Day 9: Fury Cove to Joe’s Bay
- Laurel
- May 14, 2022
- 2 min read
Updated: Mar 26
Our first mission this morning, once we had our morning cappuccinos, was to drop our shrimp pot for the first time. While it was soaking, we cruised up Darby Channel to check out Dawson’s Landing, which had been recommended to us by a fellow boater.
Things were pretty quiet there, since it’s still very early in the boating season, but the flowers were in full bloom. They have a very well-stocked store, and we bought a couple things we had forgotten to get in Port McNeill.
On the way to the next anchorage, we pulled up our shrimp pot and got the amazing haul of one spot shrimp.
Hoping for a better harvest in another location, we dropped the pot a second time closer to today’s anchorage. Shortly after lunch we pulled into Joe’s Bay, which we are sharing with one other boat. We immediately mobilized the dinghy to see if we could make it up into Elizabeth Lagoon, but the tide had already turned and we were afraid to cross the rapids into the lagoon for fear that we wouldn’t be able to get back out. Ryan used the afternoon to perfect the lifting system he had made for the dinghy while I relaxed with tea and an ebook.
One person can easily lift the dinghy onto the roof and the arm that lifts the raft also folds down to hold the raft down. It makes a big difference to one’s willingness to go on dinghy missions if it’s not a lot of work to get the dinghy ready.
While Ryan was working on the dinghy lift, we noticed a rather large amount of foam floating down from the lagoon. It looks like ice at first glance, but it’s not.
We quickly hopped in the dinghy to investigate and discovered that with the lower tide the rapids had turned into a small waterfall, and it was churning the water to make a foamy mess. As you can see in the picture of the falls below, Ryan drove us through a particularly large foam-berg and it came over the bow into the boat.
Before dinner we went back to pull up our shrimp pot and harvested…one shrimp. For a total of two shrimp today. To add insult to injury, my new shrimp deveining/shelling tool turned out to be more of a shrimp-mutilating tool. Tonight we will have to spend a little time watching YouTube videos on where to catch shrimp in British Columbia and tips for processing your catch.
Luckily there will be lots of time to practice and improve our shrimp targeting skills. We will keep you posted.
You better eat more food than that shrimp shown, else you will return to NZ skinny as a broom handle ha.
You are making great progress, and appear to be not that far from the long Sound that separates USA/Canada with Hyder, AK and Stewart, BC at it's head. RU going to visit those two villages? Cheers, Neil (& Glenys)