The adventures of m/y Anna
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| Cruising reports 2007 |
The adventures of m/y Anna
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8 July 07, Liscombe Lodge, Nova Scotia
I have been having an exceptionally good and interesting time cruising up here in Nova Scotia and, earlier for
a couple of days, in Maine, except for a bad cold that has now run its course. Having said that, however, I
really have nothing exceptional to write about. Weather has been mostly good so I have not had to seek
shelter, and the one time the weather did turn nasty I was already tied up at a marina nursing the cold, so I
have no stories about high winds or waves. (Rain by itself won't hinder me, as my boat, Anna, is a motorboat
and I do all the helming from inside a cabin with a heater -- and, in fact, rain actually helps me by beating
down the seas and washing off salt.) There have been no accidents and no breakdowns, and no panic-filled
moments at all.
My boat has been behaving flawlessly, and now that I am more accustomed to it I am no longer plagued by
the problems I had on the delivery last year, especially with fogged inside windows and salt spray on the
outside hindering visibility. Everything is working as it should -- knock on wood -- and therefore the trip so far
has been devoid of any drama. It is true that I had trouble with a fouled anchor in Cutler, Maine, and spewed
out some impolite words, but all I had to do was wait for lower low tide (and it was a spring tide) to help me
clear it, which in the end was nothing.
I have now cruised 528 nautical miles since I left Portland on the 30th of June, and am eager for more. The
scenery has been outstanding, the people friendly and helpful, the conditions great, and the boat has
performed as I envisioned when I bought her. I couldn't ask for more. And if not always fun, the trip has at
least been generally highly interesting.
Today, for example, I came from a somewhat rolly anchorage at the mouth of the LaHave River, which is
navigable for about 10 miles inland (and I went all the way up yesterday and came back out to anchor so that
I could get a quick start this morning). But when I awoke today I was presented with conditions quite novel for
me: fog so thick I had to use my radar and chartplotter alone to get out of the harbor, able to see only about
100 yards, well short of most of the above-water points of land, making my exit sort of like instrument flying
an airplane. Then almost all the way here to Liscombe I was enshrouded in a fairly heavy fog, with some
patches of light fog but never a hint of sun. Once I decided to approach a buoy and, by using the
rangefinder on my radar, determine how far I could see. The fog was particularly heavy at that point and I
calculated that I could see only about 150 feet (50 yards). Then to make Liscombe harbor later I again had
to use my nav instruments to wend my way through islands and shoals up into the harbor and the river,
where the fog was very light.
Today's voyage was highly interesting, and not very stressful, but I noticed that the long stretches of low
visibility several miles off the coast made me sleepy, and at I times I hallucinated as I stared into the grayish
soup that was all-encompassing and monotonous. I made tea several times to bolster my alertness, but I
dozed off a couple of times nevertheless. My automatic foghorn sounded every two minutes for five seconds,
however, so I was never unawares long.
I have been having an exceptionally good and interesting time cruising up here in Nova Scotia and, earlier for
a couple of days, in Maine, except for a bad cold that has now run its course. Having said that, however, I
really have nothing exceptional to write about. Weather has been mostly good so I have not had to seek
shelter, and the one time the weather did turn nasty I was already tied up at a marina nursing the cold, so I
have no stories about high winds or waves. (Rain by itself won't hinder me, as my boat, Anna, is a motorboat
and I do all the helming from inside a cabin with a heater -- and, in fact, rain actually helps me by beating
down the seas and washing off salt.) There have been no accidents and no breakdowns, and no panic-filled
moments at all.
My boat has been behaving flawlessly, and now that I am more accustomed to it I am no longer plagued by
the problems I had on the delivery last year, especially with fogged inside windows and salt spray on the
outside hindering visibility. Everything is working as it should -- knock on wood -- and therefore the trip so far
has been devoid of any drama. It is true that I had trouble with a fouled anchor in Cutler, Maine, and spewed
out some impolite words, but all I had to do was wait for lower low tide (and it was a spring tide) to help me
clear it, which in the end was nothing.
I have now cruised 528 nautical miles since I left Portland on the 30th of June, and am eager for more. The
scenery has been outstanding, the people friendly and helpful, the conditions great, and the boat has
performed as I envisioned when I bought her. I couldn't ask for more. And if not always fun, the trip has at
least been generally highly interesting.
Today, for example, I came from a somewhat rolly anchorage at the mouth of the LaHave River, which is
navigable for about 10 miles inland (and I went all the way up yesterday and came back out to anchor so that
I could get a quick start this morning). But when I awoke today I was presented with conditions quite novel for
me: fog so thick I had to use my radar and chartplotter alone to get out of the harbor, able to see only about
100 yards, well short of most of the above-water points of land, making my exit sort of like instrument flying
an airplane. Then almost all the way here to Liscombe I was enshrouded in a fairly heavy fog, with some
patches of light fog but never a hint of sun. Once I decided to approach a buoy and, by using the
rangefinder on my radar, determine how far I could see. The fog was particularly heavy at that point and I
calculated that I could see only about 150 feet (50 yards). Then to make Liscombe harbor later I again had
to use my nav instruments to wend my way through islands and shoals up into the harbor and the river,
where the fog was very light.
Today's voyage was highly interesting, and not very stressful, but I noticed that the long stretches of low
visibility several miles off the coast made me sleepy, and at I times I hallucinated as I stared into the grayish
soup that was all-encompassing and monotonous. I made tea several times to bolster my alertness, but I
dozed off a couple of times nevertheless. My automatic foghorn sounded every two minutes for five seconds,
however, so I was never unawares long.
16 July 07, Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club, Summerside, Prince Edward Island
Since my last message I have stayed at marinas -- that is, I haven't anchored out -- at Guysborough and
Ballantyne's Cove in Nova Scotia, and Charlottetown and Summerside on Prince Edward Island. I spent only
one night each at the two Nova Scotian towns, while staying for three at Charlottetown and at least two at
Summerside, and my boat, Anna, has traveled a bit over 800 nm on the trip so far. All of the passages
between have been easy -- rather boring, really, although I have intentionally missed all of the big winds,
which have been frequent of late. Part of the way from Ballantyne's Cove to Charlottetown was in a veil of
fog, but I noticed on radar no other boat the entire time.
Guysborough is a lovely small town connected to Chedabucto Bay at the NE corner of the Nova Scotian
mainland, just over from Cape Breton Island (which is also a part of Nova Scotia), on an attractive small
river-fed bay of its own, with nice old homes and a photogenic Victorian post office. The small marina is
attached to a brew pub, which is something special for a town of only a couple thousand. I hiked to the
grocery store on one side of town, then to buy boxed wine hiked to the liquor store on the opposite side of
town for a total of about four miles, which was more than I bargained for and made me rather regret drinking
the last of my first box of wine. Nova Scotia, like most of Canada, has province-run liquor stores, although in
small remote locales the province may allow an exisiting store to double as its agent in the liquor business.
