Above the Salish Sea

[tjr818]

I would love to hear the story about the track while you were opposite Springer Point. That looks similar to a day on the Mississippi during the Spring floods.

[David Patterson]

When I get steady service, I'll comment. Maybe these pics will get thru: a port stop at Blind Channel resort, with my boat in the far bay, my blue dinghy loaded with supplies; a float home headed for a new location; a transit of Upper Surge Narrows by motoring, with about 4.5 kts of that SOG being current.

[David Patterson]

Tim, here is a better view of my transit of the Upper Rapids of Surge Narrows. There are two timings for these rapids, and others. One can enter, if possible, at the first of a tide. The slack current then can make transit easier, but if the slack time is short, turbulence never ceases. The other way is to ride the end of a tide thru, but then you lose that tide's current for any subsequent travel, requiring anchoring soon. These considerations apply less to motoring than sailing, to be sure. Yet, in very fast, very turbulent rapids, like these, they apply to both. I was out exploring early, my plan to transit with the first of the north setting ebb. I had just used that timing on the preceding Beazley Rapids, designated as Surge Rapids usually, sailing thru sometimes wing 'n' wing in style (followed immediately by Force 4 and a deluge). At the Upper Rapids a few days later winds grew to Force 3 gusting Force 4 headwinds, but extremely variable moment to moment, as I've grown to expect in narrows. Currents, I found, were phenomenal. River in flood is apt. Wind and current...Shakespeare comes to mind, "it boots me not...", etc. I could find respite from both, sometimes, against the west shore. The first two circling and figure-8 tracks were that, as I waited for the currents to decrease closer to slack. Better to have had a following wind and a following current, but there I was, committed. As slack (ha! spring tides!) approached I made my play for the rapids. The conditions were tough. Whirlpools had to be dodged, no easy task for they moved about, and heavier current streams also, which was easier. Plus upwellings stealing steerage, cross currents, eddies, small rips. You get the picture. However...a current stream against one side of the passage stymied me. That baling-wire tangle of track opposite Springer Point was me working past one particularly difficult spot, eventually with success, after an athletic period. Reefed main and 80% job. I was in Homer for a bit, between Charibdis to port and the inexorable pull toward the Scylla of 6-7kts of current into Hole in the Wall Rapids. Then when I made Upper Rapids themselves it went fairly well...except for the tug pushing a barge, running fast from astern of me. Maybe I can share that part of the tale another time. I did get thru. A "notch in the tiller" as I playfully call it.

Sent from my iPhone

[tjr818]

Thanks David,
I think I understand now. Changing currents, whirlpools, fluky winds, AND a fast approaching tug just to be sure that the adrenaline is flowing. A well deserved notch, I would say. Congrats
It is times such as those when I wish I had a GoPro camera running so that I could later review what happened.

[David Patterson]

With access to cell service in the evening for the first time in weeks, I'll try to catch up those who have an interest in these cruising grounds, and this cruise. I notice only five views of the last post of the previous page, so just photos are not apparently enough. (Shucks. I liked those.) Anyway, follow me on the small scale depiction of what I call the "Spanish Islands." The Discovery Islands are to the W, the Desolation Sound area to the E. 17 passages, short or long, in 21 days:
1. Ballet Bay (not shown) to Copelands Is. A long motor passage from the SE to near Malaspina Peninsula.
2. Copelands to Gorge Harbour. Mostly sail thru Baker Passage, N to The Gorge.
3. Gorge to Hjork Bay of Read I. Mostly sail across Sutil Ch. and N in Hoskyn Ch. to the indent by the 'R' of READ.
4. Hjork B to Yeatman B. Sail only thru Surge Narrows' Beazley Passage to that indent below the 88 meter sounding in Okisollo Ch.
5. Yeatman B to Octopus I/Waiatt B, by sail only.
6. One part of Waiatt B to another by sail.
7. Another part of Waiatt to another by sail.
8. Octopus Is to Owen B. Sail only thru Upper Rapids to the large bay above the islands east of the 108 sounding in Okisollo.
9. Owen B to Okisollo, then back to Owen B by sail. A failed attempt to go W in Okisollo.
10. Owen B thru Okisollo to Otter Cove, just below Chatham Pt. Johnstone Strait, Discovery Passage, and Nodales Channel form a large open body of water there.
11. Otter Cove to Anchorage Lagoon of Thurston B. Mostly motoring up Nodales Ch. NE into a remarkable protected lagoon.
12. Anchorage Lagoon to Bickley B of E Thurlow I. Sailed out of lagoon, motored up Nodales, sailed on to Bickley, which is the largish bay W of Shoal B, at the 64 meter sounding. My farthest N latitude was at the entrance of Phillips Arm in a squall.
13. Bickley B to Charles B in Mayne Passage. Sail only. Charles is the bay just NE of the Blind Ch name, with a bit of island in it.
14. Charles B to Otter Cove below Chatham Pt again. Motoring down Johnstone Strait.
15. Otter Cove to Florence Cove of Hole in the Wall Passage. Motoring down Discovery Passage, thru Okisollo, transiting Upper Rapids and Hole in Wall Rapids on one tide, to anchor S in mid passage. My favorite motoring passage ever.
16. Florence Cove to Redonda Bay. Mix of sail and motor. Out E end of the passage, down Calm Channel, around the top of Raza I., down Deer Passage to Redonda.
17. Redonda Bay to Squirrel Cove of Cortes I. Motor down Lewis Ch to light at the end, then sail on into Squirrel.
No idea where to next. Here are a couple of waterway scenes to go with all of the words. I'm posting this on day 48 of my cruise. 28 passages total, so far.

