The theme of this year’s cruising True Love Adventure is more “sustainable bliss” vs dramatic adventure. To be clear cruising on the Salish Sea always has a bit of adventure. Navigating the needed upkeep and repairs to our 20 year old boat and navigating the weather, currents and tides always creates a sense of adventure. But we have decided that, this year, whenever possible, to take it slow and not push it. So far so good!

We left Seattle on Fathers Day in the afternoon, after joining in on an alumni zoom gathering of our “Awake and Alive” living with cancer group. It’s always so amazing to share survival and care stories with people who have a shared perspective on life and healing. After that, we left our home marina in Seattle and cruised north, stopping first at Langley, on the SE side of Whidbey Island. The weather was gloomy, but the winds were calm and we were able to stay just ahead of the big squalls that you can see on our chart plotter. We docked easily and the Lady Washington pulled in behind us. What a beautiful old sailing ship!

Langley is home to some very special friends and frankly we don’t visit often enough. It is where we did our first “Awake and Alive Living with Cancer” retreat in 2015 and home to “Healing Circles” where people dealing with serious illness and life challenges gather regularly to help each other. This trip we were able to meet up with so many special friends. First, we had a yummy dinner with Erica. She picked us up at the dock, drove us to her home, cooked us dinner where we shared the most important things happening in our lives and the wonderful views of her farm.

Heading back to the boat we noticed the Peach Pie, owned by our friends Sydney and Christopher Gorrell, who we met recently in Hawaii. They just happened to stop there for the night on a cruise from Edmonds to Anacortes. It’s a small world!

The next morning we were picked up again by our friends Carol and Laired Vanetta for breakfast before we were delivered into Langley where we walked around before connecting with our other dear friend Diana Lindsey. Clearly we have to go back to Langley more often!

From Langley we headed north again to Oak Harbor to buy some of the lowest priced diesel in WA. Seven years ago we payed $1.47/gallon. This year the price was $4.20/gallon and we considered ourselves lucky. We always fill the tank before heading to Canada where diesel is 25% more, even after the discount for paying with Canadian dollars. Fully refueled, we traveled north again through Deception Pass at the north tip of Whidbey Island, on our way to a cozy overnight anchorage in Hunters Bay on the SE corner of Lopez Island, one of the San Juan Islands, the northern most islands in Washington State.

In past years we would have pushed ourselves to go all the way from the San Juans to Nanaimo in one long day so we could dash from there farther north to Egmont and then the next day into Princess Louisa Inlet (PLI), our all-time favorite anchorage in the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia. But applying our “sustainable bliss” decision rule we chose instead to cruise only a few hours the next day to Cabbage Island, just across the US-Canada border and our favorite anchorage in this area. If the winds are calm or from the south this a perfect first stop in Canadian waters. We were a bit concerned because the weather report talked about strong northwest winds overnight “near” Vancouver Island. As is often the case with Canadian marine forecasts, that is not very clear. What does “near” mean in Canadian weather speak? Who knows? We decided to take a look and see what the winds were like. We could always move further on if we needed to.

Clearly, and thankfully, Cabbage Island was not “near”enough. The winds were perfectly calm that evening, all night, and the next day, and because it is relatively early in the season there was room for us to anchor and enjoy kayaking, paddle boarding two beautiful sunsets.

Jim is a a 45 year cancer survivor, which is a miracle. Over the past 11 years we’ve been dealing with the downstream health issues from the radiation including his near-fatal heart attack in 2012 and other newer issues like muscle wasting. It’s a bit of a mystery but, we are adapters and experiential learners. The solution for us has been sustainable bliss, mindfulness, Qi Gong and working harder on strength and flexibility. To that end, we added regular yoga to our lives so he can continue to do things like get into the kayak, and it paid off. Jim got into and out of his kayak, without a problem. As Dori says, “just keep swimming!”

Again applying our sustainable bliss principle we stayed a second night. There were so many eagles around we had a blast kayaking and listening to them communicate. A couple of them flew through the forest like Star Wars flying speeder bikes.

Both nights we were treated to spectacular sunsets.

One of my goals from this year was to be in Ganges on Salt Spring Island on Friday night so we could go to the Farmers Market on Saturday morning and buy some of the magical sourdough rye bread that is sold there. Another draw is Moby’s Pub where they sell duck wings rather than chicken wings. From Cabbage Island we had an easy 2 hour cruise to Salt Spring Island and we docked on Friday afternoon with time to dine on duck wings, ribs and homemade pie (with left overs), listen to a lovely musician and get some laundry done. Perfect!

The next morning I got the Captain up early so we could secure our bread before it sold out at the Salt Spring Farmers Market. The utterly charming collection of playful booths full of food, fresh donoughts, organic veggies, hippy charms, art and of course bread make it a must visit.

The luthier (Terry) who made my favorite Ukulele has a booth there and I needed him to look at a small crack that I had recently discovered in my Uke. Unfortunately, someone had knocked into it at the mountains and although it doesn’t affect the sound, I would like it repaired. He connected me with “Rick”, Terry’s gifted string instrument repair person. Rick is in Victoria (the southern tip of Vancouver Island and the capital of British Columbia) so we hope to meet up with him there on our cruise south at the end of Summer.

