With a good forecast (NW 10-15) for the Strait of Georgia, I
set off this morning to check out Jedediah Island for possible anchorages. If I couldn’t find something I liked, I’d
continue to the Gulf Islands.
The trip to Jedediah was easy. Basically smooth water, light winds, and good
visibility. I first checked out a little
nook on the south end of the island. It
wasn’t charted well, but it would have been an awesome anchorage with a stern
tie and in northerly weather. I think
southerly weather would work its way in…
After that I worked my way around to a few other spots but
didn’t see anything that looked ideal.
The problem was the wind was forecast to shift from the northwest to the
southeast overnight, so what was a good anchorage today could become a not so
good anchorage sometime in the middle of the night.
Given the nice weather, I decided to just head across the
Strait of Georgia and into the Gulf Islands.
Area Whiskey Golf, a joint US/Canadian naval torpedo test range, was
active, so I took a longer course around it.
As I transited the area I heard the navy patrol boats calling a lot of
other boaters who hadn’t known or bothered to check if the area was safe to transit.
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| Navy boat heading out to intercept a cruising boat in Whiskey Golf |
Tides have been quite small recently, so Dodd Narrows didn’t
present a problem no matter when I went through. As it was, I transited at the max flood for
the day, about 3 knots. No big deal and
there were even sea kayakers going through at the same time.
I cruised another hour and a half down to Wallace Island, a
wonderful provincial park that I’ve visited many times before. Princess Cove, the northernmost anchorage,
was surprisingly full and requires a stern tie so I headed down to see about dock
space in Conover Cove. Sure enough,
after asking another boat to move forward a few feet, I had just enough space
and settled in.
After reading a bit I set off to walk around the Island,
which took a few hours. Good exercise
and nice trails. On my way back I ran
into Brian and Ann from Seven Please and chatted a bit. Later on, I paddled out to their boat and had
drinks with the two of them and Brian’s daughter, who had swapped places with
Ann’s son.
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| The north tip of Wallace Island |
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| I need a car when I get back to Seattle, but I don't think this will be it... |
Back on the dock I chatted with one of the neighboring boat
owners. He was awfully impressed that
I’d taken such a little boat to Alaska.
It’s always funny when people ask how long I’ve been out for, where I’ve
been, etc. Normally they’re pretty
shocked when I tell them.
62.5 nm today and 3,157.5 total
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