Category Archives: BC

WestCoastPaddler meet-up

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Prologue: Back in the day, all the available members of Westcoastpaddler used to have an annual meet-up on Portland Island on the last weekend of April. What with COVID and one thing and another, it had been years since this had happened. So as co-owner of WCP, I was very excited when we decided to renew the tradition this year.

April 25, 2025

I drove into the long term parking at Tsawwassen ferry terminal shortly after 9AM. It might have seemed ridiculously early for an 11AM sailing, but I like to have time in hand to deal with curveball crises. Which proved to be a good idea: as I pulled my kayak cart wheels out, I was hit by a letdown feeling: both tires were so flaccid that they’d have rolled right off the rims under the load of my kayak and the weekend’s cargo. After a frantic few moments, I remembered I had an electric pump for my car tires in the back – and fortunately the valve fitting was also right for the kayak wheels. With the tires once again fully tumescent, I heaved the boat on the cart, and the cargo into the boat.

Wheeling up to the foot passenger wicket, I spotted a beautiful skeg kayak on a much more compact cart. And soon found Alana in the line up. We brunched on burgers on the ferry and compared notes. At Swartz Bay, Alana wheeled off towards the public dock to launch; I rolled over to the ferry to Fulford Harbour.

My cunning plan was to put in at Fulford Harbour, supposedly upwind from Arbutus Point based on the forecast, raise my kayak sail and glide effortlessly down to camp. Like many cunning plans, it hit several snags. Firstly as I launched, I discovered the metal bracket guiding the rudder lift/lower line had broken off, so I couldn’t raise or lower the rudder from the cockpit. But that was rather a moot point since (secondly) as soon as I put my feet on the foot pedals, the swaged copper stopper holding the right rudder cable end popped off. So I had no steering anyway for my non-deployable rudder. Fortunately, I’d upgraded the foot pegs from the “slidey” type that were OEM for a vintage boat like mine to the gas pedal ones that stay in place even with broken cables. So I could still brace properly in the boat. But it did mean that if I were sailing, it would require a lot of nimble work with my paddle to steer, because no rudder. But that issue went away as I discovered (thirdly) that the wind was SE rather than the promised NW. No sailing for me. Reduced to paddling – the horror! The horror!

Still the sun sparkled on the bright blue sea, and I had a very pleasant crossing, threading through the shallows on the north side of Russell Island, over the white shell bottom.

Otter in the water.
Russel Island on the horizon, with Portland Island visible behind.

With no rudder in the water, the Expedition kayak had a tendency to weathercock once I was out in the main channel. But that wasn’t entirely bad, as I needed to ferry between 30 and 40 degrees to windward to counter the downwind drift. (I was detecting and correcting for drift by using the tip of Arbutus Point and the high flat peak of Moresby Island behind it as a range.)   

After a couple of happy hours, I arrived off Arbutus Point to find, as expected, Alana was already in residence. Based on previous soggy experience, I lurked offshore while the wake from a recently passed BC ferry dissipated. (Surf landings in loaded boats are rather too exciting.) 

There were a few other kayaks already on the beach, but none of their owners were here for the WCP meeting – or even knew what it was! So Alana and I supped together with our respective meals, and hit our tents fairly early as it was cool and buggy.

Night, night.

It was while I was seated on the edge of my sleeping pad, writing up my journal, that the first foreshadowing of a restless night emerged: with a muffled twang, one of the internal battens in the pad parted. A small hillock now bulged up out of the formerly featureless plain of the pad. Oh, well, not too bad, right? Wrong. As I lay abed, there occurred a slow but relentless progressive failure as each torn batten put more load on its neighbour, leading it to tear in turn. My mat transformed itself first into a sort of half-inflated life raft—with my feet at the high end and my head on the ground, naturally—and then finally into a pneumatic log. After an indeterminate period of trying to drape myself over this squashy cylinder and being regularly bucked off just as I dozed off, I gave up, deflated the mat, and slid a spare fleece top between my body and the ground. But it wasn’t like the venerable pad owed me anything: it was more than a dozen years old, and the cozy companion of many a night. 

April 26, 2025

Over my breakfast of tinned hash and fruit cocktail, I discovered a third WCPer had infiltrated Arbutus Point under cover of darkness last night, and slept commando-style beneath the stars. (Many of you will know Alex from the amazing adventures and photography he has shared over the years at Alexsidles and on Westcoast Paddler.)  

