by Rob Wood
I had already finished my first cup of tea when Laurie finally came in from the barn, the smile on her face indicating that she and the chickens were okay but now she was worried about the apples. She didn’t want the bears getting any more apples.
“To hell with apples,” I said. “Did you see how big that mama was, and how close she was to you?”
“I don’t want the bears doing any more damage because then we’ll have to call in the Wildlife Manager to come and shoot them,” she replied, light years ahead of me in her strategic thinking as usual.
“So long as they don’t come in the house,” I thought. “I’m not going out and I don’t care what they do tonight. I’ll worry about the apples tomorrow, maybe.”
As an adjunct to this part of the story, some of our neighbours on the next island at about the same time had a bear open their kitchen window, climb right inside their house, take a good look around and exit by the same means. They were away at the time and it did not do any serious damage or steal any of the plentiful supply of food in their pantry, including pails of honey and dozens of cans of salmon. Could it possibly have been the same bears? They also swim between islands.
There’s another interesting sequel to this story too. A few days later we were having supper with some friends just about dusk when I happened to glance up from the dinner table as something caught my eye right through the back kitchen window at the far side of the house out toward the garden. It was that same damn bear cub again, right at the very top of that same apple tree. It’s a huge tree and was just loaded with apples that we still hadn’t got round to picking. Unfortunately, instead of doing the smart thing, which was to grab the camera, I ran out and shouted at them again. Sure enough they ran off and slid right through the original spot in the fence that Laurie had already repaired.
“How about cougars?”
THE FIRST MORNING BACK HOME from some travelling, Skookum was barking out by the barn. We had been missing each other, as he had been staying with Kiersten in town for the three months while we were away, and he was now keen to pick up his old routines, which included asserting control of his territory. He often barked at the ravens and blue jays. He knew we didn’t want to have them around and chasing them away made him feel important, which of course met our approval, of which he also was acutely aware. His will to please was very powerful. Sometimes he overdid it, which then became part of his entertaining act, and he barked at nothing at all just for the hell of it.
This over-enthusiastic barking was not at all unusual, then, but this time, partly because we hadn’t seen each other for months, there was something different so I went out to join him at the barn to see what was up. I thought I’d go through the motions of letting him save face before playing some other game, but somehow this time there was an urgency about his body language that really caught my attention.
“What’s up, Skook?” I asked as he came close in against my legs.
Now I was starting to get spooked by his unusual behaviour, realizing this was not just a game, and even my skeptical senses were catching on to some other presence. As we both tentatively stalked along the lane, his nose suddenly poked upward, indicating he had caught a scent of something. Sure enough, just around the corner from the barn, only 50 feet away right in the middle of the lane, there was a huge cougar, a 150-pound mountain lion that could easily tear either one of us apart in the blink of an eye. Fortunately, she wasn’t blinking, just staring, catlike and curious. Her body was facing away from us but her head was turned right around to the back of her neck the way only cats (or owls) can do. I was not afraid, nor was Skookum; there was more a feeling of mutual fascination, intense curiosity on both sides. I couldn’t help noticing what a beautiful creature she was and how well she blended into the bush while at the same time presenting a very distinctive and powerful presence, almost an aura. She was big, muscular and fit-looking, about twice as big as Skookum (and he was a big dog), tan-coloured with some tabby stripes, a very big kitty. The body language was not threatening but certainly demanding of respect, especially the intensity of that expressionless gaze.
“Better not push our luck, old chap. Let’s go back home now!” I said calmly to Skookum, and then I thought, “You are not supposed to turn your back on a predator.”
Instead, the cougar turned its back on us and slunk off into the bush. We quickly slunk off back to the house. It was all over so fast with no time to consider the what-if scenarios.
Safely back in the house, it felt good to be home. We sure had missed our animals.
When people ask why we are not afraid of the cougars on our island, we say, “They seem to know not to bother us, so long as we don’t bother them.”
Although, of course, we can’t prove it, this attitude has worked for us for 40 years of living with cougars in our neighbourhood. Although we rarely see them, we know they are there because whenever it snows we see their tracks. Furthermore, our seemingly cavalier attitude is substantiated by the local folklore passed down to us by the old-timers we have met. For instance, the daughters of August Schnarr, the local old-time pioneer homesteader, prospector and trapper living in Bute Inlet, had pet cougar kittens in their house when they were young.
When we were in Australia people asked us, “What about the bears in Canada? Aren’t you afraid of being mauled and eaten?”
“More people get killed by bees than bears,” we replied. “They are around and we see them now and again but they usually keep away. There’s no need to be afraid. How about your poisonous snakes? Aren’t you afraid of them?”
“Hell no. There’s plenty of them around and you might see the odd one but they usually keep away. No need to be afraid.”
“How about sharks and crocodiles?”
“Same thing, but you can’t help being afraid of them.”
Some people are afraid of horses, but the people who know them say that it doesn’t help to be afraid. Respect is a preferable state of mind.
-9-
FIORDLAND BOAT
“Why and when did you build your catamaran, Quintano?”