To reach my next port I had to tranverse the Strait of Canso and go through the Canso Lock, a canal, which
is part of a causeway that links mainland Nova Scotia to Cape Breton Isle. The highway is on a swingbridge
that pivots to the side to allow big ships through the lock. My boat was low enough to go under the bridge,
but there was a fishing vessel also passing through and the bridge had been swung over for us to pass, with
a line of vehicles, including 18-wheelers, up on the road eager for us to move. The lock only raises and
lowers a couple of feet, and I just hovered in the middle of the lock until I got the green light to leave (I was
glad I didn't have to tie up, as I am alone and tying up can be tricky). There was no fee.
Ballantyne's Cove is an interesting and highly picturesque fishing harbor near Cape George, at the base of a
mountain that leads up to the cape lighthouse. I had to pay cash to fill up with diesel there as they mainly
serve local fishermen who have accounts and pay monthly, and so the harbormaster has little need for credit
cards. About a half dozen fishermen came aboard to inspect my boat, several of the older ones speaking in
a rich, almost Irish brogue. This is in the heart of bluefin tuna country, and the largest ever caught on a rod
and reel was caught near here and weighed 1493 lbs. This part of the Nova Scotian mainland is
mountainous and hilly right up to the coast, as is the Cape Breton shore just across St. George's Bay. The
heavy forestation and the bold rocky shore combine with the high headlands to form a lovely coastal picture.
I traveled then over to Prince Edward Island, the smallest of the Canadian provinces, and its capital,
Charlottetown, which is likely to be the largest city I'll visit on this voyage, but has less than 50,000 people. I
met some locals, Kurt and Pat, at the Charlottetown Yacht Club where I tied up, we chatted (and saw the rock
group, White Stripe, briefly as they left for a mini-concert on a boat), then Pat invited me to his home, had a
dinner party, later went to Kurt's friends' home out in the country, about 20 minutes outside Chartlottetown
right on Tracadie Bay, where two couples a bit younger than I jammed in a storage building they called the
Rum Shack. True enough we drank shots of rum chased with beer and they played long, long versions of
several blues tunes, the men on guitars, the women on keyboards and bass, and it was a fantastic time, but I
petered out around midnight and had to leave, relunctantly. I also visited an excellent art museum in
Charlottetown and thoroughly enjoyed walking around its lovely streets with the old brick waterfront buildings
and the nearby residential areas, leafy and well-maintained, mostly with wooden siding and high-pitched
roofs with little, if any, front yard. Canada is more European in this respect, with buildings right on the street
front, although they also have normal American-type suburbs with sprinkler systems and riding lawnmowers.
And the traffic here is great, barely noticeable, with courteous drivers.
Canadians have to be some of the best people in the whole world. Besides the friendliness I have reported
so far, I have been offered the use of vehicles three times -- "You want to go to the store? Here're the keys
to my truck" -- and have been treated universally with courtesy and friendliness -- they wave when they meet
others on small roads, for one thing, and always stop for pedestrians, for another -- by drivers, shop clerks,
waitresses, bartenders (who invariably ask where I am from), others in the marinas, and passersby on the
street. I often exaggerate my Texas accent, which Canadians find amusing, answering their "hello" with a
"howdy", for example. And waitresses especially seem to be fond of my referring to them as "ma'am".
PEI, as this island is referred to, is not as vertical or rocky or bold as Nova Scotia, and instead is made of
largely red soils, quite evident along the coast, undulating in small rolling hills. But driving around one sees
some of the prettiest farmsteads I have seen anywhere with neat sprawling barns and silos brightly painted,
the fields and woods bright green, and overall the island is gorgeously pastoral, and known for its potatoes
and hogs.
I am now in a place I intentionally visited solely because I wanted to buy a shirt with its name emblazoned
upon it: the Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club, in Summerside. This is said to be the only social organization
in the world with such dual functions. It is quite a friendly club and its facilities are much better than the yacht
club at Charlottetown (although the latter is supposed to build new facilities in a new, more sheltered location
next year).
I like this area so much I would like to leave my boat here over winter and come back next summer and go
down the St Lawrence into the Great Lakes, but I must first overcome Canadian Customs' rule that a
foreign-registered boat's stay over six months in Canada renders that boat liable for a duty equal to about
15% of its value. There are ways to get around that, I understand, and am staying here at least part of
tomorrow, a Monday, in order to speak with a knowledgable person about the possiblities.
After PEI I intend to go to the north shore of New Brunswick, then to Gaspesie in Quebec, before going to the
Iles de Madeleine (also a part of Quebec) and on to Newfoundland.
23 July, 2007 Kegaska, Quebec North Shore (50 deg 11.2318 N, 061 deg 15.7618 W)
I have been spoiled in staying in several marinas so far that have wireless internet systems, and have been
able to, among other things, upload some photos to my web site. There are about ten photos so far from this
year's voyage. But it may be a long time before I get that opportunity again. My satphone connection, on
which this message is conveyed, is much too slow -- only about 9 kilobytes (not megabytes) per second -- to
send anything but text, and I will not be in a marina for some time, I think. Besides being spoiled by a good
internet connection, I have also had the good fortune of favorable sea conditions for the most part, eating in
several good restaurants, meeting some wonderful people, and having no major problems, although there
are some little ones nagging me.
From the Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club I first traveled to New Brunswick, the only officially bilingual
province in Canada, staying in English-speaking Mirimichi, far up a river, and in Francophone Caraquet,
passing under a lift bridge at Shippagan to enter the Bay of Chaleurs, which is both immense and beautiful
due to the high elevations. Caraquet offered me the chance to break in my rusty French, because I came to
Quebec next, crossing 50 nm over the Bay of Chaleurs to New Richmond which, although it has an English
name, is almost 100% Quebecois. In Caraquet I asked a French-speaking woman who came to look at my
boat (I estimate that 50 people have come aboard to check out my boat so far) if she were Quebecois and
she said rather forcefully that no, she was Acadian, who are also French-speaking and inhabit parts of Nova
Scotia and New Brunswick. The Louisiana Cajuns originate from Acadians expelled from Canada by the
British after their victory over the French in the 1700s. There are several varieties of Acadian French -- one
in Nova Scotia that sounds like someone from Oklahoma trying to speak French -- but the dialect spoken in
Caraquet seemed the same as Quebec French to my inexpert ear, and I was surprised that the woman was
so concerned to exert her difference from the Quebecois otherwise. Provincialism even among French
Canadians!
