After spending four days at Pond Bay waiting for winds and seas to calm down from a gale force warning, we find benign conditions for our open water crossing of Dixon Entrance. The calm passage was well worth the wait.
We soon enter British Columbia waters and call Nexus for our clearance. With our newly acquired 12 gauge shotgun (our bear gun), we now must go into Prince Rupert for inspection. Two customs agents are waiting on the dock as we pull into Cow Bay Marina. We have the required forms already filled out and after collecting the $25 permit fee, we are cleared for 60 days. Today is B.C. Day in Canada and most stores are closed. Luckily, Dolly’s Fish Market is open. We join Spirit Journey for some awesome halibut Fish and chips. It took some convincing(from Susie) but Jeff soon joined Ron in dumpster diving behind the fish market for some crab bait from the markets raw fish scraps.
Exiting Prince Rupert Harbor the next morning, the commercial shipping port is already busy with cargo being loaded.
Four massive ships are at anchor nearby waiting their turn. Traveling south down The Grenville Channel we stop for the evening in Lowe Harbor. This is a picturesque and popular stop along the Inside Passage. It is the deepest we have had to anchor the entire trip at 90 feet. In these deep anchorages we only put out a scope of 3 to 1. Luckily, the anchorage is very protected with little wind. We have a beautiful spot beside the waterfall. Salmon are jumping upstream on their annual migration. We share the anchorage with Rekindle and seven other boats.
The next morning finds us back out in the Grenville Channel. Our beautiful views are now obscured by thick fog.
Thank goodness for AIS and radar.
We time our passage so as to arrive at Heikish Narrows at slack tide. Our timing is good and we arrive to the rapids with only a one knot current. A lone humpback whale is feeding in the channel.
We follow Rekindle into Windy Bay, our home for the next two days. We try our luck at halibut and Salmon fishing with no success. We do however catch a nice red snapper for dinner.
Our next destination is Codville Lagoon. Spirit Journey and Rekindle join us at this popular anchorage.
We are pleasantly surprised to find a beautiful granite beach lining a small fresh water lake during our hike on the island.
The fishing here was the best since Thorne Bay! We caught three large Coho and two Pink Salmon and our shrimp trap yielded forty nice prawns.
They are a mixture of spot prawns and coon stripe prawns. Our freezer is almost full!
As we begin to stage for our 40 mile open water crossing of Cape Caution, we head down Fitz Hugh Sound to Pruth anchorage just off the Hakai Research Institute on Calvert Island. They allow boaters to come ashore to hike their several trails and also offer free use of their Wi-Fi. With no internet or cell service, the Wi-Fi is valuable for gathering the necessary weather data needed to make a decision on when to cross. We spend two days here waiting on a weather window to appear. We are thankful for Hakai Institutes generosity to boaters.
With a weather window approaching, we continue south thirty-six miles to Milbrook Cove in Smith Inlet. The small anchorage is packed with seven other boats also crossing tomorrow. We are in good company with Spirit Journey and Rekindle as well as two other Krogens.
As I am writing this, we are one hour out from Port McNeil. The crossing of Cape Caution this morning was a non event as the seas and winds were calm. We are very glad to have this passage behind us. We will be in Port McNeil for a few days before continuing our journey south . Our next destination will be the Krogen Rendezvous on Bowen Island, B.C. a few weeks from now. Thanks for following along.
Total Miles This Year: 2933