Disconnected

Tuesday, June 16, 2020. Waddington Bay.

 

Well, we finally did get a sunny day. And a rest day. Hallelujah for both!

It’s sunny, but cold, and a stiff west wind to keep us hunting at anchor, swinging back and forth.

We took advantage of our first real down day to sleep in a bit this morning. I finally caught up from my sleepless night a couple of nights ago. I put the cabin heater on about 7 a.m., and went back to bed until 8. Sara was up soon after that, but after a cup of tea, she took the opportunity to go back to bed again, and have a real sleep-in until about 9.

We finally came alive sometime after that. Breakfast was bagels toasted in a frying pan and a few pieces of bacon. As the sun warmed up the day, we took the opportunity to finally get the SUPs in the water, and headed up the bay to check out the other boats. Of course, the wind piped up around then too, so we ended up pushing into a fairly stiff breeze.

As we paddled by a boat called Alcheringa, the woman on board came out to hang her laundry on the line, taking advantage of our first break in the rain. We chatted for a bit, and her husband came up as well. Their boat was a wooden classic, built in 1979 they told us. I forget what make and model they said it was, but they told us it was the original boat that the molds for the Tayana 37 were based on. Another Bob Perry design. They had sailed to New Zealand and back in 1989, and apparently had been to Hawaii a couple of times too. We estimated their age to be mid to late 70s, but it’s hard to tell from a distance, on a SUP. Anyway, the seemed like lovely people, and if it weren’t for all the social isolating we are supposed to be doing, it would have been nice to chat with them more, and learn about their sailing history. They said that had sailed something like 38,000 miles on their little boat.

Alcheringa and Southwest 30 in front of Monashee III

After chatting with them, we pulled the SUPs up on a shell beach near the head of the bay, where a trail was flagged into the woods. It didn’t really go far. It seemed to end at a fire pit just inside the forest canopy. The tall trees had shaded the ground so much, though, that there wasn’t much undergrowth, and we rambled along through the huge green giants, walking along fallen logs and along through the forest for a while. Eventually, we ran out of ground though, as forest debris blocked our way, and we headed back to the SUPs. (Sara discovered the plastic in her 15 year old sailing boots had cracked and the water poured in so we will add boots to the ‘list’ when we next see a store.)

Sara getting hungry from all the hiking

We paddled around the rest of Waddington Bay, with the outgoing tide and a strengthening west wind pushing us quickly out the entrance. It was an uphill battle to get back to the boat. Eagles circled overhead, looking for fishing opportunities in the clear water.

Paddling Waddington Bay

Back on board, we had a quick lunch of cheese quesadilla, cheese and crackers. Then we settled down to enjoy the sunny afternoon. I took the opportunity to have a nap down below in the warm boat, and Sara read her book in the cockpit. The wind continued to whistle, but we were warm and cozy in our full cockpit enclosure. The plastic provides a nice greenhouse effect, and despite the cold wind, it stayed toasty inside.

After my nap, we put away the spare anchor and rode that we had left on the deck since our misadventures in Pearse Bay. I then double checked weather using the Garmin InReach device, which worked great. It is nice to have a satellite option for weather, since our VHF is only picking up the weather channel intermittently here, and without other connectivity, we can’t download weather any other way.

I was trying to remember the last time that I was completely disconnected from the world via cell phone or WiFi. It has been a long time. It’s amazing how much of a crutch it becomes, and how used we are to having constant connectivity at our fingertips. On a normal day, I shudder to think of the number of times I refresh the headlines on my news feed or check Facebook. Even the other day at Pearse Bay, a physician called me to check references for a colleague, and I answered right away.

Even though it is a bit unsettling, there is something therapeutic, even necessary, to being completely unplugged for a while. The constant availability and interconnectedness that we experience every day is an awesome thing, in the most literal sense of the word. But I wonder what the effect is of never having a break, never being alone with your thoughts, never being dependent on yourself to understand the world around you, without having instant access to all knowledge, all the time.

Anyway, eventually, we moved on to dinner. When you are out here on the boat, much of the daily routine revolves around planning, thinking about, and eating meals. We were going to barbecue, but the cold wind made it unappealing to open up the cockpit enclosure, so Sara fired up the oven and cooked some souvlaki chicken skewers, which we ate with tzatziki sauce, garlic bread, and a salad. Now, we have put the boat to bed by cleaning up the deck and pulling in the paddle boards, and are back in the cabin with the heat on and the light fading. The wind is whistling through the rigging, and we are still swinging side to side, but we are confident in the security our anchor, having hung on it all day as the tide and wind pulled hard at our home.