New Richmond lies in a lovely setting, ringed by high forested hills around its bay at the northernmost part of
the Bay of Chaleurs. I had met two locals earlier in Shelburne, Nova Scotia, who were delivering a boat from
Rhode Island to New Richmond, one of whom was the new owner, and we had enjoyed one another enough I
decided to visit them since it was not really much out of the way. Bernard Godbout, recently divorced, and
Real Cyr, married, were wonderfully kind to me, driving me around and showing me the lovely countryside,
among other things. One evening we drove into the Gaspe National Park, which is mountainous and
forested with rushing rivers. One would expect throngs of tourists, but the moose and caribou there
outnumber the people, and we traveled for miles before seeing another vehicle.
The Canadians of French ancestry enjoy much better food than their compatriots of British heritage. Even
the restaurant at the marina in Caraquet had outstanding food (better than anything in Vernon), unlike the
marina restaurants in the English-speaking provinces I have so far visited. I prefer seafood, and while in
Nova Scotia and PEI I felt lucky to find fish and chips -- deep fried in who knows what kind of oil -- in French
Canada the seafood is more often baked and served with rich sauces and vegetables over rice, exactly my
preference.
After New Richmond I journeyed to the town of Gaspe, and found another beautiful setting with lush green
high hills or mountains all around. Gaspe refers also to the region (as well as the national park) which is
essentially a peninsula that juts out into the immense Bay of St. Lawrence. The town of Gaspe is the
regional center and has a very attractive, recently developed seafront area, and their marina has been one
of the best I've seen (except for a few unlevel walkways).
Getting to Gaspe was a rather rough ride for awhile after I turned the corner out of the Bay of Chaleurs and
headed north directly into the wind and nasty headseas. It was also raining, but rain I like because it washes
the salt off the boat and helps to beat down seas, if heavy enough. The ride was rolly enough to cause me
to decide to give up making it all the way to Gaspe, which turned out to be 112 nm away, but after about an
hour and a half the seas quietened to a level for me to renew my original goal. On the way I passed the
Rocher Perce (Perce Rock), which is an unusual giant rectangular slab of rock hundreds of feet long and at
least a hundred high, with a squarish hole along the bottom and a large pillar on the outermost edge.
At one point I intended to go from Gaspe to the Magdelene Islands out in the Bay of St Lawrence, then on to
Newfoundland. But I decided finally that I was tired of the marina life and wanted to see a more rugged coast
and so decided to skip the Magdalens and go to the Archipel Mingan (Mingan Archipelago) on the Quebec
North Shore, north of the enormous island of Anticosti, which is a privately owned lumber and hunting
preserve. "Anticosti" means "cannot land" as there are no really good harbors, and I went up into the one
where the lumber barges load, Port Menier, for a look and decided the reputation was well-deserved, so
headed back out to sea. I anchored a couple of hours later off the Ile Quarry in a bay that was frequented by
tourist boats blaring god-awful local accordion music. I couldn't imagine why there would be such a profusion
of tourists until this morning when I left early to go Havre St. Pierre to refuel and had time to kill before the
fuel dock would open, so cruised around a bit and found a series of rocks carved by wind and wave in an
almost modern art sort of way on the south side of the island. The tourists must have targeted those rocks.
Now I am at anchor off a small village called Kegaska, which is supposedly beyond the endpoint for the road
on this North Shore, although I see a couple of vehicles about. Today I went 105 nm. All in all I have
traveled 1375 nm since I began.
The hard part starts about here, on the North Shore of Quebec leading to Labrador. For one thing, even in
Havre St Pierre I had to pay for my fuel in cash -- $307.07 -- which I have had to do before (even in Maine),
but here was the first time they would not accept U.S. dollars, which is just about all I brought.
Another item of concern: my inflatable dinghy has a leak, and so far I have been unable to locate the patch
kit. I noticed the leak at Perce Rock, when I slowed to take photos off the stern and saw that an oar was
flapping about wildly, come loose from one of its two secure points, which is a first. I looked in the dinghy and
saw that the floor, which is a high pressure inflatable floor, was loose and out of position. I suppose those
rough seas combined with the weight of the accumulated rain caused the problem. In retrospect I should
have stayed in Gaspe and fixed the leak or had it fixed, but I left there on a Sunday, and even on Saturday
the boat-oriented shops were closed (a French socialist inheritance, I suppose). I am sometimes impatient to
my own detriment.
I have had a couple of other problems but have been able to fix them easily -- for example the unlikely
occurrence of losing the principal pin that holds a line to the block that is the key part of my davit system for
hoisting and lowering my dinghy, but for which I had a machine screw with washer and nut that, with some
wire to secure, seems to have done the trick. Just about every problem I have caused myself, usually by
inattention to detail (such as failing to check the pin before I lost it, or failing to empty the rainwater out of the
dinghy).
29 July 07, Punchbowl Harbour, Labrador (53 deg 15' N, 055 deg. 45' W)
Since my last travelogue I have had some of the best experiences afloat I have ever had. I have not only
seen incredible beauty and fascinating isolated communities, but have experienced excellent boating
conditions as well.
Since turning the western corner of Anticosti island in the St. Lawrence, I have had favorable winds and seas
(although there has been some countercurrent), all downwind, the perfect conditions for my boat. Because
she has two hulls Anna does not roll in following seas like a monohull does, from gunnel to gunnel (i.e., from
the edge of the deck on one side to the edge of the deck on the other) and though she wallows a bit in the
troughs as the swells pass -- or as we pass swells since we are so speedy -- going downwind is relatively
stable while at the same time being exhiliarating.
From Kegaska, Quebec (the stopping place in my last message) I went to Harrington Harbour, Quebec, which
is an English-speaking community that is connected to the outside only by boat and helicopter -- and
snowmobiles in winter. The village has no vehicles other than fourwheelers and snowmobiles, and is
basically the same as a Newfoundland outport (which I have not yet seen). I tied up at the fishing docks
which were fixed (so the boat went up and down with the tide while the dock stayed put) and rough and dirty,
spilling black creosote flakes from the timbers and gray grit from the concrete over my decks. There are no
streets in the village, but only about 12 ft. wide paths that are planked with bridge-timber-like wooden planks
interspersed with huge slabs of bedrock that were in place already and cut down to suit rather than moved
entirely out of the way. Almost twenty people came aboard my boat there, and I made friends with Richard
and Daryl and Keith and others and later went to Richard's house to drink beer with three of them. (It would
have been rude to refuse Richard's invitation.) Among other things, I asked them if there were any Quebec
separatists locally, and Daryl replied, "There were a couple, but we hung 'em already." The others laughed.
When I asked about Canadian involvement in Afghanistan, where they have lost over 70 troops, all seemed
to agree that it is best to kill as many Moslems as possible. All were associated with fishing, and Richard was
an agent for a fuel company, and they told me that in the spring they also participate in the seal hunt, and I
believe I am correct in saying that they got $115 per pelt the season before last, but only $75 this last
season because of a European boycott.
