The last legs....

We left Tofino in, you guessed it, rain and clouds. My sister in Ohio is melting back there while we are freezing out here!
As we came into the Barkley Sound area, raised our sails! We had a beautiful and mostly sunny sail through the famous Broken Group of islands. I got a bit of cell coverage and it was nice to text and send a picture of the Sound to some friends and family. It felt good to be in touch again. They are really fantastic and a place we want to go back and visit.



Bamfield is a funky village to say the least. My favorite sight was Cat Town where cute cat houses were built and the residents feed and care for the feral cat community. Lots of cats around, just fine with me. A well maintained boardwalk connects the community since there are no roads to west Bamfield. (just to east Bamfield). yep, I told you it was funky.

The weather looked sketchy to do our original plan for our next stop, Port Renfrew. Its a small anchorage with little to no protection from the south. After listening to the forecast (gale winds from the south) we decided to do a LONG 73 mile day to Sooke. We left in the morning when the tide was going out and it collided with the incomng swells. Biggest waves I have been in yet -10' very steep and breaking. They were on the nose and we were really pounding. We turned to get on our course and went broadside to them for a wave or so. Ut oh!!!! Jeff was below and just trying to hang on himself and everythng that was flying around down below. Tom and I were on deck. At that point I looked to the side and saw the biggest wall of water I've ever seen next to our boat. I think I could have reached out and touched it. The boat swung wildly over. Tom turned the boat back and we decided to not do that again. We could hear Jeff "advising" us from below. Funny, it sounded more like "WTF is going on out there????". We went further out and made the turn successfully. We then had a long day of following seas but nothing too bad.

We left early the next morning because the winds and currents were supposed to be strong. I can tell you that the forecasters in BC are equal to our WA ones.... It was a glassy, smooth ride to Victoria.

Victoria felt like coming back to civilization. Again, it was not crowded and we got a primo dock. We ate waffles and walked the town. Very touristy and fun. We were right in front of The Empress Hotel and Parliamant.






We flew our flags to be festive!

Leaving the harbor is always exciting as its crowded with planes, cruiseships, ferries etc...


We had the best sail of the entire trip all the way from Victoria to Friday Harbor today. Perfect wind and seas the whole way!!!! We cleared Customs and then had to dock in 20 gusting winds. We did fine (yeah, Jeff and Tom!) but we did see a few others crash and hit other boats. Ouch!

We are now sitting around the table getting ready for our new nightly ritual - watching Curb Your Enthusiasm shows that I downloaded prior to the trip on the advice of Jeff's daughter, Danielle's, advice. What a hoot!

Chris Miner comes to pick up Tom tomorrow morning and we say goodbye to our great friend and crewmate. We'll head south to Port Townsend and be home on Saturday, we think. Maybe we will just keep sailing....
Salpare does mean sail away!





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Location:Friday Harbor

Tofino or bust...

Another day of rainy weather and light winds from the south. This weather is HIGHLY unusual and not what we planned for. Too much motoring caught up with us today. We had been watching our fuel closely and Jeff has been making calculations and spreadsheets as you can imagine on our fuel consumption. There are not many places to buy diesel out here!

Only 4 miles from Tofino, Jeff looked INTO the fuel tank and realized we were going to run out! Rocks to our port, the lee shore, and there was little to no wind. Add in swells that slosh the limited fuel from side to side. He quickly mcguyvered sponging diesel into a cup and held it under the fuel intake tube. This bought us about a half hour. Tom drove while I put up sails, readied the anchor and also got a tow line ready if needed. We quickly made multiple plans for what to do. We got a light puff of wind, just enough to give us steerage and shut the motor down to consider options. Fortunately, we had cell service and I called a water taxi service in Tofino and they jumped right on getting us a jerrican of diesel and bringing it out to us. A service fee was paid but they were great!

After refueling in Tofino and getting moorage, Jeff began to look at the numbers. Out tank hold 44 gallons of diesel, but it seems you can only use 38 of them! The way its built wont allow the tube to get the rest of the fuel. Because we never let it get low at home, we never encountered this before.
What a way to learn about this issue!

We are now safely tucked in our dock after provisioning, laundry and dinner. Tofino is a small town built on tourism. Maybe its weather or the economy but still have not encountered crowds. Its about the most populated town on the west coast of the island with 900 residents. A gorgeous sunset tonight will hopefully bring fair winds tomorrow.

Tomorrow we head to Bamfield!



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Location:Tofino, BC

Hot Springs Cove and Pete's surprise!

A day full of whale sightings and still no wind. Just a bit near the end of the day and we flew the jib for while. This cove is famous for its natural hot springs with multiple pools. Beautiful and quite fun to soak in! The boardwalk is 2km long and made up of 8" x 42" cedar planks. Over the years, people have carved their boat names into them or replaced one with their own carved at home.

