Nanaimo to Dols Cove

 

Well, all the forecasts yesterday was that it was going to be another day of wind like we had going to Nanaimo. They were wrong. There was nearly no wind and the passage was smooth and easy. Sure, there was the occasional train of waves that were so well timed that they got us rocking, but for the most part we could have been in a (very) large lake.

This was the first passage of this trip for just Rod and myself and, I believe, the first passage where it was only the two of us in the several trips I’ve done with him before. It’s always been at least three of us aboard, but not for the rest of this trip.

“Whiskey Golf” was active today. That’s an area of the Strait of Georgia that the military uses to do things like test torpedoes. When active, boats are supposed to stay clear of it. This meant that rather than a straight course across the Strait (see what I did there?) we had to run up the coast before turning to cross. It added some miles, but it sure beats arguing Collision Regulations with a torpedo (or explaining to the range officer why we ignored all the warnings being broadcast).

We also stern-tied, which means we drop an anchor and back towards shore. Then one of us (me) rows the dinghy to shore, pulls it around something and then the end is pulled back to Quijote and both ends fixed to cleats. Basically the stern tie line makes a long “V” shape where the top of the “V” are the two cleats on Quijote and the bottom of the “V” is where the line is held by whatever we’re using on shore. When it comes time to leave, we untie one end of the “V” from Quijote and pull the other end so that the free end zips back to shore, goes around the shore item, and back to us. Pull up the anchor and off we go.

So why stern tie? It limits the amount of “swing” that our boat will exhibit as the tides change. This allows more boats to use a small area. We each are kind of hung between our stern line to shore and our anchor in the water rather than (potentially) swinging in a circle around our anchor.

As usual, I took my traditional dunking into the water. Somehow it feels like the water is getting warmer as we move north. Either that, or I’m getting more used to it. The first plunge was as short as I possibly could make it – my feet didn’t even leave the boarding ladder, and even then I exclaimed rather loudly about how cold it was. Now I’m jumping off the bow and swimming along the boat and saying, “Ok, that’s cold, but not terrible” or even “quite refreshing”. This somehow feels wrong. Shouldn’t things get colder as we move north?

Dinner was cheeseburgers on the barbeque with broccoli on the side. You’d think that would be one of the easier dishes to make, but it turned out to be quite involved. First was setting up the barbeque in the first place. Then came the recipe for the burgers, which included an egg, finely chopped oats, worcestershire sauce, and lord knows what else. The broccoli was done in the pressure cooker. Dessert was going to be apple pie, but when I opened the pie, I noticed green fuzzy growth on the pie. Having had food poisoning twice already, I’m now paranoid about that sort of thing and opted out of the apple pie, instead going for the peach pie. Rod had some of the apple pie after cutting out the moldy parts and he seems Ok, but I’d rather not take the risk. It’s a shame because the slice of apple pie I had on previous nights was quite tasty. The peach pie, which we bought in Nanaimo, tastes more like a can of peaches was placed on a pillsbury pie crust. I mean it’s still pie, but not up the apple pie quality.

Tomorrow we are going to have to transit Malibu Rapids at nearly the end of our journey. There are only two times tomorrow that we can do that, and we can’t make the morning one. Thus it’s up at the crack of dawn to ensure we’ll make it to the rapids at slack tide in the afternoon. G’night!