In discussing my cruising plans with them, they told me of a 16-mile-long passage behind some islands where
I could escape the hefty ocean swell and see some land closeup as the passage was quite narrow,
considered a "tickle" in Labrador or Newfoundland (a tickle is a narrow passage in the sea between two land
masses). On leaving Harrington Harbour the next day I traveled about two and a half hours before I found
the passage and must say that, of all the cruising I have ever done, going down Passage Germain in Quebec
is some of the very best. It was still early in the morning when I reached it -- I left Harrington Harbour at 5 --
so that the sun reflected off the western side just right and highlighted the lichen-covered rock and
occasional sparse stands of fir or spruce trees and other greenery, mostly low-growing species such as tiny
ferns, mosses and small succulent-looking plants. The passage had placid waters like a lake without wind
and was narrow, perhaps averaging 200 yards wide, although it was 100 ft. or so deep in most places (the
least depth being about 25 ft.), and the land on either side fairly high for such a long run, with some areas a
couple hundred feet high, although at water's edge not so much. That type of terrain was exactly what I had
envisioned for this part of the world, and the solitude I enjoyed -- I saw no other boats or any sign of human
life except at the northern end where there was a buoy -- only served to enhance the marvelous natural
beauty. Longish bays and small coves extended out here and there along the passage, and one could
spend a month just exploring. I was transfixed. Perhaps it was the serenity and the stark contrast from the
rolling seas just outside, but I felt I was in a paradise, that I had finally stumbled on something I have been
searching for since I started cruising, and almost reached the point where I choked up a bit as a wave of
emotion swept over me.
Too soon the passage came to an end and I re-entered the sea proper and continued on to the northeast. I
intended to stop at Blanc Sablon, the last stop in Quebec, about three hours later, but on arrival the seas
were especially sloppy, small open fishing boats and lobster trap buoys ("lobster pots") forced me to run a
gauntlet and the large multideck ferry from Newfoundland was just arriving so, still on a high from Passage
Germain, I decided just to push on to Red Bay, Labrador, 35 nm away. Within a few miles of crossing the
Quebec-Labrador border I noticed a large gleamingly white motoryacht anchored far out in the harbour of
L'Anse au Clair, but it was miles away and it being a yacht, I didn't pay much notice. (I could not remember
seeing any other yachts in several days.) As I continued on I saw another large clorox-bottle white
motoryacht in the distance just off the shore and I thought, what the heck, are these yachts running together,
and why are they anchoring in such exposed and, in the case of the first at least, incredibly deep locations?
So I got out my binoculars and suddenly realized that these were not yachts or boats of any kind -- they were
icebergs. I jumped in exhilaration as the main goals for this trip have been to go far enough north to see
icebergs and Eskimos (Inuit), and so I changed course, motored over to the second iceberg and took photos.
By the time I reached Red Bay I had seen half a dozen.
On arrival at Red Bay, which is a quaint fishing village of 200 that has some tourist facilities highlighting
Basque whalers who lived here beginning in the 1540s, I was in a joyous mood already, and found the bay
wonderfully picturesque, with rocky hills surrounding and fishing shack architecture assuring the visitor of the
village's cultural roots. A local, Albert Ryan, who saw me enter the bay, drove down to help me dock (which
can be a major problem when I pull up to a fixed dock by myself at low tide and have to climb up several feet
before being able to tie up).
Going through Passage Germain, encountering icebergs, and making Red Bay in Labrador, all on the same
day! It was July 25th, 2007, the day before my grandson's third birthday, and I'll remember it forever as one
of the highlights in my cruising career.
July 26th was not as auspicious for me as it was for my grandson, however. It started off with part of a tooth
falling out while I was eating cereal for breakfast, leaving a gaping hole although causing no pain. Later the
toilet clogged up, requiring a messy disassembly of the hand pump diaphragm and subsequent cleanup of
the toilet area. Finally, I suffered a nasty head wound when hurriedly clambering off my boat to take a trout I
had aboard to a 12-year-old boy, Valentin from Austria, and, blinded by the bill of my cap, smacked hard into
the edge of an overhang. The force of the impact knocked me flat on my back into my boat, my feet several
feet in the air. The two other cruising boats tied up near me saw me fall -- we had just been socializing on
one (another invitation that would have been rude to refuse) -- and they came running. I bled profusely until
they brought ice which, with compression, soon stopped the bleeding. Small sand flies swarmed me, smelling
blood, and feasted. One of the cruisers with medical training looked at the wound on the crown of my head
and said that I must have stitches. Others went to a nearby store/restaurant to ask about a local infirmary
and found there was none for 40 miles, but luckily a Quebecois doctor and his nurse girlfriend were dining
there and rushed to check me. He agreed that it would be best to have stitches, but that they were not
absolutely necessary. Before he arrived I had lit a citronella candle to help repel the swarming flies that had
found their way into my cabin. While we were conversing -- he wondered about my most recent tetanus shot
(2001) and overall physical condition (mixed) -- the doctor leaned back and suddenly his sweater caught fire
from the candle. He jerked it off in a wink and instantly snuffed out the fire. I gave him some money to
replace the sweater, they asked one of the neighboring cruisers to check on me throughout the evening and
the next morning (to make certain I was thinking correctly and not vomiting), then the doctor and the nurse
returned to their supper, while I washed the wound and soon turned in for the night. Now I will have a
permanent mark on my body from Labrador, much like a tattoo, that I got after drinking, although being on
the very top of my head, it will not be readily visible.
I remained at Red Bay the next day to recuperate from the aches and pains, mainly in the neck and back,
suffered the prior evening and visited Albert at his modest home -- he is on welfare and lives on $100 a week
-- and was regaled by his stories of hunting wolves and fishing for salmon and trout in nearby brooks and
hitting a whale in a wooden boat without sinking, among other things. He is 48, has a sixth grade education,
and is a kind and generous person with many a good tale to offer in his deep brogue. People up here are
not well educated for the most part, and speak in poor grammar ("I sees . . .), with many an odd
pronunciation, including saying "me" ( or perhaps the Spanish 'mi') for "my", and the failure to pronounce the
standard English 'th' sound in some words, saying only a 't' instead, as in "I sees someting on me boat". But
they never utter a curse word, and are as kind and generous as anyone I have ever met. From my limited
experience, crime hardly exists in most communities and almost always entails either a pack of teenage boys
or strong drink and domestic violence. (I heard, however, that there are some First Nation communities in
Labrador where substance abuse is rife and young people even throw rocks at visiting yachtsmen and their
boats!)
The water in these northern harbours and bays is very clear when close to the coast, and from a wharf one
can see the starfish on the bottom and the jellyfish and other creatures swimming about very clearly.
Further in, however, the water is dark from tannin washing in from the myriad rivers and brooks. Red Bay, a
typical fishing community for these parts, now has only two fishing boats since the collapse of the cod fishery
where they used to have over fifty. In winter almost everyone is on welfare. Many live in one place in
summer, when jobs are more plentiful, and in another in winter.