We were supposed to have a "buddy boat" with us on this trip with our friend Pete on his trawler named Rendezvous. But just before we left, Pete had some serious health issues. Although at home in Everett with his wonderful wife, Linda, he is with us in spirit! Pete had done a bit of research into the placing of the planks and I followed up on it. While Jeff and I readied the boat for the trip,we asked Tom to make the planks. The have have been in our aft cabin for the last few weeks. We woke early this morning and completed the job!

Here are Tom and Jeff at work. Because its all lore about the planks and definitely not an official thing to do, we were a little nervous about being "caught". Tom called it malicious destruction and Jeff called it urban renewal.
Here you go Pete! Enjoy!











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Location:Hot Springs Cove, of course

A few days to catch up again...

We have so many pictures but its hard to downloadthem with the slow connections we have been getting. So i will beosting multiple emails today.


After a relaxing day of bumming and dinghying around Kyuquot, we headed
out for Yuquot. While calm in the cove, it was pretty rough on the outside. Just as we were heading through a rocky area with big waves on the nose, the prop started making a terrible noise. Now on this coast, you can't just pull in anywhere. We continued another 7 stressful miles until we could duck into Queen Cove. A slice of heaven, but literally in the middle of nowhere. We anchored and Jeff was readying to go in the water to check the prop. I had an idea... So we pulled put the Go Pro camera, taped it to the boat hook anf he and Tom became Salpare Search Team
1. It worked beautifully and showed us that we had kelp wrapped around the prop. This kelp is like rope in strength. Jeff used Toms drysuit, dove and got it off. Phew... We spent the rest of the day watching eagles and bears on shore.

Salpare Search team 1







Jeff and his prop sushi wrap!

More on the next stop in the next blog...


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Location:Queens Cove, BC

Awaiting fresh pie and lattes....

Yes, this adventure is pretty tough. We are in the First Nations village of Kyuquot about 1/4 of the way down the west side. Its a great little village and we are at Java the Hutt which is a pie and coffee place. We decided to take a relaxing day and just stay here for a day. I'm sure the pie and coffee figured into that decision.

We rounded Brooks Peninsula yesterday with no issues. We did see ORCAS in a kelp bed right next to us. Very very cool! Tons of sea otters too as we are next to a preserve that helped bring them back from the brink of extinction.

Weather has been pretty wet and chilly. Oh well... And the steady NW winds that we need to sail, are right on the nose as a low swings through. Still waiting to sail.

More days to come as we head to Yuquot tomorrow.


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Location:Kyuquot, BC

Complete the Circle - What day are we on???

Its a small world, you know... Jeff was doing laundry in the Port McNeil laundromat and a colleague of his from Pierce County was there! Jill Guernsey and her husband were on their way back from Alaska on their sailboat. And even smaller, she knows Tom very well from his days at the Sheriffs Dept. It was a nice visit while doing chores and on the boat later that night.
While in Port McNeil, we saw Ethereal - a 190' sailboat! Its usually in the Med but had been chartered over here. Pretty unbelievable. We googled it, of course, for more information.



Across from Port McNeil




Ethereal dwarfing Tom

We had a cold, wet transit to Hope Island yesterday. This is the "staging area" for boats that are going around Cape Scott. It was deserted... Later that evening, another sailboat came in and we left with them this morning. We are a bit bigger and go a bit faster but they are now tied up behind us at Winter Harbour.

Bull Harbour on Hope Island is First Nations owned and has 1 small dock. Quiet and incredibly beautiful.



We left earlier than planned becaused weather has been so calm and we crossed Nawhitti Bar with just some swells. I read that it would either be the scariest, most exciting crossing or completely uneventful. It was the latter. We rounded Cape Scott with no issues and motor/sailed the rest of the 58 miles. Its a strange thing to look to starboard and know its only the Pacific for thousands of miles. We had 8' swells the second half of the day and they must have lulled Jeff and The Colonel to sleep.








Jeff with Cape Scott in the background.

We are now in fishing nirvana, mind you that is not MY nirvana. Winter
Harbour is much smaller than I thought but the fish are much bigger! One guy brought in a 160 lb halibut! Huge fish were everywhere on the dock. Tom is going to troll a a line tomorrow off the boat and is hoping to catch a salmon. I'm guessing we will have a trail of the gigando kelp hanging on to his line... Just fine with me.

We round Brooks Peninsula tomorrow. Another big day and end up in Kuyout. We have 4 days of anchoring in small bays or First Nation villages ahead. Its REALLY isolated out here!

The weather is cold and showery and it looks like more for the next few days. Argh....

Until we have internet again!

Chris, I can't believe that somewhere today we had cell coverage and my phone said I missed your call. Darn! Glad you are following us on SPOT. Much better than following us on Denali, ha!


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Location:Winter Harbour, West Coast Vancouver Island

Ready for the crux of the trip!

After a quiet night in Tribune Bay, we headed out into the Straits of Georgia. A bit choppy at first, it calmed down for an easy trip. We were able to sail a bit as we got closer to Cambell River.

