Monday, May 18, 2020
New Blog
I was very frustrated with Blogger for the past couple of years.
There was a great app I used to use to upload photos and was easy to use on my phone. When we are away on the boat blogging needs to be easy and useable on a phone or tablet. There is no longer a mobile app for blogger and it’s almost impossible to post. So this will be short.
I started a new blog with Wordpress.
I’ve had it a few years but I had not used it much.
This summer we are back on the water. Hoping for a bit more of a trip than the past two summers.
https://phoenixhunter1985.ca/
This is the link to my new blog.
Just thought I’d post it here for anyone who might still occasionally check this blog out.
I wish I could have finished posting about the summer of 2017. It was a wonderful trip!! But the Blogger app just bit the dust right smack in the middle of the trip!! Very frustrating that was!!
There was a great app I used to use to upload photos and was easy to use on my phone. When we are away on the boat blogging needs to be easy and useable on a phone or tablet. There is no longer a mobile app for blogger and it’s almost impossible to post. So this will be short.
I started a new blog with Wordpress.
I’ve had it a few years but I had not used it much.
This summer we are back on the water. Hoping for a bit more of a trip than the past two summers.
https://phoenixhunter1985.ca/
This is the link to my new blog.
Just thought I’d post it here for anyone who might still occasionally check this blog out.
I wish I could have finished posting about the summer of 2017. It was a wonderful trip!! But the Blogger app just bit the dust right smack in the middle of the trip!! Very frustrating that was!!
Monday, September 11, 2017
Puffins
After our exciting adventure around Cape St. James the previous day it was time to head north!
We stopped by Flat Rock Island after we left Luscoone - we tried to get fairly close to the island to see if we could catch sight of some Puffins.
There were quite a few on the rocks as well as some other sea birds although it ws pretty hard to get photos of them.
There were quite a number of boats anchored up in Rose Harbour now. We are starting to see more and more boats in the park.
We traveled up to Ikeda Bay - on the west side of Morseby Island. There is an old abandoned copper mine site in the area. The copper was discovered in 1906 by Mr. Arichika Ikeda. It was the richest copper discovery on Haida Gwaii. At its peak it employed 150 men - many miners brought from Japan and operated until the 1920's
The old mining site still visible.
We had wonderful clear and calm evening in the cove. We did not put the skiff in the water so we ended up not going to shore and exploring. I think it would be a great place to spend a couple of days exploring. There are some gravestone somewhere for 3 Japanese miners. There are no longer any real sign of the float houses and mining equipment - except for a few pilings on the north shore of the bay.
We did a couple of loads of laundry in Ikeda Bay - as we decided to go for water at Shuttle Island before we left the park
The next day we went back to the De Labeche Cove area and we decided to stay in Sac Bay - the bay we did not stay the previous time because there were boat already in there.
When we arrived in Sac Bay we had the whole bay to ourselves and we anchored up close to the head of the bay. It is a lovely bay - with high cliffs - there was a old land slide area on the shore - so we stayed far away from that spot. not long after we set our anchor -- three boats came in and anchored up - two sailboats and a Nordhavn
We have noticed a lot of slides in the park. The concern would be there could be trees and debris on the bottom and the anchor could get fouled. Which would not be fun!
We are finding more and more boats out and about in the park now - must be time for us to leave!
We stopped by Flat Rock Island after we left Luscoone - we tried to get fairly close to the island to see if we could catch sight of some Puffins.
There were quite a few on the rocks as well as some other sea birds although it ws pretty hard to get photos of them.
Flat Rock Island
There were quite a number of boats anchored up in Rose Harbour now. We are starting to see more and more boats in the park.
We traveled up to Ikeda Bay - on the west side of Morseby Island. There is an old abandoned copper mine site in the area. The copper was discovered in 1906 by Mr. Arichika Ikeda. It was the richest copper discovery on Haida Gwaii. At its peak it employed 150 men - many miners brought from Japan and operated until the 1920's
The old mining site still visible.
We had wonderful clear and calm evening in the cove. We did not put the skiff in the water so we ended up not going to shore and exploring. I think it would be a great place to spend a couple of days exploring. There are some gravestone somewhere for 3 Japanese miners. There are no longer any real sign of the float houses and mining equipment - except for a few pilings on the north shore of the bay.
We did a couple of loads of laundry in Ikeda Bay - as we decided to go for water at Shuttle Island before we left the park
The next day we went back to the De Labeche Cove area and we decided to stay in Sac Bay - the bay we did not stay the previous time because there were boat already in there.
When we arrived in Sac Bay we had the whole bay to ourselves and we anchored up close to the head of the bay. It is a lovely bay - with high cliffs - there was a old land slide area on the shore - so we stayed far away from that spot. not long after we set our anchor -- three boats came in and anchored up - two sailboats and a Nordhavn
Sac Bay has high peaks of granite at the head of the bay. Very pretty - but it seemed to be a bit enveloped with fog and rain and clouds. De Labeche Cove was quite bright and sunny and as we motored by and into Sac Bay we seemed to have a completely different weather system in there!
We have noticed a lot of slides in the park. The concern would be there could be trees and debris on the bottom and the anchor could get fouled. Which would not be fun!
We are finding more and more boats out and about in the park now - must be time for us to leave!
Sunday, August 27, 2017
Cape St. James
Cape St. James
After a very successful trip to SGang Gwaii we went back to Balcom Inlet for the night. The winds were light and the seas were flat calm. The next morning we were planning to head north but it was such a lovely calm day. I suggested - why don't we go south - around Cape St James and spend another day around the south end of the park - go into Luscoone Inlet for the night.
