Heading Home
The plan was to head to God’s Pocket on Seal Bay for a couple of days of quiet before our last night to be spent in Fortune Harbour.
We wake to a warm, breezeless day but the sky is blue and the sea is as flat as glass. By 9:00 we are passing Black Rock Sunker. No waves crashing there today. Our planned route is to head south and pass between Long Island and Pilley’s Island, the passage we are familiar with. There is so much fog, though, in that area, we decide, instead, to head straight east toward the Burnt Islands. This is also to be a shorter passage.
A pod of dolphins arrives for a few minutes of entertainment as we motor through between Bread Box and Alexander Islands. The landscape is different from any we’ve seen. The many islands north of White Point appear “scattered” as if tossed like a handful of rocks. There are also the rocks and shoals we cannot see, except on the chart plotter so we proceed with great caution.
We are visited by another sea creature - this time it is just a fin above the water, “waving” as it passes. Perhaps an ocean sunfish (mola mola) of which there have been many reported sightings this summer.
Once clear and into the open water, we change our plans for the second time today, deciding to head straight to Fortune Harbour and to make this our last night on the water. It is unfortunate we can’t sail as we have a clear path 13 nautical miles east southeast to the entrance to the harbour.
By 1:30 we are settled in behind Gillespie Island and sit in the quiet for the remainder of the day. There is a barge moving quietly through the aqua farm behind us. Seems they might be cleaning up the remains of the abandoned mussel farm, removing the large drums used as buoys where the lines are secured.
We reflect on the day’s journey, the recent fun at Little Bay Islands and other highlights of this summer’s cruise. We nap and read and head into the cabin early, too cloudy for stars and too dark to play cards in the setting sun.
Fog is floating over the houses at Fortune Harbour as we raise the anchor and make our way back out the s-curve from the safety of our anchorage to the last, short journey east before heading south toward Lewisporte.
The fog is thick and as we turn west of Exploits Islands we can barely make out the red marker at Ship Run Rock. We turn on our running lights and the fog horn and try to stay focussed on the pink line on the chart plotter, following where we travelled on our way through here in July. The fog seems worse the further south we move. Exploits Islands is just a dark line along the horizon to port and absolutely nothing is visible to the south. We will not have another view of Surgeon Cove Point Lighthouse this year.
There’s the marker!
On the approach to Birchy Island, things are clearing but I warn Harald we are about to enter the shipping lane after we round Sivier Island. He goes below and checks the AIS (Automatic Identification System). There are two tankers within 8 miles but both seem to be anchored so we proceed.
It is the first day of school in Ontario and British Columbia. Photos of grandchildren and one grown son all decked out for their first day back to the books, brings us smiles and feelings of pride.
Passing the Mussel Beds, I text Ann to let her know we are just 2 nautical miles from the marina. “Yeah! We’ll go out to your slip and watch for you.” Harald and I are both excited to be back in familiar territory, knowing friends will be there to catch us as we enter our slip for the first time since we left July 6.
The sky is blue and the sun is warm, totally opposite to the fog and rain we left in 63 days ago.
Friendly faces await our return
As promised, Mike and Ann are standing at our slip as we round the break wall. I take us in and they grab our lines. We’re off the boat as quickly as we can be where “welcome home” and hugs are shared. Harald and I shed our life jackets and coastal gear and tidy the boat before heading to the clubhouse to reconnect with other fellow sailors.
We are grateful to have returned safe and sound, without any major incidents. So many friends made along the way, so many places explored and experienced the best we could in short time. Seabiscuit did not let us down. She is thirty-eight years old and getting tired so some of her parts are in need of replacing. We have driven her hard in the last three years but she is still comfortable and delivers whenever we need her to. She is our summer home.
I believe I hear her breathe a sigh of relief as she lies snug in her Lewisporte slip where she can rest until we lift her from the water in coming days.