our cruise south, we had nice weather and were able to enjoy sunny days...a welcome phenomenon.
As we travelled south, we were able to enjoy the good weather and calm seas. My folks, who travel much faster, left Ocean Falls at the same time, and spent their days fishing in various nooks and crannies, as they waited for us to catch up!
We were entertained by humpbacks, as we had been on most days of our trip, and also had the pleasure of seeing a pod of orca near Malcolm Island. WE spent our evenings in beautiful Fury Cove, in Blunden Harbour, in Port Harvey (with the Pictographs), and finally at Kelsey Bay. We had the wind at our backs for most of this time, and were lucky enough to have some fabulous sailing as we made our way on this final leg of the journey.
As we neared Campbell River, we decided that we would spend the next few days in and around Desolation Sound, as we didn't wish to be home earlier than planned, and thought we should take advantage of the weather. We were in no rush to be home to the inevitable stack of emails, phone messages, bills, and work.
But Renova must have missed her pals at the dock, because just as we entered famous Seymour narrows, good ol' Perk (our engine) started hunting again, where her RPM varied up and down. We were able to quickly shut her down, and were thankful for our outboard that we had strapped on the transom. John expertly reached over and gave a tug on the pull cord...only to find the pull cord break in his hands. With only a couple of expletives...he quickly got to work fashioning a make-shift pull cord and had the outboard running in only a couple minutes. And soon after, he had made adjustments to the injector pump, and we were running under both engines as we pulled into Discovery Passage. Our plans of lazing around for the next couple days were shot. We pulled into our marina, found a slip adjacent to a new portion of the dock, and quietly crept up to the house with only our keys and wallets. And just like that, it was over.
As luck would have it, Pierre and Danielle, were able to track us down in Campbell River, and we enjoyed a dinner with them at the house, treated to orca swimming by in the channel. What a great end to a great holiday.
As we travelled south, we were able to enjoy the good weather and calm seas. My folks, who travel much faster, left Ocean Falls at the same time, and spent their days fishing in various nooks and crannies, as they waited for us to catch up!
When we finally met, we traveled to Eucott Bay and waited out the rain and wind, were entertained by dolphins, enjoyed the hotsprings, and waited for Ken and Cherie to arrive via ferry at Shearwater. When Ken and Cherie did arrive, we met them in the dark at the Shearwater dock, thanks to the shuttle service provided by the b&b Ken and Cherie had arranged, and had a nice evening of catching up before they retired to their comfy (single) beds, and John and I to the boat at the dock. The next morning, we bought copious amounts of rain gear and boots, enjoyed brunch in the pub, picked up a few groceries, filled the water tanks, and we were on our way to explore Burke Channel. The weather wasn't as cooperative as our first two times up this way, and we found ourselves in chopping seas, with a fresh wind. Luckily, I steered to keep my stomach calm.
Ocean Falls, once a booming mill site with the biggest hotel north of San Francisco, is now a small community of fifty year round residents, and twice that in the summer months. Fishing is still very good in the area, and we saw several boats catching salmon at the mouth of Cousins Inlet. We stayed three days with Ken and Cherie and were able to explore the old town, Martin Valley and the old holiday homes along the inlet. Although it rained constantly, we enjoyed poking around town, fishing, relaxing and visiting. Ken and Cherie jumped back on the ferry for the return trip to Port Hardy.
In hopes of getting a slight head start to make up for our slower speed, we left Kumealon Inlet earlier than the others, travelling by radar in the morning fog. As we entered the channel, the fog lifted momentarily to reveal a glorious blue sky!! Wahooo....laundry day! We were able to sail with our genoa for short periods, but mostly we motored along, as our laundry dried in the breeze.
We spoke briefly with a visiting fisherman at the docks who had been having good luck on the water this week. We were inspired to do a little fishing the next day!
After another night at the rickety docks of Butedale, we made our way to Windy Bay to wait out the predicted gales. A couple of relaxing days spent exploring, crabbing, reading, and resting!!
With a leaking engine, we realized we needed to alter our course, and make our way to Prince Rupert, in order to fix our engine. We weren't planning to go to PR, so we didn't have the appropriate charts, but we were fortunate to hail a passing fish boat, who gave us his local chart, refusing to take any of our tokens of thanks. This was an indicator of the kindness we were to experience in PR.
Immediately upon entering the docks, we met Marty, who was kind enough to provide some advice on local mechanics. After more chatting, he invited us up to his house for showers, laundry and even dinner!! What a treat. Over the next week while we awaited parts, took shelter from weather, conducted repairs, and re-provisioned, Marty and his family took us in and chauffeured us, fed us, entertained us, toured us, calmed us, and warmed us. We can't thank them enough. We're looking forward to repaying their kindness and hope we can do the same for other cruisers that arrive here in CR. We also hope to return to PR to explore more of the surrounding area.
Well, after 3 months on the hard, we were thrilled when we were finally able to get in the water for the May Long Weekend. And we were more excited when Amy and Strahan decided to join us. We joined several other local club boats and headed for a weekend of fun and sun at Gorge Harbour.
another night on the water - we had heard that the weather would turn nasty on Monday, but it was hard to imagine, when all was glorious...after all...they had been wrong before.