Alex on the water

Later in the morning, Alana and Alex decided to join a pair of the other paddlers (Liam and Jane, also kayak guides as it turned out) on a quest for homemade ice cream in Fulford Harbour. 

I had a bit of cutting and chafing under my left arm (later determined to be caused by the very deep cockpit and high seatback of the Expedition kayak pushing my PFD higher up my body than in my other kayaks, and rubbing the lower edge of the arm hole against my armpit. I have an alternate PFD with a shorter torso I’ll use on future trips with the Expedition.) Plus, I wanted to see if I could fix the rudder lines and cable on my boat. So I puttered happily on the beach as the others paddled off. 

First, I improvised a guide for the rudder raising and lowering line by running it through the tent pole repair sleeve from my repair kit and duct taping that to the V-cradle for the previous rudder on the back deck. With the tape looped right around and under the hull, it was pretty fugly. But functional.

How to hack a line guide.

Next, after a bit of hesitation, I dismounted the right pedal and housing from the hull, then completely disassembled it in order to rethread the cable through it. I worked as carefully as any surgeon to ensure I didn’t drop any of the nuts, bolts or screws into the concealing sand. By adjusting the loop where the cable runs around the tiller at the rudder, I freed up some slack at the foot pedal end, which I then tied into a figure 8 stopper knot to replace the missing swaged copper stopper.    

I was just congratulating myself on the success of these field repairs when the Fulford Harbour Foursome hove back into view on the horizon. Per an earlier promise, I donned my drysuit and waded into the shallows with my GoPro to video Alana working through her rolls and static braces. I congratulated her on pulling off rolls better in quality and variety while in her first trimester than I ever could while non-pregnant. “Second trimester” she casually corrected me. Which of course made me feel much more adequate. 

Alana on the water.

As Alana was changing into her shore wear, a lone kayaker appeared. This proved to be Mick, which was a welcome surprise as I’d originally expected him to be there on the Thursday and leaving on the Friday, so we thought we’d missed him. So now we were four WCPers.

It turned out Mick had managed to leave the bag with his intended dish for the potluck at home. And that turned out to be a good thing. Because with just my veggie pasta dish, Alana’s corn salad and Alex’s zingy tofu offering, we had so much surplus that we had to accost our neighbours Liam and Jane and foist food upon them – not just for supper, but also leftovers for their lunch the next day!

Saturday night supper!

Armed with my carefully sun-dried sprayskirt as an improvised sleeping mat, I slept much more comfortably than last night.

Sunset over Saltspring Island

April 27, 2025

Over breakfast and coffee, I chatted with Mick and Alex. It turns out we all three share an interest in traditional Polynesian and Micronesian methods of ocean navigation, so the conversation flowed freely.

Alex and Alana launched together about mid-morning for Swartz Bay. Mick was staying another night, so I bid him adieu as I launched shortly before noon.

Alex and Alana set off.

I had to paddle only a few hundred metres to escape the lee of Portland Island before I was able to hoist the sail. (I was so glad to have invested the time to fix the rudder and foot peg cable!) At first I was merely ghosting along, but the wind and my speed increased as I went. Once I’d opened the mouth of Fulford Harbour, I could have sailed in a straight shot down to the public wharf and ferry dock. But I was having far Too Much Fun, so instead I zigzagged downwind in a series of ever-speedier broad reaches.

Fair bids the wind for Fulford Harbour!

I got some good video clips, but no footage of the most exciting sailing since my hands were literally full. As the wind sped up between the contracting hills at the far end of Fulford Harbour, I had to lean to the windward side of the kayak (the paddler’s equivalent of the sailor’s hiking out). As I’ve done before in high winds, I also lay my paddle on the water on the windward side in what I call a flying brace: with the leading (forward) edge of the blade angled slightly upward, the blade is continually lifted by the forward motion of the boat as it would be during a sweep brace, so the paddle becomes a hydrofoil outrigger I can lean aggressively down on if a gust threatens to capsize me to leeward.

I stopped to furl the sail a hundred or so metres upwind of the public wharf, so I’d have had some searoom to sort things out if they’d gone sideways. But fortunately for my pride, all went smoothly.

