8/30 Glenthorne Passage to Telegraph Harbour 18.2 nautical miles

It’s another beautiful day in paradise. We’re having a great run of good weather – hope it holds out for awhile.

Diane and an Olympus crewmate came by in their skiff a bit after 9 this morning. She tossed us a couple pieces of coffee cake and let us know that, if we’re interested, a tour of the sheep farm on Prevost Island would start at the dinghy dock at the head of the bay at 10 o’clock. Although this has been one of our favorite anchorages for many years, we haven’t had the opportunity to do any exploring as the island is privately owned and posted with no trespassing signs. So of course we were interested and showed up at the dinghy dock promptly at 10, along with a couple dozen other people. For some background, here’s a brief history of the island farm from the guide book “Exploring the San Juan and Gulf Islands – Cruising Paradise of the Pacific Northwest”.

Prevost Island was acquired by Digby Hussey de Burgh in the 1920s. An Irishman of noble lineage, whose family owned an estate in County Limerick, de Burgh raised sheep, goats and cattle on Prevost’s pastures. His son Hubert took over the island property in 1938. His four daughters grew up on this isolated island – one becoming a concert pianist. Upon Hubert’s death, his widow Jean, two of their daughters and a son-in-law continued living on Prevost and much of the island remains in the family’s hands.

 

Curt had arranged the tour with the family, and our guide was Sheila, one of the daughters who still works the farm to this day. As we went ashore from the dock, one of the first items we saw was an old boat built by her grandfather. It’s not the first time we’d seen it, though – it’s visible from the water and we’ve seen it many times during our dinghy rides around the bay through the years. We continued up a path around the back of the bay to a small cabin. Sheila told us that she and her husband had lived here for 5 years back in the early 1970’s. The cabin was nicely preserved, with a made up bed at one end and a sofa along the wall. To the left of the sofa was a window with a view out into the harbor – today that view included our boat the Potentate at anchor. Across the room from the sofa was an old propane cook stove and a Franklin style stove for heat. The kitchen area was completed by a small countertop with a kitchen sink, with a single faucet. There were some outbuildings for storing wood, and also a guest room adjacent to the cabin that had another bed as well as a fireplace.

We continued on our trek past the back of Annette Inlet, the next body of water beyond Glenthorne Passage. There was a small meadow here, and every so often we’d come to a fence line with a gate. The last person in the group would close the gate as he or she passed through. Along the way we encountered two donkeys, who came over to greet the crowd and hope for handouts. Sheila told us they were pretty young, about 5 years old. Diane had brought along a bag of carrots, much to the pleasure of the donkeys. Diane tried to get the youngest member of our group, 3 or 4 year old Jeremy, to feed the Donkeys but he was having none of that.

Further down the trail a herd of sheep saw us coming and they all came over, expecting to be fed. Of course we were just passing through, and someone in our group explained to the sheep that it was a false alarm - we had no food. Apparently the lead sheep figured that out and headed back up the hillside – with the rest following along like … well, sheep. Off in the distance we could see some cattle, and Sheila told us they currently had 47 head, unless there was a calf or two that they had missed.

There was a spring-fed pond at a high point on the island, and the family had earlier built an earthen dam, which converted the pond into a small lake. It is used for irrigation and their home water supply, with gravity feed. We hike up a sloping meadow and over some tractor ruts until we came to the edge of the pond, which was lined with cattails. One member of our party who had been to the island before told us that the shoreline was just thick with frogs, and that she had seen a turquoise colored one the last time she was here. Just then I spotted a blue frog on a leaf – and she said “that’s the one!” Several people, including myself, took photos of the frog. Now that I have those photos downloaded to the computer, I can see that the blue frog was accompanied by 5 green frogs that blended more or less into the leaf from a distance of a few feet.

At this point Curt suggested we head back, via a different route, as we had a long way to go back to the dock. In all, I would guess we hiked 4 or 5 miles at least. On the route back we were invited to the sisters’ current residence, where we were served cookies, ice water, lemonade and coffee. Sheila’s sister Susan was there – she’s the one who is a concert pianist, and she plans on giving a concert in Ganges next spring. We met her yesterday at the crab feed at Curt and Marsha’s cabin. She didn’t go along on the farm trek as she is awaiting hip replacement surgery soon. Their home was beautiful with a large deck and greenhouse area, where we all relaxed from our hike and ate the wonderful almond shortbread cookies. I could see a view of the water through the trees, and I think it was either Diver Bay or Ellen Bay, on the other side of the island from our anchorage.

Sisters Susan (seated) and Sheila

Before we left Sheila brought out a guest book for all to sign. I hope they enjoyed our company as much as we enjoyed the tour. When we left we still had a mile or two to walk before getting back to the dock. The CYA flotilla was planning on going to Montague around 12 or 12:30, and we were planning on splitting off from the group and heading for Nanaimo. A noon or so departure would get us to Dodd Narrows at just past slack current, with a bit of a current in our favor. By the time we were back on the boat it was an hour past that and we were bushed and not ready to leave immediately to make the narrows. A later departure to Nanaimo would have been okay too, as even if we were to arrive at maximum flow it was only 4 knots and in our favor. But, we didn’t want to hurry along and chose our secondary destination, Telegraph Harbour. We spent a couple days here last year at the Canadian Chris Craft Rendezvous and enjoyed it.

This evening we’re at anchor instead of at the marina. There are two marinas in the harbor, and they both had plenty of dock space but we had no need for the facilities. The back of the bay is very shallow, and there are a lot of local boats on mooring buoys. There’s an area in front of the canal to Clam Bay, but there was a sailboat right where we wanted to anchor. So, we headed back out the channel a bit and are anchored just beyond the Thetis Island Marina. It’s plenty deep here – we’ll still have 8 or 9 feet under us at low tide in the morning.