Nov. 19, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
823 
How We Cruised to the A. Y. P. and Back 
H. C. Nixon and two boys tells of a cruise 
they made to Seattle last yea , which is pub¬ 
lished in The Yachtsman. It is retold here. 
For the benefit of the uninitiated, I may 
premise that A. Y. P. has nothing to do with 
“Alas! poor Yorick”; but merely signifies the 
great Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exhibition which 
was held in Seattle in the summer of 1909. 
It proved to be most interesting and success¬ 
ful; and as we happen to be separated from 
Seattle by about 200 miles of perfectly ideal 
waters for cruising, I determined to go thither 
by boat. 
The crew consisted of self and two boys—one 
19, the other 15. The elder is the engineer, as 
well as doing practically all the cooking; and 
our absolute freedom from breakdowns either in 
the culinary or machinery departments attested 
his care and competence in both. 
The craft, yclept the Mowitz, is of a some¬ 
what peculiar type; but after living on her for 
more than three years, winter and summer, 
have found her eminently suitable for the con¬ 
ditions which prevail here. She is of the scow 
or barge type, flat-bottomed, with three heavy 
keels, having a propeller on each of the side 
ones, the shoal draft (4 feet 6 inches) prac¬ 
tically necessitating twin engines to get suf¬ 
ficient power and yet have the propellers deep 
enough. She is 55 feet over all, and 17 feet 
beam, and a somewhat barn-like structure 
covers all except a small deck aft and a larger 
one forward. Although fairly large and heavy, 
the normal crew of two, all told, find no dif¬ 
ficulty in handling her; the ground gear being 
of course the heaviest part of the work, as we 
have no steam capstan, but have to break out 
and hoist with the Armstrong machine. I use 
a heavy chain and comparatively light “Sim¬ 
plex” stockless, which I have had for ten 
years and like it better than any I have ever 
used. The capstan is an American one, geared, 
and very simple and powerful. Some of the 
English ones, with exposed gearing, would give 
a great deal of trouble here in winter, as at 
times, with a gale and zero temperature, a foot 
or so of slush and snow will suddenly turn to 
the consistency of marble; and then well en¬ 
closed gears and old-fashioned “simple life” 
capstan bars are the only efficient implements. 
However, no thought of snow or ice troubled 
us on the present trip, as we left Denman Island 
on June 22, and ran down to Deep Bay for the 
night. This is a very snug and typical anchor¬ 
age, near the mouth of Baynes Sound—a har¬ 
bor within a harbor—-and much resorted to by 
tow-boats and small craft in rough weather, as 
there is no other shelter for thirty miles down 
the coast, which is exposed to the sea from the 
whole gulf of Georgia. Like almost all the 
anchorages in this country, the water is pretty 
deep right up to the edge of flats which dry at 
low water, and it is often difficult to get much 
less than 10 fathoms without tailing too close. 
At the heads of the great “fiords,” or inlets, 
which abound up the coast, the water some¬ 
times shoals from 40 fathoms to two or three 
in a few yards distance, and then the mud and 
sand flats may extend for miles; hence the ad¬ 
vantage of a boat that can easily beach. In 
Deep Bay conditions are very fair, and we 
anchored all right in about 8 fathoms, and 
settled up stores, etc., for the trip. Fortu¬ 
nately, as the weather was fine, there were not 
many booms of logs in the way. In rough 
weather tugs often lie, when taking temporary 
shelter, with their booms tailing behind, and a 
more unpleasant customer cannot be imagined 
than one of them bumping alongside or, worse 
still, sweeping across one. These booms are 
sometimes 1,200 feet to as much as 1,800 feet 
long, and 70 to 80 wide, consisting of enormous 
logs made up inside “boom-sticks” and “swift- 
ers,” all secured together by one-inch chains. 
They are nearly all red fir (so-called Oregon fir) 
and cedar, and many of the individual logs are 
more than 6 feet to 8 feet in diameter, and some 
draw 6 feet of water—so they constitute a pretty 
substantial obstruction. 