I pulled alongside the public wharf about 1:15PM. Even with an unhurried remount of the boat onto the wheels, portaging the cargo separately up the dock ramp, then reloading the boat, I was able to stroll on the 1:50 ferry just behind the last car, as if the ferry had been my own personal transportation just waiting for me before departing.

Farewell to Fulford Harbour – for now.

Great to have relaunched the get-together tradition. Hoping more WCPers can join us next year.


Rooms With A View: The Basics Of Tarpology

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If you’re sea kayak touring in British Columbia, and out for any length of time, it’s not a matter of if it will rain, but when it will rain. They don’t call it “The Wet Coast” for nothing. In such Noahscape situations, being able to rig a secure kitchen-dining shelter is essential to ward off both cold and cabin fever.   

Showing a camp tarp rigged in an A-frame configuration
The classic A-frame bungalow roof tarp configuration, with an end pole improvised from driftwood.
Read more: Rooms With A View: The Basics Of Tarpology

Materials

If you only camp very occasionally, even the basic “plastic” tarps from your local Crappy Tire or Home Depot will suffice. They will be bulky and not terribly durable — though pinholes are easily fixed with duct tape. Please don’t let their semi-disposable price point tempt you to abandon them in the field at the end of your trip. Blue is the most commonly available colour, but if you can find orange, it provides a more cheery ceiling in the rain (this is true of all tarps: yellow and orange fabrics create a gloom-dispelling faux-sunlit vibe even on cloudy days.)

Polyester (PU) coated fabric tarps are more durable and compact, and, predictably, more expensive.

The most compact of all tarps are made with silicone-coated fabrics. (I fondly remember field-testing a prototype tarp for my erstwhile outdoor retailer employer decades back, before silicone fabrics were common. I wound up sharing a backcountry campsite with a friendly father and son. Their astonishment when I conjured an 8’ x 10’ tarp out of a soda-can sized stuffsack was as if I had produced not a rabbit, but an elephant, out of a hat.)
Silicone fabrics are also highly stuffable, saving a lot of time with folding and rolling.

Shapes

Several companies make cunningly-tailored wing tarps. I’ve owned a couple and really loved the catenary-cut, sag-defeating ridgeline and the assured-drainage scalloped edges. I was less enamored of the single set-up option. Particularly at improvised sites deep in the backcountry, vegetation often rudely insists on growing exactly where you need the edges of the wing to be. So these days, I carry rectangular or square tarps. They take a bit more rigor in rigging to prevent pooling water, but are more adaptable to cramped and oddly-shaped sites. 

Lines

When it comes to rope, the rule is: it’s hard to have too much. I typically carry at least a couple of hundred feet of paracord, in hanks of about 20 feet. The more line you have, the more options you have for set-up. By splicing one hank to another with a square knot, you can anchor lines to remote branches, trunks and roots. 

Showing a tarp rigged with very long lines, anchored to rock and trees up to a hundred feet away.
Playing the long (line) game. Having plenty of cord lets you float your tarp pretty much wherever you want it, even when natural anchor points are not nearby.

Brightly coloured lines will reduce stumbles and self-strangulation as you walk under and out from your roof. You can even buy reflective cord, which shows up beautifully in headlamps, and makes an excellent navigation beacon if you’ve wandered far into the bush to answer nature’s call at night.

Rigging Your Roof

If you’re setting up the classic A-frame bungalow roof configuration, you typically start by rigging the two high points that will form the ends of the tarp’s ridge, then adding the side and corner lines. 

Some folks like to do this by rigging a literal ridgeline —  a thicker rope running between two trees and/or poles. Next, they drape the tarp over this line, and use short lengths of cord wrapped in prusik knots (see below) around the ridgeline and secured to tabs or grommets on the tarp to stretch it along the ridgeline. This creates a very strong structure, but with the downside that the ridgeline rope chafing against the tarp may eventually wear the waterproof coating and/or the fabric itself to the point that it leaks. And dead centre of your roof ain’t a great place for leaks. 

Showing the A-frame configuration of a tarp without the use of poles
Look mah! No poles! The classic A-frame roof made by suspension only.