I HAVE OFTEN HEARD THE BC coast described as a “high-maintenance environment,” and we gradually discovered that our abuse of Shadowfax exceeded our ability to look after her properly and that we were fighting a losing battle against rot. She ended her life in a cremation ceremony on the beach in which we were thankful for the five years of faithful service she had provided and for the lessons we had learned. In other words she was written off to experience. So now what?
We figured out that what we needed was a fast, shallow draft sailboat, with great stability and load carrying ability, capable of serving as a work boat as well as for pleasure. I heard about two fibreglass outriggers from a Cross 38 trimaran that had been sitting in a shed in Campbell River for ten years. After checking them out we bought them for a very good price, lashed them together and paid a friend to tow them home to our island. We erected a pole structure on the beach with a tarp roof, and for the next two years it became the birthplace of Quintano, a 33-foot long, 14-foot wide and 2-foot deep catamaran.
As she was put to the test of ferrying huge loads of building supplies, dealing with winter southeasters and negotiating the local tidal rapids, we discovered that Quintano turned out to be a fine boat, well beyond what we had dared dream of or expect. She was fast and lively with tremendous acceleration but at the same time comfortable, stable and seaworthy. The shallow draft enabled us to go close in against the shore for loading and unloading and to get into more sheltered anchorages.
“Quintano” is the name the Spanish explorer Captain Quadra gave for Bute Inlet after one of his midshipmen, and for over 20 years she sailed the magnificent and challenging local waters, carrying climbing and ski mountaineering expeditions into the Mount Waddington area at the heart of the BC Coast Range.
“What was Quintano’s best adventure?”
EVER SINCE I HAD COME to the coast I had dreamed of going all the way around Van
couver Island, but having survived a few near misses, I had learned to keep my youthful headstrong impulses somewhat under control. It seems inherently part of my personality to underestimate practicalities. Perhaps that is just as well, because otherwise I would never have tried so many of the things I have done, including building Quintano.
One evening in August 1986 Quintano quietly slipped her moorage and motored out into the Okisollo rapids with the end of ebb tide, thereby fulfilling one of our favorite lessons learned in the wilds:
“Leaving home is the hardest part of any trip!”
This time it was especially true. What with the responsibilities of looking after our horse, pigs and chickens, work commitments and the fact that Laurie had an old friend from Alberta coming to visit, we did not really have enough time to go all the way around the island, but we would head up to Port Hardy and see what happened anyway.
Right at the northern and most remote end of Vancouver Island is a small island called Hope, for the very good reason that the narrow channel that separates it has a shallow shoal which, together with certain conditions of wind against tide, can present one of the most notorious hazards to navigation on the BC coast: the dreaded Nahwitti Bar.
This time there was, however, yet another formidable element to contend with – thick fog; pea soup.
Quintano motored timidly out of the narrow harbour mouth and clung closely against the shore of Hope Island, peering hopefully into the featureless grey gloom. Visibility was just enough to keep us clear of the rocks. It did not take long, even at slow speed, to reach the lighthouse at the western end of Hope Island, with its eerie foghorn and ghostly light. Beyond this was the point of no return. To proceed west toward Cape Scott, Quintano and its crew of Rob, Laurie, Kiersten and Sheen dog would have to leave the security of Hope Island, pass over Nahwitti Bar and head out into the open ocean – an ocean of fog. This was before the days of GPS, and even though we trusted the compass and had experience dealing with fog on the inside coast, we had never been out in the open ocean before.
Beyond the bar lay 20 miles of exposed lee coastline to Cape Scott, another notorious spot. After that we would head south in our bid to negotiate the west coast and complete our objective, the 650-nautical-mile circumnavigation of Vancouver Island.
Frankly, I was scared of that damn fog. I knew that I was wimping out and felt nauseous with indecision and fear. Slowly, we turned around and I tried to rationalize by muttering, “Let’s try again tomorrow.”
Having turned around, we were once again trying to pick out the rocky shore from the impenetrable grey gloom when Kiersten, our lookout on the bow, suddenly shouted, “Look! Look! A whale!”
A huge grey whale gently broke the surface halfway between Quintano and the rocks. As if to confirm its presence (which one could have been excused for doubting considering the perfect camouflage of its grey barnacled back in the grey swell, the grey rocks and the grey fog), it let out, with a snort, a spout of grey vapour before rolling forward into the swells. Spellbound, we eagerly anticipated its rising for a repeat performance, which it soon obliged us with, this time even closer, exposing even more of its body and tail. We gasped as, almost right alongside Quintano, it turned its head toward us, showing a doleful and compassionate eye. I could have sworn it was smiling, even winking at us.
“A wink’s as good as a nod to a blind bat.” The Monty Python spoof came out aloud.
“Did you take any photies, eh?, Nudge nudge, wink wink?”
The apprentices were still listening.
“Look! Look! There’s another one – two – three!” yelled Kiersten, more perceptive than me, again. “There are lots of whales!”
There were at least half a dozen grey whales all around us. I instinctively turned the helm to follow them back the way we had just come, toward the open sea. We were entertained by this playful exhibition of hide and go seek by the whales and switched the engine off so we could better hear their “blowing” and the swishing of their flukes. They were not at all threatening, even though at times they were only a few feet away from the boat.
