2006 Barkley Sound Trip

I did the Oregon Offshore Race, from Astoria to Victoria, and Swiftsure Race and felt confident
we could do the trip in our little boat. Kathleen and I had both been offshore before
on a trip to San Francisco with John & Lisa on Andiamo, the Wauquiez Pretorian.
We knew what big seas were like, and had sailed in Puget Sound all year, and often at night.

Kathleen laid down the law - we weren't going if the boat wasn't ready! So we did a number of projects
to get the boat ready: pulled the mast adding new wires for a tri-color lamp, new VHF antenna & wire,
a conduit to dampen the rattling noise,and added new running rigging. I installed a new Navman depth gauge,
and upgraded MacENC navigational software. With my dad's help, we finally got the new handrails on.
Of course, the cabin top had to be sanded, filled, fared, primed and painted a couple times first...

We had lots of great help, Mike ran the crane to remove and replace the mast, Frank and Bob
helped us get it off & back on, and Don gave us a another anchor. Kathleen had us loaded
with food. We rolled the dinghy and stored it near the mast with 50' of extra chain to keep the weight
low and centered. I changed the oil, lashed an extra fuel tank on the toe-rail, and we got off the dock,
tired but happy to be off, at 5:37PM on the ninth. Our first adventure came only hours later. . .

Exhausted, I was sound asleep, when the main sail flogged the knot loose, and came down,
East of Marrowstone Island. We bailed out of the lumpy seas, and headed for the Port Townsend Cannel.
It was very dark, we were lined up on the wrong side of the rocks - good to check the nav program!
In the cannal, we could barely see the breakwater rocks in the darkness only 20 feet away.
We ducked into Port Hadlock, looking for a place to anchor, found a mooring ball and took it
on the first try. We were probably both sound asleep in less than 15 minutes.
We stayed, slept, and caught up on a few more boat projects. I had worried about pulling
a new halyard all night, but when I went up the mast the next morning we were lucky,
the halyard heckled and hadn't been pulled into the mast. "It's not a defective hockeling line,
it's a safety feature!" was my new mantra. It was going to be a great trip after all. . .

After catching up on sleep, we left Port Hadlock at 1AM, motor sailing out ahead of the current.
We had to go around Point Wilson in the West eddy were were so early, but we had a good push
out the strait. Without much wind, it's a long slow trip, and I am very grateful to Kathleen
and "Tillie" our hard working autopilot. Note the pics of the red freighter, Tokyo Marine.
There wasn't much else to photograph on this leg. At 24 knots, the ship goes from clearly visible
to abeam in only 2 minutes!

We were so grateful to be at Pillar Point and turn the engine off, we anchored too far out!
I had a lot of rode out to ease the slamming of the swells, but it wrapped around our keel
and we drug anchor. The Blue boat "Chagres" stopped by to see if we were OK, and
went very close to shore, did a 180, and motored around the point. Ah, if they could go there
so could we! We pulled up the anchor, it was a real exercise, and re-anchored.
Then I remembered, Steve had said "you had to anchor a lot closer than you though you should".
We got out a lead line and calibrated our new depth gauge, nine feet under us and clear
enough to see a big crab below us. Nice to be out of the swells at Pillar Point!

The 11th was our big day, out the Strait, round Cape Beal and North to Ucluelet.
We left at 1:30AM, to get out ahead of the current and up to Cape Beal before the afternoon
winds built. It was a good plan, we had wind and current with us all morning, but by 7:30 AM
it was rainy, nasty and the charter fishing boats were heading back to Neah Bay.
We slogged on through the building rain and swells.

Soaked, I went below, laid down on the cabin sole and was out! Kathleen standing watch
in the companionway woke me with a yelp. The auto-pilot got kicked off the tiller in big waves
and we did a very quick round-up. I staggered out, released the main, wrestled with the tiller,
and got the boat sailing again. Looking around, the waves had certainly grown while I was asleep!
Then I realized we were sailing South, not North. I found a good wave, spun the boat around,
and learned we had a lot of wind and waves pushing us around.

Kathleen quickly got her foulies on and came out to drive. We dropped the main-sail and
were doing 5.2 knots on the gps, but the waves were really pushing us around. I put up our #3,
our smallest jib, and with the top twisted off we were soon up to 8+ knots and a lot more comfortable.
We slid down the big waves and then, they lifted us, and rolled on by. I ducked below to check
our course and realized lining up with the waves would take us into the rocky, wrecky
SW shore of Effingham Island. I understand why they call it the Graveyard of the Pacific!
We couldn't let Tillie drive, I needed to jibe, and steer up, as much as I could, to make
it into the Imperial Eagle Channel.

Once in the channel, the swells eased, and we worked our way around Effingham Island,
and through narrow Thiepval Channel in the rain and mist. It was beautiful!
We had made it to the Broken Group, Pacific Rim National Park, but we had to keep going.
Canadian Customs requires checking in at Ucluelet. Picking our way through the rocks, islands,
across lumpy Loudoun Channel and Sargison Bank, round Chow and Beg Islands, and rocks
and more rocks to Ucluelet.

As we came by the Ucluelet fuel dock we saw Odessa, Mike and Nita's fine Baba 40,
and Mike came running out smiling and waving. They were heading out but we would see
them later. We did the steps thing, called customs, found the marina, and even space
on the dock. When I told the harbormaster where we were, he asked how we got in there.
Seems a little Grady-White sport fishing boat had just left. Everything was soaked,
so we took the bedding out of the V-berth, hung gear, turned on the heater and went
out for dinner, after a little wine of course. When we returned from dinner, my PFD
had inflated. It was a long day and a very wet trip!

Ucluelet, Effingham, and Pipestem Inlet

To be continued. . .