Van Isle 360 - Sailing the outside of Vancouver Island

Up Goletas Channel, over infamous Nahwitti Bar and around Cape Scott - this is the start for the off-shore legs for the Van Isle 360.

Light winds prevailed again for the first part. Just around Cape Sutil a couple of fin whale played in the wake of Turicum for a while.

It was a long and slow night for us in light winds with the current against us. Arriving late & tired in Friday Harbor the crew did not get much rest. This ultimately led us to retire from the next leg to Ucluelet when light winds again suggested a long and tiring two nights at sea.

Having retired from the Winter Harbour to Ucluelet race we arrived early morning and had a wonderful day away from the race circus. 

Some of us explored the Amphitrite Lighthouse while others went for a some more sleep.

With the batteries re-charged the crew was looking forward to sailing in the forecast strong northwesterly breeze promised for the leg to Victoria.

Off we sailed to in a light breeze towards the Juan de Fuca Strait. The wind built slower than expected but around sunset rose steadily to a good 20+ kts. The spinnaker went up and we had a fantastic sail down along the Canadian coast towards Race Passage. At 1 am we screamed through Race Passage overtaking other boats and sprinted towards the finish line.

What a great adventure and what an achievement for the crew who until that moment never saw much more than 10 kts of wind, let alone in the middle of the night with a spinnaker up.

Well done everybody and we look forward to the final leg through the Gulf Islands, sailing towards Nanaimo.

Christof Martihttp://www.simplysailing.ca/1/post/2013/06/van-isle-360-sailing-the-outside-of-vancouver-island.html

Van Isle 360 - Day 6: Last leg on the inside

Leaving Telegraph Cove is always difficult. Such a beautiful spot with a rich history. The old boardwalk connecting all the houses and the the the former saw mill is still there.

After the start we enjoyed the usual light winds. We were having issues with the wind instruments. This made it difficult to sail the boat at it’s optimum. There were also some issues with the running rigging. To add insult to injury we got “stuck in a hole” an hour after the start.

Up goes Daisy our “wind-seeker”. We run a poll guessing at how long it would take for the wind to get up again allowing us to set a “proper” sail. The estimates ranged from an optimistic eight minutes to the doom and gloom estimate of one hour. Caroline, one of our charming “pit princesses’ guessed eight minutes one won. 

Seven minutes after sailing into “no-wind-land”: The wind got stronger and up went the #1 jib . Seven minutes does not sound like much, but it was enough so we had to watch the fleet sailing away from us.

Finally the wind filled in for us as well and we had a great time sailing towards Port Hardy. With nothing to loose we were experimenting with our new jib (a 3DL sail by North Sail) and had a ton of fun with that. 

We were doing countless, small adjustments and watching the boat speed after each adjustment. Fascinating.

Tomorrow we are off to our first overnight let around Cape Scott and hopefully enjoy decent wind on our first off-shore leg.

Van Isle 360 - Day 5: Missed the current

Another day that started with light winds and fighting the currents. 

A botched gybe and a run in with a tug & tow made us miss the favourable current and we got behind. Later in the day the winds picked up and we had some great sailing up Johnston Strait. The wind got up to 20 knots and for the first time we had to get our #2 jib up.

Lots of fun and fantastic crew work made this a great sailing day.

Another salmon BBQ awaited us in Telegraph Cove.

Van Isle 360 - Day 4: A race for the history books

This race few will ever forget. Most boats left Campbell River around 6 am to make it to the start in Deepwater Bay at 8 am. This early start was necessary to get some favorable currents through Seymour Narrows. 

Seymour Narrows is famous for the blasting of “Ripple Rock”. This rock cause so many shipwrecks, that it was finally decided to blow it up and remove a dangerous hazard to navigation. 

A spectacular video of the blasting of Ripple Rock can be found on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVQOvKh3IWY

After a light start, there was some wind and current in our favour. Close to to the finish line at Eden point the wind reduced to a whisper and the currents became vicious. Dozens of boats were piled up against the rocks trying to inch towards the finish line.

Having no steerage at all we bumped into Night Runner. No harm done, thanks to fenders. A little while later as we are drifting south, Night Runner caught a back eddy and they came screaming at us and we hit again. We did a full circle on an eddy line while Night Runner took another run at us. The scene was the same all around us. Some boats anchored, other boats fended off the rocks: Carnage all around. 

Everybody had a great laugh but after a few hours of bumper car racing the fun was over and we all headed for the fish farm where a gourmet salmon dinner waited for us. 

Needless to say no one finished in our division.

