This is the anticipated schedule of arrival days going around Vancouver Island in a counter clockwise direction. The icons are linked methods for our friends to reach us at the destinations along the way.
Additional details were posted on the March Thunder Blog.
Erin completed the PCOC exam and can now burn around in the boat all by herself! The PCOC is the Pleasure Craft Operator Cardthat is required by all recreational boaters in Canada, the US and who knows where else. I got mine about 10 years ago at the local Boat Show. There was a booth at the event offering the test for free, so I wrote it and past… Being that it was multiple guess, if you gave it to a hundred monkeys, presumably one of them would have past it too, so there are probably several monkeys bombing around out there right now. Writing the test was free but they didn’t tell me that it was $35 to actually get the card. This particular monkey happened to have the $35 bucks.
We both just took the Canadian Power Squadron basic Boating Course which you take the PCOC in the middle of the course. I took the PCOC again because, according to Power Squadron, it is the only Canadian PCOC that is accepted in the US as well; which only matters if you’re in the US for more than six weeks I think it is. The boating standard you need to conform to when out of your own country is your boat’s country of origin unless you’re in the States for more than six weeks (I could be wrong on the length of time there, so don’t quote me on that, and it varies from country to country. I think its six weeks for Americans coming into Canada too).
Erin and I haven’t written the final exam for the Power Squadron course yet, we write it on May 11th. The exam doesn’t actually get you anything in terms of accreditation other than you can become a member. Power Squadron courses are not recognized by theCanadian Yachting Association (CYA) which is a member of theInternational Sailing Federation I’m not sure why that is, but I imagine it is because Power Squadron is run by volunteers, so it may not be up to the standard when compared to a course being taught by a professional and there is no on the water component which is required by the CYA to be an accredited course. You need the accreditation if you ever want to charter a bare boat anywhere in the world. Despite that, it does give you an awareness of a basic level of safety and is quite a bit cheaper (and easier) than taking a CYA approved course. It’s a good start for someone with zero boating experience.
The next course we take will probably be the VHF licence course, which is required to operate VHF. Then we’ll probably take the Basic Cruising course with Cooper Yachting School, which is a CYA accredited week end course, out on the water.
Following that, here is a list of the courses we plan to take over the next few years:
The Yachtmaster is not actually a course. It’s a credential you achieve after having completed a minimum of 50 days and 2500 nautical miles. Passages specified must be over 60 nautical miles minimum. Applicants not holding the CYA Offshore Cruising Standardmust have experience of 100 days and prove that they have earned at least one sparrow tattoo (or the equivalent).
There are of course several other courses that can be taken but you’ll never leave if you plan on taking every course.
If you ever take one of these course exams, remember: Danger Buoy has two black balls.
Friday, March 05, 2010
Circumnavigating Vancouver Island:
Sail Plan, July 31st – September 5th, 2010
Ok, here is the initial plan, if any folks we know want to join us for part of this journey. If you supply the booze, we’ll supply the cruise.
There can never be any solid plan when boating so this entire time line can pretty much be thrown out the window before we even start.But for those that have the crazy idea that boating will ever be on any kind of schedule, here goes. (These dates are give-or-take about a week.As you will see, the margin of error gets farther and farther apart.I.e.We may get back on August 16th or September 5th, who knows.)
Vancouver to CortesIslandJuly 31st – August 4th
- Departing from Ladner probably around Saturday July 31st
Reaching the north end of Vancouver Island somewhere between August 6th and 11th.map
CapeScott to CapeCook August 6th – 15th
- 1 to 4 nights from Cape Scott to Bunsby Islands (past Cape Cook) stopping overnight on the outside at any of the inlets, possibly the following places:Sea Otter Cove, Winter Harbour Quatsino Sound, Klaskish Inlet, Columbia Cove
Reaching one of the inlets past CapeCook sometime between August 7th and 15th.
CapeCook to KyuquotAugust 7th – 18th
- 1 to 3 nights from BunsbyIslands in
to Kyuquot Sound stopping overnight in the sound at various places.
In Kyuquot Sound sometime between August 8th and 18th.map
Kyuquot Sound to Nootka Sound August 8th – 22nd
- 1 to 4 nights in Esperanza Inlet, through the inside of Nootka Island to Nootka Sound stopping overnight in the sound at various places probably stopping in at Zeballos in Kyuquot and Friendly Cove in Nootka.
Reaching Friendly Cove in Nootka Sound between August 9th and 22nd.
Nootka Sound to TofinoAugust 9th – 27th
- 2 to 5 nights in Clayoquot Sound to Tofino stopping overnight in various places probably Hot Springs Cove and through the back side of the various islands to ToughCity.
Reaching Tofino between August 11th and 27th.
Tofino to BamfieldAugust 11th – 31st
- 2 to 4 nights in Barkley Sound stopping overnight in the sound at possibly:Ucluelet, TurtleBay, EffinghamBay (with an ancient village) in the BrokenIslands, and Bamfield
Reaching Bamfield between August 13th and 31st.map
Bamfield to Sooke August 13th – September 2nd
- 1 to 2 nights to Sooke Inlet stopping overnight possibly at Port Renfrew
Reaching Sooke between August 14th and September 2nd.
Sooke to Victoria August 14th– September 3rd
- 1 night to Victoria. Reaching Victoria between August 15th and September 3rd.
Victoria to SaltspringIsland August 15th – September 5th
spring stopping overnight in the gulf island somewhere.
Reaching ScottPoint between August 16th and September 5nd.
Saltspring to Ruxton August 16th -
-1 to 2 days to Ruxton Island
and stay as long as possible, or do whatever, or return to Ladner moorage if we’ve run out of time
Holly crap, that was epic just getting that all down.