The next morning (June 23) we started for 
Nanaimo, with a light, fair wind, and passing 
Yellow Rock light were soon in the gulf. There 
is a very good lighthouse here and a fog siren 
worked by a gasoline engine. There are two 
range lights for entering Baynes Sound, up 
which there is a good deal ot heavy traffic, on. 
account of the coal mines there. Holt’s blue 
funnel liners, the Australian boats, and many 
large “tramps” are continually passing, besides 
the local trade, which is considerable. On Den¬ 
man Island, which forms one side of Baynes 
Sound, are two saw mills, a large quarry and 
many farms or “ranches,” as they are called 
here. In spite of all this stir, there are quite 
a number of deer on the island, and one morn¬ 
ing when the light-keeper was putting out the 
lights he saw no less than four swimming 
straight for his house. 
When we were about six miles down the gulf 
we saw a man-o’-war coming up behind, which 
proved to be H.M.S. Algerine, one of the small 
gun boats stationed here. As they passed they 
ran up a signal, but as I had not the new signal 
book nor the new flags, it was no good to us. 
They evidently wanted to speak, and thought 
our not answering implied that we thought they 
were using our private code, so they ran up 
the commercial code pennant to make sure, but 
of course it was all the same to us. Shortly 
afterward we met the Hon. James Dunsmuir’s 
fine yacht the Dolaura, a very nice vessel, built 
in Scotland quite recentlv. The gulf here is 
fairly wide; on the starboard hand we skirt the 
shore of Vancouver Island, passing Qualicum, 
Englishman's River, French Creek and Beaver 
Creek—none of them fit to anchor in—and on 
the other side are Hornby, Texada and Lasqueti 
Islands, with the mainland of British Columbia 
in the distance beyond. We soon made the 
Ballinacs, two small islands, with another light¬ 
house, and then passing Nanoose Bay came into 
Departure Bay and Nanaimo. Here we steamed 
right into a small floating wharf and tied up, 
only about 50 yards from shore, in perfect 
shelter. Nanaimo is a very prettily-situated 
little town, with an excellent harbor, in which 
there is generally a good deal of shipping on ac¬ 
count of the coal mines here. These are about 
the oldest in British Columbia, and furnished a 
large amount of bituminous coat of very fair 
steaming quality. It is only about 35 miles 
from Vancouver, and only 22 of that is open 
water, while nearly all the way to Victoria 
(about 60 miles) affords fine calm stretches af 
perfectly sheltered water among numerous 
islands; so, needless to say, the ubiquitous 
motor boat abounds. In fact, from this to 
Seattle we were hardly ever clear of either the 
sight, sound, or smell of one or more of all 
shapes and sizes. There is a flourishing herring 
fishery here in the winter, mostly run by Jap¬ 
anese, who largely use motors in their fishing 
boats. They like simple engines—as one of 
them said to me, he did not want one with “too 
much think” about it. 
The next day, June 24, we left in time to get 
fairly slack water at Dodd’s Narrows, about five 
miles from Nanaimo. The passage here is only 
about 100 feet wide in one place, and the tide 
rushes through at about 9 knots; but as it is a 
straight shoot there are few heavy overfalls or 
whirlpools. Some fairly large vessels use it, 
and many tugs with scows and even booms; 
but it is necessary to have slack water to ne¬ 
gotiate it safely. We got through nicely and 
found it a little rough on the other side, as it 
was blowing a strong S.E. gale, and heavy rain. 
But one is so well protected by the numerous 
islands that there is no drift for a really heavy 
sea to get up in; although in the longer reaches 
it gets nasty for small craft, especially against 
the tide. This is when the comfort of steam 
comes in, as we can sit in the pilot house look¬ 
ing at the rain beating in the windows, and the 
angry whitecaps rolling up against us from the 
narrow horizon shut in by mist and spray a 
few miles ahead. The boiler keeps our house 
dry and warm; and the little engines, working 
as sweetly and quietly as sewing machines, drive 
the old boat along with very little reduction in 
speed. We soon passed the reefs at the head 
of Thetis Island (where the Maimi was wrecked 
with over 4,000 tons of coal), and then opened 
up the long drift of Trincomalie Channel, 25 or 
30 miles long, up which we got the full force of 
the wind. However, we soon pushed down it 
as far as Montagu Harbor, where we decided 
to anchor for the next day, which was Sunday. 