Finally on Saturday my neck and back pains from my fall into my boat after the knock on the head had eased
enough for me to leave Red Bay, and I left very early in the morning and went to Battle Harbour, about 65 nm
further north, after first stopping at Mary's Harbour to refuel. Battle Harbour is a reconstructed fishing village
that was at one time the capital of Labrador. The Canadian government has spent a lot of money getting it
to tourist-level quality and has old fishermen cottages for rent, a community eating hall with one set menu for
the day, a small general store, and about a dozen exhibits about the old fishing village scattered among as
many buildings.
Then this morning after breakfast at the community table, I left and headed further north. I went behind some
islands just to break the monotony of the open sea, but it was raining and hazy and I did not see much other
than some amazing icebergs, until finally I reached a place called Squasho Run that reminded me of
Passage Germain, though it was not as long or narrow and had even fewer trees. I cut off the engine and
sat quietly in the quiet waters enjoying the surroundings for a few minutes, but the magic feeling of Passage
Germain did not reoccur. I am now in a place called Punchbowl Harbour, which is an almost perfect harbour
with a small entrance and nice depths throughout. In the '80s the Canadian government spent a boatload of
money to build a Fishing Service Center here to cater to the fishermen who came here in summer and in
lived in small simple shacks around the harbour. Then in the '90s the cod fishery collapsed and this center
was abandoned, the shacks as well. Today when I arrived -- it is a Sunday -- there were three small open
boats here in the well-protected inner harbour constructed at the same time as the center, and about a half
dozen men were scavenging mostly wood from the main building. I was a bit concerned that they would not
welcome me, but two came over and took my lines to help me tie up. I invited them aboard to show them the
boat, and one was very polite, about 30-35, while the other, somewhat older and much rougher, said nothing
and just looked simple and mean. Both were from a nearby community named Black Tickle. The nice one,
Trent, volunteered that he knew they were "sinning" taking all this stuff, but otherwise it would go to waste
and just rot and ruin, and it is hard to make a living up here since the cod fishing died out. I agreed with him.
After they left I took a nap and when a boat motor woke me I found myself alone at last. I went for a hike,
which is difficult in the squishy bog here (there is not a tree to be seen for miles), over to an area with some
abandoned shacks built in the '80s and took a few photos. A fogbank on the horizon was setting in so I
scurried back. Visibility is down to a couple hundred feet at present.
I have decided that I will try to make Makkovik, which is a largely Eskimo (Inuit is the politically correct term)
community another 200 nm or so north and a bit west from here. Trent told me that Black Tickle has diesel,
so I'll stop there on the way.
I have now traveled 1753 nm on this trip. Fuel is getting outrageously expensive up here in the north --
around $5 a gallon, although it has always been much higher in Canada than in the U.S. Cigarettes -- I
bought some for Albert in Red Bay -- cost over $10 a pack.
Since my last message I have stayed at marinas -- that is, I haven't anchored out -- at Guysborough and
Ballantyne's Cove in Nova Scotia, and Charlottetown and Summerside on Prince Edward Island. I spent only
one night each at the two Nova Scotian towns, while staying for three at Charlottetown and at least two at
Summerside, and my boat, Anna, has traveled a bit over 800 nm on the trip so far. All of the passages
between have been easy -- rather boring, really, although I have intentionally missed all of the big winds,
which have been frequent of late. Part of the way from Ballantyne's Cove to Charlottetown was in a veil of
fog, but I noticed on radar no other boat the entire time.
Guysborough is a lovely small town connected to Chedabucto Bay at the NE corner of the Nova Scotian
mainland, just over from Cape Breton Island (which is also a part of Nova Scotia), on an attractive small
river-fed bay of its own, with nice old homes and a photogenic Victorian post office. The small marina is
attached to a brew pub, which is something special for a town of only a couple thousand. I hiked to the
grocery store on one side of town, then to buy boxed wine hiked to the liquor store on the opposite side of
town for a total of about four miles, which was more than I bargained for and made me rather regret drinking
the last of my first box of wine. Nova Scotia, like most of Canada, has province-run liquor stores, although in
small remote locales the province may allow an exisiting store to double as its agent in the liquor business.
To reach my next port I had to tranverse the Strait of Canso and go through the Canso Lock, a canal, which
is part of a causeway that links mainland Nova Scotia to Cape Breton Isle. The highway is on a swingbridge
that pivots to the side to allow big ships through the lock. My boat was low enough to go under the bridge,
but there was a fishing vessel also passing through and the bridge had been swung over for us to pass, with
a line of vehicles, including 18-wheelers, up on the road eager for us to move. The lock only raises and
lowers a couple of feet, and I just hovered in the middle of the lock until I got the green light to leave (I was
glad I didn't have to tie up, as I am alone and tying up can be tricky). There was no fee.
Ballantyne's Cove is an interesting and highly picturesque fishing harbor near Cape George, at the base of a
mountain that leads up to the cape lighthouse. I had to pay cash to fill up with diesel there as they mainly
serve local fishermen who have accounts and pay monthly, and so the harbormaster has little need for credit
cards. About a half dozen fishermen came aboard to inspect my boat, several of the older ones speaking in
a rich, almost Irish brogue. This is in the heart of bluefin tuna country, and the largest ever caught on a rod
and reel was caught near here and weighed 1493 lbs. This part of the Nova Scotian mainland is
mountainous and hilly right up to the coast, as is the Cape Breton shore just across St. George's Bay. The
heavy forestation and the bold rocky shore combine with the high headlands to form a lovely coastal picture.
I traveled then over to Prince Edward Island, the smallest of the Canadian provinces, and its capital,
Charlottetown, which is likely to be the largest city I'll visit on this voyage, but has less than 50,000 people. I
met some locals, Kurt and Pat, at the Charlottetown Yacht Club where I tied up, we chatted (and saw the rock
group, White Stripe, briefly as they left for a mini-concert on a boat), then Pat invited me to his home, had a
dinner party, later went to Kurt's friends' home out in the country, about 20 minutes outside Chartlottetown
right on Tracadie Bay, where two couples a bit younger than I jammed in a storage building they called the
Rum Shack. True enough we drank shots of rum chased with beer and they played long, long versions of
several blues tunes, the men on guitars, the women on keyboards and bass, and it was a fantastic time, but I
petered out around midnight and had to leave, relunctantly. I also visited an excellent art museum in
Charlottetown and thoroughly enjoyed walking around its lovely streets with the old brick waterfront buildings
and the nearby residential areas, leafy and well-maintained, mostly with wooden siding and high-pitched
roofs with little, if any, front yard. Canada is more European in this respect, with buildings right on the street
front, although they also have normal American-type suburbs with sprinkler systems and riding lawnmowers.
And the traffic here is great, barely noticeable, with courteous drivers.
