by Pat Ardley
There were no other boats out here. Everyone else must have listened to the weather report. No one crosses the sound when a storm is forecast, which is something I know now, but especially not in a slow boat. The weather can change a lot in the six hours that a normal trip would take. And it did. When we rose to the top of a swell I could just make out the lighthouse on Pine Island through the mist. I knew that just ahead of Pine Island was a stretch called the Storm Islands and then the relative safety of Goletas Channel. I had to hold on for a while yet. I dug down deep inside me and brought out more reserves of strength and determination and started deep-breathing to maintain control of myself so I didn’t end up a pool of jellyfish sloshing around on the floor of the boat. Then I started singing in my head. I was too worn out and still being slammed around to be able to sing out loud. I sang every word to every Christmas song and every folk song and every pop tune that I could remember, and then I sang them again. This deep-breathing and singing is what I now call my “safe place,” which I have gone to many times over the years to get through some pretty harrowing situations.
We were passing Pine Island very slowly, and we were making very little headway. But wave by wave we plowed our way forward and headed into what I hoped would be the relief of Goletas Channel. There is a lighthouse at Scarlett Point, right at the corner of Christie Pass, which leads into Goletas Channel, and as we passed it I could see several people waving encouragement to us from the deck of the tower. The water was different here, with very little swell, but the waves were higher and coming faster. I had hoped for a feeling of safety when we turned into the channel but we were still in danger. We were no longer dropping heavily between swells, but now we were crashing and crashing through the waves. The sky started darkening, and I felt my heart plunge again. How can we do this in the dark?
The last hour of the trip from the channel into Hardy Bay and finally to the dock was agonizingly slow. Every bone in my body was aching, I could hardly hold my head up and I was numb and chilled to the bone. I had not even been able to reach for anything to put over my shoulders to fight the frigid onslaught of spray. It was pitch dark until we turned the corner into the bay and could see the lights of Port Hardy, nestled safely onshore. George’s eyes were fried from focusing so hard on the water and his arms were ready to fall off. Later we discovered a blister that covered his whole hand from working the throttle for twelve gruelling hours. We finally tied up at the government wharf in Port Hardy and stumbled up the dock.
What kind of life had I gotten myself into?
First Days in Sunshine Bay
I survived the epic boat trip to Port Hardy, and we went on to Vancouver, where we could have some fun and buy supplies for our new life spending the winter on our own in Rivers Inlet. And here we were, three months later, waking up for the first time in the cabin we rented from the elderly fisherman, Jack Rendle. George and Jack had agreed on the rent for the winter. George would build a counter with a sink and taps and shelves underneath. That was our rent. At that time, there was no kitchen sink, but we had very limited groceries so having no kitchen sink didn’t bother me. This was our journey! We were on our own! And whatever didn’t kill us outright, would only make us stronger. Right?
There was frost on our sleeping bag that first morning. My clothes were warm from being tucked under my pillow the night before, but it still hurt to climb out of our warm nest so I dressed quickly in the stinging air. The sun was shining and the outside air was brittle and clear. January in Rivers Inlet with no central heating and no electricity was going to be a challenge.
The day before, we had flown into Dawsons Landing just hours after the freight boat had dropped our belongings off there. Everything we bought while we were in town was tied into a ten-foot skiff that was left sitting on the store’s dock. Lucky, the storeowner, was not pleased with us because amongst our supplies we had boxes of groceries in the boat. His actual words to us were, “Either shit or get off the pot.” Which I assumed meant that if we wanted freight dropped at his dock, we should have bought our groceries from him. We paid a freight charge to him and hoped we could continue to do business. We unloaded all of the cartons and bags and a twenty-five-horsepower Johnson outboard engine. George put the plug in the bottom and then pushed the empty boat into the water. He learned at Addenbroke to always check for the plug in the bottom because three men, probably talking too much, once lowered the skiff into the water far below the wharf and quickly scrambled to lift it again as it started to sink. He hooked the motor up and we loaded some of the goods back in and headed to the cabin that was tied to a standing boom in Sunshine Bay. A standing boom is a series of logs tied together and to another set of perpendicular logs called “stiff legs” that act like a hinge to keep the floats away from the shore as the tide goes up and down. We unloaded the freight at the cabin and headed back to Dawsons to collect the rest of our gear.
