It was a rocky but sleep-able night in the open waters of Port San Juan. In the morning fog we had breakfast, and were briefly joined by a West Coast Trail hiker. He swam over in nothing but a mask, his swim trunks, and a smile. After making small talk for a while (“Where are you from? How long have you been at sea? How fast does your boat go?” etc…) he got to his point – did we have any beer we could sell him? Looking for breakfast beers, impressive. Cap’n Adam only had a finite supply of his own beers, but did appreciate the effort and therefore gave him the last 2 beers he had left in the poop-deck cooler (but none from the private Bilge Reserve inside the boat). Happy, the hiker thanked us and was on his way, to be greeted with cheers and congratulatory back-pats upon his return to camp. Good times.
Knowing we did not have very far to go to meet up with some friends who would be arriving to camp later in the day, we puttered along the coast further into Port Renfrew. We checked out the sea caves, and slowly idled towards the beach where we knew the campsite was. Now out of cell phone range again, we decided to get as close as we could to the beach, throw down the anchor, and wait for our pals to see us and holler from the shore. While we waited and napped the wind picked up, something fierce. Concerned that the wind might actually cause the anchor to drag in the sandy bottom and blow us ashore, we decided we’d better move to a more protected spot, or at least throw down another anchor. As we started to sort this out, suddenly we could see our friend Kath, waving at us from the beach. She was getting pounded by the wind as she tried to yell the direction of their campsite to us. Adam, now in the dinghy and heading toward her, could barely hear her. The rendezvous point would have to be figured out later, now we had to make sure the boat didn’t end up high and dry. Back on the boat, Adam throttled up and drove forward while I pulled up the anchor with the winch – the anchor line was being pulled so tight by the wind that the winch alone could not lift the anchor, Adam had to assist with the engine-based-forward-momentum power. Successful, we motored over to the more protected Snuggery Cove and dropped the anchor there, in deeper water.
Into our survival suits and into the dinghy we hopped, and headed over to the campsite. We were most happy to see some pals there. Sam & Kath, Shan & Tara, OJ & Cristal, and Talia & Sean. Over the next hour or so the wind died right down, and we were able to enjoy a most beautiful sunset. We loved how well our stomachs were taken care of – we really appreciate the effort our pals made, especially Sammy & Cristal but really everybody, to cook for us and then clean up after us on land. Follow that up with a beach fire and some wine, and it turned out to be a pretty good day.
The next day we took the camping crew for a short cruise on the boat, tried to catch a fish, tried to trap some crabs. Unsuccessful at gathering protein, we headed back for a campsite BBQ, and bought some crabs from a local fisherman. Crab feast, another beach fire, more wine, another great day.
All 3 of our nights in Port San Juan / Port Renfrew were pretty rocky – this bay is not very protected from the winds or the waves. Port Renfrew is an interesting little place – not a lot going on, yet thousands of people descend on this town every summer to hike the Trail, or to fish. There is a new(ish) hotel and pub which replaced the one that burned down a few years ago. There is a great, small breakfast place we went to, which also had a nice dinner menu. Kath’s blog, which can be found by clicking here, describes the restaurant in greater detail (once she finds some time to blog about it). But the highlight of Port Renfrew was definitely the fact that our friends were there to camp, and met us on our circumnavigation journey. We treasure that, and are so glad that we can also have some “Hey, remember that time we were going around Vancouver Island and you guys camped in Port Renfrew?” memories with even more people. Good times.
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