So for chafety reasons, I usually opt to simply stretch out the two attachment points at either end of the tarp’s centreline, letting the tensioned fabric itself create the ridge. Separate-ridgeline-rope enthusiasts will sneer that this stresses the fabric of the tarp more and is a weaker structure in wind. They are not wrong. But, tocca ferro, in decades of touring, I haven’t had a tarp tear yet. This might be because I retire my tarps (or demote them to “windbreaks only” duty) once the waterproofing has worn out, and this typically occurs long before the fabric itself is brittle. 

If you’re at a site that doesn’t accommodate retangular, symmetrical roof sides, think outside the box: make the diagonally opposite tarp corners the ends of your ridge, so the sloped sides become asymmetrical triangles that can poke between barricading trees and bushes.     

Showing a tarp rigged with an interior pole.
The high centre(ish) point setup. The tip of the pole is covered with a stuffsack to reduce chafe on the tarp.

Another classic tarp configuration is the high centre point, with the sides sloping down to form a shallow (and not necessarily symmetrical) pyramid. You can raise that centre point from the inside or the outside. From the inside, it’s via a pole of some kind, store-bought or improvised from driftwood. Either way, the tip where the pole makes contact with the tarp fabric should be condomized with a stuffsack to reduce chafe.

showing a kitchen tarp rigged with a centre pole made from a driftwood log
A driftwood log, upended and with the low end buried deep in the sand, makes a secure centre pole for this cozy camp kitchen.

Raising the centre point from the outside maximizes usable interior space. If there’s a cooperatively placed branch above the tarp site, just sling a line over it, tie it off to the topside tarp tab, then hoist the far end of the line and tie it off to a tree trunk or branch. (Your D.O.T. mandated “buoyant heaving line” works a treat for this.) 

a tarp suspended pyramid-style over the vestibules of two tents.
Centre-suspended pyramid configuration. Hanging from an overhead branch, this tarp forms a rain-free “mud room” for both tents.

If there’s no handy overhead branch, run a line from tree to tree above the tarp, then attach a prusik knot to this line and hence to the topside tab. This way, you’ll be able to slide the attachment point along the high line to fine-tune the tarp’s position. 

The blue line runs above this tarp from tree to tree. It’s connected to the topside tarp anchor point with a short, separate piece of cord wrapped into a prusik knot.

At breezy kitchen sites, you’ll want to rig the tarp as a combination windbreak and roof, with one edge at ground level. This will block wind-blown rain and keep gusts from wicking heat away from you and your camp stove. Some folks just rig their tarp as a simple lean-to, but these flat surfaces are prone to inverting into a sail when hit by strong wind. So I prefer to do a sort of pyramid tilted on one side. With the tip of the pyramid pointed into the wind and anchored securely, the tarp is much more aerodynamic and wind shedding.

Showing a tarp rigged as a leanto windbreak.
The “tilted pyramid” windbreak configuration. On the outside of the black patch above my head, a line runs to the tree branch beyond, preventing the tarp from inverting when wind hits the far side.

Though I do carry a few pegs for my tarp lines, I generally prefer to tie the lines off to tree branches, driftwood logs or roots. Natural anchors are usually more secure than pegs.

To minimize wrinkles and maximize drainage, try to run the lines from the side of your tarp as close as possible to 90 degrees away from the centre ridgeline, and corner lines out at roughly 45 degrees. Where lack of anchor points or the presence of obstacles prevents running a single line at the optimum angle, attach two lines to a single tab or grommet, run them out to whatever anchors are available, and tension them differentially to rid the tarp of ruckles.

As anyone who’s ever schlepped even a 5-litre waterbag knows, it doesn’t take a vast volume of water to be seriously heavy. So you want to ensure your tarp setup won’t trap large rainpools, lest there be rending of fabric and gnashing of teeth. Preventing pooling isn’t always a matter of going higher with your tarp lines or steeper with your tarp slopes. Sometimes it’s as simple as creating drainage valleys at the lower edges of your tarp. Do this by suspending a light weight, such as a water bottle, stuff sack with pebbles, or small piece of driftwood from one of the grommets or tabs.   

