Groceries from Bella Coola

March 27th (Friday) 

Well, today we told Ken, the manager of the fish-fry farm, that we would work two shifts for him.  We will be working from April 14th - April 27th, and then again from May 12th – 25th. 

I was also able to get hold of the manager of the Shearwater grocery store and post office, and I talked with her about the possibility of us coming and getting our mail and maybe a few groceries.  She said that that would be okay, and that what they were doing was requesting that customers call them when they arrive at the dock.  We would then tell them what we needed (our mail and any groceries).  If we were getting groceries, they would gather everything for us and ring the purchase through over the phone on a credit card.  They would then put everything outside of the door, and once the door was closed we would be able to go and get the items.  That was good news for us as we had been getting mixed messages as to whether or not we would be able to get our mail. She also gave me some other details regarding the chandlery and the fuel dock. With that good news we are now hoping that the weather improves so that we can go to Shearwater, and then hopefully stay out at anchor for at least a few days before we have to come back and work.  

I also finished off our Bella Coola food order at 11:30 this morning when I called the Co-op.  I was told that we would not be able to get any whole-wheat flour, but that we could get some white flour, not as much as we had requested, but at least we would get some.  We also could not get any eggs, as none had come in on their shipment.  I gave them our credit card information, and we then waited for the ferry to arrive.  

The ferry was supposed to be in at 20:30, but we felt the wake from it going by at 20:15, so we quickly put on our rain gear, grabbed a flashlight, and headed over. Our boxes of food were on a luggage cart, which was brought off of the ferry for us to get our items.  We were given a ride back to the marina, and came home to see what we had gotten.  

The box of produce looked beautiful, the cabbage was a deep purple, the tomatoes a lush red, and the oranges and apples looked perfect as well.  The biggest negative to this way of ordering groceries that we came across while unpacking was the need to be incredibly specific.  I had tried to lay everything out with specifics that would also leave room for flexibility as to brands and sizes of certain items so as to hopefully increase the likelihood that we would get what we wanted.  At the same time I unintentionally left too much ambiguity with regards to a few items.  I had requested 6 cans of diced tomatoes.  To me a can of diced tomatoes is large, about 796 ml, I didn’t even consider the fact that there might be smaller cans.  What they sent us was 6 cans of Hunts Heirloom Tomatoes, 398ml.  Probably the most expensive diced tomatoes that it are possible to buy, and so if we ever do order this way again we will definitely need to be more specific.  Overall we did get what we wanted, although upon reviewing the receipt, the items were all quite expensive, but at least we got our groceries, and we were happy with what we got.  Like I said, the produce was beautiful!