[David Patterson]

Some generic views of this area. If I'm repeating, apologies. As with any area (perhaps especially 50 days into a cruise) the scenes can become simply variations on a theme. Independently, they can be breathtaking. I'm still a few weeks ahead of the conventional tourist season for this area (July and August). I expect to be --and find that I often am-- the only boat in sight when on passage, typically no other cruisers. Nowhere to go here that someone else hasn't been before, yet I can get a sense of exploring beyond the known, at least briefly. Plus, I have charts.

[Steve Laume]

That is some seriously stunning scenery. The NW in so beautiful. Do you ever do much hiking?

I am planning a trip north of the east coast this summer and I am really looking forward to doing a lot of hiking.

Do you have a shore pack of any sort to carry in case the mother ship should depart while you are on shore? This is something I want to put together, Steve.

[David Patterson]

Yes, I love to hike. And 'stunning' is a good word for the scenery, sometimes. The mind just stops functioning for a bit. Then, "Take a photo, you dolt." So many lovely moments go by uncaptured during a tack or as some maneuver is required. As for a shore pack, just ordinary day needs, usually, with some rain/wind protection. Two years ago in Jedediah Marine Park I fell while bushwacking off trail, in search of high places. Slippery moss-covered rock. I was fine, but since then I've taken care to carry a handheld VHF with me, in case I need assistance and am still conscious. I'm a single-hander. And I'm very serious about my anchoring, having experimented with multiple ways. Practice truly helps. Anything can happen, of course, yet living in constant concern is not living, to me. It is strange how reluctant a cruiser can become to leaving the boat. An odd question of ownership can arise: do I own the boat or does the boat own me? Now, if I really can make it north to the Spirit Bear Wilderness --and it will have to be next year, not this one, now-- I don't know how I'll feel about hiking ashore. I don't have experience in big bear country. Grizzlies, I mean. This cruise has been an extensive and fairly thorough recon of part of the route. More than half. Thru most of the barrier rapids anyway.

[Skeep]

The impression of your photos reminds me of the comment a friend made years ago when CDs had just entered the market and she had one of Strauss playing throughout the house in our little French village, I turned and asked her which composer that was, and her response stuck with me hence these many years the simple phrase, "Strauss, (hesitating)...ca entre..!." just about the same sense as stated above, with that sense of reaching the soul, "penetrating the deep..." Those photos, they do penetrate the deep!

[David Patterson]

They do, Skeep. I've been wondering how being subsumed by all this beauty might be changing me. And Ira Progoff's word comes to mind at times: Tremendum. Do we in some fashion become what we surround ourselves with, what we have playing in every room of our "house?" I wonder.

