Buddy Boating in Barkley Sound

Looking back, one of the things Aaron and I were most excited about when starting this trip was solitude.  Cruising in Puget Sound and the San Juans, you never (or very rarely, like in the dead of winter) get a bay or cove all to yourself.  But in B.C. in the springtime, secluded anchorages are a dime a dozen.  Which isn’t to say that we don’t love coming around a bend and finding we have that special nook all to ourselves.  But sometimes we just want to party!

And who better to help us out with that than our friends Deborah and Marty on s/v Three Sheets (of Three Sheets Northwest fame).  We’d like to think they packed up their Island Packet, readied their fearless sea-kitty, Lily, and made the trek north to Barkley Sound all for us, but whatever the catalyst, we spent an amazing week buddy boating with them.  I just wish we’d interrupted our socializing to take a few more pictures!

One of my very favorite moments happened after we’d finished dinner and brought our wine and oil-filled trawler lamp (and citronella candle) into the cockpit.  As the night got darker, we snuffed the candle and lantern and simply gazed at the stars for hours. 

But we also peeked in the windows of abandoned buildings:

We rafted up at the dock in Ucluelet:

We devoured a delicious happy hour spread on the beach (four cheeses! crackers! cherries! grapes! pepperoni! pistachios! salami! dark chocolate!):

We stern-tied off beautiful Nettle Island:

And of course, we did a lot of dinghy exploring:

Although our livers are happy that we only had a week with the crew of Three Sheets before they moved on to Victoria, we were sad to see them go.   Until Mexico, guys!