5/26/11
Blubber Bay, Texada Island, B.C.
Miles motored: 31
Miles sailed: 0
Why did I write that we were going to rest well last night? I totally jinxed us. If last night was a fire drill of cooking, getting two screaming boys down to bed and moving the boat, then this morning was a clusterf**k.
At 3am the wind piped up and Tor and I were up listening to it. He checked on things and they seemed to be okay. At about 3:15 Lars woke up so I brought him to bed and just nursed him to sleep with us. Then the swell started. We were directly in the path of the opening to the cove, which is where the wind was coming from, and with it pretty heavy swell. Uncomfortable. At about 5am Tor decided to let more anchor chain out, but in order to do that he needed to start the engine to take some of the strain off of the anchor. More chain out made the ride more comfortable. By this point Lars was back in his bed asleep, but Odin woke up, so I took him back to bed and just nursed him to sleep. By about 6:15 the motion had gotten really bad with the swell and the boys both woke up screaming. Tor was getting queasy at anchor, both boys were screaming because I’m sure they didn’t feel well and I just wanted it all to STOP!
We decided to up anchor and move to another place in the cove. Last night Tor realized that instead of using our manual windlass to pull the anchor chain it was faster if he just pulls it by hand and lays it on deck. So he pulled 150 ft of chain and put it on deck since we were only planning on moving to another lobe of the bay that was hopefully less impacted by the swell. Well, the swell looked just as bad in the other part of the bay so Tor looked down at me and said we were getting out. I had both boys with me in our berth and the safety enclosure up.
Because last night had been so hectic, nothing had been stowed. There was sh*t ALL over everywhere, including glass bottles and Tor was tripping over laundry supplies in the cockpit…we were NOT ready to go to sea. We especially weren’t ready to go to sea with 6’ swells that were 30’ apart crest to crest. The dinghy was trailing behind us and I was sitting looking out the portlight on the aft end of the house and I could see the whole inside of the dinghy as the big boat went up one swell and the dinghy went down the first one…and the oars were still IN it!!! What a great way to lose our dinghy or its propulsion.
Lars was having a really rough time, but he quickly cuddled up with me and even fell asleep. Odin actually played for a while and when he’d had enough he cuddled up with me and fell asleep too. My boys aren’t cuddlers and I have to say that even through all of the worry and stuff crashing around, I just kept marveling at how sweet it was to be able to cuddle with my boys and give them enough comfort that they could relax enough to fall asleep.
Finally we got in the lee of a couple of islands and the swell quieted down. Lars woke up cheerful as could be and Odin kept snoozing for a while. Tor took us around the other side of Lasqueti Island and we anchored in Scottie’s bay. We fed the boys breakfast and got things cleaned up. Amazingly only 2 things ended up on the sole, an empty cracker box and a pair of long john pants. We didn’t lose anything on deck or in the dinghy. The anchor chain all ended up in a pile in front of the house, but it didn’t go anywhere.
We put the boys down for their morning nap at 11:00 (usually at 9:00) and we looked at our options. We were both anxious to get away from the Strait of Georgia and the weather report predicted calm winds in the afternoon so we both were anxious to go. We planned to go around the south end of Texada Island and go to Pender Harbor on the mainland…it was truly a decision based on desperation to get out. We still would have a transit of some big open water, but we would be comfortable for the night. The boys woke up and we got going as quickly as we could…get us the HELL out of here! Soon Lars started screaming. Tor and I independently thought he was having some PTSD from the morning or our crossing of the Strait from Nanaimo two days earlier…nope he was just hungry. I gave them some lunch and they were happy as clams.
The conditions were so calm by the time we got out that we made the decision to head north and get to the northern tip of Texada Island and anchor in Blubber Bay. The trip was uneventful except that Tor got a bit sea sick. Stupid Strait of Georgia. The boys took a nice long nap and I spent most of the transit out in the cockpit. The winds were calm though there was some residual swell, but it was pretty much ideal conditions.
Blubber bay is a pretty little cove if you turn your back on the ugly industrial lime kiln. The sun came out, and best of all it is calm! There is a little wake from the B.C. ferry dock, but this feels like heaven. We had a nice dinner and the boys went down easily. It’s early to bed for Tor and me. Tomorrow the forecast is for light winds and we will be in Desolation Sound!
We learned some very important lessons:
- We need to keep the boat in better shape to move if need be in the middle of the night.
- We need to look at a chart when we listen to the weather report and understand how it will impact us, not just go on memory of the geography.
- We need to not anchor too close to moorings which may necessitate us to move. The place we had been anchored before we moved last night was as calm as could be and we would have been fine if we had just moved a little farther back into the inlet instead of moving at the last minute to what turned out to be a terrible place because we were trying to be quick before putting the boys to bed.
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