There was a two-inch black plastic water line coiled up behind the cabin and George wrangled it to shore while walking along the stiff leg behind the house and up the hill about thirty feet to a natural little pond. After covering the end of the pipe with a chunk of one of my nylon stockings, he weighted the end of the pipe down low in the water with rope and a rock and scrambled back down and across the log to the float. Then he sucked on the end of the pipe to kick-start gravity to carry the water down to the cabin. After he was finished spitting out a few squirmy, buggy-type pests, the water finally arrived. He jammed the pipe onto the hose that was sticking out of the back of the house and water spluttered out of the tap into the bathroom sink. Even with the tap turned off, water still dripped into the sink. This was lucky because it kept the water moving overnight, which was just enough to keep it from freezing in the line. We weren’t so lucky with the toilet though: overnight the water froze solid in the bowl.
George got the oil stove working while I cleaned the tiny one-and-a-half-room cabin that had a bathroom behind a curtain, which was actually a step up from the door-less toilet cubby we had recently been using at the resort. I made the bed by zipping together the two sub-zero sleeping bags that we had traded for George’s design and drawing skills when he designed an office extension for an outdoor-equipment shop in Vancouver. We had two Aladdin lamps that were our only light in the late afternoon and evening. We had water and a little heat plus our love to keep us warm. We were happy.
That first night, the oil stove had quietly slowed and finally stopped during the pitch-black evening and we decided to climb into our warm and cozy sleeping bags and deal with it in daylight. In the morning, George took the carburetor apart and cleaned the firebox and got rid of quite a bit of dirty grease and managed to get the oil flowing again. He turned the oil stove up and put the kettle on for coffee. Then he went in and chipped through the ice in the toilet. Once I started moving around, I could feel the heat coming from the stove and was warmed in my soul again when I heard the water start to boil.
We didn’t have a fridge, but we didn’t have trouble keeping things cold. We just stored them at the far end of the cabin, away from the stove. There wasn’t a lot of fresh produce to keep cool anyway. The freight boat Tyee Princess delivered groceries to Dawsons Landing every two weeks and there was never much produce to choose from. We had root vegetables, cabbage, apples and oranges. The rest of the vegetables and fruit were from cans. We also ate a lot of brown rice, which was easy to ship, store and cook and was full of nutrients. I could make a fresh healthy loaf of bread though. George still called it a brick of bread. It didn’t make a very good sandwich. Well, maybe an open-faced sandwich.
Shortly after we settled into Jack’s cabin, a friend of ours came for a visit. Chas Bowman was an architect in Vancouver and an adventurer always looking for new, wild and wonderful things to do. We did a little fishing while he was with us and had fabulous fresh cod and chips for dinner. George took Chas beachcombing and the two of them came back beaming and full of the beauty of the inlet on a
sunny winter’s day. The air was crisp and clear and the snow on top of the Coast Mountains created a stunning contrast between the blue sky and the evergreen slopes.
I was quite content for the two of them to go on their adventures without me since it was only a ten-foot boat and having an extra person on board made it go too slow. And it was a boat. In the morning, we were taking our time at the breakfast table and just lounging with a second pot of coffee. I happened to look out the window and saw the Thomas Crosby V coming into the bay. Not a chance was I going to let them catch me in my pyjamas at 10:30 AM! With a squawk, I grabbed the milk jug off the table and scooped the corners of the tablecloth up with the rest of the dishes and breakfast things and ran clattering into the backroom. I raced back past George and Chas, who were still sitting at the table watching me with their mouths hanging open. Had I suddenly gone crazy? Apparently they hadn’t looked out the window. I ran to get dressed, and all was well and presentable by the time the minister and his wife were tied to the dock.