Knots

I have a pretty basic repertoire of knots that I mix-n-match as needed for rigging. The trucker’s hitch lets you apply a lot of tension to a line easily, so I tend to use it for the ends of the ridge attachment points, or for a tree-to-tree line that I’m going use a prusik hitch to suspend the topside attachment point from to form a high centre point pyramid. For the side or corner lines a tautline hitch usually provides enough tension. A simple square knot is great for splicing lines together to extend your anchor options. In the photo below, I used a pair of Japanese square lashings to secure the tarp pole vertically against the end of the picnic table. You can also use a square lashing to attach the ends of driftwood poles together to form an A-frame for one end of your tarp. 

Poles

If you can find one of suitable size on site, driftwood poles are an excellent option: they’re free, fully biodegradable, and take up no room in your boat. That said, I often carry at least one tarp pole for convenience and assurance I’ll have the right pole for my needs. I find the fully-telescoping type is easy to stow against the keel line of my kayak, but its minimum collapsed length is a few feet. If you have tighter hatches, you might need poles that fold tent pole style to fit through them.  

Tarps For Tents

Even if your tent’s fly is reliably waterproof, there are several reasons you might want an over tarp for it, especially on extended tours in persistent rain: 

Firstly, it’s wonderful to have a dry porch roof/mudroom where you can stand up to doff and don wetwear without getting the tent interior soggy. 

Secondly, in seriously heavy rain–the sort that hammers down in dollops rather than drops–bedtime in an unshielded tent can be like trying to sleep inside a drum at a heavy-metal concert. Intercepting the rain a foot or two above the fly dials down the din from crazy-making to practically cozy. 

Thirdly, like me, you may well be fond of breathing right through the night. Each of your hundreds of exhalations contains water vapour. The cooler and wetter your tent fly is on the outside, the more of that breath vapour will condense against its inside. Wet begets wet. In a really prolonged rain in cooler weather, so much breath moisture can condense against a fly’s interior that it looks–and feels–as though the fly is leaking. By keeping the outside of the fly dryer, an over tarp will vastly reduce this effect.  

Finally, by rigging the over tarp first and taking it down last, you can set up and pack up your tent out of the rain, and keep the interior canopy dry. Or at least dryish.        

Midwinter Paddling: to the Pasley Islands in Howe Sound, BC

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January 21, 2024

The relentless icy rain this Sunday morning was pretty uninspiring. But we thirteen Jericho Beach Kayak guides had committed to a group daytrip weeks before. So we had a certain professional pride (plus a gender-neutral machismo) that dissuaded any of us from chickening out in front of our peers.

We waded through a small ice-water lake in front of the Jericho Beach Kayak hut to schlep the boats out to the roof racks waiting on our vehicles (the prudent—or at least the so-equipped—of us had heeded EJ’s suggestion to bring boots for this portage.)

Our little car convoy made fine time to the Horsebay Ferry Terminal, and caught the 10AM something boat across to Nex̱wlélex̱wm/Bowen Island. Enroute, we had a quick huddle in the passenger lounge to confirm launching, the paddle plan and radio channels.

final pre-paddle briefing on the ferry

As if to reward us for our perseverance, the rain stopped just as we launched from Tunstall Bay at noon. On the cliffy south side of the bay, a frozen waterfall testified to the unseasonably cold weather of the previous week.

Ice, ice, baby! A frozen waterfall on the south side of Tunstall Bay
Enroute to Worlcombe Island

As we approached Worlcombe Island, we could see vast flocks of large birds gyring above the treetops. They proved not to be vultures lurking for under-prepared kayakers, but eagles young and old. (They’re clearly visible at this point in my buddy Mike’s video of our outing.)

Along the north side of Worlcombe Island

We alit a little after 1PM in a small bay at the southwest tip of Pasley Island. In summer, I wouldn’t bother firing up a stove for lunch, but in winter, it’s nice to stoke the inner fires with pre-warmed fuel. So my trusty WindBurner stove came into play. It was not only mucho fast but also provided much amusement for my tripmates, as the vast clouds of steam made it look like I was either improvising a sauna or preparing to do a magician’s disappearing act.

It being the offseason, the homes on the upland above our picnic spot were not occupied. This was fortunate, since it meant that those of us who lined up facing the southern rockwall to take the necessary pre-launch precautions to ensure our drysuits would remain dry for the next leg of the voyage were not accosted by irate cottagers. 

On an offshore rock near the northwest tip of Pasley, we spotted a bleached white skeleton. This was not a kayaker who’d been marooned by an insufficiently secured boat, but a brilliant bit of sculpture installed by an unknown artist for the delight of passing boaters. It even included an appropriately wind-tattered pirate flag.

