It is fun to read the history of an area. This area had a cult leader called Brother who made off with quite a bit of money not to mention the stories of the women that he had as followers. Some say the gold is hidden here on the island. We had time this morning to talk to the other campers. This being Victoria's weekend, quite a few folks were out for the weekend. One of the kayakers had a double boat that he paddled as a single. This was made possible with a sailing rig. We are thinking that a sail is a good thing to have. Someday we will have to add that to the gear list. He was quite talkative and plans to leave at slack tide as well. Most likely he will pass us on our way to Nanaimo. Jeff gave us a little guy who I call Esri man. He is secured to the front of my boat as my mascot. We have let Ryan know that we expect him to send a mascot for Don's boat.
Esri hanging out.
Finally it is time to leave in order to reach the narrows near slack. We are fortunate to have the tide being close to high which makes for easy loading.
Carrying lots of gear as we have 15 days worth of food with us.
Lots of seals are hanging out on the rocks as we head toward the narrows.
What fun to feel the sun!
We see the narrows up ahead and enjoy the ride through it. The current is with us and soon we see the town of Nanaimo in sight. First though we pass a huge pulp mill and a ferry dock for containers.
Lots of tree cutting in the area.
Lots of activity here as we pass the industrial section of Nanimo
Soon we see our friend the kayaker sailor. when the wind dies we are able to keep up, but as the wind picks up off he goes.
No hands kayaking
We decided to take a break at New Castle Marine Park. It was decision time. We had only paddled 10 miles due to our late start, but the wind was blowing harder from the North and the tide would be against us. It would be a push to get to the next campsite so we opted to enjoy the afternoon and stay at this beautiful park. All of the campsites are walk in only which meant we had a long carry with our gear. Using our legs is a good thing we said as we made numerous trips back and forth. Plenty of time to make pizza with Elk meat and mushrooms. Bread was also on the menu for tomorrow's travel. We plan on getting up at 5 to be on the water by 7. This is not like our Baja loading where it is usually just a short distance to the water.
One had to take a ferry or paddle to the town. We opted to just see it from the distance.
At least the ground was flat to the water.
We saw Michael, the kayaker at the park. He had stopped at a campsite where some other kayakers were camped. They were able to patch his boat and he was good to go. We were glad to hear the good news. It does not seem that there are many kayakers out here doing this route.