The OM
George just had to have the boat with the for sale sign on it. It was a twenty-four-foot very, very old wooden double-ended boat that looked to me like it leaked. Double-ended meant that the boat was pointed on both ends. George saw it as a great opportunity. I saw it as a disaster waiting to happen. The boat belonged to a young fellow named Ken Hall, who lived with his mother on floats tied to shore across the bay from Dawsons Landing. Ken called the boat the OM.
Ken was interested in selling and moving to town, so one afternoon we bought the boat and towed it home. George didn’t understand why I couldn’t muster any enthusiasm for working on it. He started to think that I was just being lazy. I couldn’t stand the thought of going anywhere in what I considered to be a hazard to navigation. The whole thing needed to have work done on it. The engine wouldn’t start, and it needed to be pumped out constantly to keep it from sinking. George built an A-frame at the stern and started the long, slow process of raising the engine so he could move it off the boat and put it undercover somewhere where he could work on it.
After hours of struggling with the engine, daylight was fading and he left his work to get ready to go out for dinner. We took our skiff to our log-salvaging friend John Salo’s cabin, which was about thirty yards away and tied to the same boom of logs that we were tied to. In actual fact, we were tied to John’s standing boom. We had an enjoyable dinner with John, then, at about 9 PM, headed back to our place. There was a very light, soft snow drifting down that seemed to mute even the sound of the skiff engine. I had a strange feeling as we came toward our float. I shone the flashlight onto the cabin and could see the whole end of it. The OM wasn’t there! As we neared the float George didn’t even stop to tie up the skiff; he leaped onto the float and ran to where the OM had been sunk. It was still tied at both ends but it was covered almost completely with water. After tying up the skiff, I joined him where he stood ringing his hands while I was wishing that I had an axe to help it sink the rest of the way. There were a few things floating up to the windshield, and in the flashlight beam I could all too clearly envision myself floating up to that window with a silent scream on my face. There was nothing we could do in the dark so we went to bed.
The next morning, George found a spot in the bay where the tide went out and left a natural beach that would support the OM. At low tide, he built a crib that would hold the boat upright as the tide went out around it. Then he cut down two alders hoping to use them to help keep the boat floating, but they barely floated themselves. He then borrowed two buoyant cedar logs from John and strapped them to the sides of the boat so he could tow it to the crib on the beach. He had to wait until the next high tide to move the boat. Finally, about an hour before high tide, he cut through the ropes that were holding the OM to the side of our float. It didn’t sink any further. That’s too bad, I thought.
Then he towed it over to the spot he had prepared and tied it to the trees that were hanging off the shore. As the tide went out, water poured from hundreds of different places on the sides of the boat. We had borrowed a pump to drain the water out as the tide went down, but we didn’t have to use it. This was not a good sign, confirming my opinion that this boat was definitely not seaworthy.
We borrowed a small empty float that belonged to another fishing resort. It was in Sunshine Bay for the winter for safekeeping. George worked day after day, building a proper cradle to hold the OM upright after it was pulled onto the float. He used his brand-new chainsaw and cut down several small trees and also used the first two alders that he cut down. When the boat was empty of water, and before the tide came back in, John helped pull the boat up onto the float with his tugboat. He used lots of ropes tied carefully into a harness and around the OM to protect the boat so it wouldn’t fall apart as he pulled it out of the water. I was somewhat dismayed by the care he took, as I was hoping that it would crumble with the force of the pull. George then built a frame around it, which he covered with plastic so the whole boat could dry out.
Once in a while I made dinner for John and another friend Warren Nygaard, who also lived in Sunshine Bay. The two fellows would come over for supper, and then through the evening we would play hearts, which I usually won. The three guys were all very competitive and watched the cards being played while I was up and down getting tea or treats and chatting while I had a captive audience. I never paid much attention to the cards, and this kept the fellows constantly guessing about my strategy and me constantly winning. Sometimes I won just because I ended up with 101 points, which is an automatic win! One afternoon I made a Chinese food dinner for the four of us. I spent three hours chopping, slicing, stirring, mixing and sautéing. We sat down to dinner and the food was gone in less than three minutes. What on earth had I just spent three hours on?! I don’t know if anyone even tasted it. But it was worth the work to be entertained by Warren’s stories of growing up in the wilderness of Rivers Inlet and the long Robert Service poems that John memorized while he was towing a boom of logs for thirty hours at a time.
