Back To La Scie
Back through the tickle
It’s moving day and I am up at 6:30. It is cloudy but the weather report says clearing in the afternoon. I go back to bed for one more chapter of Kevin Major’s “Two for the Tablelands”.
With the clearing, the wind is also supposed to build through the day but there is none when we head out at 8:30. Michael passes us in the tickle, waving and calling out, “see you in the fall”. He is heading to Roberts Arm for more plywood for new roofs on the 5 houses he owns in LBI.
Sails are both raised and Harald has the preventer on the boom, so it doesn’t accidentally swing around - a danger when sailing downwind. Harald tries the whisker pole but then the breeze shifts NE so he aborts the plan. The wind is actually variable. We’re sailing 4.8knots at a heading of 60’ straight to Cape St John. There are 12 icebergs in our field of vision, including one at 60’. The last report from the Coast Guard was that there are still over 200 bergs from here to Labrador. Slab ice too. Rob told us La Scie fishermen were calling for an ice breaker at the end of June so they could get out to their nets. The ice was moving in and out of the bays as late as three weeks ago.
Birds on the berg
It’s warm. We’re in t-shirts and jeans and I even remove my socks. We haven’t sailed in this kind of heat for 3 years.
We sail a bit wing on wing (one sail out each side of the boat) with the wind pushing us from behind. Then we motor sail, always scanning for fishing nets. We are just a bit early for whales, but we know it won’t be long and the capelin will have come where we are, followed by the whales.
Harald dumps the holding tank while we are at least 3 miles offshore. This is such a benefit to sailing here - there is no need to worry about being in the next harbour in time for a pump out at the dock.
We lunch early on the prepared sandwiches and raw veggies. It’s an easy day. Our jackets come back on as we pass Gull Island, where there is another ice berg and a few larger ones in our path to La Scie. At this point we spot another sailboat which appears to be coming from the north. We later find this is Mamashee from Lewisporte. Gary and Kevin are at the dock when we finally arrive less than an hour behind them.
Rugged home for the shore birds
Many shore birds are flying in and out of the crevices at Cape St. John and Duggins Tilt Cove, including dozens of puffins that fly low to the water, skimming past our bow.
We pass quite close to a large ice berg, with just enough room to go between it and the shore. I guide Harald through the bergy bits in its debris field.
Harald prepares the fenders and lines and I steer us down the La Scie channel, past the break walls and to the finger docks where Gary and Kevin are waiting, along with Clyde the Harbour Master. We are grateful for someone to take our lines.
Once we are settled, we visit Clyde in his office and tell him our plan and need for laundry. No problem. We meet Clyde’s wife, Marilyn, who also works in the Harbour Master’s office. The harbour has been busy with the end of the crab fishery. There is no longer a fish plant here, but there are many transport trucks parked at the old site. The large longliners come along side where they empty their catch and their gear into the trucks. Crab traps are being stored on shore.
We walk to the grocery store and buy milk and bread and then head back for cold beverages in our cockpit with Gary and Kevin. We hear their plan and the tale of their leaking oil. We hope they can fix it and not be yet another casualty trying to get to Labrador this summer.
Supper is left over cod and schnitzel. I try Rob’s recipe for Salsa Cod, covering the cod, while it heats, with salsa and mozzarella cheese. Easy and so good!
The next two days are spent doing laundry, writing Seabiscuit’s blog and walking back and forth from boat to harbour office to complete both tasks. Harald caulked another leaky window (successfully!), filled the diesel tank from a jerry can, oiled the steering chain, checked the engine oil and hauled laundry.
We are invited to join Clyde and Marilyn for their noon dinner in the office on Tuesday. He has prepared a large pot of fish and brewis and has the boardroom table set. (Hard tack soaked overnight, mixed with cod and pork scrunchions) Marilyn shares her home baked cinnamon rolls and boiled raisin-spice cake for dessert. The conversation is about the area, places we have been and fishing, including a full description of how Clyde cleans cod. We mention our visit to Fleur de Lys and seeing Sam’s Place, the memorial to the young murdered girl. Clyde said the entire peninsula was drawn into the tragedy. Stories and towns are all connecting for us now.
Looking out the La Scie Channel
On Wednesday, after lunch at the Outport Tea Room, we walk to the lookout (the temperature is 36’C with the humidity. Grateful for a breeze) to see the whales. The capelin has arrived so the whales have too. The capelin was “rolling” east of here just as we set out on our journey. The tiny fish actually roll onto the beaches, in the thousands. This phenomenon brings people to the beaches to scoop the fish by the buckets full. We expect to see whales from the boat tomorrow. We ask the locals what kind they are - humpbacks? Minkes? “Just normal whales”.
There is a lady standing at the lookout when we arrive. We start chatting and she tells me she is from the Horse Islands, just off shore. I tell her we met Keith Bath, also from the Horse Islands, when we were here last year. We bought his book, “Diary of a Master Fisherman”, after he sat with us for an hour telling us his tale. She is his niece. The conversation is friendly and personal - typical for people here. She confirms Keith is on the Grand Banks fishing for hake and pollock, the only boat that went from La Scie - we aren’t surprised, knowing what we know about Mr. Bath. He hauled 100,000lb to shore in one day this week.
This has been a delightful day but we still need to get some provisions so we can head further west tomorrow. The bread shelves are bare but the delivery comes just as we are checking out. Three bags of groceries, $85 - but we got a beautiful cantaloupe, romaine hearts, tomatoes, sausage, milk, eggs and yogurt. Blueberries from the USA will have to due until we are back in August and can pick our own.
That visit will include a tour of The Outport Museum and at least one more hike, as there are several noted worth doing.
News from Pachina Mia! Mike and Ann are off the dock after a dramatic cell phone retrieval (3 dives and still working!). They don’t plan to travel far but we look forward to getting their location updates with the hope to anchor with them on our return journey.
Our last evening in La Scie includes BBQd chicken for supper, a FaceTime chat with a special grandson turning six the next day, cards in the cockpit and a very threatening sky in the west. We have seen some spectacular sunsets here but this is an ominous dark cloud.
For some reason the ATVs aren’t running this evening??? This is a local practise which we witnessed on our last visit. As soon as they finish supper, many people get in their pickup trucks or on their ATVs or dirt bikes and drive the entire coast road - back and forth until after dark. We can see them coming, like a parade, equally spaced, from across the bay. They drive past the floating docks and on toward the end of the harbour where some will stop to wash their vehicles with the water hose at the wharf. We are amazed considering the price of gas!
The forecast was for rain which finds us at 2:30am. I am up closing hatches. Men are still working at unloading a boat at the wharf. Fortunately, with the rain came a cooler temperature, so we sleep okay in the closed-up cabin until 7:00. It is a cloudy morning but we expect some clearing before we head across the bay to the ice plant for water and then west to Coachman’s Cove for the next few days.
Seabiscuit across the bay