Millers' Time

After leaving Ladysmith on Wednesday, July 30th, Darrel and I went to pull shrimp pots and fish and planned to catch up with the Bryant’s later at Wallace Island. We did a little better with the shrimp than we had the whole trip. We ended up with about 100, and we also caught 4 crab. Darrel was able to catch a few rock cod and one under-sized ling cod. I, again, caught nothing!

Wallace Island is a long narrow island with little on it. The anchorage was also long and narrow and the boats were far in the back anchored and stern tied to shore. I cooked steak, potatoes, and had leftover cabbage salad. The Bryant’s cooked their own chicken, mac & cheese, and salad. It was so quiet in the area that they didn’t want to fire up their generators and disturb the peace – mostly sailboaters in the anchorage.

The next morning I cooked up our crab and Carl’s and then we all took off. They were headed for Ganges and we decided to head to Sydney as it was Thursday and there is a huge street fair/market on Thursday nights.

We pulled our crab pots and stored them – not too many shrimp. Then trolled for salmon. After a while, we pulled the lines in and stopped to bottom fish. Darrel caught one small rock cod and I didn’t even bother dropping a line since I hadn’t been successful anyway.

We decided to move to another spot so started the engine and took off. Almost immediately, the engine started popping and acting strange – again! It seemed to me very similar to the problems we had around the 4th of July with the fuel pump. Darrel tried changing fuel filters while I putted us along on the kicker motor. At one point, a ferry was heading right for us and blasted us with his horn, even though I was going as fast as the kicker would take us. I fired up the big engine and even though it was backfiring and starved for gas, managed to get us a few yards further/quicker and avoided being rammed.

I told Darrel I was setting a course to Roche Harbor and even using the kicker motor we could be on dock by 5 or 6. So, off we went. At one point, we were only going about 1 mile an hour due to the current, but we averaged around 4 mph.

We pulled up to the Customs dock around 5:30 and I saw a man get off a boat to come help us dock. It was Roger Hazzard, a friend from the club. I got to talking with him and Darrel got the passports and went into the Customs office and came back out with an agent who told Roger, in no uncertain terms, to get back on his boat until we were done.

We got our slip and docked the boat and I got a text from Karen, Roger’s wife, inviting us for dinner since we had had such a long day. Yes! We had a very pleasant evening visiting with them and eating a very good barbecue chicken dinner.

The boat started up again with no problem so we decided to fuel up and head for home. If we ran into any problems, we would find the nearest port and Darrel would go get the truck and trailer and we would haul it home. But, it ran fine all the 110 miles home! It is crazy making to have it do this!

Marilee came and picked us up and took us home since we hadn’t left a vehicle at the club. We went back and unloaded it and brought the stuff home. Darrel just went back to throw the crab pots in and maybe troll for some salmon.

Three weeks to the day, we made it safely, but much poorer, home. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…

Sunset at Roche Harbor.

It was a very hot day today. Not sure what the temperature reached but it was supposed to be about 96 degrees and it sure felt like it!

Darrel, Carl, Waylon, and I went out to check the shrimp pots and ended up with about 45. Better than we have done! We then dropped the crab pots. Carl and Darrel checked them twice more and got one legal crab.

Darrel has been doing fairly well but his feet are starting to get worse and he left his new prescription of pain meds at home! Chemo brain strikes! We are trying to see about getting them either overnighted to Garrison Bay or brought back with the Landes.

I had said I would do a fish fry for dinner for all of us not knowing it was going to be the hottest day of the year! I cooked up the ling cod we caught and froze a week or so ago. Had to do it in the boat on the stove top in a skillet since none of us had brought our fish fryers. I also made an asian cabbage salad and Carl cooked fries in the oven. Ann contributed the sangria.

The boys ended up drinking a lot of that sangria and had a very good time. Not such a great time the next morning, though.

Today we are going to head to Thetis Island and stay one more night with the Bryants. Then Darrel and I will head Southward tomorrow. We might catch up with them again in the San Juans. Hope to see the Landes again there too.

I meant to take pictures of the fish fry last night but was too busy cooking, so just one of the Ladysmith Maritime Society Marina. They have a program here for the recovery of Purple Martins, the largest swallow, that migrates from South America for the summer. Lots of birdhouses on each piling and lots of chirping going on all day. They even have a web cam in one of them showing a baby, that looks full grown.

The boat part came in right on time on Saturday morning. The hydraulic steering unit shipped from Vancouver overnight. Darrel struggled with it for a couple of hours, because, of course, it wasn’t exactly the same. He finally got it on, but it didn’t give us full range with steering. The part was not exactly the same and had to be adapted. Why, they do that, I have no clue! At least we could steer, however.

So, at about 3:00 Saturday afternoon we headed for the fuel dock and then to either fish and go back to Campbell River or head south. It all depended on the winds and waves. My back still had not recovered from the Strait of Georgia crossing a week and a half ago.

We got out of the harbour and it was calm and clear, so off we went South. We got about 10 miles North of Comox and saw a lot of fishing boats, so we stopped and put out the lines. Trolled around for an hour or two and caught a small silver.

We decided, since it was after 5:00, we would stay at Comox that night. It is a large marina with mostly commercial fishing boats, sailboats, and really, really large pleasure boats. Here we were docked between 2 boats that were probably 65 feet or so in length. Felt a little out of place.