Somewhere between our boney friend’s reef and Mickey Island, the rain began to fall intermittently. But it had held off for our lunch stop and was pretty tolerable while we were buttoned up in our boats and pumping out body heat with every stroke.

As we bobbed in the lee of Mickey Island, confirming our course home and who was leading the next leg of the trip (me, as it happened), swooping and diving seagulls just off the point on Pasley Island south of us showed something was afoot (or perhaps, afin). And as we got nearer, swirls and splashes from beneath the sea, like reversed raindrops, confirmed that fish were being herded up from below. Sure enough, enormous thick brown necks suddenly broke the surface, accompanied by huffs and snorts. (As an aside: I’ve been within paddle-poking distance of Orca more than once over the years, but I continue to be more wary of sealions than killer whales. Still, I comforted myself with the idea that if they decided they were tired of seafood and wanted a little red meat, the odds were only one in thirteen I’d be dinner!) The sealions are best visible at this mark in Mike’s video.

Switching leaders once more at the western tip of Worlcombe, we handrailed along its south shore, encountering more sealions on route. They proved pretty camera-shy, appearing only in the distance anytime I had my Go-Pro in hand.

along the south shore of Worlcombe Island

We landed back in Tunstall Bay a bit after 4PM, with a rain falling so steadily I opted not to change out of my drysuit, but to drive to the ferry terminal still wearing it.

The last of us rolled onto the five-something ferry just moments before it sailed, as if it were our own personal, private transportation. Upstairs in the passenger lounge, we ambushed one of our number, whose birthday it happened to be, with donuts and singing.

After offloading the boats back at Jericho Beach Kayak, we supped at the Wolf And Hound. It’s amazing how many of our adventures end there. It’s almost become our off-season office!

The fabulous thirteen!
a chart of Bowen Island and the Pasley Islands in Howe Sound, British Columbia, showing the route of our kayak daytrip
the route of our daytrip

Thanks to all my colleagues for the pleasure of their company, and to Mika, Chris, Natalie, Tomo, Warren, and EJ for sharing pictures for this post.

April Showers bring… April showers

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April 7, 2023

We’d laid plans for this trip with an Option A (Howe Sound/Átl’ka7tsem) and an Option B (Indian Arm/Nuth Khaw Yum Provincial Park). The predicted winds made Howe Sound sound rather too exciting, especially given that if we were crossing from Porteau Cove to the Islets View site, we’d have the wind and waves on the beam coming and going.

Rack n’ Roll: securing boats to the trusty Subaru
Read more: April Showers bring… April showers

So Indian Arm it was. Rhian and I swung by the Jericho Sailing Association compound to grab our boats, then met our accomplices, Paul and Nessa, at the Deep Cove put-in. A light drizzle washed us as we loaded and launched. 

Paul and Nessa snap a selfie at the Deep Cove put-in as Rhian and I demonstrate precision kayak maneuvers in the background.

Things cleared a bit as we made our way down the Arm, becoming what the Irish would call “soft”. Scraps of blue sky even appeared, lulling us into a false sense of security.

We paused to frolic briefly in the currents below Silver Falls, then pressed on.

Premature Exhilaration: Paul and I celebrate the blue sky. North Twin Island is visible on the horizon behind my outstretched left arm.
Sea kayak siren self-portrait: Rhian’s selfie


The rain held off as we landed at Bishop Creek (Berg’s Landing) in the late afternoon, letting us all rig both our tents and the overtarps for them. It began to foreshadow the coming deluge as we rigged the kitchen-dining tarp.

Nessa and I approach Bishop Creek/Berg’s Landing on the left. Croker Island is visible just beyond us.
Overtarps are de rigueur in heavy rain to reduce interior condensation in tents. So de rigger set’em up!
Paul and Nessa’s backcountry pied-à-terre. Happily, the grey overtarp I lent them accessorized well with their tent, else I’m sure they would have refused it.

Fortunately, the group consisted of seasoned outdoor folk, who understand that when it comes to weather, things are what they are. Plus, we had brought a lot of good cheer (mostly of the fermented-red-liquid-in-bags kind.) And, as this group’s now-traditional dessert, we heated a pie in the Outback Oven until it was as warm as though fresh-baked, and drizzled it with hot custard. 

