Day 56 ~ Echo Bay to Blind Channel via Lagoon Cove

We departed on schedule at 8:00. The weather was overcast and a bit chilly so Dad drove from the lower helm. Becca and I took advantage of the time and continued our sprucing up the boat project. We got to Lagoon Cove right on schedule. Dad knows Bill at Lagoon Cove and they were happy to just let us hang out and wait for the plane. They put us on the ‘honeymoon’ dock.

Originally, we were going to stop at Lagoon Cove and spend the night because they have a famous all you can eat prawn dinner every night. All of the boats bring salads and other side dishes and you sit on their deck, peel and eat the prawns and throw the shells into the water. It is really fun and they are delicious. The best thing about Lagoon Cove is that if I went way up on the bridge and stood still my phone would work. Much to Becca’s chagrin, the plane was several hours late which gave her plenty of time to continue helping me work on the inside of the boat. We really wanted it to look nice when Dad and Judy return to Campbell River and move the boat south while they play golf. Finally the plane arrived.

There is a 24 pound per person limit on float planes for luggage and I had far more than 24 pounds of clothes, Navigator Rendezvous stuff and my brief case. On top of the fish that we just caught. We had been told that it was up to the pilot to decide how much extra they would carry. So, when I saw how young the pilot was, I sent Becca out with the bag of fish and told her to go and talk to him and she could ask him if he would take anything else. My plan worked, he took the fish, Becca’s duffle and another duffle of my stuff. I thanked him profusely and then he said he would take anything else that I wanted to send with her. He said that his plane which holds 12 only had 4 passengers. Frankly, I think that he just wanted to stand on the dock and flirt with her. I ran back to the boat and since I didn’t have any more suitcases, Dad dumped out his laundry duffle and we stuffed it with clothes and I sent my briefcase!  We waved goodbye to Becca and went about our day heading towards Blind Channel.

The winds were extremely strong but they were coming from behind us so they just kind of pushed us along. The sun was shining so we drove from the bridge. Dad let me drive the boat which was really fun because you could feel the waves pushing the boat around and it was a game trying to anticipate what the boat was going to do and then head it off at the pass.

Blind Channel is an interesting place to dock. They have fairly strong wind currents that run one direction and then strong water currents that go the other direction. I totally misjudged the landing and the strength of the water currents, needless to say Dad had to come up to the bridge and assist. Guess I scored a 2.0 on that landing only because once he got me straightened out I was able to recover with quite a bit of coaching. I was really rattled and disappointed after I had been doing such a good job. Dad being the fabulous coach that he is took the time to walk through with me what had gone wrong and what I should have done. He also reminded me that we didn’t call the insurance company which technically makes it a perfect landing. It is great to have an opportunity to be in a difficult situation, fall flat on your face and get a helping, loving hand to help you up. My confidence meter is still running a bit low!

Blind Channel like most resorts was started by a sole proprietor. One of their niches is their lovely German restaurant. The original folks have since retired and now the son and daughter-in-law run the place. We had a lovely dinner. Dad had some kind of pork dish and I had Roulaudin with red cabbage. We shared a bottle of wine and reminisced about our trip. It was very touching. These past 56 days have been pretty amazing.

After dinner we went back to our chores. We really wanted to finish the inside so we only had to wash the outside when we got to Campbell River. We got to bed about midnight and had our alarms set for 6:00 to make slack tide and to allow enough time to get everything done.  

Becca and all my stuff arrived safely and the pilot even helped her carry her stuff to the car!