July 27 – La Conner to Lake Union, 53 miles

We woke up early in anticipation of getting out of town to do some traveling before the heat of the day caught up with us – but still had a leisurely start, brewing a pot of tea and a pot of coffee for Ray and Mary. We noted the direction of the current to plan how to adjust our lines for departure. In La Conner, on the Swinomish Channel, the current flows fairly strongly in either direction, depending on the tide. It was still flowing in our favor, but wouldn’t be for long. We shoved off a few minutes before 7 o’clock in the morning. I angled the stern out away from the dock and let the current catch it and push us away before heading out of town and under the Rainbow Bridge.

South of La Conner, after passing Shelter Bay, is Hole In The Wall, the narrow opening created years ago by the Corps of Engineers when they converted what was Swinomish Slough into a navigable channel. From there we make a sharp turn to starboard, line up with the range markers and follow the dredged channel past the mud flats on either side that are being exposed by the falling tide. We are “behind” Whidbey Island and the tidal flow ebbs around either end of the island – to the south around Possession Point, and to the north through Deception Pass. We were just a few miles from Deception Pass where we made the turn to the south, so the ebb current opposed us, reducing our headway speed.

But, it was a beautiful morning with glass smooth water and scenery everywhere, including Mount Baker coming into view as we passed by the Skagit Bay shallows. We had an almost chilly breeze at the time, and I said out loud that we would be wishing for this breeze in a few hours, as the forecast was for temperatures into the 90’s.

Once we had cleared the shallow channel and viewed the close-up scenery, Erin went below to stir up some breakfast, and soon reappeared with some egg and sausage sandwiches, perfect hand food for eating on the run. We were soon at Strawberry Point, where we angled towards the western shore of Camano Island to follow it south through Saratoga Passage. Along the way we were removing the windows on the bridge until we had just the canvas top, which we left up for shade from the ever warming sun. I had the throttles at 1400 rpm, which was about 8.5 knots through the water, although our boat speed was usually a little less due to the ebbing current. As we got further south the ebb actually helped us for a short time before the tide turned.

We passed both the Mukilteo/Clinton ferry and Edmonds/Kingston ferry routes as we continued south towards Shilshole and the Ballard Locks. At times we would be traveling the same speed and direction as the wind, which left us with no wind at all. Erin brought up an electric fan and we placed it on the bridge dash behind the computer to create our own breeze.

After about 6 hours of cruising, we arrived at the locks, and as we were cruising down the fairway towards the railroad bridge, I could see that the green light was lit for the small lock. We continued on towards the entrance to the lock, thinking how lucky we were to hit it just right. As we approached the light, it quickly changed to red and the locktender’s voice came over a loudspeaker “What is your length? Call us on channel 13”. I called to report our overall length, and they said “sorry, you won’t fit – we’ll get you on the next locking”. The tide was fairly low, so rather than tie up to the barnacle encrusted waiting wall we stood by, waiting for 20 or 30 minutes until the lock was available again. At least we were first in line.

The small lock typically holds 5 or 6 pleasure boats, and is by far the more desirable of the two locks available. It also features floating walls that the boats tie to, so no line work is required during ascent. In the large lock, the locktender throws a small line down to each end of the boat, your lock lines are tied on and secured to bollards topside. As the water fills the lock, it’s necessary to keep the line taut as the level changes. To add to that difficulty, 3 or 4 other boats are usually rafted alongside with their weight pulling on your lines as well. So, we were grateful for the small lock, even with the wait.

As we exited the lock into the ship canal, I called our friend Trav, who had volunteered to operate the “Interurban”, a ride so Ray and I could retrieve our car from home while Erin and Mary organized stuff. We soon returned with Erin’s car, the PT Cruiser. It’s smaller than our Jimmy, but I remembered that the air conditioner had failed about a week before we left on our trip and it was now 91 degrees outside with the temperature still rising. We stuffed what we could in the back of the car, and we all climbed in to air conditioned comfort, including, of course, Tribble, who had earned her stripes as a genuine boat cat.

We had a great time the entire trip and were delighted that Ray and Mary could come along with us. We enjoy their company and look forward to assembling the photos and video so we can revisit the good times. The boat performed flawlessly as well, making the trip all the more pleasurable. A good time was had by all.

July 26 – Anacortes to La Conner, 10 miles

This morning Ray and Erin collaborated on making a frittata for breakfast. It had maple sausage, onions and some other goodies in it. It was yummy, along with the hash browns that Ray cooked up.

