Around Vancouver Island 2013

Day 31 – August 4, 2013 Sunday

When we awoke this morning and peeked out at the day, we discovered the world was gone. Instead of the beautiful islands we saw when we went to bed, we were welcomed by a dense fog. This must be Fogust. Moe and I both laid right back down and snuggled in for a little more sleep. No one would be going anywhere for awhile.

Last night we had all decided that we would take a little putt in James around the islands and, in particular, stop at Jarvis Island, which is Jon`s namesake. Once we had all got up to greet the day, I made some bacon and eggs for breakfast and then we prepared to do a little gunkholing. Sounds terrible, doesn`t it? We all piled into James with our chart, Dreamspeaker book, VHF and compass in hand. I had visions of us getting lost in this maze of islands. Jon and I sat in the middle, Kate on the bow and Moe on the stern with the motor. Jon and I carefully charted where we were and soon I realized that we would be okay. We made our way over to Jarvis island where we hoped to find some old fish traps in a pool and then do some beachcombing. We did find the pool and, with high tide on our side, were able to motor into the pool. It was deep enough for our dinghy but clear enough that we could see the hundreds of oysters covering the bottom. No one noticed any old fish traps. With that, we exited and found our way into another inlet that led us into a bay. We found a good spot to pull up our dinghy and disembarked. The shore was quite rocky with black jagged rocks so we carefully picked our way along. I tried to find a comfortable rock to sit on and settled for a barnacle encrusted rock with a small flat top. After scraping barnacles off the rock with my bum, I abandoned that rock and looked for a friendlier one, which I did eventually find. The day had turned out quite nice once the fog burned off and the sun kissed the trees and the water. We all enjoyed a little relaxation and then Jon, finding some large dried kelp that he draped over his shoulders as a cape, did a little spiritual dance in honour of his claiming Jarvis Island as his own.

Time was passing and we needed to start heading back to Reborn for our journey to Ucluelet. We motored passed some kayakers as we went through the exit channel. I hope we didn’t leave too much of a wake for them to roll over! We didn’t hear any yelling, so I’m sure they were just fine.

As we motored across the open part of water between the islands, we saw a very dense fog bank on the Vancouver Island side. Hmmm, looked like we would be navigating through the fog. Within about half an hour of arriving back at Reborn, we had the anchor up and just after 2:00 we were heading out of Joe’s Bay, bathed in sun, and making our way to the fog bank. Ten minutes later we were engulfed in the fog. Moe had the radar on and we were all on high alert. Visibility at the worst was about 100 meters. By 2:45 we did make it to the other side of the fog bank and, finally, the world came into view again. That, of course, also made us very visible. There are many charter boats out here toodling the tourists and fishermen around. One of the charter boats, Beachcomber Charters, thought they might like to get a closer look at us and set, what appeared to us, to be a course directly for us. Was he planning a T-Bone?! He got close enough to see the whites of our bulging eyes before he turned to pass us on our stern. All the looky-loos on the deck got a good look! Tourists.

As we entered the inlet leading to the marina at Ucluelet we saw another ketch coming up behind us. I had a look with the binoculars and was pleased to report it was ‘Marissa Ann’, who we had last seen in Walter’s Cove. They followed us in all the way to the marina entrance where we took a little detour around a boat that was at anchor. We had found Michel and Frances on Paxx! Then we followed ‘Marissa Ann’ into the narrow passage. Unfortunately, for us, both of the spots at the dock that the wharfinger had told us to go to were now occupied, but they were able to find us another spot and at 5:07 we were happily tied to the dock.

Michel and Frances soon joined us for drinks on the deck. I had planned a shower but was thwarted by occupied shower stalls so returned to the boat where we had a great visit with our friends. We invited Michel and Frances to join us at dinner. We were going to go out to the ‘Canadian Princess’. This is a large, ex-cruise ship that is permanently fixed to the shore and serves as a pub/fine dining restaurant. They declined so John, Kate, Moe and myself went on our own. The restaurant looked very nice and nautical and we had decided to eat on the fine dining side. I could go into the abysmal service we received but, suffice to say, I cannot recommend that restaurant. But the food was good.

We returned to our boat where Jon, Kate and Moe sat in the wheelhouse chatting and I took a walk up and down the docks. When I returned I asked Moe if he could kindly come with me the next day and explain the many varieties of commercial fishing boats that I had walked by. We didn’t stay up long after I returned and soon were cuddled up in our bunks.