We took our Sirius 22 to the North Channel this summer. Launched in Spanish and headed west through the Whalesback Channel. It has been many years since we had been there and the low water levels where quite obvious. The little cove on the figure 8 shaped Parsons Island that we had used in the past was so small and really unusable. We stopped in at Beardrop Harbor and since we were coming from the east we used the very short and narrow channel on the southeast side of the bay. We have done it in the past and got through with our keel down (5 feet) with no problems. Had the keel up this time and we touched a few times with the rudder. We also stopped in at McCleary Cove, part of John Harbor. This was our first time back there since our first trip in 1987. Back then there were at least 8-10 boats some of them 30 feet+....now the east entrance has about 2 feet of water....the very narrow west channel had maybe 3 feet. This was a very popular spot then but now we had it all to ourselves. It was so nice we spent three days there...watched the Perseids Meteor shower and saw the space station fly over two nights in a row. Only the occasional dinghy with jealous sailors from larger boats anchored out in John Harbor came by to disturb us. 3 to 4 feet of water once inside.
McCleary cove
Blueberry season was in full swing and we had blueberry cobbler every night.
Ran east to South Benjamin and tucked into the little network of coves southeast of the main anchorage shown below.
We are in the cove behind the power boats
You can make out our mast in this close up
Once again we had this cove all to ourselves and ending up staying for three days. We had been in this spot before but with the shallow water it was half the size now. Where we anchored in the past was near the weeds seen in the third photo. Another thing that surprised me about this trip was the lack of small trailer boats. I saw one boat that was the same size as mine.
In this photo from 1987 the blue arrow points to the rock right above my head in the photo above.
Found a trail and hiked over for a look at the North Benjamin anchorage.
Did a little rock hunting on a shale beach and found a few fossils. To give an idea of size the larger triangle shaped one is 12 inches on a side.
The rocky islands and shoals just to the south of South Benjamin are called the Sows and Pigs. You can see some shale here this is close to where I found the fossils.
You can see how the glaciers carved these islands
Found a nice berry patch nearby and after three days of heavy picking I had only cleared about 1/3 of it.
At our last anchorage behind Wilfrid Island we picked some berries to take home and they survived the trip in fine shape and we made a nice cobbler when we got home.
McCleary cove
Blueberry season was in full swing and we had blueberry cobbler every night.
Ran east to South Benjamin and tucked into the little network of coves southeast of the main anchorage shown below.
We are in the cove behind the power boats
You can make out our mast in this close up
Once again we had this cove all to ourselves and ending up staying for three days. We had been in this spot before but with the shallow water it was half the size now. Where we anchored in the past was near the weeds seen in the third photo. Another thing that surprised me about this trip was the lack of small trailer boats. I saw one boat that was the same size as mine.
In this photo from 1987 the blue arrow points to the rock right above my head in the photo above.
Found a trail and hiked over for a look at the North Benjamin anchorage.
Did a little rock hunting on a shale beach and found a few fossils. To give an idea of size the larger triangle shaped one is 12 inches on a side.
The rocky islands and shoals just to the south of South Benjamin are called the Sows and Pigs. You can see some shale here this is close to where I found the fossils.
You can see how the glaciers carved these islands
Found a nice berry patch nearby and after three days of heavy picking I had only cleared about 1/3 of it.
At our last anchorage behind Wilfrid Island we picked some berries to take home and they survived the trip in fine shape and we made a nice cobbler when we got home.
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