Two days of sailing in very calm waters
During an afternoon lull, when our speed dropped to half of what it had been, Judy, the Ocean Cruising Club (OCC) representative who we were planning to meet in Halifax, texted us suggesting we don't miss the stop at Shelter Cove. Since we weren't likely to get to Halifax before midnight, and Shelter Cove was just a quick reach across the wind. We took her suggestion and told her of our change of plans.
It was a good recommendation. When we pulled into the pretty bay, there were three other boats there, two of which were flying the OCC flag. As we passed by Zen Again, we slowed to have a quick conversation with Mike, who gave us a couple of tips on how to access the trails ashore and then invited us for sundowners later. We thanked him for the former, but declined the latter on the basis that we were flagging and doubted we could stay up and be interesting for that long. We agreed as a consolation to meet up with everyone at one of the nearby beaches for an OCC seventieth Anniversary celebration the next afternoon.
Feeling properly refreshed the next morning, we took the dinghy to the shore to look for the Shelter Cove Trail. It took a few tries of bashing through thick underbrush before we finally stepped on something that looked pretty undeniably like a mildly-trodden trail.
We then turned left and went through several sections where the encroaching foliage kept us from being able to see where we were putting our feet. Maryanne found a couple of hidden roots and holes, but managed not to make her tender ankle any worse for doing so.
After a while, we emerged onto the beach at Sandy Cove, opposite the anchorage. We traversed the isthmus between it and Eastern Sandy Cove, before we finally popped out at the outside of the t-head at the end. There, we had fun scrambling along the rocks and through the tide pools, before turning back to find the trailhead at the end of the road a few miles distant.
At some point about halfway along, I noticed the end of a charge cable poking out of Maryanne's purse. I was worried she thought her phone was attached to it.
Sure enough, it had been. She had last used it to take a photo way back at the beach. After a thorough pat down for each of us, we decided we were going to have to turn and retrace our steps to find it. My signal wasn't good enough for the tracker to work.
Our leading theory was that it had dislodged somewhere in the portion of shoulder high branches we had pushed our way through earlier. That narrowed the search area, but it wasn't going to be easy to find the phone in that mess.
We met two women shortly thereafter, coming from the direction of the beach. We asked them if they had noticed any bright pink (that's why we buy the cases such bright colors) phone having a rest along the trail. Alas, they had not.
The overgrown bit of the trail was most of the way back to the end. We were taking it very slowly and using sticks to poke through the shrubbery when Maryanne called to me from ahead and said she had found it. Whew!
Exploring the trails and beaches around Shelter Cove; such a beautiful place.
We did another 180 and resumed our push to the trailhead once more. We passed our previous turnaround point, passed another very pretty isthmus, and continued on. The trail got hillier and at some point, we emerged into a clearing to see at least two more ridges that we would have to cross. That would be going each way, of course. We looked at each other and agreed that we just didn't have it in us anymore, plus the increasingly long trip back to the dinghy. Time to call it a day.
Well, not really. We still had the beach get together to attend. We had just enough time for a quick wash before boarding the dinghy for the row over.
Mike was there, plus his wife Nicki and two other singlehanded sailors, each named Tom. New to the anchorage was Andrez and Ali from Kelper. A committee then formed to create a beach fire, followed by various stick-borne foods for carbonizing. Drinks were passed around and we all stood together for an OCC Anniversary photo. (Mike was hoping to make the cover of the newsletter).
Andrez mused that this occasion was the first time he had ever had a beach fire using wood he hadn't brought. That seemed odd, since he is an experienced sailor in his 60s. He then explained that he and Ali are from The Falkland Islands, where they have very few trees. The only wood you will ever find near a beach in the Falklands is driftwood.
Meeting fellow cruisers - our first real chance this year so far!
The others, who were all keen to get eastbound, left early the next morning. Andrez and Ali were also going that way, but had made a big push to get this far and decided to have a day off instead. They invited us over for tea and appetizers.
At their boat, Andrez and Ali explained the name to us. Kelper is a slightly archaic (but in no way derogatory) term Falklanders use for themselves. Andrez then assured us that Kelper is the only Falkland Islands cruising boat out there and probably the only one we will ever see.
They bought her as a bare hull, and then took her home, where Andrez then spent several years doing major repairs and building the interior from scratch while Ali worked out her last pre-retirement years as a teacher. They are heading as far north as they can get this year, with the aim of transiting the Northwest Passage in a year or two. They are going to see how the boat handles the Arctic and then make whatever modifications they need for the trip to the top of the Pacific. These are, of course, people who have sailed a lot around the tip of South America and characterize the Drake Passage to Antarctica as “an easy crossing if you get the weather right”.
Both Ali and Andrez are good-natured, enthusiastic and quick to bellow out a big laugh. They talked so lovingly of their home waters that they almost, almost convinced us to give up our lame Panama Canal plan and get to the Pacific the old-fashioned way, via The Falkands, of course, where we would assuredly be given a warm welcome by them as long lost friends. Tempting as it is, a catamaran is not a heavy, steel boat. After a couple of seasons at high (for us) latitudes, we're looking forward to getting back to the Tropics for a while.
Anchorage location >> On google maps
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