Sept 11th - Day 131 - Part 2 Cabbage Island - one more day

Sept 11th – Day 131 – part 2 Cabbage Island – one more day


Diane was eager to go fishing so we dropped them off at the big boats and Glen and I continued our exploration of the next island where there had been a fox farm, coal mine, and farming in years past. We found a number of old houses and remains of old houses, outbuildings, a piece of old farm equipment, and posts from fencing off livestock.

 

Log buildings - one was outbuilding and the other to the right was a cabin

 

Outbuilding

Log Cabin

Boat planter – most people plant flowers

Old boat abandoned in the yard, and a tree grew out of it

 

There were rows of rocks on the beach and into the water, which clearly were placed there by humans. These likely were for oyster or clam beds, and there are lots of oysters and evidence of clams in the area.

 

 

 

The old houses/buildings ranged from true log cabins and various renditions of very old planed logs to what appears to have been a more modern wood shake place from likely the 50 or 60’s.

There was an old skull on the deck in front of the newer place. Don’t really know what type of animal it was but it could have been a fox or some smaller pointy nose animal.

 

 

 

Beach log and large stump on shore

 

Great beach

Sept 11th - Day 131 - part 1 Cabbage Island - one more day

Sept 11th – Day 131 - part 1 Cabbage Island – one more day



Overcast, and off and on wet day.

We went for a walk on the beach. Saw a family of racoons, and one blue herron, but no other wildlife unless you count the kayakers who were camping. Interesting rocks on this beach.

 

Odd red rocks imbedded occasionally around the beach

 

 

Green rocks have been a favorite this summer. Steve would love this one.

 

 

 

Bench for a yard! It’s still on the beach.

 

 

 

Glen walking on the beach access to a neighboring island. Tide coming in, don’t go out there Glen you will be stuck till the next tide.

 

Sept 10th - Day 130 - Cabbage Island

Sept 10th – Day 130 – Cabbage Island

Todays plan is to go south through Dodd Narrows and then head over to Cabbage Island. Diane wants to do a bit of fishing. She called a friend who gave her the skinny about the fail safe Ling hole near Boiling Reef



Glen, Willard, and Diane went out fishing. They caught several fish 22, 23, 24, 23, 24” but not the minimum 26”, so will go out tomorrow to try to catch ones that are of keeper size.

 

Beautiful sunset this evening that just kept going on and on showing different colors. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sept 9th - Day 129 - Nanaimo

Sept 9th – Day 129 – Nanaimo

We headed out and motored south, pretty uneventfully. But I wore my bracelet as I did not want another day of stomach issues. We pulled into Nanaimo at about 2:30pm and anchored off Newcastle island.

We went into town to get off the boat for a walk and visited a couple stores and got ice cream cones. Then back to the boats. The weather was sunny and warm. Shortly thereafter we headed over to the ‘Dinghy Dock Pub’ for appy’s and a beverage, took the board with us to play some cribbage, and eventually had dinner, and then back to the boats. Fall is here as the ‘dew had dropped in’ making things damp. Willard and Diane called it a night and Glen and I watched a movie before calling it a night. The evening was calm and water reflective.

There is a fall crispness in the air.

 

 

 

At anchor in Nanaimo

 

Dinghy Dock Pub

 

Moon over town

 

Lights of Nanaimo

Dinghy Dock Pub

 

 

 

Sept 8th – Day 128 - Henry Bay

Sept 8th – Day 128 - Henry Bay



It’s raining again, and raining hard, so I did not get up as early as normal this morning.

By 7am m/v Esprit d’ Four had already pulled out of the bay. Clearly the barn is calling them toward the border.

We cruised down to Henry bay / Comox and anchored at about 3:15pm. The water had started out smoothish but with the tide change and winds for the last 4 miles, it kicked up a bunch. I had to put my bracelet on but still felt every bump.

Willard, Diane, and Glen went to the beach for a walk, it was low tide so there should be tons of sand dollars, little snails, and other low tide creatures on the tide flats. I really like this beach, but alas I had a conference call at 4 pm so going to the beach and getting back in time for the call was out of the question.

