July 20 – Ladysmith to Cowichan Bay, 21 miles

Before retiring for the night, we announced we would be leaving around 8 o’clock in the morning for the best currents heading south and through Sansum Narrows. Ray and Mary must have taken that to heart, because they were both up way before sunrise. They blamed it on the apple-rhubarb pie. In any case, when we got up around 6, Erin’s tea was ready and we had breakfast before leaving, rather than while underway.

It was already warm when we left, and the side windows were coming out before we got too far away from the anchorage. Our cruise south was uneventful, which is a good thing. We arrived at the narrows around a half hour after slack and encountered only the slightest of turbulence. Cowichan Bay is just around the corner from the southern exit of the narrows, across the bay from Genoa Bay. While we have never cruised into Genoa Bay, we drove there last year with Trav and Barb when we rented the car out of Maple Bay, the harbor on the north side of the narrows.

We’re on the government dock at one end of town, and are delighted with both our moorage and the town itself. The main street runs along the waterfront for about a quarter mile, with a mixture of shops, floating homes, restaurants and shipyards along the way. Craig and Kristine told us we could get the best ever fish and chips here, and a couple from Victoria who moored their boat ahead of ours about an hour after we arrived offered the same advice, unsolicited. We plan on having some fish and chips tomorrow. We also plan on staying for at least a second night so we’ll have some time to look around.

When we arrived, the tide was low and the ramp was quite steep. Erin and I went into town to look around while Ray and Mary stayed on the boat. The maritime museum, which we all want to see, is situated at the other end of town and would be quite a hike for Ray and Mary round trip, so our plan is to take the dinghy to the other end of town for an excursion tomorrow.

We took several photos of the waterfront here during our initial walk, and I’ll post a few here. There are two or three unsecured network connections here, so hopefully we won’t have any problems posting some updates to the blog.