I am starting to look on Sturt Bay, a smallish indentation toward the top end of Texada Island near the little mining town of Van Anda, as a sort of Zen master of boating. Every time I visit there, I think I am learning something, but the next time, it turns out the lesson wasn’t what I thought it was.
The first time I came to Sturt Bay, it was toward the end of a blustery day that had culminated in a tacking duel of sorts between ourselves and another sailboat bound for, as it turned out, the same tiny destination. That shouldn’t have been any surprise, because there are few places to duck out of the north end of Malaspina Strait for the night. Sturt Bay represents about seventy-five percent of those places.
The race wasn’t formal, and from the other boat’s perspective, probably didn’t even exist, but it’s a natural thing to start to measure your progress against others on the same path and I shouted gleefully when I saw them ‘give’ by turning into the wind and furling their sails well short of the destination. Our rails buried in foaming green water, we actually gained on them after they started motoring. My first Sturt Bay Zen lesson: sailboats are meant to sail. When it gets rough, you’re probably not gaining anything by dropping sail and relying on your engine. They had a rougher, slower ride on what already had to have been a difficult day.
When we actually ducked into the bay, I was doubly glad we had beat them there. Deep at the mouth, the available anchorage area for small craft toward the head is woefully tight, hemmed in by drying shoals on both sides, with relatively small shelves of solid mud holding ground around the periphery. On a windy day, when one is looking to put a lot of scope out, there may only be swinging room for a couple of boats. We were number one; the anchor was down and set by the time the other sailboat nosed in, and he shuffled around forlornly a bit before going in and tying up at the Texada Boat Club docks (also a fine choice; but not free).
I congratulated myself on ‘winning’ the race and picking up the prime anchoring spot, immensely self-satisfied. Only later did I realize what a jerk I had been. By setting a stern tie to shore, there would have been plenty of room for both of us and more boats besides, should they come in. I had rushed in, slopped out a lot of scope, and monopolized a precious anchorage in a storm. I imagine mariners have been hung for less.
Second Sturt Bay Zen lesson: don’t be a jerk, help other boats fit in.
So, this year, when I once again found myself entering Sturt Bay at the end of the day (thankfully in much more benign conditions) I was both gratified to find it almost empty again, and determined to do my part to keep it open for any later arrivals. And just as we were setting the hook toward the head of the cove, a powerboat came in behind us, the owner standing on the foredeck and looking around speculatively.
“I’ve never been in here before,” he yelled across.
“Don’t worry,” I said, “I’m going to set a shore tie, you’ll have plenty of room to drop right there!”
Once the anchor was set I hauled out my stern tie line and put the raft over the side. I made the line fast to a stern cleat and started rowing for shore. I rowed. And rowed. And rowed. It wasn’t that far… but the wind, if not threatening, was still brisk enough to swing the stern of the boat out toward the center of the bay, and not in the direction I was hauling the line. Turning a big boat with a lot of windage broad on to the wind with oar power alone, I found, wasn’t all that easy. Maddeningly, I could pull it around and get within ten feet or so of shore just before the next gust came up to turn the boat back around, and force me to start rowing like mad again just to hold in place.
The power boater made a few runs at setting his own anchor and eventually gave up and headed for the Boat Club docks. I hope he was just unhappy with how he set and wasn’t fed up with waiting around for me. I gave up, eventually, and rowed myself and my spaghetti coil of line back to Insegrevious.
Third Sturt Bay Zen lesson: good intentions are meaningless without some abilities to back them up.
I have thought up a half-dozen ways I might have accomplished what I was planning on, if only I had thought about it and talked it through first with my wife. It’s hard to come up with and implement that stuff on the spur of the moment, though, particularly if you are not very experienced cruisers. If there’s anything else that Sturt Bay has taught me, it’s that we’re an awfully long way from that sort of Zen focus I can only admire in others.
We’re passing by there a couple more times on this trip, though. Who knows what I might learn?