Erin and I went for a walk into town, first heading down to the other end of the marina to take a look at the W.T. Preston, now on display ashore. The Preston is a steam powered stern-wheeler that plied the waters of Puget Sound for many years removing snags and other hazards to navigation. It was retired from service in 1981 and ended up on permanent display in Anacortes a few years later.

As we were walking to the Preston we noted a car with two dogs inside, windows rolled all the way up and unattended. It was still there when we left for our next stop, the Safeway store to pick up a Sunday newspaper. After we returned to the boat, I took my cell phone and walked back to see if they were still there an hour later. They were, so I called the police and they said they would dispatch an officer to check. In weather like this, those dogs could get cooked pretty fast – they were already wiener dogs (dachshunds).

As usual, the tide and current was against us for our run down to La Conner, but we didn’t have that far to go. We cruised out of Cap Sante past the oil refinery dock. There were two tankers at the dock – one full and one empty, and another at anchor, which appeared to be empty. A work boat approached it as we were cruising by and dropped someone off at a stairway that was lowered. Must be getting ready to go for more crude.

We arrived at La Conner around 1 o’clock. Both marina boat basins had plenty of room, so with that in mind we cruised along the waterfront of town to see if there was a vacancy on one of the city docks. They have no facilities, but they’re right in town and just fun to stay at. None had an opening our size, but when we got to the south end of town, one more dock, a relatively new one just a block south of the last business, was available. Eventually a hotel is going to be built there, but for now there is just a landing area and the dock. We tied up, and Erin and Mary immediately headed into town to do some shopping. Ray and I had some leisure time reading the newspaper while they walked the town in the blazing sun. When they returned, Mary had a new travel bag, and Erin had an outdoor garden decoration and a silver ring – a successful shopping trip for both.

About that time, a fellow heading for a small boat behind us stopped by to ask if we had registered. We hadn’t yet, but I told him we planned on it. We had also been noticing some undesirable odors from time to time, so I went back to chat with the guy, a local, some more. I asked him if there was a sewer outlet somewhere around here, and he said that there was, although it was treated and supposed to be below the low tide level. He went on to tell me that the reason he asked about registration is that the dock belongs to a developer friend of his, and he said boats were staying without paying. No one is there to monitor the dock – they just have a drop box, same as the city docks here.

We didn’t care for the dock after being there a couple hours. Besides the smell that would waft up every so often, our view landward was the underside of a pier, and the price was higher than either the city docks in town or the marina. I could see with the binoculars that there was still plenty of room north of town at the marina, so we decided to pull up stakes and head up that way. Along the way we saw a boat leaving a city dock, one of our favorites with a steel fish sculpture over the walkway to shore. We went upstream a bit as we were heading into the current, turned around and came in for our second landing of the day. The view is better, it’s 15 bucks cheaper and as a bonus I’m picking up a free wifi connection.

Erin and I went for another walk into town just to snap a few photos, and we decided that rather than cook dinner in the heat we’d pick up 4 orders of fish and chips from the La Conner Tavern. We’ve had them there before and knew they’d be good. They were.

Tomorrow we make the long run home down to the locks and into Lake Union. As has been our luck the past few days, we’ll be going upstream, as the ideal time to take advantage of the currents would be to leave at either 3 in the morning or 2 in the afternoon. Neither of those sound like a good idea, so we’ll just plan on cruising an extra hour.

July 25 – Westscott Bay to Anacortes, 29 miles

As we were having breakfast this morning, we noticed a tall ship come into the bay and anchor, up at the entrance. It was the Hawaiian Warrior. We saw both it and the Lady Washington last year while we were traveling with Trav and Barb, as we entered Maple Bay in the Gulf Islands. And, sure enough, not too much later we saw another tall ship come in and anchor and it was the Lady Washington. We took a few telephoto shots, and planned on taking some close-ups as we left the harbor. We had some extra entertainment when they fired their cannon – it was towards us, but no cannonball came flying overhead.

Yesterday morning, for some reason, the starboard engine was a little cranky about starting up. It eventually did start, but because we had to crank on it quite a bit, it belched a lot of smoke on some neighboring boats at Roche Harbor. So, I thought it would be a good idea to start a little early, just in case some tinkering would be required. It wasn’t – it started right up. We raised the anchor and slowly cruised out, doing a full 360 circle around the Lady Washington as she lay at anchor, snapping photos all the way around.

