7/30/11 Left Friday Harbor and anchored Wallace Island, BC

The grand trip north began at 8:30 am from Friday Harbor with me and my boys and a friend from Bainbridge and his son. The five of us were headed up to Lund, BC on the Sunshine Coast where these friends would depart and Amy and some other friends would join the boys and I for a week in Desolation Sound. Bill, my Bainbridge friend, is a lifelong sailor and I was excited to have him along to coach me on some of the finer points of sail trim. He grew up in a salty family back east and counts Peter Isler as a family friend, so he really knows his sheets from his halyards. His son is a school friend of my older son Elliott and so were were out for a father son trip.

Owen and Aeolus getting ready to depart

The trip began with light winds and so we motored north to Boundary Pass on customs at Bedwell Harbor. After customs, we were able to sail north in a lovely building breeze from the SSW and did about 5 knots in the 10-15 knot wind. Skies were mostly sunny and the temp was around 70.

Wing on wing heading north at 5 knots

Once we got to Wallace Island we tucked into Connover Cove for the night. This time I dropped anchor against the eastern shore and gave my usual 3:1 scope, which when stern tied and with my heavy ground tackle has never once been a problem anywhere else. We immediately jumped into the dinghy and headed off for the rope swing along the northern part of the cove, and boy was it a blast. There is a pure exhilaration and joy of swimming in wild water, as opposed to a pool, and flying off a rope swing is just all the more joyous. Elliott is a real spider man at it, and I just scream with happiness every time I do it. Owen is still too young to be that adventurous and Banning thought better of it too. The water there is quite warm, certainly in the 60's, but only a tease for how warm the water is further north!

Elliott taking flight at the Connover cove rope swing

Now everything was great until a strong W wind came up and began to blow right into the mouth of this cozy little anchorage. Pretty soon, we were dragging anchor! I've never drug anchor anywhere in my life and now I've done it twice at Connover cove in one summer! I let loose the stern tie and pulled myself forward and this time let out 6:1 scope in the 20 knot west wind blowing small chop into the cove. A little later on, a good size power boat next to us began to drag, and a pretty major drama developed as they tried to motor out but forgot to untie their stern line. They ended up swinging all over back and forth, as you'd expect, and nearly hitting me and the boat on their starboard side. Once they released their stern line, they pulled out but then got blown beam onto the bow roller of the power boat on their starboard. People kept cool heads, but it was ugly. They got away from that without major damage and limped over to the dock to spend the night.

I believe I will never again anchor in Connover cove as the holding is just so very bad and the room for error so small. With Princess Bay nearby there is just no reason to risk the holding to be at Wallace. The sunset that night was stupendous and we all settled down for our first night sleep after a great day of sailing and playing aboard the good ship Aeolus.