This is another perfect anchorage, quite land¬ 
locked and sheltered from all winds, and not too 
deep. It is on Galliano Island, and is sur¬ 
rounded by high land, wooded to the water’s 
edge, with little bays and beaches of white sand 
alternating with its otherwise rocky shores. As 
it cleared up in the evening, we went ashore 
and got some wood for fuel. All the beaches 
and shores here are covered with all sorts of 
drift wood, and it is generally an easy matter 
to load up in a short time. We carry saws and 
axes, but only in deep snow in winter have to 
use them much, as the furnace takes wood over 
five feet long. This again is a great advantage 
over gasolene—as wood and water are the two 
things one can get everywhere in this country 
for nothing. Sunday was a lovely day and we 
“loafed” around, catching a few cod and having 
a talk with an “old-timer” who has a ranch 
here. There are a good many blue grouse and 
some deer on the island, but of course we did 
not bother them at this time of year. There are 
also swarms of mosquitoes—in fact, more than 
I have ever seen (or felt) anywhere else; for 
as a rule, the whole coast is quite free of them 
away from the large rivers. 
On Monday, the 26th, we started early and 
had a most lovely day. The sea was like a look¬ 
ing-glass and the air clear. We steamed down 
Plumper Sound, and soon afterward crossed the 
imaginary line and got into foreign waters, in 
“Uncle Sam’s” territory. On the starboard 
hand were Stuart Island and San Juan, and, to 
port, Tumbo Island and the last of the British 
Columbia lighthouse, Waldron Island and Or- 
cas Island and its high mountain rising ahead. 
Just after passing the town and salmon fishing 
station at San Juan we turned to port around 
the north end of Lopez Island and anchored 
in Shoal Bay. The salmon fishing was in full 
swing, and in every direction we could see the 
long lines of traps, in which tens and even hun¬ 
dreds of thousands are caught in a day. Count¬ 
less gasolene boats, some very large and power¬ 
ful, and a few steamers are engaged carrying 
the fish from the traps to the canneries. All 
these fish are making for the great Frazer River 
on the Canadian side of the line, but pay heavy 
toll on the journey to the enterprising Amer¬ 
icans, who secure by far the greater number, 
owing to the deadly and wholesale traps. These 
are prohibited on the Canadian side, at the 
Frazer, and in addition there is a long and 
strictly-enforced “close time” each week, while 
on the other side the weekly close time is 
shorter and is often more honored in the 
breach than the observance. Besides, the Can¬ 
adian Government supports many fish hatch¬ 
eries on the river and annually .turns out mil¬ 
lions of young salmon. However, there is soon 
to be an international agreement on the whole 
subject, to insure the preservation of the in¬ 
dustry. 
As the next day was wet and threatening and 
I did not want to chance the entrance of De¬ 
ception Pass in bad weather, we stayed in Shoal 
Bay and had a look round Lopez Island. But 
on the 28th we started. Passing between De¬ 
catur and Blakeley islands, we steamed down 
Rosario Channel and looked for the pass. I 
had never been here before and my chart was 
a very small scale one and of exceedingly 
ancient date. In fact, all the way down to 
Seattle it was quite interesting to note the 
numerous towns, or, as they call them all here, 
“cities,” railways, etc., which were everywhere 
in sight, but not one on the chart! After hunt¬ 
ing around the only likely opening, we saw in 
the rocks, we noticed a gasolene launch or two 
coming out, and then made out a tug, the Mary 
D. Hume (nationality obvious), with logs, 
dodging on and off, waiting for tide. This 
looked bad for us, as we wanted a fair tide or 
slack water through, but we thought we would 
try it anyway. We looked for the entrance to 
be marked by a lighthouse, as a light was 
