Summer continues in Drury Inlet

The sun-soaked mariners arrived here in a cove amid the cluster of islands, islets, and rocks known as the Muirhead Islands after motoring for a little more than two hours on another brilliantly sunny day. The Saturday morning fog melted away as the hours passed, and after untying Braesail’s stern line from the shore behind her, winding it onto its reel above the bathing platform, and raising the anchor (no sea-stars clinging to it today!), we left cozy, cedar-edged England Point Cove

and returned down Drury Inlet to our present (September 10) anchorage. Some find the relatively shallow inlet challenging to navigate, with its many islands, partly-submerged stacks of rocks, twists and bends, and currents that produce little whirlpools, eddies, and up-wellings that surge against a boat and send it swinging about as if its autopilot had lost its way. Walt is an excellent navigator and pilot, however, and enjoys taking Braesail through waterways about which the various cruising guides give warnings in capital letters!

We again “stern-tied” the boat before spending the late afternoon resting and reading, listening to numerous distinctive bird calls (I recognize those of eagles, ravens, and loons, but not many others; I was entertained by the calls of three ravens, at some distances from one another, who engaged in a long conversation, their raucous “krauk-krauks” ringing around the islands), and admiring the rippled sapphire silk of the water’s surface where the breezes ruffled it, and its deep forest green shade in the spots that the wind ignored. It’s such a treat to enjoy a succession of warm, sun-drenched days–we can wear our shorts and T-shirts at last!

[Note on stern-tying: to do this, Walt rows one end of a 400-ft. line from the stern, where it’s attached to a large reel, to the shore in our dinghy, finds a rock or branch or trunk around which to wrap it, and then rows the rope back to Braesail; we fasten one end of the line to a cleat on the starboard side of the stern and the other to a cleat on the port side, so that the line forms a “V” at the boat’s rear. The anchor keeps the bow in place in the front and the stern lines keep it in place in the back, and it doesn’t swing around the anchor as it does when the anchor is its only point of stability.]