Victoria, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. 31 October 2002
Dear Everybody
It’s now more than three months since we arrived in Seattle on board the Horai Maru, following the heartbreaking loss of Island Way 1500 miles away in mid-Pacific.
When we last wrote, we were just getting acquainted with our new land-cruising life aboard Harvey (our 25-year-old RV, or motorhome!). We can still hardly believe our good fortune in having found such a splendid house on wheels. Harvey was sold to us with an invoice for US$3500 containing the comment “Sold as junk. Buyer knows nothing works”. Since July, with a little help from a couple of garages, everything has been made to work, with the exception of the generator (useful mainly for running the airconditioner in the Arizona heat to which Harvey was accustomed for most of his earlier life). We now have the luxuries of gas/electric powered fridge; gas-fired heating; 4-burner stove/oven; hot water; electric-flush toilet; 6-speaker hi-fi radio/CD changer; full-lenth roll-up awning; even cruise control so that we can eat up the miles (and the petrol!!) on the freeways at 55 mph without a foot touching the pedal!
We knew that Harvey’s bodywork had a few leaks when we bought him, but with the application of copious quantities of sealant we hope that problem has finally been resolved. It is difficult to be sure, though. Since July, we have been treated to one of British Columbia’s and Washington’s driest, sunniest summers on record, with only three days’ rain, so leak-testing has been a very occasional occupation.
The outstanding weather helped to provide a memorable ten days on Vancouver Island with my (John’s) sister Suzie and family. The five of them hired an RV in Vancouver, and we travelled together across the island to Tofino on the west coast, then back to Courtenay on the east coast and north to Telegraph Cove, which faces the narrow Johnstone Strait separating north-east Vancouver Island from the mainland. In Tofino, we joined a small, high-speed tour boat for the trip up the coast to Hot Springs Cove. Apart from the hot springs themselves, which provided a welcome warm-up after the chilly (sometimes foggy) boat trip, we were also given a taste of the spectacular scenery and the huge wealth of wildlife which inhabits the island’s western shores. We saw numerous seabirds, bald eagles, sea otters, a black bear on the beach, a colony of sealions and even a small group of grey whales lazily making their way south. Telegraph Cove is a jumping-off point for Knight Inlet, on the otherwise inaccessible mainland, and another boat trip up the Inlet took us into the heart of grizzly bear country. We spent three hours watching several of these magnificent animals going about their daily feeding routine - with the occasional snooze when the effort of chewing all that grass proved too exhausting!! We were a few days too early for the salmon run, when the bears’ diet undergoes a sudden change from the vegetarian - so we missed the spectacle of bears pouncing on unsuspecting salmon as the fish make their way up the rivers to spawn. Nevertheless, to have been able to watch grizzlies at close quarters in their natural habitat was a real treat. Johnstone Strait is well-known for its local population of killer whales, and a whale-watching boat trip is almost guaranteed to provide sightings from close quarters. Ours was no exception, and we spent a beautiful sunset evening cruise in the company of several orcas.
Since the departure of Suzie and family, we have spent much of our time visiting friends both new and old, and have been overwhelmed by the hospitality we’ve received in this part of the world. We’ve also done quite a lot more sightseeing and, since the end of August when we received our insurance settlement for Island Way, we’ve been looking at boats. An invitation to Wynn (Barbara’s Mum) and friend Gordon to come and join us on Vancouver Island produced a lightning reaction, and within a week they were with us. They stayed for two weeks, proving that Harvey can be as comfortable a home for four as for two. We saw more of Vancouver Island with them, and then had a few days in Vancouver.
Our boat search has taken us to Nanaimo and Sidney, on Vancouver Island; to Vancouver itself; and to Bellingham, Anacortes and Seattle in Washington. Having drawn a blank on a permanent replacement for Island Way, we had the idea that we could still do the Inside Passage trip to Alaska’s Glacier Bay in a smaller, much cheaper boat. However, still undecided about what that boat should be, we have now come to the conclusion that we should continue our land-cruising through next summer and take Harvey to Alaska instead. The Alaska Highway is a route we have both wanted to travel for many years, and now that it is no longer the gravel track it once was, the opportunity seems too good to miss. Whether we shall make it to Glacier Bay remains to be seen - doubtful, as it’s only accessible by water - but we’re sure there will be plenty of other adventures to keep us occupied for a few months!
Towards the end of next summer, we shall resume the search for Island Way’s replacement. So far we have not seen any boats in the 40-43 ft range that compare with the Island Packet 40 in providing all the attributes we are looking for in a live-aboard yacht, so we’re hoping that our next boat will be another IP40. We are encouraged to find that, at the moment, there are several on the market in various places around the USA and we hope that in ten months’ time the same will true.
Our wonderful summer in British Columbia/Washington is almost at an end. We fly back to England on 6 November - the day, according to the long-range weather forecast, that the next rain is due to fall! We’ll be spending Christmas in England, New Year in France and part of January in Turkey before returning to Canada some time in February. We have at last made time to update our website, and Barbara has been working hard during the past couple of days to add some more photographs. If you look at “www.geocities.com/gayfords” you’ll find new sections on Hawaii, Island Way’s last trip and Harvey the RV’s travels in the Northwest. We have also managed to put a couple of maps into the ‘map’ section to show the route taken during our three-year voyage with Island Way.
Finally, many thanks for all your kind messages in response to our last newsletter - we’ve tried to answer most of them. Sorry if yours has remained unanswered until now.
With love and best wishes
John and Barbara