[David Patterson]

I've accepted that having entered the popular warm-water (warmest Pacific waters in the coast north of Mexico) conventional tourist side of the Spanish-named islands that my "challenge cruising" is behind me. I'm on to more typical "vacation cruising" now, with sail as the auxiliary power and motoring primary. I'll resist. Three photos. First: this anchorage was benign in terms of wind and wave. Yet after three days of swinging, when I brought up Old Cold Nose from the bottom he had hooked a log. The chain had managed a full round turn around a 12" diameter log. It was just within my strength to bring it to the surface. To my relief, it spun on the grounded end and the chain and anchor came free. My spare primary would be a 10 kg Bruce, yet to be set up with chain and rode, though all is aboard. Second photo: evening light, just as the phone camera saw it. Ineffable color, for me. Have a name for it? Third: approaching the narrow (<100') entrance/exit to Squirrel Cove, it looks impossible to sail thru, but with the proper tide and a following wind, no problem. IF there is no other traffic. I was able to sail both in and out...this time.

[David Patterson]

Another posting while I have service. The largest and best-stocked store, on at least this part of Desolation Sound proper, is at Refuge Cove, West Redonda Island. "Rustic" describes the scene. The anchorage cove I sailed into, after a current-controlled brush with the rocks as I entered the Refuge. I could have touched with my boat pole, and had the engine idling in case. The steep-sided spot gave me a chance to find out if I could stay off. Fieri potest. The cove I sailed into had charming old places. Those piling are not whimsical. Unusually high tides easily reach them. Tidal range is 16' locally. Calculating rode length takes on meaning when swing room is also limited. I left before the next lower low tide. The store itself is adapted from an old fish-packing building. Such uneven floors you have rarely seen. Sea legs help, though the planks don't quite shift to movement.

[Skeep]

Love the photographs. I was startled at the height of the tide level in that place!

[David Patterson]

Skeep, and any other curious viewer, some comments on local tides, with some illustrative photos: local tides are mixed semi-diurnal, which means twice a day cycles (semi-diurnal) with differing heights as highs and low (mixed). A daily lower low and a higher low, a daily lower high and a higher high, in other words. Most of my passages are one-tide passages of about 6 hours, as a consequence. Tidal timing is a planning necessity when cruising under sail. All of the usual tidal aspects apply, as in spring and neap tides, and currents. The concept of slack, or neutral current, can be locally specious or just very brief. Currents tend to continue, swirling and countering, especially in narrows and above all in rapids...some of which are notable in world-wide comparisons. Additionally, there are areas, such as the one I'm in as I write, where flood and ebb tides do a kind of battle. Tides up out of the Strait of Juan de Fuca flood north; tides down from Queen Charlotte Strait flood south. Where they meet some unpredictability occurs. Yesterday I was coming north out of Desolation Sound waterway into Waddington Channel. The flood, supposedly running north, was running full spate toward me out of Waddington. I gave in, furled, and motored the last couple of miles into Roscoe Bay, to have water over the drying bar there when I arrived. Good use of my auxiliary. The tidal volumes are incredibly prodigious. 16 and even 18 foot floods are common among these and more northern islands. Part of me experiences incomprehension at the collective water amounts. Units of measure beyond acre-feet need to be found. Cubic miles? Plus...fresh water inflows from over a hundred miles away, like the Fraser River affecting Johnstone Strait, can actually reverse tidal flows. There are times when there is basically no observable flood currents in Johnstone, I read, because of the laminar flow of light fresh water atop the heavier salt water. Ebb all day. All of which means, for the sailor and for most motorists, that tidal currents dominate planning, especially given the frequent wind variations in direction and speed. Tidal currents also can easily set up wind-over-tide situations that are truly dangerous for small craft, and not just off well-known places like Cape Mudge, but in any given channel. Water depth, constrictions and obstructions, nearby island surface topography, and so on all come into play. Wind itself can diminish or accentuate current flows of the water. Anyway, here are two screen shots from AyeTides, a phone app that has the advantage of not needing connection in use, for the data is stored in the app. There may be better ones, but this one does the trick for a couple bucks. One shot is of tidal heights, illustrating range and a mild version of the semi-diurnal nature of a recent small anchorage I was in. The other is a typical current station prediction (note the speeds). This one of a narrows with a very brief slack, like many--Beazley Passage aka Surge Narrows--which I was able to sail thru wing 'n' wing by getting there at the right moment on the correct tide. With the proper wind, of course. Winds among these islands and their channels and mountains is another topic entirely. Both wind and current are fascinating studies, here, and relentless challenges. Last shot is of the chart of a unique bay I just spent a couple of days in. I'm on passage 30, 56 days out, as I post this. The bar dries at zero tide, Canadian datum.

[David Patterson]

A few local scenes.