Today we stayed in Prince Rupert with hopes of completing a few boat projects. An oil change, and since Dave had seen some water in the fuel - a cleaning of the fuel filter. Turned out there wasn't as much water contamination as he had feared. Dave also wanted to install a filtered water tap on t…
Blog posts : "2013 Alaska Ho!"
Making Tracks
Yesterday we got up at 7am and headed out. We motored through more of the inside passage. Barely a ripple on the water. We had to choose between calling it quits at 5:30pm or going till 10:30pm as there were no anchorages in between. But stopping would mean we can’t make Prince Rupert today. So…
A few days on the inside passage
On June 17th we followed Joint Decision to Shearwater marina. It was smooth water and no wind the whole way. We saw one male orca whale sitting on the surface with his dorsal fin in the air. Just sitting there. Odd behavior in an orca. Maybe he is waiting for the pod of girls to arrive? Maybe …
Who needs to be rescued anyway?
The day started out amazing. Melissa got up at about 5am as the sun was coming up. The lagoon we were in was dead calm. The only noise was the birds chattering and the fish jumping as they tried to escape the seals that were fishing for breakfast. She could hear the crows talking to each other o…
Lets just keep going
We left Lagoon Cove headed for Port McNeil to provision. This meant going back out onto Johnstone Strait and then into Queen Charlotte Strait. When we got there it was smooth as glass. Not so much as a ripple on the water. We got to McNeil, had hamburgers for lunch and grabbed our groceries. It…
A project lay day
Lagoon Cove has a big workshop and Dave had some laminate to cut up to complete the master shower repair. So we decided to hang out at Lagoon Cove for the day and work on a few projects. Dave worked mostly on the solar panel installation. He discovered that the controller box he had purchased was…
Lagoon Cove
Melissa slept in while Dave shot the Greene Point Rapids. By the time she got up we were in the infamous Johnstone Strait. While we had heard all the horror stories about how bad it could be – it was 1 foot chop seas and we ducked into Havanna Channel by 1pm before the afternoon winds kicked up and…
Rapids? What Rapids?
We left Refuge Cove and shot the Yuculta and Dent Rapids. Dave was super nervous about this having heard the many horror stories about boats getting turned over in them. But as he hit the timing square on the money, Melissa didn’t even know there were any rapids. We spent the evening at a place c…
Where is the dang fuel tank?
We started out with a plan to make tracks today. Ahead are rapids that you have to hit at precisely slack tide or the current runs so fast it can tumble your boat over. For you Seattleites, think Deception Pass type currents. So we stopped at Refuge Cove for a couple of hours while we waited for …
A lovely day to sail
The day was a lovely ride, we got in some good sailing, and while we had planned to stop about 3pm, we kept going till about 7pm because it was sunny, warm, and the sea like glass. We pulled into a marina at Lund. And Melissa managed to lose her good sunglasses overboard. Dang it! But as we were…
Sucessfull Sea Test
The day started out calm and beautiful. That is till we hit the Straights of Georgia. Then it was 5 foot seas - with a short period and sharp sides. And we were pounding up wind. Bleck. Even took one good wave of green water over the bow. Not Melissa's idea of a good time. (Note to Dr. R. - I…
What color is the spinnaker?
We sailed out of Vancouver at lunchtime set for a nice little place called Plumper Cove. Along the way, Dave decided to put the spinnaker sail for the first time. It was still in the bag it came in till today. We had no idea what color it was. Dave put it up, keeping the jib out till the spinnak…
Apsaras decides she likes Vancouver
When we did the boat survey, the starter motor was determined to be marginal. With that in mind, we put two spare starters aboard. One for Dave to replace the known bad one, and the second so that we would have a spare once the new one was installed. Changing a starter isn't hard in theory - shou…
A Quiet Start
We left with the tide at 6am. The current flushed us out of Puget Sound, and then turned around and pushed us up to Canada. It cut an entire day off the trip - which meant we got to spend day 2 at Poet's Cove and go to the spaaaaa. It was calm the entire way. A couple of seals said good by a…
Changing the Anchor Light
Dave wanted to make sure to practice with the mast climbing gear before anything critical required a trip up the mast. So he decided to go up and change out the anchor light to an LED that uses way less electrons. It was really hard work because the system basically involves a system that allows y…
Bedwell Harbor Sunset
Today was a quiet day in Bedwell Harbor. This was the sunset tonight.
A Lone Humpback Whale Puts On A Show
On our first day out, on the way to Poet's Cove, a Humpback Whale treated us to an hour long show. Humpback Whales are rarely seen in the San Juan channel, so this was quite a treat. As you can see from the pictures, there were a number of boats that stopped to watch. While it looks like the boat…
MacGyver Goes to the Doctor
Ok, this is one of those icky medical posts. If you hate that stuff stop reading now. Poor Dave managed to cram into this last week of preparations way too many doctor's appointments. All of whom were hacking and slashing him. Last Thursday he had some oral surgery. They had to slice his gum op…
Cast off party - Life lesson for Melissa
Sometimes life lessons sneak up on you. In this case, Melissa discovered that when 70+ people accepted for the cast off party that there was no way to cater for that many people from the galley on the boat. That meant (gasp!) having to ask a few friends for help. This is something I am not wired …
Anyone need to be rescued?
When you know you are going to be several days travel away from medical help, your first aid kit takes on a whole new meaning. My brother is a paramedic so he gave us a list of stuff we needed to have. I ended up buying a paramedic bag to store everything.
It includes a CPR mask, first …