I had plotted a course on the computer to take us to Anacortes. We hadn’t stopped there in many years so thought we’d see what was new. Our computer software includes ETA and Best-Departure-Time features. All the current stations along the way are automatically linked to the route’s waypoints, and given a date and time range and expected cruising speed, the best and worst departure times are calculated. Today some more than average tides were occurring, which begets a little higher than average current speeds through the various passageways throughout the islands. Of course, for today’s trip the best departure times would have been about 4:30 in the morning or 3:30 in the afternoon. We left about 45 minutes before the absolute worst departure time, so had reduced headway much of the time due to oncoming currents as the tide ebbed and the water flowed out of the islands and into the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Our trip through the islands and across Rosario Strait was uneventful, and although some legs seemed to take quite a bit of time as our forward speed was reduced from 8.5 knots down to under 5 knots at times, in total only about 45 minutes extra time was added to our journey.

We arrived at Cap Sante Marina in Anacortes around 1 o’clock, and the drill here is to tie up to C dock to get a slip assignment. A small sign on the breakwater gave the hailing channel for the harbormaster, and I called as we were approaching the dock. Just as Erin and Ray were tossing our lines to someone standing on the dock, I received an assignment to a slip on D dock, and away we went, with our lines being hastily retrieved. If only they could assign slips in Sidney that quickly.

The last time we were here with the boat the docks were wood, old and rickety, with some individual floating boat houses along the way, so we were agog at how much the harbor has changed. The docks looked brand new, and we found out at the office later that they were upgraded just last year. The boat houses are gone and the shore side facilities are all new.

The weather was sunny with temperature in the low 80’s, and we quickly closed the sun side curtains and set up our fan for maximum cooling effect inside the salon. We watched from our shady location as other boaters came in and quickly went about their business of hosing off any salt residue from their hull and railings. A little later Erin and I took a walk over to the Safeway store a few blocks away, and although we have only two days left on our trip and much more food than that on board, we managed to come back with a selection of goodies.

Later in the evening we were treated to quite a light show, as a thunderstorm approached from the southeast. For the first hour or so it was just bright flashes and loud thunderclaps, but eventually the rain hit. Ray and I were up on the bridge watching, so quickly put in the side curtains, then congratulated ourselves on our previous laziness as the rain washed away any salt residue. Erin hastily deployed our drip bowls, as we have an assortment of interior leaks. Some reliably occur in the same place and others pick new locations to manifest themselves. We’re hoping that planned maintenance with sealers and new topside paint will stem most of it. We’ve been fortunate to have mostly dry weather on the trip, but on the other hand, that also makes any open seam that much more open and more prone to leaks. We have work to do when we get back.

We’ve got a good wifi connection here at the dock, and we were pleased to see an update on Craig and Kristine’s travel blog that they were successful with their run to Bellingham for repairs to their alternator. Actually, the alternator was shot; they got a rebuilt one and returned to the San Juan Islands Friday afternoon.

We had hamburgers and salad for dinner tonight, along with some steak fries we picked up at Safeway, but probably should have left there.

July 24 – Westscott Bay, 3 miles

Ray found the package of cinnamon rolls that Erin requested he make the other day, so that was incorporated into breakfast today. We all slept in a bit, if 7 o’clock is sleeping in.

After breakfast, Erin and I walked ashore to the sculpture garden for a walkaround. We saw several pieces we liked – especially the mobiles and of course the turtle art. All the pieces here are for sale and range in price from a couple thousand dollars up to $25k and more. I don’t think they’re moving them very fast.

Checkout time was at noon, and we were in no hurry to leave earlier, as we’d decided to go anchor at Westscott Bay, a 3 mile cruise just around the corner. By the way, all the references to miles in this blog are nautical miles, not the statute miles we’re all familiar with on land. Nautical miles are 6,076 feet.

We pulled away from the dock just before noon, idling out of the harbor towards Mosquito Pass. This pass runs between San Juan Island and Henry Island, and leads out to Haro Strait. About two thirds of the way through southbound, one can turn to port, or to the east and enter either Westscott Bay or Garrison Bay. Mosquito Pass is pretty straightforward if you pay close attention to your chart, but many who have attempted to cut a corner short have run aground here. That would especially be the case today, as we passed through on a minus 2 foot tide. We saw no one stranded today. Other than a run into the bay about 16 or 17 years ago in a rented skiff, we first came here last year to rendezvous with Trav and Barb on the Bar-T-Na. This year there were nearly as many crab pots scattered about as last year, but nowhere near the anchored boats. Many of the pots are being checked, I think, by people zooming in here from Roche Harbor.