Canadians have to be some of the best people in the whole world. Besides the friendliness I have reported
so far, I have been offered the use of vehicles three times -- "You want to go to the store? Here're the keys
to my truck" -- and have been treated universally with courtesy and friendliness -- they wave when they meet
others on small roads, for one thing, and always stop for pedestrians, for another -- by drivers, shop clerks,
waitresses, bartenders (who invariably ask where I am from), others in the marinas, and passersby on the
street. I often exaggerate my Texas accent, which Canadians find amusing, answering their "hello" with a
"howdy", for example. And waitresses especially seem to be fond of my referring to them as "ma'am".
PEI, as this island is referred to, is not as vertical or rocky or bold as Nova Scotia, and instead is made of
largely red soils, quite evident along the coast, undulating in small rolling hills. But driving around one sees
some of the prettiest farmsteads I have seen anywhere with neat sprawling barns and silos brightly painted,
the fields and woods bright green, and overall the island is gorgeously pastoral, and known for its potatoes
and hogs.
I am now in a place I intentionally visited solely because I wanted to buy a shirt with its name emblazoned
upon it: the Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club, in Summerside. This is said to be the only social organization
in the world with such dual functions. It is quite a friendly club and its facilities are much better than the yacht
club at Charlottetown (although the latter is supposed to build new facilities in a new, more sheltered location
next year).
I like this area so much I would like to leave my boat here over winter and come back next summer and go
down the St Lawrence into the Great Lakes, but I must first overcome Canadian Customs' rule that a
foreign-registered boat's stay over six months in Canada renders that boat liable for a duty equal to about
15% of its value. There are ways to get around that, I understand, and am staying here at least part of
tomorrow, a Monday, in order to speak with a knowledgable person about the possiblities.
After PEI I intend to go to the north shore of New Brunswick, then to Gaspesie in Quebec, before going to the
Iles de Madeleine (also a part of Quebec) and on to Newfoundland.
23 July, 2007 Kegaska, Quebec North Shore (50 deg 11.2318 N, 061 deg 15.7618 W)
I have been spoiled in staying in several marinas so far that have wireless internet systems, and have been
able to, among other things, upload some photos to my web site. There are about ten photos so far from this
year's voyage. But it may be a long time before I get that opportunity again. My satphone connection, on
which this message is conveyed, is much too slow -- only about 9 kilobytes (not megabytes) per second -- to
send anything but text, and I will not be in a marina for some time, I think. Besides being spoiled by a good
internet connection, I have also had the good fortune of favorable sea conditions for the most part, eating in
several good restaurants, meeting some wonderful people, and having no major problems, although there
are some little ones nagging me.
From the Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club I first traveled to New Brunswick, the only officially bilingual
province in Canada, staying in English-speaking Mirimichi, far up a river, and in Francophone Caraquet,
passing under a lift bridge at Shippagan to enter the Bay of Chaleurs, which is both immense and beautiful
due to the high elevations. Caraquet offered me the chance to break in my rusty French, because I came to
Quebec next, crossing 50 nm over the Bay of Chaleurs to New Richmond which, although it has an English
name, is almost 100% Quebecois. In Caraquet I asked a French-speaking woman who came to look at my
boat (I estimate that 50 people have come aboard to check out my boat so far) if she were Quebecois and
she said rather forcefully that no, she was Acadian, who are also French-speaking and inhabit parts of Nova
Scotia and New Brunswick. The Louisiana Cajuns originate from Acadians expelled from Canada by the
British after their victory over the French in the 1700s. There are several varieties of Acadian French -- one
in Nova Scotia that sounds like someone from Oklahoma trying to speak French -- but the dialect spoken in
Caraquet seemed the same as Quebec French to my inexpert ear, and I was surprised that the woman was
so concerned to exert her difference from the Quebecois otherwise. Provincialism even among French
Canadians!
New Richmond lies in a lovely setting, ringed by high forested hills around its bay at the northernmost part of
the Bay of Chaleurs. I had met two locals earlier in Shelburne, Nova Scotia, who were delivering a boat from
Rhode Island to New Richmond, one of whom was the new owner, and we had enjoyed one another enough I
decided to visit them since it was not really much out of the way. Bernard Godbout, recently divorced, and
Real Cyr, married, were wonderfully kind to me, driving me around and showing me the lovely countryside,
among other things. One evening we drove into the Gaspe National Park, which is mountainous and
forested with rushing rivers. One would expect throngs of tourists, but the moose and caribou there
outnumber the people, and we traveled for miles before seeing another vehicle.
The Canadians of French ancestry enjoy much better food than their compatriots of British heritage. Even
the restaurant at the marina in Caraquet had outstanding food (better than anything in Vernon), unlike the
marina restaurants in the English-speaking provinces I have so far visited. I prefer seafood, and while in
Nova Scotia and PEI I felt lucky to find fish and chips -- deep fried in who knows what kind of oil -- in French
Canada the seafood is more often baked and served with rich sauces and vegetables over rice, exactly my
preference.
After New Richmond I journeyed to the town of Gaspe, and found another beautiful setting with lush green
high hills or mountains all around. Gaspe refers also to the region (as well as the national park) which is
essentially a peninsula that juts out into the immense Bay of St. Lawrence. The town of Gaspe is the
regional center and has a very attractive, recently developed seafront area, and their marina has been one
of the best I've seen (except for a few unlevel walkways).
Getting to Gaspe was a rather rough ride for awhile after I turned the corner out of the Bay of Chaleurs and
headed north directly into the wind and nasty headseas. It was also raining, but rain I like because it washes
the salt off the boat and helps to beat down seas, if heavy enough. The ride was rolly enough to cause me
to decide to give up making it all the way to Gaspe, which turned out to be 112 nm away, but after about an
hour and a half the seas quietened to a level for me to renew my original goal. On the way I passed the
Rocher Perce (Perce Rock), which is an unusual giant rectangular slab of rock hundreds of feet long and at
least a hundred high, with a squarish hole along the bottom and a large pillar on the outermost edge.
At one point I intended to go from Gaspe to the Magdelene Islands out in the Bay of St Lawrence, then on to
Newfoundland. But I decided finally that I was tired of the marina life and wanted to see a more rugged coast
and so decided to skip the Magdalens and go to the Archipel Mingan (Mingan Archipelago) on the Quebec
North Shore, north of the enormous island of Anticosti, which is a privately owned lumber and hunting
preserve. "Anticosti" means "cannot land" as there are no really good harbors, and I went up into the one
where the lumber barges load, Port Menier, for a look and decided the reputation was well-deserved, so
headed back out to sea. I anchored a couple of hours later off the Ile Quarry in a bay that was frequented by
tourist boats blaring god-awful local accordion music. I couldn't imagine why there would be such a profusion
of tourists until this morning when I left early to go Havre St. Pierre to refuel and had time to kill before the
fuel dock would open, so cruised around a bit and found a series of rocks carved by wind and wave in an
almost modern art sort of way on the south side of the island. The tourists must have targeted those rocks.
