August 6 – 13 Sidney to Sidney Spit with many stops in
between
A week of being tourists unfolds. We have decided that we will probably not be
back in this area for awhile so we will work our way up the east coast of
Vancouver Island from Sidney to Chemainus, areas we have not even explored by
land.
We spend one night anchored in Tod Inlet, near the back
entrance to Butchart Gardens. It is BC
day. We had hoped Butchart might have
fireworks. Alas, the only fireworks are
as people anchor too near one another, including us. The same boat drags his anchor. I am sure we were not the only ones who were
glad to see them leave without spending the night.
Catching the currents we ride up to Cowichan Bay. We set the shrimp pot over by Separation Point
and then cross to Cowichan and anchor.
Beaching our trusty ET on shore we walk the quiet beach front village
and sample the bakery. Excellent!
We then tour the Cowichan Bay Maritime
Centre. This is an excellent use of a
converted fuel wharf. There are numerous
small buildings along the wharf that highlight the local maritime history. It serves as well as the local small boat
building center. We of course sample the
ice cream at the Morning Mist. We enjoy
our cone while sitting at the locals open air hang out, a few tables in a
covered area between a couple of the small marinas. We ‘hang out’ long enough to then grab a
burger and brew at the only pub. We
waddle back to ET and sleep well on the hook.
While watching the clothes go round and round we hear via
email from Liv. She and Bill have moored
Mischief at the MBYC as well and are wondering where we are. We set a date for drinks at the bar in order
to get an early seat for the MBYC Wednesday night movie and light dinner. The movie “Hector and the Search for
Happiness” is a funny yet oddly thought provoking romp. We top off the evening sipping “Mischief” a
nice whiskey that someone had given Bill and Liv when they first bought their
boat.
They are gone from the dock, headed south, before we are
up for our cockpit coffee hour the next morning. We pass a quiet lazy day reading, hike once
again to the pub at the other end of the bay, and are helped off of the dock
the next morning by a combination of people from a Willard, the stand in
wharfinger Phil, and a nice woman from the power boat that we are sandwiched in
next to.
Continuing our way north we have a nice sail most of the
length of Stuart Channel. Our last point
of interest is quiet Chemainus, another small berg we have not explored. It is just south of Ladysmith where we docked
ExTerra a few years ago when Barb and Craig drove up to meet us.
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| MODEL sailboat 'sailing' Telegraph Harbor |
On the advice of Bill, Liv and many others we anchor in
Preedy Harbour, Thetis Island, across the Channel from Chemainus. We can then ferry across the next day to
enjoy the small town. But tonight, in
our never ending quest for a good dark beer we hike to the Thetis Island Marina. They do have a Nanaimo porter! It is quite good. Along our hike we see a couple of beautiful model sailboats gently sailing on Telegraph Harbor. We believe they are somehow tethered in place but they do sail back and forth in the gentle breeze.
Our anchorage is quite close to the thankfully small
ferry. It motors in about every two
hours, loads up, spins a 180 and if we gunned our engine we could probably
motor right onto it when it hits the 90 degree mark. Instead we dinghy to the small community dock
and walk on as passengers along with the entire current group of youngsters ‘camping’
at the local Capernwray Harbour Bible Centre.
The exuberance of this many young campers is fun to watch.
Our day in Chemainus consists of walking the streets and
enjoying the more than 50 murals that have been painted all over town. They depict the heritage of Chemainus from
its early First Nations people, through the wars and onto the lumber dynasties.
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| Tug Boat "Chemainus" 1909-1945 |
They are quite well done and we thoroughly
enjoy wandering up and down streets and alleys to view them.
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| Local First Nations figures past and present Snip Hunter statue in the foreground |
Of course we find the bakery, the pub, and
the thrift stores. We do however forego
our normal ice cream for a change. Pam
picks up a paperback for a quarter and we wait for the ferry to take us back to
our Thetis Island anchorage.
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| First Nations woman awaits arrival of HMS Reindeer |
Having completed our east coast tourist swing we head out
with the proper currents the next morning for the Isle-de-Lis National Park
Reserve on tiny Rum Island. After a
brief visit by a power boat we have the anchorage to ourselves overnight and
watch the lights of the numerous cargo and container ships as they transit Haro
Strait between us and Turn Point lighthouse where a couple of weeks ago we
hiked with Jim.
The crab pot is not very
productive but we keep two. Carl lands a
twenty pound dog fish on our deck so that Pam can use the needle nosed plies to
extract the hook. This is a nice new set
of pliers….with a lanyard….that Zach bought for the boat. Yes, there is the usual reason for this and
it does include releasing dog fish with needle nosed pliers that did NOT have a
lanyard!
The next day our hike around the tiny island is nice. The foot wide path clings to the edge of the
rocky points and takes us up and down the small swales turning at times to
nothing more than a deer trail. Evidence
of deer yet we do not see any. We weigh
anchor after the hike and head for Sidney Spit for another night on the hook.
Entering Sidney Spit we hear a distinct “pop” somewhere
in the engine or under the boat. Carl
quickly puts it in neutral and goes below to watch the engine. No crab pots were in sight so we hope it is
not a rope. We motor very slowly into
the anchorage and set the hook, then we work the motor through forward and
reverse. We watch the motor and
listen. No smoke, no clanking, both
gears work. We simply ponder over a
glass of cold Crystal Lite.
As we watch the commercial crabbers we see something
suspicious. They ‘long line’ their crab
pots meaning they throw out some floats then drive their boat in long straight
lines dropping off numerous crab pots that are strung together, then throw out
another float at the end of the run.
They do this numerous times.
Another time they are fairly close to us and we see them pull something
out of the water. It was a SUBMERGED
float. They then continue to pull lots
of line and some pots working their way back towards where we heard the “pop.” Perhaps they will find that their line has
been severed by our razor sharp Shaft Shark that we put on our shaft this
spring. We are not sure, but that is
quite plausible.
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