After such an arduous journey, of course we kicked back for a little relaxation. But, soon I lowered the dinghy, and Ray and I went for a spin around the bay. We checked out the aquaculture pier, which appears to be an oyster farm of some sort. They have a bunch of black buoys running in several lines around the pier. On the dock are a few that have been pulled up, and we can see thin mesh cages, about the consistency of shrimp pots. They were round, about a foot and a half in diameter, but cylindrical – several feet long as they hang down under the buoys. The ones up on the dock appeared to contain oyster shells, and there were also some plastic milk crates with oyster shells.

We continued on to the head of the bay, where we saw a small sign on an upright stick, about 50 yards from shore. Of course, we had to approach it to read it, as the font was very small. It was a warning that we were now entering an eel grass preserve, and to keep out.

Erin and I went for a ride a little later in the afternoon, with Erin doing all the motoring, including landing at our swim step upon our return. We cruised along the shoreline, and tried to find the viewpoint in the sculpture garden where we could look out at the tide flats of this bay. We could only guess where our viewpoint was this morning.

Our dinner consisted of pork chops, corn and the remaining new potatoes we had picked up at Ganges some time ago. They tasted extra good, maybe because we weren’t supposed to bring them across the border.

I was able to find an unsecured wifi signal after dinner, and was hoping to see an update to Craig’s blog to see if they had a successful day in regards to getting their alternator problem resolved. No update, but we’re hoping for a good outcome. The wifi was a one bar weak signal and is gone now, but may come back when we swing around. If so I’ll post this this evening – otherwise it’ll wait.

Tribble is finally coming around to taking on the roll of a boat cat. The past two or three days she has spent very little time under the couch, and has joined us up on the bridge while we’re underway. Today she ventured out onto the deck when no one was watching, exiting via the back side curtain and walking the length of the walkway. Erin spotted her as she passed in front of the salon side door. She was in her typical cautious nervous cat slink, but continued on out to the foredeck, checking out the closed hatch there. She stopped to look over the edge several times, but must have intuitively known it wasn’t a good idea to jump down. We brought along our salmon net for just such an occurrence – fortunately it wasn’t needed. She returned back to the rear side curtain, bypassing an entrance into the salon, to come back in the way she left.

After a chill wind off the strait early in the afternoon, the weather has settled down and we are enjoying a sunny, calm evening swinging on the anchor at Westscott Bay.

July 23 – Sidney to Roche Harbor, 10.5 miles

We also picked up a couple of cinnamon rolls at the Sidney Bakery yesterday, and that became our breakfast, along with eggs over easy, courtesy again of Ray’s galley handiwork. Afterwards, all four of us went for a walk into town. Erin and Mary headed for the bakery to procure some fresh butterhorns. Ray and I went to that marine store that Craig told us about yesterday, just to browse through the stuff. We got there about 8:30 and they were not yet open. There were no hours of business posted, so we decided to take a walk down the street towards the water, where there was a fishing pier at the street’s end. From the pier we could see not only our harbor, but also the ferry landing for the Anacortes ferry that comes here once or twice a day. We were blessed with another sunny day and we could see all the way across the straits to Washington, even though a thin fog was developing.

We returned to the store at 9 o’clock and found them just opening up, hauling odds and ends out on the sidewalk for display, including some large ball fenders and a full sized wooden pirate. Inside were rows and bins of all sorts of paraphernalia, similar to the Second Wave store in Seattle, only with aisles closer together. Outside was a yard with fuel tanks, a canoe, exhaust manifolds, teak ladders – you name it, they probably had it somewhere. But, it turns out we didn’t need any of it, so we came back empty handed.

Erin and Mary almost came back empty handed as well. The bear claws were not quite ready at the bakery and the clerk suggested they come back in a half hour. They shopped in some nearby stores and returned a half hour later, only to discover someone had come in and bought their entire stock of fresh bear claws. They did manage to come back with a box full of butter horns, though.

