Port Hardy to Codville Lagoon

Well, we left Port Hardy on 6/1 at 1512 heading for the fuel dock to top up the tanks prior to attempting Queen Charlotte Sound. We pulled up to the dock only to have the attendant inform us that "there's no fuel." There's a power outage that's affecting the entire top of the island. No electricity from Port Hardy to Port McNeil. We have enough fuel in jerry jugs on deck to get to Shearwater with fuel to spare. Just that, Shearwater's a resort and very expensive to boot. Well, that's why we carry 25 gallons on deck. Just for emergencies like this. We fill up the water tanks anyway and head out for God's Pocket in Christie Passage for the night and hope for continued good weather tomorrow.

Got up at 0500 6/2 and the weather forecast was good. Had a quick breakfast and headed out Gordon Channel to pass west of Pine Island. Seas calm, wind light, so far, so good. Turned northwesterly to pass west of the Storm Islands, seas pretty calm, wind light and on our nose, still: so far, so good. We raised the main and sheeted it hard while cheating the traveler to try to grab some of that wind on our nose. At the very least, we'll get some stabilization from having the main up there.

Headed up towards Egg Island, very light swell from our forward quarter, light wind on our nose, seas rippled - still good! We're almost there! After passing Egg Island, we started feeling wind coming down Fitzhugh Sound. Again, right on our nose. Seas became a little lumpy but still no noticeable swell action. Even though it makes for a very long day, we decide to bypass Safety Cove and head on up to Kwakshua Inlet and Pruth Bay. We dropped anchor there at 1811 for a total crossing of more than 13 hours! No wonder we're tired. This was a great day for wildlife watching. We passed a group of about 30 Dall's Porpoises, spotted 2 black bears along the shore of Calvert Island and watched a humpback whale slapping his pectoral fin right off the entrance to Kwakshua Inlet.

We expected to make a short day on 6/3 and just head up to Sea Otter Inlet and drop the anchor after only about 4-hours of traveling. Sea Otter Inlet is just under half-way to Bella Bella/Shearwater where we expect to get on 6/4. As it turns out, we're feeling strong and rested after our easy QCS crossing and decide to just continue on to Codville Lagoon where we'll have an easy 4 or 5 hour trip into Shearwater. The last time we were in Codville Lagoon we were pinned down for 4-days by deluging rain and gale force winds. We went stir crazy and were desperate to get out of there. So desperate that we went out into Fitz Hugh Sound in 20-30 knot winds and slogged our way down to Namu where we tied up to a rolly dock. This time, the weather was with us. We had beautiful blue skies and warm wind (on our nose of course). By the time we'd anchored in Codville Lagoon at 1648, the temperature inside the boat was 81. By the 2100 it had risen to 83.3! We had to Lagoon to ourselves. Only the osprey, eagle, mink and sea lions disturbed the quiet. It was so hot and quiet you could hear me moaning for miles.

David and Christine and Sibs
SV Raven
Juneau, AK

Currently lying: Codville Lagoon, BC