Day 3 - A Stormy Crossing
We are all chilled to the bone, the possibility of hypothermia is rearing its ugly head. We are determined to get to camp.
Expedition Fishbait: In May 2001, five friends embarked on a kayaking trip through the Broken Islands group of the Pacific Rim National Park off Vancouver Island. This is the journal of that trip as kept by me. To see all the photos from this trip you can view the associated photo gallery.
Day 3 — Tuesday
7am Tuesday — Everyone awakes. No one has been eaten by animals yet.
8am — Decision has been made to try for Willis Island. We should be ready by 10am so that we can take advantage of calm seas and dry weather.
11am — The lady from Sechart shows up to collect the money for camping on the islands. She says the weather on the major channels is pretty bad. We shouldn’t try for Turret of Gilbert Islands. We are still unpacking camp.
12:30pm — We are finally ready to leave Gibraltar Island. Our beautiful camp is destroyed. We say goodbye to Major Stumpy but we take Bucko as our sixth member. The weather is calm still. We head west and north to Willis but the weather looks so calm, we decide to cross the major channel to Turret Island. There are clouds heading our way but the seas are still calm.
3pm — The clouds have reached us, it is raining, the wind has picked up and we still can’t cross Turret Island to get to the South side. Expedition Leader makes a decision — Expedition Fishbait must go do a crash landing to prevent drowning. We all like this idea.
3:30pm — We crash land on the beach. Boats are okay, we are soaked and drenched and cold. The waves are now crashing and the rain unrelenting.
4pm — Santhi and Haseena offer to scout and find the campsite and perhaps a way overland so that we can take the supplies there. Major, Private and Chief Navigator unload all the supplies and move the boats from the surging tide. The rain is unrelenting.
5pm — Santhi and Haseena are not back yet, we are now quite worried. Chief Navigator and Private attempt an overland crossing using a path made by pygmy deer a third of our size. We come to a dead end. We decide to follow Santhi and Haseena leaving Chief Navigator at the boats. This has all the ear-markings of a horror movie where the monster is eating us one by one. The Major and Private meet Santhi and Haseena; all is well; we are still cold, wet and hungry. Santhi and Haseena tell is the overland route is blocked, but that the campsite is like Winnie the Pooh’s home. We should try for it. We eat a quick lunch and attempt to portage across a reef and beach to the opposite side of Turret Island leaving behind most of the water. We will get it on Wednesday. We are all chilled to the bone, the possibility of hypothermia is rearing its ugly head. We are determined to get to camp.
6:30pm — We row through surging seas into camp at Turret Island and set up camp. Life is good again.
8:30pm — We have supper of pasta and hot chocolate. Aaron would like Sean Connery to play him in a movie of Expedition Fishbait. Dups is deciding between Morgan Freeman and Samuel L. Jackson.
10pm — We head to bed. No intention of early rising. The sounds coming from the Major/Private’s tent this night weren’t from the Orgasmatron but the screams of pain from Dups when blood started flowing into Dups’ finger tips. Aaah warmth.
