Port Hardy, Vancouver Island, August 5 - 11, 2003
Sea Venturer, Captain Chris and Belinda Miller

I'm writing about the surface stuff; Jim Brown's report will cover the diving.

Paul Good, Jim "Uptown" Brown, Vern "Darth" Heagy, Fran Rebert, Cindy Wilman-Kinsey, Chris Mayo, Ralph Spayd, and yours truly just spent fabulous week in God's Country: Port Hardy, Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Actually, Port Hardy was the northernmost town on Vancouver Island and the point of departure for the Sea Venturer which took us another hour north through the Goletas Channel. Ten hours after leaving Harrisburg's stifling summer heat and humidity, we had cool and clear Fall-like weather. The Gore Tex jackets and pants we packed for the forecasted rain, rain, and more rain hardly made it out of suitcases the entire week. We learned, however, that there was a price to pay for such good fortune. First, all of the sun created orgy-like conditions for the plankton which decreased the viz to as low as 10-15 feet at times. [Note in proof: Unfortunately, nothing rhymes with plankton. I was a lot happier when I first wrote there was an algae orgy, but I was corrected by our own resident ichthyologist, Jim Brown. Incidentally, nothing rhymes with ichthyologist either]. The first few dives were like quarry-diving with critters. Second, we were a seal's worst nightmare. After the first dive, Vern shredded his neck seal, probably on a metal cleat on the boat gunwale. After Vern busted the zipper on a loaner drysuit that Capt. Chris had on the boat, he and Paul shared Paul's suit, fortunately for those of us with queasy stomachs, not at the same time. Then about 2 minutes before splashdown, Chris Mayo noticed that I had a torn wrist seat. A little electrical tape was enough to get me in the water and stay dry for the first 3-4 minutes. I got wetter on that dive than I did on Dive 1 when I forgot to close my drysuit zipper (Doh!!). A little patching and I was ready to rock and roll. The only near casualty was when I was in the water at the stern just as the Christmas Tree ladder decided it was time to fall - and I got clobbered. Fortunately I got hit in the head, which contains one of my many vestigial organs. A lot of blood and a bruised ego, but not enough to cancel the dive. Fox will include footage in a special this Fall entitled, "When Ladders Attack!"

When we weren't in the water, we ate like kings and queens and reveled in the beauty of Vancouver Island. The boat was docked in the inlet of a rustic resort called God's Pocket. (By "rustic" I mean they rely on generators for electricity, get water from a stream, have no telephones and no cell phone service. Kind of like New York City yesterday). Dives were run from the tender that absolutely hauled ass out to the channel. We were treated to bald eagles on every one of these "balls to the wall" trips to the dive sites. We spent a glorious 30 minutes running with an Orca, but had less luck with the Stella's sea lion that ditched us. The Harbor Seals basking on rocks were a lot better looking than the naked grandmother skinny dipping in the 50 degree water. Naked Granny chilled us more than the 48-50 degree water temps. We took a break from diving to visit the nearby Scarlet Point lighthouse and then trekked the surrounding old growth forest where a garter snake had Vern and Franny take turns hiding behind each other. Cindy and Fran made the most of the hiking trails and kayaks at God's Pocket.

The description of this trip on Smokey's website was true: not for the novice or the warm water diver. These were drift dives in cold water where you had to watch your depth. On one dive we were 10 feet from the edge of a small rocky island when Capt. Chris mentioned that the sounder showed a depth of 208 feet. Most of us stayed in the 40-60 ft range and good stuff was often found in the 25-35 ft range, unless you were in a kelp forest. The Kelp Krawlers, Paul and Ralph, spent 30 minutes making sure that there was nothing to see in a kelp forest. Two hundred feet off shore the depth was often 300-350 feet. What made diving possible with such strong currents was Captain Chris' ability to nail the slack tide period when the current was minimal. Capt. Chris even finessed it a few times telling us the incoming current would take us north and then after 30 minutes the outgoing tide would bring us back. Pretty slick!

You're going to love the photo album. Darth's and Uptown's digital photos are fabulous; hopefully the divers shooting film got some great pics too. And a very good time was had by all!


More to come - Uptown Brown is finishing up the underwater reports!