29 Jul 22

The charms of Kyuquot were calling, so we got going shortly 08:30. The fog was gone this morning, or at least offshore somewhere, and we motored down the inlet and into Kyuquot, tying up at the government dock at 10:40. There was already another boat (“Peregrino”, Hunter 38 out of Ladysmith) tied up at the dock when we got there; they are headed around the island, counter-clockwise, having left Ladysmith 2 weeks ago today. A buddy boat of theirs showed up a couple of hours later. After we landed, Terri started a load of laundry immediately, although the drier was not heating, so nothing got dried out. Massilia arrived about 20 minutes behind us. We all, except for Terri, had lunch and Java the Hut and spent an hour on the deck downloading e-mails, etc. Back at the dock at 13:00 for the store opening, but Sue had not yet returned from Campbell River, so the shelves were pretty bare. We filled up with water and hung clean laundry all over the boat to dry. “Betelgeuse”, a Sceptre 40 out of Tacoma/Seattle, arrived about 14:00, also on a whirlwind circuit of the island; we have seen these guys before somewhere, as we all recognized the name and the painting of the eponymous constellation on the bow of the boat, but cannot think where. Sue finally arrived at the dock at 16:45; she kept the store open after 17:00 to service us and we scoured the shelves for fresh fruit and vegetables like a hoard of locusts. We were finally able to pull away from the dock at 17:53 for the short run over to Clanninick Cove, which proved to be much more protected from the Pacific swells that Barter Cove; oddly, it is not even mentioned in Dreamspeaker, although John’s guide book lists it. We had a late happy hour and dinner aboard, then sat up late tasting whisky and working on cross-word puzzles. The stars were out in their full glory again; it was really cool when I looked out at 23:00 to see the North Star and immediately below it and just very slightly to the left (or west), one could still make out the loom of the sun below the horizon. The Milky Way was glorious. We drifted off to sleep with the roar of the surf pounding on the other side of McLean Island.

50-02.100’N, 127-24.788’W; Log = 12.4, Sum (2022) = 511.9 N-m

30 Jul 22

I was awakened by the howling of a pack of wolves at 05:45; it sounded like they were right over on the beach. I could not get back to sleep after that and when they started howling again at 06:45, I got up to see if I could catch a glimpse of them, although I was not hopeful of such. By the time I got dressed and up on deck, they were in full voice somewhere over on McLean Island, but some distance away. I’m guessing from the sounds that they were making (although I am no expert on wolves) that they had made a kill and were tucking into it with a vengeance. Since I was up, I went ahead and brewed a pot of coffee, watched the sunrise progress (it was fully above the horizon by 06:45, and updated the blog notes. The silence of the morning was broken only by the occasional roar of a high-speed sport-fishing boat heading out in the distance beyond the entry to the bay. When John woke up, he announced that his house battery charge was down to 9.5 V, which almost certainly means that the house battery bank (2 6-volt golf-cart batteries) is either dead or on it’s last legs. So, he has a dilemma facing him. He started his engine up to see if he could get the batteries to take a charge. Then, he noticed that their paddle board was not floating alongside the boat. After a few minutes of searching with binoculars, I spotted it about 1/2 a mile away, apparently hung up in a kelp bed alongside a small island; they are lucky it did not float clean out to sea. Julia apparently failed to secure it adequately last night upon her return from taking Lucy ashore for her late-evening constitutional. 

John and Laurie (and Lucy) decided to take Massilia back to Walters Cove to see what they could do about finding replacement house batteries. Matt and Julia stayed with us. After lunch, we all went for a long exploration (us on Swallow and them on the double kayak) up the creek at the head of the cove, where, about a mile up - at head of navigation, we found a rapid with a deep pool of cold fresh water above it. Matt, Julia and I went for a quick swim, jumping off a big rock to enter the water - very refreshing. On the way back down the creek, we rowed within about 30 feet of a good sized eagle sitting in a branch overhead. Then we rowed across the head of the cove to the high-water waterway between McLean Island and the mainland and into the Pacific Ocean. On the Pacific side, we were faced with a hot wind (blowing off Brooks?). We braved half a mile of rollers to gain another little island where we were able to see the full length of Brooks Peninsula - very impressive. We got back to the boat just before 17:00, in time for another swim, solar shower and happy hour. John and Laurie got back just before 18:00, so we had another happy hour. John ordered a couple of new 6-volt house batteries from Striker Marine in Port Hardy; they will have them delivered to Winter Harbour, so John will just have to nurse his old batteries until we get there. He did top up the cells with distilled water and was able to get a full charge using shore power in Walters Cove. The wind stayed warm all evening, so we were able to stay up and watch the stars a bit; the barest sliver of a new moon showed itself an hour before sunset.