Wandering the Gulf Islands and Howe Sound

On xʷənen̕əč/ Salt Spring Island

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? --Mary Oliver

I've thought about this question often. Throughout our lives, we learn our worth closely correlates with our schooling, our careers, and how many hours we devote to these pursuits per week. We learn we need to earn our worth as people, and any deviation from this path is selfish, entitled, lazy, and impractical.

I've spent years shedding this notion. It's silly. Ms. Oliver is right: we each have one wild and precious life. And with mine, I plan to Sail. Hike. Explore. Love. Learn new things and meet new people. At least for now. And thank goodness Dave chooses to do the same.

As you may know, we took a break from our careers, sold our car, and terminated our moorage agreement, so we are now officially nomadic. Home is wherever De Novo is. And it's rad. As I write this post, our home is anchored in secluded Ch’á7elsm/ Hawkett Bay on Chá7elkwnech/ Gambier Island (Island of the long, deep bay in Squamish) in Howe Sound, surrounded only by sea lions, seals, oystercatchers, gulls, and geese. They're good neighbors. Ch’á7elsm means "Some kind of little fish always goes there," so that's probably what attracted them. Tomorrow it will be somewhere new. The only constants in our new life are our awe and gratitude: we are so thankful to be here now, wherever here is.

We mentioned in our blog last October we'd be sailing to Mexico next. That wasn't entirely true. The best time to sail south is late summer, and since we missed our chance last year when Delta surged, we needed to wait until next summer. This delay gives us the opportunity to return to the wild and precious places of the British Columbian coast and do what we love best.

We left in mid-March, now meandering our way north along familiar waters. Dave's sister Cailin and her fiancé Anthony are getting married in late April on the Sunshine Coast, so we're not wandering too far from the Strait of Georgia for now. After the wedding, we'll pick up the pace only slightly to circumnavigate Vancouver Island, this time taking the time to explore all the varied inlets down the coast. While we sail, our cat Uma continues to live with my mom and monitor the deer and squirrels there. Thank you Mom!

Some notes so far:

We met up with some old friends in Tacoma on the way north, Adam, Alicja, and their adorable toddler Aleksander. Adam and Alicja sailed from Seattle to the South Pacific on their C&C39, Black Watch, a few years ago and provided valuable insights to sailing in Mexico. We've tucked them away for later. Dave's dad joined us on his Hunter 34, Tangent, from Kingston to Friday Harbor. Dave and his brother introduced Charlie to boating just a few years ago, and he's already a badass single-hander. It felt good to share meals and miles along the way.

It hasn't been exclusively smooth sailing and hippie dreams though. As we left the customs dock in Sidney, I rounded an underwater rock on our chart, or at least I thought I did. We heard a terrible scrape and crunch, some of the worst sounds to hear on a boat. Dave and I looked at each other with wide eyes for a moment before he yelled, "Reverse! Reverse!" Oh right, reverse! I reversed, pulled back into the dock, and after checking the bilge (no seawater, whew), decided to haul out to be safe. Thank goodness we have a lead keel and the damage was minimal. We'll need to fix it when we antifoul our keel later this summer, but for now, we can move on. We'll need to budget more wisely to pay for this mistake (and of course route more wisely), but it could have been so much worse.

For those new to our blog, we generally don't hit rocks, so this probably won't be a theme moving forward. Somehow in the days prior, our autopilot compass deviation shifted, causing our position on our electronic charts to offset. We should've noticed earlier in the trip that landmarks didn't quite line up and fixed the problem then. Oops. This was a learning experience. Once we reached Swanson Channel, Dave calibrated the compass which in turn fixed the charts, and everything's lined up and rosy again.

Ok, the good stuff. Hiking in the Gulf Islands rocks. Sailing in the shoulder season when anchorages are empty and winds are high rocks. Not hitting rocks also rocks (too soon?). It's still pretty cold, but occasional moments of sunshine remind us what's coming later this season.

And the people rock. It's said the best way to understand the culture of an area is to take the public transit, and we discovered Gabriola Island's culture on the island's commuter bus, Gertie. During the workday, it was mostly used by the older folk as a way to share humor and wit. In fact, we're not convinced most riders actually go anywhere. Waiting at the stop in the village (known simply as "Village"), one resident, Tammy, broke through even my shell and offered her life story and jokes. When I asked if she was hopping on the bus as well, she simply shrugged as if to say "why not?" Once on, she and her companion skipped to the back and laughed about everything they saw out the window with the carelessness of little kids. Tammy is wild and precious. I love her.

While kayaking across the cut from Penelakut/ Clam Bay, we were greeted by Marcus, an eight- or nine-year boy, on his paddleboard. He followed us through the cut and showed us all the marine life he found. He tried to convince us we could go ashore despite the no trespassing signs and hike in the woods with him. You're pretty cool, Marcus, if not a little too trusting. Stay wild and precious.

Tomorrow, Callie and Anthony and their cat Pumpkin(!) are meeting with us at Xwáw̓chayay/ Porteau Cove to go camping. As I've mentioned in an earlier post, Callie researches Indigenous languages at UBC and inspired us to add a few Indigenous place names to this post. They're not easy to find (which is the problem to begin with), and we may not be able to keep this going as we get further north and away from the Internet, but we'll do our best now. We may add more later.

Oro Bay

Meeting a new(t) friend in Jacobs Point Park, Oro Bay;
these little guys were so abundant we had to watch where we walked!

Meeting another little friend and her mother at Pt. Defiance State Park

Friday Harbor

Taking a recorded covid test to get into Canada. Who said customs requirements were boring?

Impromptu lift in Sidney to survey the damage

The damage to the bottom edge of the keel, with Dave's hand for scale

Back to doing what we love in Bedwell Harbour

On Mt. Norman

A Council of Elders, cedar, at the sculpture park in syaxʷt/Ganges Harbour

Salt Spring Island is right: we should stop being mean.
Also, Rainbow Road was much different from what MarioKart led me to believe.
I meant to get more pictures of Salt Spring since it's so quirky and artsy and fun.