In the past, we’ve enjoyed a stopover in Cadboro Bay. It’s the home of the University of Victoria,
a nice bay, a quaint village in its own right that has a one-block business
district and a great park right on the sandy beach, and only about 8 nautical
miles from Victoria. We like to anchor
there overnight, then get an early start into the city in the morning. We usually stay a night or two right
downtown, then come back for another night at Cadboro before heading north
again into the Gulf Islands.
Both Cadboro Bay and Victoria are on the very south eastern
tip of Vancouver Island, and basically lie on the Strait of Juan de Fuca. We travel SE down Haro Strait, with Vancouver
Island off to our right until we “turn the corner” and reach Cadboro. As we got closer, the wind really started
picking up and the sea got choppy. We’ve
been in worse, but it was still uncomfortable.
Once we actually made the turn, it really picked up. We couldn’t wait to get into the protection
of the bay. Unfortunately, to our dismay,
the bay was almost as choppy as outside!
After we anchored, the wind was howling from the southwest and good
sized rolling waves were bounding in, hitting us broadside and rocking us back
and forth. Hmmm. It’s never been like this for us in here. Not much we could do, though.
We checked the marine forecast and found out that there are
strong wind warnings in this area for until Friday. We were REALLY looking forward to going to
Victoria, but we REALLY didn’t want to venture out into the Strait of Juan de
Fuca during strong wind warnings. We know
the boat can handle it, just not sure about our stomachs. You don’t want to mess with the Strait when
it’s misbehaving.
We sat on the boat, at anchor, almost feeling seasick
because of the waves. What to do? And then it dawned on us: we’re only about 10 miles from Victoria BY
LAND! Instead of beating ourselves up
tomorrow cruising there, followed by the same thing the next day cruising back,
we could just dinghy into shore and grab the bus that stops a block away!
Oh we feel much better.
This is a good plan. The only
downside is that it is going to be a long, sleepless night if this wind doesn’t
die down.