Cruising with Phoenix: Kwatsi Bay to Claydon Bay

June 17 - Kwatsi Bay Marina

Couldn’t make up our minds this morning about whether to move on or to stay another day in Kwatsi Bay so that Jim could finish the work on installing the Internet router. So, we decided to flip a coin. Heads, we leave; tails, we stay. First flip was tails, so we decided to make it 2 out of 3, and it was tails again. To be sure, we flipped again, for 3 out of 5, and it was tails a third time. So, we stayed!

It was sunny and calm this morning. So nice for a change. Jim finished mounting the router in the forward hanging locker while I baked some treats for tonight’s happy hour. I found a recipe for baking flour tortilla wedges with melted butter and cinnamon and sugar on top…VERY tasty. All the sailboats from last night left this morning, and have been replaced by 5 more boats. So the dock is full again tonight.

One of the benefits of staying another day is that Max went over to Port McNeill this morning to bring Anca and Russell home for the weekend, so we had a chance to catch up with Anca and look over the additional things she added to the store. We bought a book called “Totem Poles and Tea,” written by a woman who was a nurse in Mamalilaculla (now a deserted Indian village) in the 1930s. Looks to be a good story about life in the Broughton Islands a long time ago, and will be a nice addition to our boat library.


In the early morning calm, the snow-capped Mt. Read towers above the entrance to Kwatsi Bay Marina

June 18 – Claydon Bay

Kwatsi Bay to Claydon Bay, 27.59 nautical miles

Total this trip to date: 280.57 NM

It rained hard all night and into the morning at Kwatsi Bay. Everything was SOAKED! Visibility was reduced by the rain and accompanying fog. Fortunately the rain slowed down and the fog lifted to about 150 feet as the morning wore on, so we felt okay about leaving.

The Internet was not available this morning due to volume. Kwatsi Bay Marina offers WiFi service, but there is a usage limit, and once the limit is reached, the server is down for 24 hours. So that’s what we experienced this morning. Guess there were a lot of people using the Internet yesterday.

We left Kwatsi Bay around 1100, and all the other boats at the dock left within minutes of each other. However, we encountered a boat on its way in as we left, so the dock won’t be empty very long. We topped up our water tank, and chatted with Anca in the store as she checked us out. Russell and Max helped us get away from the dock, and we made our way north in Tribune Channel. It was rather rough motoring into a 15-knot northwest wind, but the chop was reduced as we left Tribune Channel and entered Penphrase Passage. From there on, it was an easy passage. Mickey and Rosie are getting more comfortable with the motion and noise, and they moved around more in the cabin today while we were underway.

As we approached Claydon Bay, we encountered numerous floats from crab pots, and they looked like commercial floats. What a surprise to find even more floats in the Claydon Bay anchorage! There was only one boat here when we arrived, but they hoisted their anchor and left shortly after we anchored, and we have the entire anchorage to ourselves. In past years, we have usually seen, on average, about 8 or more boats anchored in Claydon Bay. Don’t know if it’s because of the crab pot floats or just not many people coming this way today. It’s still early in the season.

We are anchored in about 30 feet at mid-tide, with good mud holding and lots of room to swing. Still cloudy, but at least it’s not raining. Expected to put out our crab pot here, but there are way too many commercial pots already covering the area.