We planned to spend two nights at the dock at Salt Spring, but those predicted winds were howling, but from the south right into us knocking us into the dock for a noisy and rocky stay. Looking at another night of creaking and rocking the Captain suggested we leave at 6 and head to nearby Montague Harbour where we could have a quieter night.

I was concerned that leaving late in the day after a really full day of walking twice into town pushed the limits on our “sustainable bliss” goal. But persistent southerly winds and waves were making our time at the dock in Ganges really uncomfortable, and as the Captain pointed out, Montague Habour was only about an hour away and a place where we have anchored many times. So despite my concerns, we left Ganges and cruised over to Montague.

The Captain’s intuition was correct (this time). It didn’t take long on our journey from Salt Spring to Montague to escape the winds and waves. And we got to enjoy another fabulous sunset in calm waters!

From Montague it was an easy cruise the next day to Nanaimo, another of our favorite stops and a perfect place to prepare for the sometimes difficult crossing of the Strait of Georgia to get to the mainland side of where our favorite fjords (like Princess Louisa Inlet) are located. But before we left I used one of my new favorite power tools to blow up the bumpers. The cruise from Montague to Nanaimo was gorgeous, sunny and calm.

We connected with Hawaii friends, Marylin and Don Harvey, who recently moved to a community just north of Naniamo. They drove to us and stopped by for a quick visit on the True Love. Then they joined us for a yummy dinner at one of our favorite restaurants Astera Taverna (which specializes in Greek food).

In nice weather crossing the Strait of Georgia from Nanaimo east to the mainland is easy. In winds it can be brutal. It’s where we had one of our scariest adventures, involving storms and smoke and it inspired Episode 2 of the Curve of Time Podcast. The blog post is in some old software I can’t locate. This year the forecast looked good and the crossing was easy. Four hours later we were docked at the Back Eddy Marina in Egmont where we had a nice meal on the deck and watched a beautiful sunset. Next stop Princess Louisa. But first the Orcas.

We woke up to a lazy morning and as we were enjoying our yogurt parfaits the Captain spotted the first orcas of the day. It was one of the biggest Orcas we’ve ever seen. Then we saw them again so we we decided to quickly leave the dock and get closer.

As we made are way down Jervis Inlet toward PLI we encountered a second pair of Orcas. The orca escort continued until we had to journey on to make it easily to the tidal rapid entrance to PLI at slack tide.

Sunny, warm and calm, the journey up Jervis Inlet was perfect and we listened to music and danced along.

And the entrance to the inlet through Malibu Rapids was the calmest we’ve ever seen it, so we timed it perfectly! Once in PLI we made our way to our favorite anchorage with its two “private” waterfalls.

In past years, the Captain would do the shore tie with the tender while I stayed with the boat. This year we thought it would be best if I climbed the shore and the Captain stayed on board. The only problem is that I’m not as good at maneuvering the tender. But with a little trial and error, I figured it out. Going forward onto shore was pretty easy, but backing out in the correct direction created a little more challenge. I know if was tough for the Captain to watch me as I figured it out. But we succeeded.

The gloriously sunny weather continues, the water is a warm 71 degrees and I quickly deployed the blow up pizza and paddle board so we could float and cool off. In late June the days are long. And the best way to cool off in the afternoon heat is in the water. Floating on the water, in the sun, and listening to the waterfalls is truly heaven and is in perfect harmony with our goal of Sustainable Bliss.

Princess Louisa continues to amaze and inspire us. The mountains, the calm water, the remoteness and the magical anchorage just doesn’t get old or boring. We will travel into to PLI 3 times this summer, sharing our favorite place with friends and family.

When we woke up yesterday, the captain checked the weather forecast for the next few days. We now have connectivity through our Starlink Satellite. Although installation wasn’t as smooth as we expected – go figure — it is nice to have the safety net of internet onboard. We were a little worried that we wouldn’t be able to control our “screen time” but it wasn’t a problem at all. And it does let us spend a little time clearing out all the junk daily instead of coming out of an isolated area to 500+ emails and messages.

Anyway, we checked the weather and it predicted a strong Northwest wind Friday and Saturday. This update would make it difficult to make our next destination: Dent Island on July 3rd. Although we planned another night in PLI, we decided to muster after breakfast and clean up our floaty toys to head out a day early. And I’m sure glad we did. It’s sunny, but the wind has arrived. We are now safely docked at the Garden Bay Marina in Powell River. And we have the extra blessing of connecting with other Canadian friends we met in Hawaii who are going to fly down on their private plane from Revelstoke to connect. As Paul Simon wrote: “We live in an age of miracles and wonders.”

Powell River is a major town (15,000+ residents) so my next project is to go to Staples and print a bunch of of my Curve of Time Podcast posters to hand out at a few key marinas and resorts. I’ll let you know how that turned out in my next blog.