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Trip Day:
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139
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Latitude:
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46° 08.00'
N
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Locks Today:
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0
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Miles Today:
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31
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Longitude:
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082°36.98'W
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Locks Total:
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81
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Total Miles:
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2,805
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Location:
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John Harbor Anchorage
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A nice-sized bass decided to join us for dinner tonight as the guest of honor. We wish his brother had come along, but he was the one to accept our invitation.
Since we anchored on the south shore of the channel last night, we motor sailed another 14 miles to Gore Bay to check out the area. The marina allowed us to tie up long enough for a walkabout on main street and lunch at a little café advertising three dollar beer. Unfortunately the town museum was closed so our visit was short but lunch was good and the weather was perfect.
Leaving Gore Bay we headed northwest to cross to the north shore of the North Channel. The winds were light making an easy crossing of wide-open water with no land in sight for a few miles, then the island ranges came into view. Boat traffic was fairly heavy since it was Saturday with a lot of white sails visible against the dark outline of the hills.
The selected anchorage for the night was the protected waters between the large John Island and the small Dewdney Island which would put us in position for a westward run tomorrow. The entrance between the two islands looked skinny on the charts, but it wasn’t until we approached that we got a little nervous. It appeared that there was a rock shoal almost all the way across. Ron raised the center boards then stood watch on the bow as I inched into the opening. The depth reading was 28 feet then began to decrease 16. . .8. . .5.5. . .4. . .3.5! We held our breath and drifted through, the bow cleared, the center cleared, then the port rudder bumped briefly and we rounded up into 9 feet of water again. 
There were several sailboats at anchor in the harbor but they must have rounded John Island and entered from the north—they certainly could not have cleared the southern passage.
This small plane flew over John Island, landed, and pulled up to shore. The two occupants secured the plane then brought out lounge chairs and relaxed for an hour before packing up and taking off again.
Spot us on Google Earth at Location: John Harbor in footer below. . .
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