As the novelty of watching the whales wore off, I started the motor and locked my focus onto the compass bearing: 225 degrees, 20 nautical miles, 3 hours and 20 minutes motoring at 6 knots. Time: 2:00 PM. Anticipated arrival at Cape Scott 5:20 PM.
I opened the throttle and Quintano’s bows cut smoothly into the ocean swell. Before I had chance for further reflection or doubt we had crossed Nahwitti Bar, lost sight of land and the whales and were out in the open Pacific.
We soon picked up a favourable breeze and Quintano surged forward at thrilling speed, sails wing-on-wing running straight downwind, carving smoothly into the sunny ocean swell. We had intended to stop for the night at Winter Harbour, but we were making such good progress, the weather was so fine and evidently stable, that we decided to continue on through the night while the going was good. As the sun went down to starboard a huge moon came up to port.
Everything went well until Solander Island off the tip of Brooks Peninsula, the farthest westerly point on Vancouver Island. We had changed course, having rounded Cape Scott at 1:45 AM. I was thinking what a rugged and impressive-looking fortress Solander was, with its lonely light, when suddenly, without warning, we entered chaotic, high-pitched seas with huge breakers bearing down on our stern. The wind picked up at the same time, whipping the water into white spray glistening in the moonlight all around. We were now running into the worst situation for a catamaran, with too much sail power, surfing too fast in huge following seas, with the possibility of having the bows dig into a trough and the boat tripping forward into a “pitch pole.” As I rushed forward to pull the jib down, a monstrous breaking wave crashed over our stern and washed through Quintano’s cockpit, lifting Laurie right off her seat at the helm – “pooped.”
Fortunately, in spite of the panic we felt and the intimidating predicament, Quintano remained steady and secure. Although, as they sliced through the chaos of white water both bows were often submerged, somehow the wing deck between the hulls was buoyant enough to lift us gracefully and comfortably out of the troughs. She felt more confident than we did, and that’s a fine way to feel about your boat in a situation like this.
Lowering the jib seemed to make little difference. Quintano still hurtled along through the dazzling moonlit pandemonium. We needed to shorten the main. To do this, however, would have meant either “gybing” – swinging the boom across to the other side – a tricky and potentially dangerous operation at the best of times and totally unthinkable in these conditions, or else turning in toward the rocky shoreline to complete a U-turn to head up into the wind and spill the load off the main sail. Even though we were several hundred yards out, Quintano would travel extremely fast beam-on to the wind and could put us too close to the rocks too quickly. Anyhow, we didn’t fancy being beam-on to these waves. The only possibility left was to heave the mainsail down, loaded as it was – a desperate and panicky measure.
I was busy struggling with battens caught up in the shrouds, no doubt cursing and swearing, pretty close to freaking out, when Laurie was pooped a second time. Thank goodness Quintano was easily able to deal with the problem by quickly self-draining the cockpit and, apart from the helmswoman getting soaked and spooked again, there was no serious effect.
Eventually, I managed to shorten the main and things started to settle down a bit. We felt more relaxed and even enjoyed the excitement and exhilaration of speed for a while before the wind and the waves suddenly eased off and left us wondering what on earth had been happening. “Like Hobbits at the gates of Mordor!” Laurie summed it up later.
Eventually, just about at dawn, we arrived safely in the welcome security of the remote First Nations village of Kyuquot among a fleet of fishing boats and stole a few hours of well-earned rest. Kiersten had slept through the whole thing, and when we told her about all the fun she had missed, she replied, “Good.”
Things went relatively smoothly after
that for the remainder of the voyage. Quintano, like a horse heading for the barn, beat up the last lap to the finishing line with spectacular speed and perhaps the most comfortably exhilarating sailing of the trip. As well as the normal satisfaction of getting where we wanted to go by using the wind without diminishing it, there was the additional thrill of riding a dynamic balance between speed and safety. The mechanical efficiency is fine-tuned with one hand on the tiller, responding to the sideways heeling thrust on the sails (safety), the other hand on the main sheets controlling the tension and shape of the sails (speed). It is precisely this intense participation in the flow of events, the interaction between ocean, wind, boat and man that moulds the rhythm of the sailor’s thoughts and actions in harmony with the natural environment.
“In the Zone again. You must have felt exhilarated completing that trip!”
YES. WE COMPLETED THE 650 nautical-mile circumnavigation of the island in just nine days; that’s an average of 70 nautical miles per day. We arrived home just in time to rescue one of our pigs that had broken loose from the pen and was hassling our neighbours.
Thanks largely to Quintano’s strength of character, we survived a wonderfully exciting adventure which, in the calmer light of retrospect, turned out to be one of the highlights of our lives and left us feeling a warm euphoric glow. The memory of Quintano surging through the ocean swells, the grey whales of Nahwitti and the white water of Solander will stay with us forever.
“Do you believe the whales of Nahwitti told you it was okay to proceed?”
I BELIEVE, AT LEAST, THAT our attention being focused on the whales connected us with the universal consciousness of the environment and that took us out of the subconsciously conditioned box of fear and doubt that had prevented us from proceeding.
