Photos to follow

14 July - day trip to Tofino - With expected strong winds blowing across Berkeley sound today we decided we would keep doing the tourist thing and head over to Tofino today.  We  were waiting for the bus from Ucluelet by 09:30 and it finally turned up t 10! (looking at the time tables we had found times for 09:38, 09:48 and 09:59 and with the next bus not until 2 we didn't want to miss this one!)  An hour later we disembarked in Tofino to a glorious hot, sunny day with very little wind.  It must have taken us all of an hour to tour the town (4 blocks by 4 blocks, as the bus driver said) and then we headed out for a walk to Tonquin beach.  This was very well worth the trip as it was a beautiful sandy beach looking out to the ocean After spending a little time feeling the sand between our toes we headed back into town, grabbed a bight for lunch and waited for the return bus at 2:15pm.  Getting back to the boat we were surprised, and a little concerned to find that, contrary to the wind forecast the wind was plowing fairly strongly from the South (a 180 degree reversal) which had blown us back over the anchor and relatively close to a rocky lee shore.  Although we were a little spooked by this, we stayed pu as the wind ws meant to die down, which it did by 5pm at which point we settled in for a wonderful quiet evening on board

15 July - Sailing practice and the perfect solitude at the back of the sound - The boat was now all ready to go and we were just waiting for a window now to head south.  The one thing we both agreed though is that we could do with more sailing practice so we headed out today to set the sails and potter around Berkely sound. 

We had decided we would head to the back of the sound for the night and, with the wind blowing straight into the sound we got to spend some time getting more comfortable with her under canvas and downwind.  I would say we both still have concerns related to our sailing ability and are still reading books as we learn but we are slowly building up our confidence.

By 3pm we were anchored alone in Lyall Point Bight a beautiful anchorage, if a little exposed to the west, but we knew that the weather was meant to be very calm this afternoon and overnight.  We weren't disappointed as the wind dropped to nothing and we ended up with a glorious sunbathing afternoon with unparallelled views out towards the man island.  Around 5 we went for a putz around in the dinghy and then when we got back to the boat,

Exploring Lyall Point Bight

the early evening was so stunning, and the water warm enough that we both went for a swim.  I dived to have a look at the prop just to make sure things looked ok and unfortunately found the zinc on the end had fallen off - another thing to add to the list!! But the prop was clean - just lots of barnacles around the shaft As we looked at the weather forecast, The rest of the evening provided a stunning backdrop as the sun gradually set

Sundowners on the back deck 

Another Stunning sunset!

it looked like things may settle down to head south by the weekend.  We are now running out of excuses and may be pushing off from Canada within the week.

16 July - We wanted to do some more sailing today so headed across the sound and back into Empress Eagle channel.  Today we were both feeling more confident with the sailing and, even through we didn't have any 'testing' winds it was great to just settle into sailing again. 

Around 3pm we again started looking for somewhere to pull in and found a beautiful seculded spot tucked into Alma Russell Islands,  The entrance was a little tricky, only 100ft betweeen two drying rocks, but we snuck in and found a wonderful haven. Once settled we got in the dinghy and explored some magical islands and found a small floating fishing community in the back of the Island

Heading off to explore the Alma Russell Islands

ALthough very peaceful it was getting a bit of swell and Beture has a havbit of turning side on and 'rockin and rollin' sometimes.  To counter this we had a go at dropping a stern anchor.  This allowed us to point the bows towards the swell which gave us a much calmer night