We had planned on leaving at about 11, but hearing that fog had formed in the strait around that time yesterday we backed away from the dock a bit early, around 10:30. As we were headed down the fairway towards the exit, we saw Craig and Kristine aboard the Elsa, also heading out. “Adios Potentate”, they radioed, as they were headed south towards Cadboro Bay.

We set our course for the tip of Sidney Spit, and then a direct shot across Haro Strait to San Juan Island and Roche Harbor, where we could clear U.S. Customs. Because we left a little earlier, the tide was ebbing quite a bit faster. It was to our advantage for the first half of the crossing, boosting our speed over the bottom up to 11 knots in some places. It also created quite a bit of turbulence, but it didn’t approach the level of a pounding and we only took a few sprays up over the bow. Midway across we entered the ebb flow coming out of Spieden Channel on the U.S side and our speed over the bottom dropped dramatically, to as low as 4.6 knots. The water was much smoother, though – a fair trade for the reduced headway.

We passed Battleship Island and entered Roche Harbor just before noon and headed towards the marina and Customs. We expected the usual 20 or 30 minute wait for a spot on the Customs dock and were pleasantly surprised to see an opening large enough to accommodate us and then some. We cruised right on in and tied up. I gathered up our papers – passports, registration document, customs decal number, Canadian clearance number and Tribble’s medical records and went into the office to declare our arrival. That all went smoothly, and today the agent came out to the boat – not to board it but to compare everyone’s face to the photos on our passports. We were done in less than 10 minutes.

The agent asked us to shove off as quickly as possible, as other boats were now waiting. We had decided to stay here for the evening, so I contacted the marina on the radio and we were assigned a slip. About an hour later, Mary, Erin and I walked ashore to investigate while Ray stayed on board. As we were walking past the store, who should we see approaching but our friend Craig, who had been heading south from Sidney when we both departed the marina. They had encountered an electrical problem with their alternator or voltage regulator as their battery voltage was dropping rather than increasing as they cruised. They decided to divert here in hopes of finding a quick repair somewhere in the San Juan Islands. They had just cleared customs, and Craig had found a marine store a couple hundred yards beyond the old lime kiln area here at Roche Harbor. He had inquired there about repair facilities, and found that nowhere in the islands is there a place that repairs alternators. They typically ship them out to Seattle or Bellingham. With the shipping turnaround time he’d be looking at several days of waiting.

After hearing the story, I said “we have a spare alternator on board the Potentate, from when we upgraded to a higher capacity alternator a few years ago. Maybe you can use that.” Craig and I returned to the Potentate while Erin and Mary continued on their walk. We found the alternator in our sea chest after a bit of rummaging around, and carted it off to the Elsa, which was tied to the visitor area adjacent to the Customs dock. It looked like it would fit, but it had been a few years since I removed it, and I wasn’t certain which terminal was which. We decided to walk back to the marine store for advice. We got the straight story there on battery lead, ground and switchable field connections, and headed back. We even hitched a ride on a harbor service golf cart for part of the way, a good break. Craig began removing his alternator, and I went to the Potentate to retrieve a coil of wire that we could run from an ignition switchable terminal to the voltage regulator (his was configured differently). We thought we were in fat city with all the bases covered. Then Craig noticed that the mount for our alternator was the opposite configuration from his. His alternator has a couple of ears on it that go on either side of a mount on his engine. Mine had a solid mount on the alternator made to go onto ears that come out from the engine. We thought there might be a way to make it work, but without a supply of different size and different length bolts and a few other things, it just wasn’t going to work. We were bummed, especially because it took away a few hours of travel time in hopes of getting it fixed. Craig resorted to his original plan, which was to cruise either to Anacortes or Bellingham this evening in hopes of getting a quick fix tomorrow. He can last a couple days without the alternator, but will have to go to a dock with shore power for recharging at least every other day. We’re hoping to hear a successful update to this story soon.



Dinner this evening consisted of cheese dogs that Erin and Mary picked up at the store here, along with some baked beans and chips. Afterwards Erin and I walked a few docks, admiring the boats. The Thea Foss, a classic from the 1930’s and originally John Barrymore’s boat, was here and in pristine condition. We admired and photographed it, walked a few more docks and returned to the Potentate for the evening.

July 22 – Cowichan Bay to Sidney, 13 miles

As usual, Ray was in the kitchen looking for breakfast fixin’s, and came up with pancakes and eggs. We could get used to having an onboard chef.

