Summer in BC Wrap Up

July 1, 2023

"Let's just sail straight through to Hornby. I'm done with Desolation." Famous last words. Starting a 40-mile sail at 4 in the afternoon during a wind warning isn't the smartest thing, but here we are.

Heading out into the Straight of Georgia, we pointed the boat south. It would be a long time before we'd travel northwards again. The seas started pleasantly and quickly descended into choppy waves, kicked up from the consistent 25-knot winds blowing down from the North.

The hours went by quickly as we rocket-shipped our way down the straight under a super moon, and before we knew it, we were pulling into Tribune Bay. We were both sick of being tossed around and were looking forward to the reprieve we would get once we tucked into the bay. We pulled into the bay and quickly found out that there was no wind protection.

We were looking forward to spending a little time on Hornby before continuing our trip South. Although while lounging on the beach, we also realized we still had some things to take care of before leaving. So we figured we'd tackle bits and pieces and be good to go. We split the time installing those necessary handrails and touristing around the island.

Then we woke up to find the boat bouncing in a southerly wind. Not a slight bouncing, but waves touching the bow type of bouncing. There was no scenario we were staying for this, so we (and the other boats in the anchorage) pulled up the anchor and headed out. We needed to return to some city, so we continued south...into the wind...towards Nanaimo.

A short, not really, 8 hours later, we found ourselves back in our old, less-than-favourite place. We tied up to a mooring and got out the old to-do list. Engine service, sailcover repair, rig check, and provisioning are some of the "small" things to do. Nanaimo turned into a whole week of work work work. Once we had enough of the city, we pointed south again.

We wanted to revisit Pirates Cove before leaving, so we aimed ourselves that way. We timed our transit of Dodd Narrows to be there for slack tide, not expecting a tug towing an entire forest of logs to come from the other direction. His "only going to be 10 minutes" turned into an hour of waiting. We didn't want to wait for the following tide change, so we figured we could still make it through. And make it we did! The boat reached speeds of 8 knots while we rode the current through. We weren't the only ones waiting, and we weaved through the traffic and made our way to our spot for the night.

We popped over to the shore expecting a nice walk, only to be met with all the mosquitos. Even the dog was annoyed. We quickly walked the dog and returned to the boat's refuge. The weather was hot, so we spent the next two days lounging on the ship and recovering from all the work we'd just done.

We woke up to some lovely wind and decided to take advantage of it and continue south towards Gabriola. After a few days at the North anchorage, we continued towards Russell Island for a short stay.

After a few days at Russell, we moved on to Sidney Spit to pick up parts, get a couple of small projects taken care of and visit some friends on the island. We got to see all of our friends from the Island and finally met our friends on Siri in person.

Before leaving Canada for good, we decided to join the Bluewater Cruising's August Rendezvous. It was a lovely weekend of seeing our cruising friends before leaving on our trip South.

Finally, we'd visited our cruising friends, prepped the boat and were set to go!

NM Sailed: 159