Now I am at anchor off a small village called Kegaska, which is supposedly beyond the endpoint for the road
on this North Shore, although I see a couple of vehicles about. Today I went 105 nm. All in all I have
traveled 1375 nm since I began.
The hard part starts about here, on the North Shore of Quebec leading to Labrador. For one thing, even in
Havre St Pierre I had to pay for my fuel in cash -- $307.07 -- which I have had to do before (even in Maine),
but here was the first time they would not accept U.S. dollars, which is just about all I brought.
Another item of concern: my inflatable dinghy has a leak, and so far I have been unable to locate the patch
kit. I noticed the leak at Perce Rock, when I slowed to take photos off the stern and saw that an oar was
flapping about wildly, come loose from one of its two secure points, which is a first. I looked in the dinghy and
saw that the floor, which is a high pressure inflatable floor, was loose and out of position. I suppose those
rough seas combined with the weight of the accumulated rain caused the problem. In retrospect I should
have stayed in Gaspe and fixed the leak or had it fixed, but I left there on a Sunday, and even on Saturday
the boat-oriented shops were closed (a French socialist inheritance, I suppose). I am sometimes impatient to
my own detriment.
I have had a couple of other problems but have been able to fix them easily -- for example the unlikely
occurrence of losing the principal pin that holds a line to the block that is the key part of my davit system for
hoisting and lowering my dinghy, but for which I had a machine screw with washer and nut that, with some
wire to secure, seems to have done the trick. Just about every problem I have caused myself, usually by
inattention to detail (such as failing to check the pin before I lost it, or failing to empty the rainwater out of the
dinghy).
29 July 07, Punchbowl Harbour, Labrador (53 deg 15' N, 055 deg. 45' W)
Since my last travelogue I have had some of the best experiences afloat I have ever had. I have not only
seen incredible beauty and fascinating isolated communities, but have experienced excellent boating
conditions as well.
Since turning the western corner of Anticosti island in the St. Lawrence, I have had favorable winds and seas
(although there has been some countercurrent), all downwind, the perfect conditions for my boat. Because
she has two hulls Anna does not roll in following seas like a monohull does, from gunnel to gunnel (i.e., from
the edge of the deck on one side to the edge of the deck on the other) and though she wallows a bit in the
troughs as the swells pass -- or as we pass swells since we are so speedy -- going downwind is relatively
stable while at the same time being exhiliarating.
From Kegaska, Quebec (the stopping place in my last message) I went to Harrington Harbour, Quebec, which
is an English-speaking community that is connected to the outside only by boat and helicopter -- and
snowmobiles in winter. The village has no vehicles other than fourwheelers and snowmobiles, and is
basically the same as a Newfoundland outport (which I have not yet seen). I tied up at the fishing docks
which were fixed (so the boat went up and down with the tide while the dock stayed put) and rough and dirty,
spilling black creosote flakes from the timbers and gray grit from the concrete over my decks. There are no
streets in the village, but only about 12 ft. wide paths that are planked with bridge-timber-like wooden planks
interspersed with huge slabs of bedrock that were in place already and cut down to suit rather than moved
entirely out of the way. Almost twenty people came aboard my boat there, and I made friends with Richard
and Daryl and Keith and others and later went to Richard's house to drink beer with three of them. (It would
have been rude to refuse Richard's invitation.) Among other things, I asked them if there were any Quebec
separatists locally, and Daryl replied, "There were a couple, but we hung 'em already." The others laughed.
When I asked about Canadian involvement in Afghanistan, where they have lost over 70 troops, all seemed
to agree that it is best to kill as many Moslems as possible. All were associated with fishing, and Richard was
an agent for a fuel company, and they told me that in the spring they also participate in the seal hunt, and I
believe I am correct in saying that they got $115 per pelt the season before last, but only $75 this last
season because of a European boycott.
In discussing my cruising plans with them, they told me of a 16-mile-long passage behind some islands where
I could escape the hefty ocean swell and see some land closeup as the passage was quite narrow,
considered a "tickle" in Labrador or Newfoundland (a tickle is a narrow passage in the sea between two land
masses). On leaving Harrington Harbour the next day I traveled about two and a half hours before I found
the passage and must say that, of all the cruising I have ever done, going down Passage Germain in Quebec
is some of the very best. It was still early in the morning when I reached it -- I left Harrington Harbour at 5 --
so that the sun reflected off the western side just right and highlighted the lichen-covered rock and
occasional sparse stands of fir or spruce trees and other greenery, mostly low-growing species such as tiny
ferns, mosses and small succulent-looking plants. The passage had placid waters like a lake without wind
and was narrow, perhaps averaging 200 yards wide, although it was 100 ft. or so deep in most places (the
least depth being about 25 ft.), and the land on either side fairly high for such a long run, with some areas a
couple hundred feet high, although at water's edge not so much. That type of terrain was exactly what I had
envisioned for this part of the world, and the solitude I enjoyed -- I saw no other boats or any sign of human
life except at the northern end where there was a buoy -- only served to enhance the marvelous natural
beauty. Longish bays and small coves extended out here and there along the passage, and one could
spend a month just exploring. I was transfixed. Perhaps it was the serenity and the stark contrast from the
rolling seas just outside, but I felt I was in a paradise, that I had finally stumbled on something I have been
searching for since I started cruising, and almost reached the point where I choked up a bit as a wave of
emotion swept over me.
Too soon the passage came to an end and I re-entered the sea proper and continued on to the northeast. I
intended to stop at Blanc Sablon, the last stop in Quebec, about three hours later, but on arrival the seas
were especially sloppy, small open fishing boats and lobster trap buoys ("lobster pots") forced me to run a
gauntlet and the large multideck ferry from Newfoundland was just arriving so, still on a high from Passage
Germain, I decided just to push on to Red Bay, Labrador, 35 nm away. Within a few miles of crossing the
Quebec-Labrador border I noticed a large gleamingly white motoryacht anchored far out in the harbour of
L'Anse au Clair, but it was miles away and it being a yacht, I didn't pay much notice. (I could not remember
seeing any other yachts in several days.) As I continued on I saw another large clorox-bottle white
motoryacht in the distance just off the shore and I thought, what the heck, are these yachts running together,
and why are they anchoring in such exposed and, in the case of the first at least, incredibly deep locations?
So I got out my binoculars and suddenly realized that these were not yachts or boats of any kind -- they were
icebergs. I jumped in exhilaration as the main goals for this trip have been to go far enough north to see
icebergs and Eskimos (Inuit), and so I changed course, motored over to the second iceberg and took photos.
By the time I reached Red Bay I had seen half a dozen.
