Port Hardy

We left Lund with current and wind going our direction, since we are making plans the day before leave and changing them when the weather & current works better as we go, we decided to head to Campbell River, check our the recommended Gowlland Harbour across from Campbell River.  We made such great time, we again changed our plans and decided to go thru Seymour Narrows at slack of 1:13.   We stopped for diesel in Campbell River, checked out Gowlland Harbour for another time and headed to Menzies for a quick lunch to wait on slack and then it was time to lift the anchor and head thru Seymour Narrows.  We motored for 5 minutes and was just getting ready to enter Seymour Narrows and all of a sudden 30-40 ft in front of the bow of Omega, John announced, "Humpback",  a humpback surfaced & did a deep dive with the gorgeous tale fluke.  Amazing.  We have never seen the humpback this far south and it was very exciting.  So we had an great calm transit of Seymour Narrows and low and behold 2 more humpback in the distance dove and showed us their amazing tail flukes.

The winds were blowing from the SE and the current was going with us so we had calm seas and made great time to Turn Bay on Turn Island, which was recommended.  We had never been there before and found it very nice and right off of Johnstone Strait so we could see what the weather was like the next morning.

The next morning it was still calm and the predicted winds had not shown theirselves.  The front was stalled and we had good weather for another transit along Johnstone Strait.  We covered the entire length of Johnstone in one day arrived at Growler Cove on Cracroft Island.  It was a good anchorage to take shelter in the 20-30 knots winds that were predicted that evening.  The bay was protected from seas but the wind still blew 10-15 inside the cove with no fetch.  We were joined by 5 other boats seeking shelter.  John put up the riding sail to steady us.

We left Growler Cove again at 7am on 7-8-16 under calm and cloudy skies.  Winds were predicted to be in the 10-20 but we saw only 8 knots of wind during the first half of our journey to Port McNeill.  Well we did it again.  We checked the 10 o'clock weather and the seas north of Port McNeill were great and again we had SE winds with our current going with us North so we had a wonderful transit and decided to spend the night in Port Hardy.

We went to the grocery store to stock up on more salad fixings and other items and went out to dinner at the Pub right above Omega in the marina.  It has been a interesting few days and will be ready for some sunshine and dry weather in the future.

The locals say the weather should be calm the next few days so we again checked the weather and are planning to leave Port Hardy in the morning to find an anchorage close to a good starting point to go around Cape Caution.  It is a 40 mile transit that is open to the ocean swells.  Once we cross this section of water we again will be in protected waters in the Inside Passage.