We headed up to the ‘pub’ for dinner thinking a bar with burgers. Nope. First question was if we had reservations and I looked around and immediately felt under dressed in my wrinkled tank top and shorts.

We ended up at the bar and ordered sandwiches. I had a Montrealer and Darrel had an Italian panini. The Montrealer was ‘smoked’ beef, with cheese, onions and a Caesar salad. The beef didn’t really tasted smoked, more like dried. It was good, but maybe someone who has been to Montreal can explain it to me.

We took showers at the marina before bed. It was the largest marina shower I have ever seen! A bit more expensive, however, as it was 1 loonie for 2 1/2 minutes. Usually, it more like a loonie for 4 or 5 minutes! But it felt good to get clean.

We left Comox around 6:15 and headed towards Nanaimo where we fueled up again. Darrel also went to the fishing supply store and bought some new downrigger line since he had lost 2 balls with the old stuff.

We stopped once more by Tree Island to fish for ling cod. The island had a house on it and they had brought in multiple tons of boulders to create their own little harbour with a dock for a boat. Can’t even begin to think how much that all must have cost.

We ended up at Montague Harbour (notice I am spelling it the Canadian way) with all the yacht club friends plus more. The Lande’s, Josowitz’s, both Bryant boys and their families, the Wamsley’s and us. Quite a raft of boats – largest one in the harbour.

Darrel, Carl, and Ken Bryant all worked on our boat most of the day trying to get the steering to work right. The managed to get it to improve, but it still isn’t quite right. It worked much better, though. Many more dollars to be spent, I imagine, when we get home! Yikes, this has been an expensive trip!

Today, we headed to Ladysmith with the Bryant families while the rest of the group headed back to the USA. We took 6 year old, Waylon, with us because he wanted to fish and shrimp. We stopped for a couple of hours but didn’t catch andy fish and only got 6 shrimp. He probably won’t want to go do that again!

It has been hot and sunny all day today and I think more is on the way tomorrow. I am fixing Asian marinated pork tenderloin tonight with roasted potatoes, cauliflower and broccoli.

It has been a good couple of days!

P.S. Just thought that we, or at least I, have been on this 24 foot boat for like 17 days. We haven’t quite killed each other yet, even though the boat problems have made it close.

Woke up to a cloudy morning and a Happy Birthday wish from Darrel. I also received birthday phone calls from Jan and Yvonne, and many Facebook wishes too! Thanks to everyone for all the good wishes.

Kind of a lazy day for me. Darrel washed the boat with fresh water! We are finally in a marina where water is free and you are allowed to wash boats with it. It is so nice not to have salt-crusted windows.

Packed up a small bag for Darrel to take home with him, then we went out for a birthday lunch. We walked up to the Riptide Pub just up from the marina. It was a pretty nice place, dark and pubby. I had an oyster and bacon sandwich – yes, we did just shuck a bunch of oysters last night, but it sounded good. Darrel had beef stroganoff. Both were really tasty.

It started raining quite heavy as we ate. Darrel had planned on walking to the floatplane dock but hadn’t brought a hat or coat. So, we asked the bartender to call a taxi. Took the taxi 30 minutes, but luckily we had allowed enough time for him to walk. So, off he went and here I sit all by myself in the rain on the boat.

I was going to do laundry but don’t feel like hauling it back and forth in the rain. I guess I will just hang out and read. I think the weather is supposed to improve somewhat tomorrow so there is plenty of time.

Shortly after writing the above (I was waiting to post until I could get a picture of the marina) I had a visitor!  It was Suzanne that we met at Homfray Lodge on Monday.  She came to invite me to dinner for my birthday.  How sweet is that?  They are going to ‘pick’ me up at 6:00 so I will add more when I get back before posting this.

What a wonderfully nice couple.  Suzanne & Richard took me over to the White Spot, a Canadian chain restaurant.  It was a very nice place with a varied menu.  Jim Ramsay, to get the food part out of the way – I had a Southwestern Chicken Salad, Suzanne and Richard had specialty burgers (the White Spot is known for their burgers.)  Richard, however, was thinking ahead and got the special one with a little blueberry pie!  All was delicious!

Suzanne & Richard are from Victoria, BC.  She is a kindergarten teacher and he is retired – Navy, I think.  They were so thoughtful to invite me out and she even bought me a book that she told me about the other day.  Her husband died of cancer young when their kids were only 2 and 4.  The book she got me as Love, Medicine & Miracles.  She said it helped her a lot so it was really nice that she was able to find one here in a used book store!

They also insisted on buying my dinner.  It is unbelievable how many really nice people you meet boating, and the Canadians seem to be extra-special.  That is a shout out to my Canadian peeps too!

So, I have had a wonderful birthday even though I thought it would be lonely.  I have made two new friends and can’t wait to see them tomorrow.

Oh, yeah, Darrel made it home even though his place was an hour and fifteen minutes late and Courtney was texting me like crazy.  He couldn’t find the place, then didn’t find dad, then waited for the guy to get off his personal phone call!

Night, night everyone.  Thanks for a good day!

Oh, and I forgot to take a picture of the marina so here is one of the fish cleaning station behind our boat.  The guys there got two nice Chinooks!