July 21 – Cowichan Bay

It’s another beautiful day in the neighborhood. The skies are clear and the weather is sunny. A breeze developed later in the morning, which helped keep us cool throughout the day. Ray fulfilled his morning duties of preparing breakfast, baking some orange flavored rolls accompanied by eggs over easy. I topped up the water tank, which was almost empty from several showers and laundry loads, and Erin ran another load. Other than that, we mostly spent the morning watching harbor activity and catching up on some reading.

Ray and Mary decided to walk through the town rather than take the dinghy down to the Maritime Museum and around 12:30 we set off into town. We browsed through a couple shops before arriving at our first destination, the Rock Cod Café, home of purportedly the best fish and chips you can find in this hemisphere. We all ordered the two piece cod fish and chips plate. The only quantity choices on the fish were one piece or two pieces and we figured we could take home some leftovers. We sure did. Each piece was literally a slab, an entire filet and a big one at that. The pieces were quite a bit longer than the plate and were folded, giving the appearance of four huge pieces on each of our plates. We did our best but still brought back more than we ate there. I’m not sure about the entire hemisphere, but Trav and Barb can take note that it beats the Dinghy Dock Pub in Nanaimo hands down.

Adjacent to the café was the Maritime Museum. It consists of a shop and a 350’ pier with three buildings or “pods” along its length. Each pod housed exhibits of various elements of maritime history. In the first pod we saw some old dugout canoes, and they were remarkably similar to those we saw being paddled around our anchorage at Dunsmuir Island across from Ladysmith the other day. I don’t think I mentioned it in that day’s log but those canoes were being manned by natives, one with two persons and two with one each. They were paddling in earnest, no doubt preparing for some sort of regatta or meet. The canoes were long and narrow and hewn from a single piece of wood.

The next pod housed several examples of antique outboard motors as well as exhibits of lap strake boats and their construction techniques. It was slightly disturbing to find as a museum exhibit a 2 hp Elgin outboard very similar to what we had as kids. To share the museum similarity wealth, in the shop there was also a Sea Horse 22 hp outboard of 1930’s vintage, a twin to Jim’s 22 hp Johnson outboard. Also on display was an Indian outboard, made by the same folks who made Indian motorcycles. Only 2000 of these were made in 1930 before the depression hit, so they’re relatively rare now.

The last pod at the end of the pier housed several meticulously made model boats from several eras, including the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria. The accompanying blurb pointed out that the real Santa Maria was built in 1462, so was already 30 years old when relegated to Columbus for his quest to find a new route to the east. Also on display was a 1/64th scale model of the HMS Victory, an 18th century ship of the line in the Royal Navy. The actual HMS Victory is the oldest naval vessel still commissioned, currently in dry dock in Portsmouth, England serving as a museum. Several models of tugboats and other workboats from the late 19th and early to mid 20th century were also on display. Most of the models were built by local retired ear, nose and throat surgeon Ewald Dwersteg, who says: “I worked with fine instruments in surgery and this hobby requires a similar coordination and spatial orientation with your hands”. Although the doctor had an extensive knowledge of shipbuilding and naval history, he was a landlubber who would sum up his opinion of sailing thusly: “He who goes to sea, goes to Hell for a pastime”. Seventeen of the models on display are his handiwork.

A boatbuilding class was in progress in the shop on shore. They were building a 10 foot dinghy of mahogany, oak and cedar. One of the museum staff told me that if a class member paid for the materials he could then take it home, otherwise they would raffle it off. A previously built model was on the floor to be raffled, with tickets $5 each. It takes from $1500 to $2000 just for the materials they use. Outside on the street side were some other exhibits, including a couple of vintage diesel engines from old tug boats.

By the time we got back to the boat we were all ready for some ice cold drinks and relaxation. It was somewhat cooler inside, thanks to the sun shield of dish towels devised by Erin. Our future plans include a more formal window dressing for these front windows, but for now we’re cool inside, whether we look cool or not.