Yah, so, the plan is pretty much get up past Cortes and slow down from there.The inside passage up past Cortes will largely be determined by when the tide is going the right way.There are some crazy currents up between the islands around that portion of the trip.The outside of Vancouver Island down the coast will be dependent on the weather conditions.August is usually not too bad though and the prevaili
ng wind and current should be down the coast.
If you’re thinking of meeting up with us after about the first week (or you're sick of us after the first week) of this trip then flying may be the way to go, flights from YVR to (one way on Pacific Coast):
Campbell River, AKA Scrambled Liver, are about $120 (tax in)
Port Hardy:$175
Things get pretty expensive flying if you want to hook up anywhere between Port Hardy and Tofino unless you’re doing a group rate through Tofino Air.It only makes sense if you can pack the plane.I think they take six passengers?They will drop you off anywhere as long as there is a dingy to row out to you which is not a problem.They won’t drop you on the rocks.
The proletariat chariot to Tofino is $66 from Vancouver, a pretty cheap way of getting there or back if you want to meet up with us in the middle of the trip.
Getting to or from Victoria is pretty obvious.
That’s about as much thought as I want to put into it at this stage.Just throwing that out there at this point, if you’re wondering what to do with yourself this August. Most people will never have the opportunity to see any of this part of the world and with the way things are going, it will never be the same.
At this point I wouldn’t really call this website officially launched so if you’re looking for adventures on the high seas, we’re no where near there yet, we’re on the three year plan. We are still caught up in the dreamer stage of things, so who knows if we will actually make it out of here, out of careers, out of our scheduled lives. I think this site will continue to be totally rearranged right up until we cast off.We are still in the dreaming stage and not totally committed for this round the world cruise thing because of our other commitments. Erin is more or less ready to go, it is me who needs to finalize a bunch of stuff. Some minor things that I need to settle. After buying the boat with just about every penny I had, there were a couple things that sunk me into the negative. Provincial Sales Tax… What a piss off. I knew I was going to get dinged, but was pretending that it wasn’t going to happen. It ended up being a little over $12,000 Canadian (that’s probably about $11,000 US right now). In Canada, the sale of your primary residence is pretty much tax free, so when you buy your next primary residence you also don’t have to pay PST. The problem with going and buying a boat with the proceeds is that as far as Revenue Canada is concerned, a boat is not allowed to be a primary residence. There is an exception to this. If it has no method of self propulsion, then it is ok. I.e. if it has an engine, or a sail, you’re screwed. It would be fine if your home is just randomly floating around and bumping into things, but as soon as you give it the means to locate itself into a logical location, that’s not a primary residence. Who came up with that crap.Another thing about this that I’m pretending to ignore: Eventually when it comes time to sell the boat, am I going to have to pay capital gains on the boat? Not that it will go up in value, I’m quite aware that it’s going to go down, but what about the value itself that was originally gained on the sale of my house that was at that point free of capital gains? If you know, and it’s bad news, don’t tell be, I’d rather not know. Ignorance is bliss when it comes to taxes I’m just going to assume that it will be sold at a loss.I could have avoided the PST if I didn’t import the boat up into Canada. I could be wrong here because this is not what I did, I did end up bringing the boat up from the States. Even though my boat was already registered in Vancouver Canada, I bought the boat when it was parked down in Point Roberts, Washington. I may have been able to not import the boat up and not pay the PST, but I think technically that would mean that I would have had to pay Washington taxes. Or from what I understand Oregon has little or no sales tax on boats. I don’t know, it all seemed a bit convoluted, and we’re not planning on going anywhere yet so I just paid their dam tax when the letter came for Revenue Canada.
One of the diesel engines ended up throwing a rod and needed to be replaced last summer. I mean the entire engine needed to be replaced. That put me another $11,000 CND in the hole. Not a lot I can say about that without repeating myself. I wrote about that on my “Shit happens” page of my website.
Student loans: I’ve paid most of it off when I sold the house and was pretending that I wouldn't need to pay PST on buying the boat, but I still have about $6,600 CND left to pay off to the Federal Government.
I guess my point of all this is before we cast off into the wild blue yonder, I’ve got about $16,000 CND that I have to pay off in debt. With the exception of my favorite weakness of going down to the Fringe Café (local pub in Kits) and blowing 30 or 50 bucks on beer about once a week, I’m scrimping my pennies and putting about a thousand bucks every pay cheque, every couple of weeks toward paying the debt off. Probably about a year to get even as long as there aren’t any other major unforeseen mechanical failures. Erin calls it being squeezey with her money and she’s a lot better at it than I am. From what I’ve read of people who are currently cruising around the world, you can get by fairly comfortably on about 10 or 12 thousand US each a year. Some do it for a lot less, and others probably spend more in a week than I do in a year. For a three year trip, Erin’s already got the money together. Me on the other hand, its going to take a couple years after I settle my debts to get that together so we are on a three year plan at this point. A lot of people won’t understand this but the other big factor on leaving is Louie Bert the freckle faced dog. We have a commitment to each other that is beyond description. If a stranger, Louie and I were in a plain, that had run out of fuel and was about to crash and we only had two Para shoots… Louie would definitely put one on (he’s almost that smart) and give me one and we’d jump together leaving the stranger in the plain. Louie is about 9 1/2 I think. It would kill him if I left him and as far as commitments go, this is the strongest commitment keeping me from leaving, so we are here for probably not much more than three years while Louie is still around. You probably don’t understand, but you probably have never lived with a Border Collie. They are not your average dog.
