2nd Half of the Gulf Islands Tour

3/27/11

Interesting geographical formation

What a doofus!  Now that I’m truly cruising and not near any marinas with shorepower for a week at a time, I’m finding that I’m running out of electricity.  The reason: my alternator on my diesel is not charging!  It’s probably been doing that for a long time, and I never knew it. Sigh!  This boat is a lot more complicated than my old boat Bokonon (we’re talking prehistory here), which never had a generator that worked, with no electronics, and kerosene lamps for light – call it pre-Model A.  But having been exposed to modern technologies while working with West Marine, I should know better. 

Oh well, I’m sure this won’t be my first mistake.

Well, my aim now is to get that fixed and make sure it will remain reliable.  That and fix the turn-off switch which is now no longer intermittent, but plain-old not working.  And replace the manual shut-off switch as well.

One comment about this particular blog:  I really crammed a bunch of pictures in it, but the gmail blog edit system makes it really hard to place the pictures with any accuracy, if not down right impossible. I try and drag the pics where I want them, but it often doesn't respond.  If any of you know how to manipulate them, please let me know.  If I was a book publisher, I'd be tearing out my hair about now.  Oh, also, if the pics are not very clear, double-click them, and they'll enlarge to look - at least better.

I’m now in Nanaimo after a pleasant week of cruising through the Gulf Islands.  I would have spent it more leisurely, but since I was low on electricity, it would have been really hard to pull up the anchor chain with no windlass…I could have done it with a combination chainhook, some line and one of my jib winches, but it would have been time consuming.  But I will have to set up a jury rig system in case my windlass gives up.  This morning pulling up the chain, I had to help the windlass with some extra muscle on my side, using a winch handle to supplement the windlass.

South Gulf

North Gulf

To give you a better idea on where I’ve been, here’s a map of San Juan Islands, Sydney, and the south Gulf Islands, and where I’ve been. And here’s another map of the north Gulf Islands and Nanaimo and where I’ve been.  I’m not sure where I’ll go after Nanaimo.  It depends on what gets done here.  But I still may go to Vancouver (the city), or at least Bowen Island, both 30 miles away across the Strait of Georgia.

Deadhead ahead

One comment that I need to insert in this blog is how I am always on a lookout for deadheads.  Deadheads are big logs that have mostly escaped from loggers’ rafts (logs tied together in bunches), or, it occasionally might be a whole tree.  These get waterlogged and you can barely see them above the water, much like small icebergs.  It makes it easier to see them if seagulls are sitting on top, but that often is not the case.  If I’m on autopilot and need to do something where I can’t see where I’m going, often times, I will slow the boat down to a crawl or heave to if I’m sailing so I don’t run into one of these things.  I would say that’s the main drag in cruising in these waters, as running into these could ruin my whole day.

An otter on the dock at Ganges

Ganges Harbor

The last blog, I had just arrived at Ganges harbor, after a short stay at Selby.  Ganges, which is on Saltspring Island, reminds me a bit of Friday Harbor, but with many more stores on the waterfront, as if the waterfront was a major tourist destination.  Auto traffic is much more intense – one has to be careful crossing the street – with lots of people walking around.  It seemed to me that there were more young people here than Friday Harbor. Certainly the population on Saltspring Island is more – 10,000 people.  The café that I went to send my last blog was filled with people not much older than 30-35 (yeah, I was the old guy), and most of them reminding me of the late 60’s and early 70’s in their dress and characteristics (ie: hippy). That seemed unusual until I found out that Saltspring has long been an artists’ haven with art galleries concentrated all over the port of Ganges.  Just walking around the town, I saw lots of shops with locally made, handcrafted jewelry, clothing and folk art.

With so many people in town, I was still amazed to see a river otter eating some mussels on an empty dock when I was walking back to my dinghy.  I tried to take a good picture of it, but it decided to scram when I got closer to get a better picture.

Canada comment: every town that I go to has an inordinate amount of book stores – people love to read in this country.  And since I also do a lot reading, I usually visit those stores, which I did here in Ganges, which had 3 bookstores!

Montague Harbour

My next stop the next day was Montague Harbor.  It was another resort/marina and like Otter bay, it was closed, but unlike Otter bay, it was completely deserted – nobody around.  I took the dinghy to the resort and walked about 2 kilometers to a park, not seeing anything exciting, but good to be stretching out my legs.  The boats around where I was anchored were on moorings with no one around.  There was a Hillyard 9 tonner (it could have been a 12 tonner), same as my old Bokonon, but with an aluminum spar and a radar on it - hull still made out of wood.  Another boat was an eyesore plywood trimaran with tons of solar panels and wind generators – obviously a cheap residence for someone.

Princess Cove - QUIET!

Next day, I left (early again, as the currents were going my direction) and stopped at a really nice spot called Princess Cove, which is on skinny Wallace Island, a marine park.  The cove itself is skinny too, but had enough room that I could swing on a single hook.  I noticed hanging along the cliff shore on both sides were chains marked with bright-colored ribbon where one could tie stern to, with their front anchors out, thereby allowing much more boats to stay there, which I’m sure happens during the summer a lot.

This place was so scenic, that I had to take my kayak and paddle inside and outside the cove, finally stopping at a public dock to get out for a hike.  I saw a river otter (very briefly), and raccoons, one standing up to look at me before running off before I could take any picture.

Overlooking Blue Bossa on cliffs in Princess Cove

It’s obvious to me that I’m going to have to be much more clever in taking wildlife shots.  There are a lot of geese flying around this time of year, and I guess they are in migration.  My point is that I still haven’t gotten a good telephoto lens shot of them zipping by, squawking, usually in twos. 

There was one house overlooking the bay, with what looked like an old gentleman living there.  Other than one sailboat that briefly anchored before heading to what I think was Nanaimo, since it looked like a charter boat, I was totally alone.  During the night, it was REALLY quiet.  I could hear the occasional soft rumbling of the anchor chain as it would shift with the boat’s position to an occasional puff that would come from the south, and occasionally some rustling of bushes overhead above the cliffs and a raccoon call.  Princess cove was definitely my favorite spot in the Gulf Islands.

Looking west from Wallace Island

I would have liked to stay for another night, but with my electrical problems, I weighed anchor and left to go to Nanaimo, where I had to time my approach to Dodd Narrows.  It states in the guides that you have to be there during slack tide (no currents going one way or the other), so I motored slowly to it so I’d get there a half hour before, which I figured was close enough that I wouldn’t get into trouble.  No problem, as it turns out, and I headed to Nanaimo.

So here I am, batteries charged up, and waiting for tomorrow (Monday) to start calling.  I hope that when I get these problems fixed, this will be the end for a while; but, knowing Murphy’s Law (if it can break, it probably will), I’m not holding my breath.

Leaving Dodd Narrows