A Fantastic Outing

March 20th (Friday) 

At 09:00 Ken came by to pick us up. We headed up to Link Lake to see what we could do about clearing out the boat launch area. It was blocked by logs, and we set about throwing, carrying, and pushing them out of the way. It did not take us long, and we had the ramp all cleared except for one log that was too far out into the water for us to get a good push on. It was floating except for the root end, which was stuck in the mud. We decided that we would have an easier time moving it once we had the boat backed part way into the water so that we could stand in the boat and be closer to the log to give it a good push.  

We headed back to Ken’s place in Martin Valley to get the boat, and then back up to the lake we went. It turned out that the boat trailer had an easy time of moving the last log out of the way as Ken backed the boat into the water. Soon we were off, planing across the lake.

The wind from planing was quite nippy, but it was a beautiful day!

It did not take us long to pass Saiuk Creek, where Jason and I had stopped to have our fire when we were in our kayaks, and we turned northeast and headed up the lake.

The lake, in this area, was fully surrounded by mountains that were still fully snow-covered, and we were surprised by how much snow there was down at the shoreline. The snow in Ocean Falls is all gone, but up at the lake especially in the area past Saiuk Creek there was still a lot of it, even though it was only about 100’ higher in elevation than sea level.  

As we headed towards the end of the lake, about half way down, we saw what we thought was a wind line on the water up ahead. When we reached it, however, we immediately realized that it was actually ice. 

At first the ice was very thin and we planed right through it. The pattern of the ice was beautiful, it looked like feathers, or fern fronds, and as we sped through it our wake rippled outwards making the ice rise and fall, and often break apart behind us.

Suddenly, however, we entered an area of much thicker ice. Chunks were now breaking off and jumping up on top of the ice, and skidding across like hockey pucks. We could see from these pieces that the ice was close to a quarter of an inch thick and we slowed right down and steered towards an area that looked thinner.  

As we headed towards the shore that had been in the sunshine for the longest, we quickly came to thinner ice and then clear water, but we were very surprised by this massive floating sheet of ice.  

We continued through clear water towards the end of the lake. 

The mountains around the lake were amazing, each one uniquely majestic and beautifully snow-covered right down to the water. 

It was a gorgeous trip and our view was continually changing as we made our way down the lake. 

As we neared what remains of the flooded forest at the end of the lake we noticed that among the ghost trees was a defined white line, it appeared to be the end of the water and yet we were still about a nautical mile away from the actual end of the lake. 

As we got closer we quickly realized that it was ice, and not just a thin sheet of ice, but an actual thick layer, thick enough to appear fully white, and when our wake hit the side of it, instead of flexing with the wave, the wave simply broke on the edge just as it would along a shoreline. We could go no further. 

We tried casting from the boat while drifting on the glassy water in the sunshine among the dead trees, but we got no bites, and because we could not get to the shore at the end of the lake we turned around and headed back. 

We stopped at a spot that Ken called Triple Falls.

It was a beautiful stop with a lovely beach that was covered in about 5” of frozen snow. There was a creek running out into the lake, and there were three beautiful waterfalls tumbling down the bank from way up above.

We sat on a log on the shore and enjoyed the sun while we ate our picnic lunches. It was absolutely spectacular, sitting there looking out at the glassy calm water and the beautifully snowy mountains; it looked like a painting and it almost looked like one could reach out and touch it. 

On our way back to the boat launch we pulled into a couple of stream areas, but we decided not to go for a hike because it was quite cold in the shade. Back at the boat launch we easily loaded the boat onto the trailer, and Ken dropped us off at the marina on his way by. It was a fantastic outing. 

It was around 14:00 when we got home and so we decided that we would go and do some painting at work. 

We ended up painting for five hours and got the second coat of paint onto the walls and ceiling in the living room. We plan to paint the kitchen area a different colour so that was left for another day.  

While at work we received a few text messages from my parents and found out some bad news. Apparently Canada has closed many parks, and the Haida Gwaii park on the Queen Charlotte Islands, where we were planning to head to this year, has been closed due to the COVID-19 virus. The Haida people are also trying to isolate the island from visitors, and they are saying that the town is closed. We are still trying to find out exactly how much this will affect our cruising plans, but it is quite disappointing.  

Today is three months after the shortest day of the year, winter solstice. It is the first day of spring, and the difference in our daylight hours is amazing. On December 20^th the sun rose at 08:41 and it set at 16:22, a total of 7 hours and 31 minutes of sun-up time. Now the sun rises at 07:34 and sets at 19:45, that is 12 hours and 11 minutes of sun-up time, so that is a difference of 4 hours and 40 minutes in three months.  

When we first got back to Ocean Falls from Victoria, on January 12th, the sun never rose above the mountains, and even on days of clear blue sky we were always in the shade, now the sun is on our boat by around 08:45 and it does not drop below the mountains until 19:04. It’s pretty awesome!