The South Hecate bouy was only 4 knots of wind and the seas were less than one meter. When we left Balcom Inlet it was pretty much glassy in South Hecate Strait. The Cape St James light station was reporting winds of 6 knots. Sounded good.
We did have the poles out and the fish in the water for the trip.
Flat calm!
We idled south along the east side of Kunghit Island going in and out of some of the big bays there. The tour boat Swell was travelling along as well.
One of the bays. I can't remember which Bay this is.
A cave on the shore in one of the three big bays on Kunghit Island.
Woodruff Bay was the last Bay before Cape St. James.
We were watching where "Swell" was going - apparently this was as far south as they went! Jim thought they would go around the Cape - I was not so sure.
This is the chart on the computer as we are heading south - Jim has it orientated so it is displayed to the direction the boat is travelling - instead of north to south. So south is at the top of the screen as we head along our route.
Cape St. James is the very bottom of Gwaii Haanas. At one boater called it -- the Mount Everest of pleasure boating.
We could see some big waves crashing on the shore between the islands, on the west side of the islands. But it is very hard to tell from a distance what it will be like exactly - until you are in the middle of it.
The winds were calm and we were coming up to high water slack.
Hundreds of Sea Lions lying on the rocks - boy did they smell!
Jim decided to go a little further south and go around the southern most island, instead of between the islands as you see on the chart. The waves were just crashing on the shore! He figured it was the safer option.
After a very successful trip to SGang Gwaii we went back to Balcom Inlet for the night. The winds were light and the seas were flat calm. The next morning we were planning to head north but it was such a lovely calm day. I suggested - why don't we go south - around Cape St James and spend another day around the south end of the park - go into Luscoone Inlet for the night.
The South Hecate bouy was only 4 knots of wind and the seas were less than one meter. When we left Balcom Inlet it was pretty much glassy in South Hecate Strait. The Cape St James light station was reporting winds of 6 knots. Sounded good.
We did have the poles out and the fish in the water for the trip.
Flat calm!
We idled south along the east side of Kunghit Island going in and out of some of the big bays there. The tour boat Swell was travelling along as well.
One of the bays. I can't remember which Bay this is.
A cave on the shore in one of the three big bays on Kunghit Island.
Woodruff Bay was the last Bay before Cape St. James.
We were watching where "Swell" was going - apparently this was as far south as they went! Jim thought they would go around the Cape - I was not so sure.
This is the chart on the computer as we are heading south - Jim has it orientated so it is displayed to the direction the boat is travelling - instead of north to south. So south is at the top of the screen as we head along our route.
Cape St. James is the very bottom of Gwaii Haanas. At one boater called it -- the Mount Everest of pleasure boating.
We could see some big waves crashing on the shore between the islands, on the west side of the islands. But it is very hard to tell from a distance what it will be like exactly - until you are in the middle of it.
The winds were calm and we were coming up to high water slack.
Hundreds of Sea Lions lying on the rocks - boy did they smell!
Jim decided to go a little further south and go around the southern most island, instead of between the islands as you see on the chart. The waves were just crashing on the shore! He figured it was the safer option.
Coming out the other side!
Unfortunately a photo will never really give the full picture of waves! We were met by these "houses" as Jim liked to call them!! Huge waves!! Phoenix Hunter seemed to enjoy the trip thoroughly - Jim and I held on and went for the ride - no turning back - by the time we were in the thick of it that was not an option! I wasn't able to take a lot of photos while we were in the big waves - I was holding on tight!
We came up the west side of Kunghit Island - traveled up the east side of Anthony Island and spent the night at an anchorage in Luscoone Inlet. It was a lovely - settled - out of the wind and waves little spot tucked up between some small islands on the east shore of Luscoone. It turned out to be one of our favourite anchorages in that area.
Luscoone Inlet
We are home now. I have been having a terrible time with trying to post to my blog since July. I've had a bunch of different problems - from a failure of my blogging app, not able to use the blogger dashboard from Google Chrome on my Ipad, lack of cell service and poor dock wifi - etc!
I started this post multiple times to have it fail to upload and then get deleted and then partially not saved and finally I decided to just wait until I got home. I will try to get the rest of the trip up on the blog during the next few months. We have a number of things we are doing this fall so I will not be able to do it as often as I would like.
I will work on it because Jim and I use the blog as a diary for ourselves more than anything else. It is nice to look back at where we were and what we did in the years after our trips.
We had an amazing summer. We left home on May 17th and returned home on August 30th.
We put a total of 2200 nautical miles on the boat. Jim said that would be like getting in the car and driving from Vancouver to Timmins Ontario.
It is nice to be home. Jenny and Lilly were well taken care of by an amazing house/pet sitter!
Lilly is still a pita!
Friday, August 25, 2017
Back to the land of cell and sun
I have not been able to post to my blog for a number of reasons.
The first -- no cell - no service!
The second - blogging app I liked to use is no longer useable - Blogpress - doesn't work!
I got another blogging app and it's ok but the photos are not as nice as I would like.
And I'm going to try using the desk top version of Chrome on my iPad. So this is mostly a test blog.
Last time I blogged I was still blogging about Gwaii Haanas.
Next post will be about our trip around Cape St. James.
The first -- no cell - no service!
The second - blogging app I liked to use is no longer useable - Blogpress - doesn't work!
I got another blogging app and it's ok but the photos are not as nice as I would like.
And I'm going to try using the desk top version of Chrome on my iPad. So this is mostly a test blog.
Last time I blogged I was still blogging about Gwaii Haanas.
Next post will be about our trip around Cape St. James.
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