A peaceful “vacation day” in cedar-surrounded Claydon Bay has been very welcome (and has resulted in a very brief blog post!) as we prepare for the journey (perhaps including some sailing?) across Queen Charlotte Strait to Part Hardy on Friday.
Gray morning skies gazed sullenly at the water, and at around 8 we turned on the Cabola heating system to make cabin temperatures more comfortable. A bagel breakfast was followed by Morning Prayer, and the rest of the day, which gradually warmed into another delightfully sparkling blue-sky-gauzy-clouds-mirror-smooth-water summer specimen, was occupied with Walt’s study of his Messiaen organ score while listening to various performances of the work’s nine sections, his reading of sections of a book about radar, an adjustment of a seat back at one end of the settee in the saloon, my study of my Sailing Fundamentals book (a volume I saved after taking a basic sailing course in the 1990s), composition of email to send when next we have sufficient connectivity, transfer of photos from my smartphone to my laptop for posting with my saved blog entries, some clean-up and organization of files on my MacBook, and some long, languid afternoon naps. I worked on some French, as I try to do every day or so, and Walt showed me how to plot a course and set up “way points” using the chart plotter in the cockpit, and we now have the route to Sutherland Bay at the end of nine-mile-long Drury Inlet (on the BC coast) ready to follow on Thursday. I plan to practice the way-point-setting as we return to Everett in September.
Cheese and vegetable omelettes used up some of the eggs we don’t want to leave in Braesail’s fridge, and more of the vanilla ice cream we purchased in Sullivan Bay, topped with strawberry jam to form a sundae on Wednesday, served us well as dessert. After the galley was put back into order, I took up some writing tasks as Walt listened to more portions of the “Nativity of the Lord” and marked his score. During our return journey, he plans to set up his electronic keyboard, presently stowed in the crew cabin, and put in some physical practice.
Cotton-candy-pink clouds are now spreading over the skies above the bay at 9 pm; the trees on the hillsides will still be barely visible at 10:45. Such lengthy, lovely summer evenings we have this far north!
Braesail - A grand yacht in the Salish Sea 