On arrival at Red Bay, which is a quaint fishing village of 200 that has some tourist facilities highlighting
Basque whalers who lived here beginning in the 1540s, I was in a joyous mood already, and found the bay
wonderfully picturesque, with rocky hills surrounding and fishing shack architecture assuring the visitor of the
village's cultural roots. A local, Albert Ryan, who saw me enter the bay, drove down to help me dock (which
can be a major problem when I pull up to a fixed dock by myself at low tide and have to climb up several feet
before being able to tie up).
Going through Passage Germain, encountering icebergs, and making Red Bay in Labrador, all on the same
day! It was July 25th, 2007, the day before my grandson's third birthday, and I'll remember it forever as one
of the highlights in my cruising career.
July 26th was not as auspicious for me as it was for my grandson, however. It started off with part of a tooth
falling out while I was eating cereal for breakfast, leaving a gaping hole although causing no pain. Later the
toilet clogged up, requiring a messy disassembly of the hand pump diaphragm and subsequent cleanup of
the toilet area. Finally, I suffered a nasty head wound when hurriedly clambering off my boat to take a trout I
had aboard to a 12-year-old boy, Valentin from Austria, and, blinded by the bill of my cap, smacked hard into
the edge of an overhang. The force of the impact knocked me flat on my back into my boat, my feet several
feet in the air. The two other cruising boats tied up near me saw me fall -- we had just been socializing on
one (another invitation that would have been rude to refuse) -- and they came running. I bled profusely until
they brought ice which, with compression, soon stopped the bleeding. Small sand flies swarmed me, smelling
blood, and feasted. One of the cruisers with medical training looked at the wound on the crown of my head
and said that I must have stitches. Others went to a nearby store/restaurant to ask about a local infirmary
and found there was none for 40 miles, but luckily a Quebecois doctor and his nurse girlfriend were dining
there and rushed to check me. He agreed that it would be best to have stitches, but that they were not
absolutely necessary. Before he arrived I had lit a citronella candle to help repel the swarming flies that had
found their way into my cabin. While we were conversing -- he wondered about my most recent tetanus shot
(2001) and overall physical condition (mixed) -- the doctor leaned back and suddenly his sweater caught fire
from the candle. He jerked it off in a wink and instantly snuffed out the fire. I gave him some money to
replace the sweater, they asked one of the neighboring cruisers to check on me throughout the evening and
the next morning (to make certain I was thinking correctly and not vomiting), then the doctor and the nurse
returned to their supper, while I washed the wound and soon turned in for the night. Now I will have a
permanent mark on my body from Labrador, much like a tattoo, that I got after drinking, although being on
the very top of my head, it will not be readily visible.
I remained at Red Bay the next day to recuperate from the aches and pains, mainly in the neck and back,
suffered the prior evening and visited Albert at his modest home -- he is on welfare and lives on $100 a week
-- and was regaled by his stories of hunting wolves and fishing for salmon and trout in nearby brooks and
hitting a whale in a wooden boat without sinking, among other things. He is 48, has a sixth grade education,
and is a kind and generous person with many a good tale to offer in his deep brogue. People up here are
not well educated for the most part, and speak in poor grammar ("I sees . . .), with many an odd
pronunciation, including saying "me" ( or perhaps the Spanish 'mi') for "my", and the failure to pronounce the
standard English 'th' sound in some words, saying only a 't' instead, as in "I sees someting on me boat". But
they never utter a curse word, and are as kind and generous as anyone I have ever met. From my limited
experience, crime hardly exists in most communities and almost always entails either a pack of teenage boys
or strong drink and domestic violence. (I heard, however, that there are some First Nation communities in
Labrador where substance abuse is rife and young people even throw rocks at visiting yachtsmen and their
boats!)
The water in these northern harbours and bays is very clear when close to the coast, and from a wharf one
can see the starfish on the bottom and the jellyfish and other creatures swimming about very clearly.
Further in, however, the water is dark from tannin washing in from the myriad rivers and brooks. Red Bay, a
typical fishing community for these parts, now has only two fishing boats since the collapse of the cod fishery
where they used to have over fifty. In winter almost everyone is on welfare. Many live in one place in
summer, when jobs are more plentiful, and in another in winter.
Finally on Saturday my neck and back pains from my fall into my boat after the knock on the head had eased
enough for me to leave Red Bay, and I left very early in the morning and went to Battle Harbour, about 65 nm
further north, after first stopping at Mary's Harbour to refuel. Battle Harbour is a reconstructed fishing village
that was at one time the capital of Labrador. The Canadian government has spent a lot of money getting it
to tourist-level quality and has old fishermen cottages for rent, a community eating hall with one set menu for
the day, a small general store, and about a dozen exhibits about the old fishing village scattered among as
many buildings.
Then this morning after breakfast at the community table, I left and headed further north. I went behind some
islands just to break the monotony of the open sea, but it was raining and hazy and I did not see much other
than some amazing icebergs, until finally I reached a place called Squasho Run that reminded me of
Passage Germain, though it was not as long or narrow and had even fewer trees. I cut off the engine and
sat quietly in the quiet waters enjoying the surroundings for a few minutes, but the magic feeling of Passage
Germain did not reoccur. I am now in a place called Punchbowl Harbour, which is an almost perfect harbour
with a small entrance and nice depths throughout. In the '80s the Canadian government spent a boatload of
money to build a Fishing Service Center here to cater to the fishermen who came here in summer and in
lived in small simple shacks around the harbour. Then in the '90s the cod fishery collapsed and this center
was abandoned, the shacks as well. Today when I arrived -- it is a Sunday -- there were three small open
boats here in the well-protected inner harbour constructed at the same time as the center, and about a half
dozen men were scavenging mostly wood from the main building. I was a bit concerned that they would not
welcome me, but two came over and took my lines to help me tie up. I invited them aboard to show them the
boat, and one was very polite, about 30-35, while the other, somewhat older and much rougher, said nothing
and just looked simple and mean. Both were from a nearby community named Black Tickle. The nice one,
Trent, volunteered that he knew they were "sinning" taking all this stuff, but otherwise it would go to waste
and just rot and ruin, and it is hard to make a living up here since the cod fishing died out. I agreed with him.
After they left I took a nap and when a boat motor woke me I found myself alone at last. I went for a hike,
which is difficult in the squishy bog here (there is not a tree to be seen for miles), over to an area with some
abandoned shacks built in the '80s and took a few photos. A fogbank on the horizon was setting in so I
scurried back. Visibility is down to a couple hundred feet at present.
I have decided that I will try to make Makkovik, which is a largely Eskimo (Inuit is the politically correct term)
community another 200 nm or so north and a bit west from here. Trent told me that Black Tickle has diesel,
so I'll stop there on the way.
I have now traveled 1753 nm on this trip. Fuel is getting outrageously expensive up here in the north --
around $5 a gallon, although it has always been much higher in Canada than in the U.S. Cigarettes -- I
bought some for Albert in Red Bay -- cost over $10 a pack.
After looking at this page, see
After looking at this page, see