July 26, 2013

July 19th  through July 25th  docked Ladysmith Maritime Society marina:  On the 19th we pulled anchor and headed for the Ladysmith Maritime Society marina to moor the boat for a week.  Ladysmith is a quaint town on the east coast of Vancouver Island.  Here we will meet Pam’s sister Barb and her husband Craig (Carl’s best friend).  They spent the night on the boat with us then we all drove to the west side of Vancouver Island to the very nice little fishing town of Ucluelet.  Two years ago we booked a whale watching and fishing trip here with Cam and Laura of Beachcomber Ocean Adventures http://wildedgewhales.info/  We had such a good time and successful fishing trip that we decided to do it again.  We stayed with them for three nights with a salmon trip and rock fish (bottom fishing) trip.  We did well on salmon and had at least one halibut and a few ling cod.  Wonderful when they are done up fresh on the barby!  We topped off the days with a sauna in Cam’s rustic, authentic cedar and woodstove sauna.  You get to a pretty hot steam and cool off with cold buckets of water over the head.  Unless of course you are Cam in which case you sink your whole body into a big vat of very cold water after each steaming in the sauna!  We headed back to the boat and enjoyed two days of sailing and one night “on the hook” anchored in a small cove.  We put Barb and Craig to work hoisting sails, cleaning the anchor and pulling anchor chain.  Craig took over steering for awhile to get a feel for the big boat and Barb got adept at tacking the head sail (pulling the sail from side to side as we turn the boat).  It was great to have them along and they are now on the Victoria to Port Angeles ferry on their way home.