CR is all about fishing. We stayed at thr First Nation owned and operated Discovery Harbour Marina. Well run and closr to everything. More food, a bit of booze and fishing licenses for the guys were purchased. We had a later start the next morning because of the timing of the Seymour Narrows. This is very tight channel where currents can run up to 18kts against or with you. It proved uneventful as we timed it just right.

We stayed in Kelsey Bay which was just a bunch of old, dilapidated fishing boats and a docj that half our boat fit on. We met a kayaker, paddling to port Hardy and after giving him some water we fed him dinner, beer and had him spend the night on our boat rather than find a beach somewhere to stay. Great guy and nice to pay it forward...




We had more nice (but cooler) weather as we headed northwest to Port McNeil. We spent the night and are now abput to push off for Hope Island. Tomorrow morning we make the move around Cape Scott!
Until we write from Winter Harbour!

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Location:Port McNeil

A few days to catch up!

First, sorry the videos have not worked. I am working on it. When we get to a port with free internet, I will post more videos that will hopefully work. They are a bit corny but we hope you like them.

After Fishermans Bay on Lopez Island, we spent a fabulous night anchored in Reid Harbor on Stuart Island. What a cool place. Beautiful with about 40 full time residents. There is school that only has 2 students this year. The students make and sell post cards and tee shirts, completely on the honor system. You take what you want and send them a check. We bought post cards and a tee shirt for Jeff. Here are some photos from this magical place.





- Tee shirts for sale!




Salpare showing her colors on July 4th!

From here we went to Friday Harbor to pick up a few things, including Tom. Friday Harbor is the hub of the San Juans and is a great harbor. We had an awesome view of Mt Baker and Odyssey, a 90' schooner who happens to dock next to us in Tacoma.




Tom was right on schedule and we started our journey north. We cleared customs at Bedwell Harbor and I broke out the ORCA hat I had secretly picked up at Friday Harbor. I'm quite sure it will attract orcas or something...




We spent the night in Clam Bay on Thetis Island and had a long day today in the Straits of Georgia. We are now in Tribune Bay on Hornsby Island. This is one of the Top 10 Places to cruise and it is spectacular. Even on this cloudy, cooler day. Its been perfect weather up to today and it should get nice again tomorrow.

Everyone is doing great although Jeff and Tom are a bit tipsy now on crab, shrimp and some of my special drinks! The Colonel continues to be a trooper although this is not his dream vacation....




We head to Campbell River to provision and wait for the Saturday timing of the infamous Seymour Narrows. The current can run up to 16kts there and we have to time it just right.

Tom's SPOT site is active so you can see where we are each day. The address was in the original email I sent.

A few notes to folks at home:
Mary- your strawberry jam is awesome! We are having it each morning.
Dave and Karen Boguki- thanks again for the charts!
Ron and Deb - Jeff is drinking plenty of Bridgmans.
Carolyn and Jerry - wish you were here too!

We miss all of you!

Fran, Jeff, Tom and The Colonel
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Location:Tribune Bay, BC

Testing the video

Sorry the videos are not working! Try this link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmS4cKHQR5s



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Location:Friday Harbor, San Juan Island

Complete the Circle. Day 1 and 2

After a year of planning and a boat load of money, we have finally begun our next adventure - circumnavigating Vancouver Island, BC. It about an 800 mile trip with half of it being offshore on the wild west coast of the island. Jeff has raced offshore but this will be my first test.

The last few weeks have been nonstop, trying to complete our project list. Completing an additional Man Overboard system (notice I did not say Woman Overboad), installing the liferaft, new radar reflector, new table, finishing a marine weather class, emergency replacement windows, mounted the Epirb, installed and figured out the Imux/AIS system with the Ipad, fixed the macerator (very important as this is a poop grinder) and on and on. Add in resigning from my last job, traveling to Vail for a mountain rescue event, our daily chaotic lives and its been a bit stressful. Only now, anchored in our favorite town, Port Townsend, are we starting to feel like we are on vacation.

Last night we scored the Roche Harbor Yacht Club slip at Kingston. Many members are at the Wagon Wheel in Poulsbo. Tom Miner, who we pick up on Wed for the rest of the trip, is the organizer so I'm sure they are having a blast.

The weather has been clear, breezy and in the 60s and 70s. It will be cloudy tomorrow but clearing again on Monday.

Port Townsend is packed tonight and winds are picking up at our anchorage in town. Many (including us) have dragged anchor today. While I am all freaked out about it, Jeff just says "it wont be the last time"! We just clocked 25 mph.

Tomorrow the weather changes a bit for the worst and we'll make the run across the Staits of Juan de Fuca. We'll leave early and the tides and winds look favorable.

The video below is on our sail up here with our new GoPro Hero camera.

Until we post again at Lopez Island!


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Location:Kingston and Port Townsend