What I was afraid would happen, did indeed happen. When it is a nice day in Ketchikan, we will pay for it the next day with low hanging clouds. Very dense and very low hanging clouds. Luckily it remained clear during the night and I had an undisturbed sleep, as I knew today was going to be a very long day indeed. Seymour Narrows tide was going to be a late night affair. But by 10 am. it became “a very small world” and the white wall was not further than about 300 feet away from us, and there it remained. Once in a while it teased us a little bit by letting blue sky come through but the moment our hopes went up, the curtain came down again. Such a beautiful day and we did not see anything.
British Columbia still has a number of manned lighthouses and they provide regular weather observations on the VHF. So my interest turned to them as it is a great tool to find out if the low clouds were extending all the way inside the islands. The reports gave hope; the 13.30 hrs. observations indicated that by the time we were picking up our pilots at Pine Island it should be clear there. 8 miles of visibility. Hurrah we were in business.
We lined ourselves up behind the Celebrity Celebration who had been racing ahead of us and we thought that all was well in the world. Then suddenly the Celebration started to slow down and missed her early pilots picked time. When I called in, we were un-affected but the Celebration was getting the pilots at the same time as we did. Why the captain there wanted to be early I do not know but such is life. The pilot plane could not land because of the low clouds and had landed the pilots in Campbell River. From there they had taken a cab (2.5 hour ride) to the pilot boat and hence the delay.
Now things were getting ominous. Reports of fine visibility and a pilot plane that could not land, ……… and that in the same area. By the time we were 8 miles from the pilot station, there was no visibility and we boarded the pilots with still having a big white wall around us. Okay, if we cannot rely on the weather reports, let’s try the pilots and see if they can do better. Via Traffic Control the pilot got in touch with the ferry sailing from Port McNeil and the ferry skipper reported good visibility.
The option is, to go north of Malcom Island sailing to blackney Pass in open waters, or go south through a more narrow area and see Alert Bay.
Why all the fuss? Well I wanted to go sightseeing. With the Seymour Narrows Tide being so late I was going through the Inside Passage with 12 knots and a bit of sightseeing would only add .05 of a knot to the average speed. So the daring plan was crafted to add 3 miles to the journey and sail by the Indian village of Alert Bay. World famous for the highest totem pole in the world, and home to the only trumpeter in the world who performs from a speed boat doing 20 knots.
Maybe we will see him next cruise.
While approaching, the great white wall remained and I had already discussed with the pilot, that if visibility would not improve that we would return to our normal, more open water route. Just before our abort point, we once again called our Ferry skipper who now reported that the curtain was also coming down around him. So with a big turn to port we changed course and headed for Blackney Passage.
Once we got there at 19.30 the clouds finally lifted and we were treated with a great show of approx. a 100 dolphins all trying to win the prize of the biggest loony around. Those guests who had patiently waited outside to see something were finally rewarded. We then continued with a sedate speed towards Seymour Narrows.
We are planning to transit the Narrow around 01.00 hrs in the very early morning, just when the tide drops under 4 knots. That is about the limit pilots like to do but as the tide will be against us, it will slow us down anyway and that makes it less of a challenge than when you have the current with you. With following current you tend to “race ahead” and that makes it more difficult to take the two sharp turns safely, when going through the Narrows.
The good news is: We are expecting a glorious day in Vancouver. 75o F / 24oC at noon time and lots of sunshine.
September 9, 2013 at 4:22 am
that huge pod of dolphins followed in the Zuiderdam’s wake two days ago – what a glorious sight! We believe there was well over 100 of them. And most of them stayed with us for hours, giving us quite a show!