Moving northward. We've stopped at Montague Harbor on Galiano Island, and during the next week or so (weather permitting), we'll continue to make little hops until we reach Desolation Sound :>.
Our hope is that we can get there early enough to beat summer crowds, to enjoy quieter anchorages for a little while. Then, when they come we'll keep moving north to the Broughtons.
Arrived in Nanaimo this morning. It's been 6 years since we were last here! Good to be back.
We'll wait here for weather to cross the strait of Georgia to Smuggler's Cove :>.
Arrived in Pender Harbour this morning, found some friends already anchored in the bay :D (also, found some internet *flails*)
We are updating our path as we go, as internet allows :).
We are now in Melanie Cove. The view here is breathtaking, with plenty for snow covered mountains.
We had some wind, but mostly in our faces :<. We don’t understand how the wind travels in the area here yet. The mountains disturb the wind, and funnels it around in unexpected ways. We’ll get it, eventually...
I’m re-reading the Curve of Time right now by Wylie Blanchett, a friend of hers, Mike, had a cabin in Melanie Cove in the 1930’s. A place filled with books and surrounded by an apple orchard.
He used to cut down entire trees in the area on his own, and sell them off to keeping living there, comfortably, alone.
We've moved Pino to Háthayim Marine Provincial Park, a lovely inlet at the northern end of Cortes Island.
Previously, we stopped at Refuge Cove on Redonda to upload our upcoming NIME talk.
@rek My coworker who has sailed the BC coast en route to/from Alaska alluded to studying specific coastal fjord sailing techniques for some of central/northern BC coast - a lot of looking at topology maps and learning what wind likes to do in hyper-micro-climate conditions like those apparently. The funneling effect in particular sounded tricky to master because of the "gusts" they can create.
Best of luck up there! The PNW just gets more stunning the farther north one goes.
@klardotsh yea we have a book that talks about this stuff and that covers the area, "Taken by the wind: the Northwest Coast" by Marilyn Johnson. I just forgot we had it >_<. I browsed through it today, and it is suuuuper helpful.
@rek I got my Starlink for the boat. Are you all opposed to getting it, yourself?
@singlerider honestly, me and Dev have adapted to not needing internet always (our work also allows for that, not the case for everyone). So, not sure.
Report back on it though, don’t know anyone who has it.
Our 6-hour sail to Grace Harbour from the North of Texada Island was so, so nice. It was raining the whole time, and we were thoroughly soaked, but we sailed beautifully.
We went downwind, wing on wing for nearly 5 hours. It's rare that we get to do that, the wind isn't always reliable, and our path doesn't always allow it.
Had it not been for rain, this transit would have been per-fect.