April 8, 2023

Throughout the night, the temperature continued to fall, as did the rain. In fact, it cranked up to a volume that made last evening’s showers look like a desultory drizzle. Even landing on the tarp above the tent canopy, it drummed loud enough to preclude sleep. So I stuck in my ear plugs – not usually a recommended procedure in bear country, but honestly, unless Brother Bruin were clashing cymbals to herald his approach, I’d never have heard him over the rain anyway.

I was on breakfast duty and had massively underestimated the time needed to cook a “full English” for everyone in the group. It could only have gone slower if I’d started by planting the potatoes and fattening the pigs. Fortunately, no-one was in any hurry to leave the sheltering tarp, so the meal evolved into a leisurely “full English brunch”, washed down with endless cups of tea and coffee.

Camp kitchen, complete with cold and colder running water (under your feet)!

The ground under the kitchen tarp had gone from fairly damp last night to full swamp this morning. Fortunately everyone had waterproof pants for kneeling to cook or fill plates, and full-frame, above-the-flood chairs for actually eating.

By this point, all of us were wearing every layer we had when outside our tents, and counting our blessings that we’ll all brought winter-weight sleeping bags, pads and clothing. Entering and exiting the tents involved elaborate doffing or donning rituals that would have looked familiar to a hard-hat commercial diver. Vapour hung in the air with our every breath.

In the afternoon, Paul and Nessa, ever the bold and energetic ones, launched for a daytrip to Granite Falls. Rhian went on a wet weather photo safari, finding the beauty in the rain. I did likewise in my own way, hanging out under the tarp and admiring the way the swirling low clouds concealed and then revealed the various peaks and crannies in the fjord walls opposite our camp. And I pondered an additional point I would emphasize to the students in my Online Trip Planning Class: in the Marine Weather class, we typically talk about the importance of being dressed appropriately for whatever on-water (and possibly in-water) conditions prevail. But frankly, if everyone in our group had not been equipped with not just drysuits and appropriate layers, but winter-weight shore wear and sleeping equipment, we’ve have at best been trying to call a water taxi for the trip home and at worst needed to be medi-vaced for hypothermia.

Supper was tamped down with our also now-traditional hot Auntie’s Puddings and custard. (Are you sensing a theme here?)

April 9, 2023

Wanting to be back home at a reasonable hour for what promised to be several days of drying tarps, tents and selves, we’d agreed the night before to aim for a 9:30AM launch. Typically this means we’d actually launch nearer 10ish. But we were all apparently very motivated, and were sliding the boats off the cobbly, shelly beach at the appointed hour. Even with all four on each boat for the portage from the loading station to the water, we all walked very gingerly – one slip on the slimy, lumpy and shifty rocks would have been an excellent way to twist an ankle or break a leg.

Undamped spirits or contagious rictus? We Report; You Decide.
Rhian and Nessa model this winter’s must-have kayak cruise wear. From the high (and watertight) necklines to the little-black-cockpit skirts, they’re sure to make a splash wherever they go!

My three companions, all younger than me, set a smart pace back to base. At first, I kept up well, and was even in the lead for a bit. But gradually, I fell behind. If there had been a Captain Oates Award For Best Straggler, I’d have been a shoe-in. Fortunately, the situation was not quite dire enough for the others to suggest I go outside for some time. Besides, we already were outside.

About an hour out of Deep Cove, we got hammered by a headwind squall and blinding rain. In the low vis, I mistook two other paddlers who were bee-lining for their shoreline cottages as Paul and Nessa, and wound up paddling for sometime at a tangent to the rest of the group. But once the weather cleared, we re-united.

On the final leg to Deep Cove, the wind shifted, and I kept hoping I would get a least a sail assist to catch up with my friends. But the wind just toyed with me – repeatedly inviting me to rig the sail, glide through the water for a few seconds, then dying off. My companions were remarkably patient with all this faffing about. And even with it, we landed at Deep Cove shortly after noon.

The rain continued to fall so hard that Rhian and I simply stayed in our drysuits for the drive back to Jericho and dropping off our boats. Even with the wipers on full blast, the windshield often looked as though it were iced over. The heavens poured one last contemptuous dump on us as we offloaded the kayaks. And naturally, as I drove Rhian home from Jericho, the showers ceased and the sun began to peek coyly out from behind the clouds. That sun of a bi …!

