Wednesday-Thursday, October 7-8, 2026
A warm Wednesday was partly “lazy day” and part “chore day,” as Walt did some work to make the cockpit enclosure’s structure more comfortable for the person sitting at the helm and leaning back against the enclosure’s supports, and also worked on the windlass in the bow, replacing some parts. He then got out the digital keyboard in the wooden case he’s built for it, put it onto the table in the main cabin, and returned to work on making it functional after a two-month hiatus.
I sat in our pleasant “sun-porch” and enjoyed a long conversation with a Trinity Church friend, and then watched two workers repair the dock next to the boat and followed the timber-processing activities on the nearby waters and shore. Floating logs were assembled and arranged and bound by someone on a fast-moving little diesel-powered boat that reminded me both of a bumper-car at a carnival and of a cowboy on horseback working a herd of cattle. The boat darted backward and forward and swerved sharply sideways, belching clouds of smoke, and sometimes its operator hopped out onto the floating logs and maneuvered them into position using a hook at the end of a long pole.
The speedy little “log-wrangler” boat appears at the bottom-right of the photo
The “log-herder” “wrangled” the logs into position at the bottom front of a gigantic machine that scooped up bundles of logs, lifted them many feet into the air, and tumble-dumped them at the top of the apparatus where a long mechanical arm with a claw at one end (it reminded me of the neck and head of a brontosaurus!) reached over the bundles, clipped the chains that bound them, and nudged them into an area from which they were shoved into lines and rolled away into a tunnel that took them into the sawmill.
The huge, very noisy “log-eating” machine in Ladysmith Harbour
It was quite a process to observe—and now I knew from whence came the thunderous banging, clanging, rumbling, whistling, and whining sounds that fill this portion of the Ladysmith Harbour from about 6 am until nearly midnight!
Our evening hours encompassed our usual activities of reading, writing, German exercises, supper preparation and consumption, and galley clean-up, to which we added watching two episodes of a recent British crime drama series that was new to us. We discussed travel options for the next few days and tumbled into bed with the sounds of the sawmill swirling around us.
I’d gone to bed on Wednesday night feeling somewhat unwell with “embarrassing tummy troubles,” as a friend describes diarrhea, and this continued into a shimmering Thursday morning that blossomed into a bright and beautiful day. We left the reciprocal dock at the Ladysmith Yacht Club at 10 am and motored over calm seas toward Wallace Island Provincial Marine Park, about two hours away. As we went along, we examined wind predictions for the next two days and decided to try to anchor and stern-tie in shallow but well-protected Conover Cove rather than in larger and more open Princess Cove, since some strong winds, variable in direction, were appearing in the forecasts.
With the tide rising, we were able to enter Conover Cove with JUST enough water beneath Braesail’s keel, and the windlass and anchor chain behaved themselves during the anchoring process in about eight feet of water. There was enough breeze, however, to make stern-tying challenging because, while Walt was able to run our stern-line through the metal pin afixed to a rock on the shore and return the end to the boat’s stern, the wind blew the boat sideways and Walt had to use the bow-thrusters to reposition it so that the stern-line, the boat, and the anchor were all lined up properly. In addition, I didn’t manage to cleat one end of the line in the stern as I should have, and this made Walt’s task more difficult—aargh!
With the anchor and stern-line in place, I ate some yogurt, a slice of bread, and a mint, we both took naps in the aft cabin, and I awoke feeling better. We prepared for rising wind as well as we could, and will see what the night and following day might bring.
As I sit in the cockpit in the fading evening light,
writing this blog entry and listening to the fascinating birdcalls reaching me from shore, there is almost no wind in the cove, the water’s surface is slightly rippled, two additional boats have joined us and our neighboring sailboat, and whatever Walt is preparing for supper in the galley below smells wonderful; I hope my GI system (and perhaps the wind?) will be calm tonight!
