8/3/11 Stayed at lovely Jedidiah

Windrope boys in meadow near Home Bay

We decided to stay a full day at Jedidiah because it is so lovely and well suited for exploration. We went to the island after breakfast and walked over to Home Bay. On the way you pass by some nice forest areas and into a truly wondrous meadow. There are few such places in the Salish Sea, and this meadow is particularly green and large. Home Bay is a really special place, and it is almost nicer because it is too shallow for all but the most shallow drafted boats to use. The old homestead is still there, though failing, and the nearby orchards invoke the nearby past of habitation.

All the boys below homestead at Home Bay

Aeolus in Deep Bay looking NE toward Texada and her eventual destination in Desolation Sound

8/2/11 Left DeCourcy and anchored at Deep Bay, Jedidiah Island

Our two days at DeCourcy were just perfect, as is typical of time there. Endless play and gorgeous scenery with great weather. Now we were settling into the groove of the trip. We left there at 11:30 am to time the slack water at Gabriola Passage and had a smooth trip through the lovely gap. The forecast was for SE 10-15 and that is what we saw, so up went the sails once outside the pass and we began a perfect broad reach straight across the Strait of Georgia to our destination at Jedidiah.

Underway to Jedidiah in the Strait of Georgia

7/31/11 Wallace Island to DeCourcy Island

This morning began with a little bit of water play as I had to dive on the propeller to remove our swim ladder line from it being wrapped around the shaft! Turns out that in our motoring last night to reset the anchor someone, one of the kids, had let loose the non-floating line that is normally kept wrapped neatly out of the way, and it had managed to get sucked down and bound around the shaft. It had been cut or town clean off and my big worry was that we had bent the shaft or ruined the transmission.

It came from the deep!

I heard from some Friday Harbor friends that their round Vancouver Island trip this summer had to be cancelled because near Campbell River they had wrapped a mooring line around their shaft and managed to bend their shaft and destroy their transmission. Of course, their boat is a fin keel with that long expanse of shaft exposed.

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.

A series of posts on nearly three weeks of sailing in the northern Salish Sea

I've just returned from nearly three weeks of sailing in British Columbia and have so many tales to tell and photos to post that I am going to do it as separate posts based on islands and anchorages. In overview, my boys and I were joined by some Bainbridge friends to sail Aeolus from Friday Harbor up through the familiar Gulf Islands across the Strait of Georgia to Lund on the northern Sunshine Coast. Those friends left, and Amy and some other friends came up from the Bay Area and we all spent a week cruising around Desolation Sound. Returning to Lund, I dropped everyone off and sailed Aeolus back to Friday Harbor by myself.

The Windrope boys on top of Jedidiah Island's highest peak

It was a profound and adventurous exploration of the northern Salish Sea, and we are all still walking on water with the memories of it. 

In total the trip was nearly 400 miles and I am happy to report that Aeolus had no mechanical problems of any sort! The weather was hot and sunny, the salt and fresh water swimming was out of this world and the good times with friends were priceless.

Saturna, Wallace and Russell Islands

Anyone paying much attention to the recent posts will notice that I have managed to do a lot of trips aboard Aeolus recently. Well, the boys and I are just back from yet another week of sailing up in the Gulf Islands and have more tales to tell! With the boys on summer break and me not working at the moment, there has been no impediment to getting out for extended periods of time. And of course, my desire for trips is insatiable.

Me on top of Saturna Island, looking South

This latest trip began with a quick night at Prevost Harbor, Stuart Island, as this is the closest good anchorage to the Bedwell Harbor customs dock for Canada entry. The next morning we zoomed through customs and headed over to Winter Cove for a few days at Saturna Island. The winds were calm and so we motored. Winter Cove is a really lovely little hurricane hole of an anchorage. That first day the boys and I played on the beach and went over to Boat Pass to watch the rushing current go through. It's quite a spectacle if you haven't seen it. When flooding, the water rushes out of Winter Cove toward the Straits of Georgia, and reverse for ebb. Speeds can be quite high, and the passageway so narrow, that the hydraulics involved are just wonderful to watch.

Tumbo and Prevost adventures

For this recent trip my boys and I headed north into BC and visited locations that were new to us. We had heard from a few people about Tumbo Island on the east side of Saturna, and it had long caught my interest due to the remarkable location. So we took off from Friday Harbor and had an easy motor in calm seas up to South Pender Island to clear Canadian Customs. As always, the Canadians were polite and familiar, pulling our name up on the system and not requiring passport numbers or anything lengthy. In literally a few minutes, we were on our way back into Boundary Pass to catch a strong flood east and around the corner to Tumbo.

Can it be more beautiful??

Happy Boys

The anchorage there is exposed to the north but the forecast was for consistent south winds. There are mooring buoys, but we chose to drop anchor. Right away, I could tell Tumbo was going to be a magical place to stay and it was. Cabbage Island is just to the east of the anchorage and it is famed for the white sand beach it contains.