It was a windy and bumpy evening and night. We had dinner on Sea Life tonight and the watched another movie.

Sept 7th - Day 127 - Blind Channel to April Point and Campbell River

Sept 7th – Day 127 - Blind Channel to April Point and Campbell River



The plan is to go another 20 miles or so down to April Point and Campbell River area.

Might do some fishing near Campbell River as one of the couples we spoke to at Blind Channel who live in Campbell River said that the fishing has been great there this year.

The cruise was uneventful, the water great, and the sun out. The super yacht Paladin passed us like we were standing still. It is a beautiful yacht of 157 feet. But clearly could not do the type of cruising we do, going into all the nooks and crannies, and I’m not sure Glen’s attire of shorts and maybe a t-shirt would bode well in all the luxury.

 

Anchored in the inner bay behind April Point lodge.  

We went in the jet over to Campbell river to get a couple items from the store, and on the way Glen of course needed to explore a river. We could not go up-river very far do to it being shallow (low tide). There were people swimming and Kayaking in the river, and others walking on the beach.

Who is leading this group – which way are we going?

 

Ducks in a row - finally

 

 

Went on into town and headed for the store but Glen spotted the pub/restaurant and decided we needed a snack and beverage first. So, in we went and had a quick snack of clams, mussels, calamari, and beverage of choice.

 

Not being hungry made us less likely to overbuy in the grocery store. Got the few things we needed/wanted and headed back to April point, and spent the late afternoon on the deck in the sun playing cribbage.

 

At anchor near April Point

Great fluffy clouds this afternoon

 

The boat , Esprit d’ Four that we’d seen in Kalinan Bay and then again in Elfin Cove, AK pulled in at sunset and anchored down the bay. They are from Tacoma and are clearly on their way home. Called them on the radio but no answer. After dinner we thought about running over to say hi, but their lights were all out.

Watched a movie and went to bed.

Sept 6 – Day 126 Johnstone Strait

Sept 6 – Day 126 Johnstone Strait

Glen pulled in our crab pots in the morning – two nice keepers. Willard collected logs.

Headed out with flat water and overcast sky. Goal is Blind Channel for tonight. Willard made reservations for dinner in Blind Channel “to give the girls a break from cooking, and a nice dinner out”.

Johnstone strait was true Liz water, flat and often reflective flat. A pretty uneventful day just cruising along. Pulled into Blind Channel resort, got tied up and went for a hike up to see the large Cedar trees.

There is a well used and maintained but natural trail up the hillside with bridges over creek beds along the way. We came across 4 other groups on the trail. It seems to be a must ‘must do the hike’ thing.

They have signs occasionally identifying the various types of trees and describing the bark, but from our looking at them in the shaded woods they pretty much all looked the same …. tall wooden tree covered with green moss.

Large Cedar tree

Looking up at the large Cedar Tree

The base of the larger Cedar

The area has like most areas been logged many years ago of the ‘old growth’ trees. There are many large stumps with ‘spring board’ notches. There are a few very very large Cedars that somehow did not get logged. This is nice as they really show how big trees can get if given the chance.

Blind Channel is a small but interesting place. They have flowers all around the docks and patio areas. There are quite a few paintings, mosaics out of glass, tile and shells, and photographs, all around the place, and all done by the same person Annemarie Richter. She and her husband Edgar moved their family to the property in 1970 and built the resort. It is a multigenerational family business which caters to long distance travelers as well as the just out for a weekend getaway types. There is a great restaurant which serves German food. We went to dinner and it was great.

 

 

One of Annemarie’s photos and quotes

Just one end of a very large crocheted wall art piece

This would not have been easy to crocheted

I have always liked the outside wall of the store building. They imbedded wine bottles in the concrete, the bottoms of the bottles show on the inside wall and the necks stick out on the outside of the building. Light glows through and shows the various glass colors. I think this would be a great wall for a winery tasting room.

Inside view

Outside view