Later that night we were invited by Ede & Gunnar Jonsson for a Margarita Party on their boat Havoc (SR 33). Somehow 32 people piled into Havocs cockpit. Amazing. Danny served the best Margaritas and I could not help thinking he was trying hard to get us drunk to have less competition the next day.

Van Isle 360 - Day 3: Spectacular Race Start 

6:30 am - French toast breakfast at the marina. The sun was up and a light breeze was blowing in the Strait.

At the start line there was about 10 kts of wind from the Northwest. The pin end was clearly favored and all the boats were jockeying for a good starting position. 

9 am, the gun goes off and..... general recall. The line wasn’t square and too many boats were over early. So we tried again.

This time all boats had a clear start and off we sailed towards Cape Lazo. The winds were from the Northwest and after a good start we had fun sailing with the other boats in our division. 

The wind was reasonably steady and most of the fleet tacked along the coast line towards Campbell River. 

Later in the day the wind veered north and eased. As we approached Cape Mudge the current was against us and in the light winds many boats would drift aft. With the time limit of 6 pm approaching quickly it became apparent that most boats would not finish within the timeline. Having had a good day, but disappointed about not being able to finish we retired along with most of the fleet and motored to Campbell River.

We are hoping for more wind over the next few days.

Van Isle 360 - Day 2: Sailing into the top 10

6:30 am - the alarm goes off. 7 am Pancake breakfast at the dock. The wind is blowing at 10 - 15 kts from the Northwest, just like all the different weather models predicted.

We decided to leave the dock early and getting into race mode. These were conditions Turicum (our C&C 44) should thrive in.

8:55 am - the first gun for the start went off. We are in a much better position than the day before and head off north. A few boats decide on the inshore route close to Vancouver Island. We went to the right of the course. It was great sailing. The crew work was fantastic, communications were clear and everybody was focused on sail trim.

We were right in the groove and made good speed. This was champagne sailing: Sunny, a nice breeze and right along with other boats in our division: Night Runner, Cu na mara, Hana Mari, Zulu and others. It was great to be that close to other boats and being able to see the effect of each trim change as we measured boat speed against our competitors.

From driver to plumper: After having helmed for a good hour a little less glorious task was to take care of a blocked waste line. After a good half hour mocking around hoses, chocker vales pieces of hose and hose clamps we had a functioning head again. Half a bottle of bleach to care of the mess after the repairs.

Back on deck, I realized the wind eased a bit and the speed was down somewhat. Still, we were making good progress towards the finish line. We were neck on neck with Havoc and Night Runner. Both boats were lower than Turicum and we were pulling ahead. Then the boats ahead of us launched spinnakers. Among them Amazing Grace and Papillon. We got Zelda on deck, our light weight A-sail. Up she went and away we pulled from Havoc and night runner.

To our disgust the wind went further and further aft, favoring the Havoc and Night Runner who were both lower than us. It was painful to watch as both boats pulled ahead of as and managed to get across the finish line just seconds before us. Nothing we could do at that point.

10 place for Turicum - a vast improvement from day one. The crew was happy and we celebrate with wine and pizza at the back of the boat in Comox Harbour.

A huge thank you to Marilou and Breda of the Amazing Grace team who drove us to Courtney, were we had to pick up the pizza. Without them the day would not have ended as wonderful as it did.

This was a demonstration of great sailing spirit: Amazing Grace, our nemesis on the water but part of the big Van Isle family once we are tied up to the dock! 

See you all on the water tomorrow!

Van Isle 360 - Day 1: Nanaimo - French Creek

The wind forecast called for light winds. Some model predicted a south easterly wind while others called for a north westerly. This made for interesting conversations during the pancake breakfast put on by the Salvation Army.

Initially, indeed the wind was from the SE, but while racers prepared the boat for the start at the dock the wind backed to the NW. With the wind almost on the beam, most boats started with a spinnaker. 

Of we went, a little lower on the starting line than we were hoping. Once around Protection Island we change to our #1 jib and headed north. We were well placed in the fleet and had a great sail.

A few sail changes and gybes later we saw ourselves further back in the fleet. It looked like we were not quite in race mode and a few things went slower than we were hoping. Light winds can be very unforgiving and once we got behind it went from bad to worse as the wind got lighter and lighter.

We were still having a good time sailing against some of the other boats at the back of the fleet such as Amazing Grace and Rubato.

As the wind slowly died, so did our hope to finish the race and we had to use the iron spinnaker to get to the finish in French Creek.

Not a great race for us, but the spirits are high and with a few changes on how we will manage the boat during the tomorrow’s race we hope to be competing again for a much better finish.