Big thanks to Rhian, Paul and Nessa for sharing their companionship and photos!

Freshwater Get-away

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September 30, 2022

Wanting a trip that was low in cost and complications, we’d opted for a fresh water adventure on Alouette Lake in Golden Ears Park. This avoided the time and deadlines of ferry trips, and let three of us revisit a campsite we hadn’t been to in many years. The expedition consisted of myself, my friend Rhian, and Paul and Nessa, two longtime friends I hadn’t seen in person since before the pandemic.

Rhian and I met the other two expeditioneers at the boat launch on Alouette Lake about noonish. As anticipated, with all the faffing about, we didn’t launch until about 1:30 – just in time for the afternoon wind to have ramped up in our favour.

The fleet ready to launch. The Narrows is visible in the distance as the gap between the taller mountain on the left and the much lower hill on the right. Photo courtesy Paul Richards
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Shoulder season on the Sound: Hotham Sound

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September 30, 2021

During the drive to Earl’s Cove, heavy rain showers coated the winding road with sheets of water a centimeter deep at times. It was uninspiring, but by the time we arrived at the ferry terminal, it had cleared.

As we approached Saltery Bay on our second ferry ride of the day, we could see Freil Falls (AKA Harmony Falls) in the distance off the starboard side. Shortly afterward, the ferry crew announced whales cavorting off the port side. I snapped a couple of photos of the “you can’t quite make it out, but this black blur is a whale” variety.

The Falls in the distance
A humpback whale spyhops in the distance

By the time we’d landed it was late afternoon. Packing the boats for the first time on any trip always involves a couple of hours of faffing about, especially when you have to go park the car several hundred meters from the put-in after offloading. So we opted to car camp at Mermaid Cove that night, and make a single hop, all by daylight, to our intended destination at Elephant Point the next day.

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The Trip That Wasn’t (Part 2)

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August 20, 2001

Though I had set my watch alarm for 6:30AM, when my bladder alarm went off at 3:30AM, the wind was howling fiercely through the trees and the barometer had continued to fall. I switched off the clock alarm and slept in until 8AM – which was fine: as it turns out the wind continues to blow against me and whitehorses gallop north through the passage as far as the eye can see.

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The Trip That Wasn’t (Part 1)

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August 13, 2001

Just getting to the put-in at Prince Rupert from Vancouver has proven to be an epic. I’d driven up from Vancouver to Port Hardy and camped at the Wildwood Campground. The Port Hardy to Prince Rupert ferry which was supposed to leave at 7:30AM on Sunday, August 12, had engine troubles. On the plus side, this meant I didn’t have to get up at 4:30AM to hike from the campground to the ferry terminal. Having driven over to the terminal at 7:30 and dropped my kayak and equipment, I drove back to the campground to park my car long term, and caught a lift back to the terminal in the RV of a friendly Dutch family I’d been chatting with the evening before. 

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Valhalla Warrior: Solo Kayaking And Hiking On Slocan Lake, Part 2

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July 12, 2003
I slept until 7:00, clearly tired out after my hike down from the hills yesterday. What with breaking camp and chatting with my neighbours, I didn’t launch until 10AM.


a sea kayaker paddles down a lakeIt was a perfect morning’s paddling. I came across two sunken barges, easily visible in the clear, fresh water. Like shipwrecks in the sea, these old hulks act as reefs and nurseries for life. They swarm with minnows and a few full-grown trout. Continue reading →

Valhalla Warrior: Solo Kayaking And Hiking On Slocan Lake, Part 1

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July 9, 2003
The shuttle driver from Smiling Otter dropped me off with my boat and gear at the north end of Slocan Lake at about 13:00 hours. The weather was lovely and sunny.

The first few hundred yards of paddling was past beautiful summer cottages. Beneath the emerald water, I saw what I’m speculating might be Asian Milfoil growing on the bottom – a corkscrewed shape, like a drill or auger. The branches of an evergreen freshly toppled off the bank vanished into the ghostly green depths of the lake. The water was startlingly clear; in the shallower areas, I could see the shadow of my kayak flitting across the lake bottom. 

kayak from underneath rescan resized

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