We awoke in Silva Bay this morning to coffee, pastries, and fruit provided by the folks at Silva Bay Resort and Marina. They were completely full (turning away many boaters) for the Victoria Day holiday weekend, yet still found the time to deliver fantastic service and hospitality. Thank you!
The Strait of Georgia is one of the significant gates of the Inside Passage. Thankfully, we had an ideal weather forecast. Environment Canada called for northwesterly winds 5-15 knots, and when we woke up all the key weather stations reported calm seas and winds under 10 knots. With a good forecast, we enjoyed a relatively lazy morning in Silva Bay and left the marina around 9:00 a.m. The weather couldn’t have been better: calm seas, beautiful sunny skies, mountain views, and reasonably light traffic.
Soon after getting settled into our respective anchorages, everyone dinghied over to the public dock and walked up to the IGA supermarket (about a five minute walk) for some provisioning. Fruits, vegetables, wine, beer, liquor…things that are restricted when entering Canada from the United States.
After groceries, some of us got together for a light happy hour, and then a little later all of us met for dinner up at the Grasshopper Pub (top of the hill at the Pender Harbour Hotel). The climb up is VERY steep (steep enough to have switchbacks, and even that doesn’t really lessen the grade much) but hey, we take what exercise we can get when cruising.
Tomorrow will be our first early day! Departure time is 6:30am…headed to Desolation Sound. Why the early departure? Significant (30-40 knot) winds are forecast for later in the day, but the morning looks reasonably calm. Once we get into Desolation Sound, we have a few days in protected water where the wind doesn’t matter much. If the weather turns earlier than we (and the meteorologists) expect, we can always duck into an anchorage or marina.
Today’s mileage: 35.1 nautical miles
Today’s time: ~5 hours
Area Whiskey Golf: Inactive
Total mileage: 78.6 nautical miles
Total time: ~11 hours