The ill-fated OM hauled out on a borrowed float. George thought I should help work on it but I never had the confidence that this boat would ever safely carry us without sinking.
Other than winning at hearts and cooking or serving tea, it was hard to get noticed when I was always surrounded by men who were logging or fishing or hunting, or doing any number of real “men’s pursuits.” I spent a lot of time alone in the cabin, and when someone arrived I would be so excited and anxious for some real conversation that I would become tongue-tied. I usually sat quietly listening to all the guy talk, and when I did speak up, the fellows would turn to look at me and then get right back into their own stories. Every so often I would start talking and then they would all turn and stare. Then I would lose my train of thought and stop mid-sentence. I needed to do something or I would go crazy. I observed the men in conversation over time and learned a few tricks. When I felt I really had something to say, I would step one foot into the group, lean forward and speak in a loud voice about the “lube job that I was doing on my sewing machine.” This would be enough to catch their attention, and then I could launch into what I really wanted to say. Once I had them, I had to talk quickly or I would lose their attention.
We had met an older couple, Ed and Dottie Searer, when we were working for the resort the previous summer. One day we saw them again at the store and they invited us to visit them and stay overnight. We drove our skiff up to their cabin at the head of the inlet on the side of the Wannock River. Ed had been a TV announcer in the States and they had retired to the inlet for a change of pace. They introduced us to the most amazing breakfast: fried bacon, scrapple fried in the bacon fat, fried eggs, biscuits and gravy—made from the bacon drippings and a can of condensed milk—and toast. Dottie’s scrapple was made from cornmeal mush and the meat and gel from pork hocks boiled for hours. These ingredients were ground all together with spices. We poured syrup on the scrapple after it was fried, just for good meas
ure. It was an authentic Deep South breakfast and absolutely delicious, but you really needed a four-hour nap after eating it.
Ed was an amazing fisherman. In the summer, they catered to paying guests who came from the States to have Ed guide them to the huge chinook waiting to spawn in the Wannock River. He always seemed to have the best luck. Possibly luck and skill—with a little deviousness thrown in. He had a boat that was painted green on one side and yellow on the other. One of his best tricks was to motor slowly away from the rest of the fishing boats as soon as he had a fish on the line. He would hold his fishing pole underwater so that no one could tell that he had hooked a fish. Once he was away from the tourists, he would turn his boat so the other colour was showing. People would usually only be fishing at the head for a couple of days so were never able to figure out exactly where he hooked into the big ones.
There was another couple who also lived in Sunshine Bay that winter. Bob and Joan Ryder lived on their own classic wood cruiser and were the caretakers for the American-owned Rivers Inlet Resort. Bob told us that he had helped train commandos who were involved in the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. He liked to throw cans and bottles out into the water, and after they had drifted for a few minutes he would blast away at them with an automatic rifle. Warren and I traded notes about how we would dive into our cast iron bathtubs when we heard him start shooting. Bob also said that he was suspicious of anyone entering our bay. He said, “I watch the boat approaching through the scope on my rifle, ready to shoot if I don’t trust the look of it.”
Small Boat, Deep Water
I decided that I needed to overcome my fear of being in boats on the ocean. I wouldn’t last very long in Rivers Inlet if I couldn’t comfortably travel around in them. We were surrounded by islands, and if you did go to shore, you didn’t exactly walk around as much as slog, slip and scrabble through the underbrush, and over or under fallen logs and up and down ravines. There are no roads in Rivers Inlet. If you want to get from one place to another, you have to go there by boat. Most people lived miles apart and on separate islands. I use the term “most people” loosely since there were fewer than fifteen people living at the mouth of the inlet at that time.