East to Fogo!

Tracking

For those of you that have been led astray by the Marine Traffic App (I have no idea why it is not working for us…our instruments appear to be fine) we are no longer in the middle of the Strait of Belle Isle and have not been for weeks.

Even the SPOT tracker seemed to have had a wobble.  Nothing I can do about Marine Traffic, but we took SPOT apart, gave him new batteries, pushed all his buttons, yelled at him, and threatened to throw him in the ocean, and now he seems to be working. The link is on the ‘Where Are We’ page.

As a recap, here is our route pulled from our ships instruments, since we left St Anthony.

Saturday, July 12 – Bay of Islands

With a Bald Eagle standing guard on the northern cliff we thoroughly enjoyed a quiet, calm, solo anchorage here. The water temperature in the bay was 19C(!) so we enjoyed a cooling dunk while the other person watched out for the lion’s mane jellyfish (has stingers).

The NW arm of the Bay of Islands is completely undeveloped, with a dilapidated walkway that originally connected the NW and SE bays (old settlement houses there), but access from shore was overgrown.  We dinghied around looking for more birdlife -Gulls, Terns, Bald Eagle.

Sunday, July 13 – Seal Bay

Sailed on to explore more of Notre Dame Bay. Found Budgell Cove, in Seal Bay, a nicely sheltered bay, which the map indicates has aquaculture farms. All we saw were fishing gear around the shore and a possible mussel raft at the end of the bay.

Ideally, we want to anchor in a mud or sand bottom and on our first attempt the anchor skipped across hard rock; second try got hooked into mud and kelp in ~15 m.  It was a great anchorage because, despite a bit of a blow that night, we hardly moved at all.

Just above the bay is Budgell Lake, but there is now a substantial cottage on the only natural path between the bay and the lake (10m apart).  Not to be denied a fresh water plunge, we were prepared to beg… but no one was home! What a treat! While the ocean dunks are great to cool off, there is something magical about immersing yourself in fresh water (it had been a while!)

Monday, July 14 – To Exploit Islands

We heard much about the Exploit Islands so off we went. Had a nice downwind sail, chose to enter from the south entrance versus the narrow north ‘tickle’ – arrived at 2pm. We didn’t have to anchor further into the populated bay (nice, bright cottages!) as the community wharf was empty and it was close to the start of the hike. Also being on the wharf meant we did not worry about wind shifts (there’s been a lot of cycling winds).

The Surgeon Cove Head Lighthouse Trail is a 3-hour, out&back, grind with lots of vertical, bogs, and forests but there are stunning views of the Exploit Island Chain from the Lighthouse. Mercifully, the Newfie mosquito swarm seem to have taken the day off but we were escorted by several squadrons of deer flies (that didn’t bite). Thank you to the Exploit Island community as they really take their hiking seriously by offering a ‘stick library’ – we were very grateful.

Wednesday, July 16 to Twillingate

With a day of rain, followed by a day of very high winds forecasted for the rest of the week, we made the decision to move to a harbour with services where we could ride out whatever came at us in relative comfort.

We had a lovely downwind sail to Twillingate arriving mid-day. Twillingate Bay is long, with a north-south orientation. The small, sheltered harbour is behind a substantial breakwater at the southern end. As we motored in we quickly realized that the floating docks (usually designated for transients) were full of local motorboats, so we hovered in the harbour in a cross wind, phoned the local harbourmaster (shout out to Kathy) who guided us in behind the fishing fleet to the inside of the commercial wharf where we tied off. We are getting better at maneuvering with no bowthruster! We did take time to turn Tikaani around using lines and with the help of a retired fisherman who was itching for something to do! While the fishing fleet is active here, there is no fish processing facility in town (it all gets shipped away) so the fishy harbour smell is limited when they are offloading – which was shrimp while we were there.

The day we arrived was an “off” day for the fleet, so the fleet was all in. We were the only transient boat. Over the next few days, we had several other boats join us, tucked in the back of the fleet to wait out Friday’s blow.

The weather was sunny and hot and Kathy suggested the Hospital Lake park and trail 15 minutes up the road. Another fresh water dunk – with the local kids! We prioritized Lobster Rolls, laundry, eating out, touristy shopping and the winery tour. Twillingate is definitely a tourist mecca – many RVs and US license plates. Breakfast at the Cozy Tea Room is someone’s walk out basement converted into a small restaurant, offering baked goods.  The Great Auk Winery (Auk is an extinct penguin – puffin-like) in the adjacent town, Durrell, makes wines from local berries and Dandelion, with a good a restaurant and a funky shop. The products are decidedly Newfoundland!

With time to kill, we hiked the Back Bay, had amazing cod tacos, and developed an affection for Quidi Vidi beers Day Boil and 1892 (brewed in St.John’s).

We were in Twillingate for 3 nights due to the weather forecast…and so glad we did. The rain came in steady volumes on Friday and the wind came howling out of the SW. We recorded 28 kts in the sheltered harbour behind the fishing boats! Gusts were much higher. Tikaani was pinned against the wharf, so all fenders out, lines watched -it was a less-than-restful night.

Saturday July 18 – Heading East

Saturday morning offered clear sky and more manageable winds of 15-20 kts. We reviewed PredictWind and planned possible harbours these next 7 days. We decided to continue east to an anchorage on the west side of Fogo island, BUT the fun in Twillingate was not over…

As we were motoring out of the Bay, just contemplating going through the ‘tickle’ on the exit,  the engine coughed and started spewing white smoke. We shut it down immediately, Steve checked under the hood – seemed ok – but then could not get it restarted. Winds were up to 20kts and pushing us to shore quickly. We got the staysail up to give us some motion and steering, called the harbourmaster to arrange a tow back in – no response – rocks got closer, staysail was not enough, could put up the Mainsail but then still couldn’t maneuver into harbour under sail.  Not knowing what else to do, we called up the coastguard (based in Labrador). Fifteen minutes later, the Coastguard Cutter Conception Bay out of Twillingate and 4 crew saddled Tikaani up (side by side) and took us back to the fishing wharf, dropped at the loading zone. Kinda like the walk of shame for sailors…

For an hour on the wharf, we ran diagnostics on the engine, checked every filter/valve/fitting and were able to start her up again with no issues.  We tried everything to recreate the cough/smoke but the engine purred like a kitten.  We gave it a good hour on the wharf and decided to take our chances. We slipped out of harbour again, hoping nobody was looking.

The rest of the day was a pleasant downwind sail arriving at 5pm to an anchorage on Hare Bay, Fogo Island, town is Deep Cove. It is just around the corner from Fogo, the town. The terrain reminded us of Labrador – rocks and lichen.

The Cruising guide had a suggested anchorage but it looked really shallow on the Nav. We checked out the south end of the bay but weren’t convinced it wasn’t a rocky bottom.  So, trusting the Cruising guide and carefully watching our depth, we nestled our way into a stunning little cove, very sheltered, at the end of the town Deep Cove, anchored and settled in for the night.