After tidying up a bit and topping off the water tank, we pulled out at about 11 o’clock, destination Sidney. The wind was blowing in the 15 to 20 knot range and we had whitecaps, but it was a relatively smooth ride all the way as we crossed Satellite Channel and entered Colburne Passage. This leads to Swartz Bay, a major B.C. ferry terminal. We saw one of the jumbo ferries leaving the bay while we were still a few miles out, and could see another approaching in the distance. A third, smaller ferry coming from Saltspring Island followed us into Colburne Passage, but turned off to the terminal before catching up with us. We chose John Passage, between Coal and Goudge Islands, to round the point and take us towards Sidney. This is a small narrow passage with marked rocks at each end. The passage between them is clear but requires a zig in the middle. We entered just in time to avoid the wake of the third oncoming jumbo ferry, the Empress of British Columbia.

The main harbor at Sidney is at the foot of Beacon Street, the main drag, and has been upgraded in recent years to accommodate hundreds of boats. It is surrounded by a huge rock breakwater. Last year, when we came here with Trav and Barb, we learned that they are quite disorganized in the manner they track and assign slips to visiting boaters. We radioed ahead before approaching the breakwater to get a slip assignment for one or possibly two nights, and found that the process was equally disorganized this year. We circled outside for 10 or 15 minutes standing by the radio for a slip. Finally, we were assigned slip F18, but then informed that the vessel there that was supposed to leave was still there due to the low tide, so we’d have to wait an hour. “Okay, where can I wait?” I radioed back, still circling. After a few minutes of unintelligible chatter at low frequency on the dock radios, we were informed we could proceed to slip F17. We entered through the breakwater, jockeyed past a boat aiming for the customs dock and headed down the F dock fairway. I was close enough now to hear the dock attendants radios, and heard that there was another boat in F17. We were rerouted to F13 and told we could stay there for two days if we liked. As I registered at the office later, I learned that the owner of our slip would be returning tomorrow, so we’d have to move if we wanted to stay a second day. That’s not a big deal, except checkout is at 11 and check in time for new slips isn’t until 1 o’clock. I’m sure they’d work around that, but we’ll probably be on our way tomorrow anyway.

The facilities here are top notch, with new, wide docks and lots of room – other than at the entrance, that is. Every piling, and there are a lot of them, is decorated with two hanging baskets, overflowing with flowers. When we arrived, the baskets were far overhead, but now, at high tide, they’re just 3 or 4 feet above the dock. Each basket is watered automatically from a coiled hose that has enough slack in it for the tidal changes. The only design flaw I can see is that the basket drips right onto the electrical stanchion where we connect to shore power. At the head of the dock is a large two-story floating building. The lower area is a lounge with laundry facilities and the upper floor houses the marina office and souvenir store. The grounds along the shoreline are impeccable, with wide paver stone walkways, manicured lawns and nautical looking fencing with chains and ropes.

A little later in the afternoon the four of us went for a walk into town. Erin had a craving for some fresh bear claws and butter horns from the Sidney Bakery, a longtime institution here. When we arrived there we found the cupboard relatively bare, but did get some sausage rolls, donuts and cookies. We walked back towards the water to an incredible view of Sidney Spit. Beyond the spit, across Haro Strait we could see Spieden and San Juan Islands, our next destination – back in the USA.

As we were leaving on our walk we came upon Kristine from the Elsa at the lounge area at the head of the dock. They had arrived here an hour or so ahead of us and she had a load of laundry going already. Their plans on to head down to Cadboro Bay tomorrow for a stay there before returning back to home waters. They plan on meeting their daughter and her boyfriend next Monday up at Samish Island.

The rest of the afternoon was taken up with some reading, napping, art work by Erin and a couple rounds of Canasta between Mary and Erin. We planned on dining on leftovers today to clear out some space in the refrigerator, so no major preparations were necessary there. Erin and I walked some of the docks, including D dock, where the Elsa was berthed. Craig was busy barbecuing some chicken for dinner so we only chatted for a few minutes.

Tomorrow morning we’ll make another trip to the bakery for some fresh goodies, and I’ll take a look at the used boat store Craig told me he found earlier today. He said it had quite a few old Chris Craft parts and other funky stuff – just what we may need to see. After that we’ll probably head out across Haro Strait, back to the good old USA. We plan on visiting another Craig and Kristine recommendation, the sculpture garden at Roche Harbor.

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.