It’s been an overwhelming past two months of preparing, paddling and finishing my first personal sea kayak expedition with the support of so many friends, family, and sponsors. I’d been planning a B.C. Coastal expedition in some way ever since my friend, Kathleen Pelto and I talked the night after finishing our first Coastal B.C. expedition in May 2004 on the NOLS Sea Kayaking Instructor Course (KIC). We had both spent our 24th birthdays paddling an amazing route from Bella Bella to Port Hardy, paddling along the outer route (including the west coasts of Goose and Calvert) with a talented group of paddlers in great weather. Kathleen and I felt grateful for the training experience, but we both wanted a chance to paddle farther, take less layover days and explore more of the coastline.
Three years later, we spent our 27th birthdays finishing a different route, from Prince Rupert to Bella Bella with less ideal weather and just the two of us. We originally planned on paddling to Port Hardy as coastally as the weather allowed. Turns out the weather wanted us to have some quality base camp time in the middle of our trip, which altered our route. But of all the places to be stuck for 10 days of gale and storm winds, we lucked out. It’s taken me some time to re-acclimate to civilization after the experience and it’s taken me over a week to finally try to write it all down after being thus far unable to convincingly describe how successful our altered plan turned out to be. Not as lengthy or hard-core as we had imagined, but a successful experience regardless.
After our journey to Prince Rupert that included huge swells that tossed our ferry about and most locals we talked to saying they had the worst winter weather they could remember, we ended up staying the night in the Coast Guard’s staff house, our boats stashed in their office trailer. As we heard the wind and rain outside shake the walls and windows of the house in Prince Rupert, we were thankful to not be in our tent for the night, which we had originally planned on before checking in with the Coast Guard and they’d insisted we stay in their spare room.
After sharing stories and plans over coffee the next morning aboard the Coast Guard’s docked red and white boat, Kathleen and I loaded our plastic boats and took off in what turned out to be the start of a 7-day stretch of gorgeous paddling weather. We crossed Chatham Sound and exited the protected waters through Edye Passage to paddle south along the west coasts of Porcher and Goschen Islands.
Near the end of the beautiful stretch of weather, we found ourselves on the northwest tip of Banks Island, the 40 nm long "crux" of the route. Every resource said the paddle had to be done in one move, due to the reefs and lack of landing spots. After examining the chart for Banks, I was tempted by the inlets and islands along the coast, many with the telltale dotted shorelines that generally meant sand and/or mud beaches. It was so hard to believe that there wasn’t anything to sneak in behind and pull up plastic boats on.
We decided to head for Kingkown Inlet, 12 nm south of the “committed rounding” of the northwest corner of Banks. Kingkown stretched 6 nm from its reef protected entrance into the farthest river mouths that fed into the island strewn inlet. We knew we could make it into the protected waters before the forecasted afternoon’s SE gale winds would pick up. The morning’s paddle went smoothly and we entered Kingkown in a gap between two islands and a large rock all awash in the swells. Once inside, there were many better-than-decent campsites to choose from. We set up a camp, ready to enjoy at least a day of rest from our 7 straight days of paddling.
For the next 6 days, we enjoyed paddling, hiking and relaxing in, on and outside “our” inlet in constant SW-SE gale or storm (30-50 kn) winds in Hecate Strait. Quite the headwind for at least 30 miles of questionable landings before reaching the south end of Banks. Even dicey to head north in following seas in loaded boats for 6 or 12 committed miles (depending on swell size and its effects on the reefs/breakers). Once backtracking north, we’d still be faced with paddling into the SE winds that funnel through the 40 nm long Principe Channel on the inside of Banks.
We regularly kept our deltoids in shape trying to get a decent signal from the VHF radio, waiting to hear anything but a gale warning before Hecate Strait’s forecast or outlook. On day seven, after summiting nearby “peaks” and playing in unloaded boats beyond the protection of the reefs, we got the first forecast without a warning in front of it – only 1-2 m swells and 20-30 knot SW winds (Hecate Strait never caught on to the “small craft warning” classification, apparently). We packed up early and started to exit out the north end of the inlet, near where we entered a week ago. The swells were irregularly spaced and sized, quartering from the stern/port side. Even when we were still somewhat protected from the brunt of the wind by a point a few miles south of us, our heavy boats’ decks were already regularly awash in the spilling peaks of the steep swells that built over the shallows outside of the inlet. With the forecast calling for building winds and 6 or 12 miles of committed coastline with entrances that would be like this or steeper and more obstructed, both of us decided this wasn’t much more of a window than the gale warnings we’d been waiting through. We probably could make it, but neither of us felt that it was a good idea to go out into 6 or 12 miles of committed paddling in these conditions that would only get worse. It made us realize both our reliance on the weather radio’s choice of words and the tendency to loose objectivity on weather/sea conditions after being stuck in one place for a week.
We upgraded our base camp to a great cobble beach and spent 3 more days exploring Kingkown Inlet, reaching the far east end and jokingly exploring our portage options up a river, across a lake then down a river on the other side. We decided it wouldn’t be fun after reaching the river mouth at the end of the inlet – likely a multi day endeavor of shlupping boats and gear up river, through salal, paddling across a 2 mile lake, then being committed to going down an unknown river on the other side. The weather gave in after we completely explored all our options of an unassisted exit of Kingkown.
Day 11 in Kingkown, forecast for Hecate Strait – 10-20 kn northerlies building to 15-25 kn in the morning, backing to strong to gale southeasterlies in the afternoon, 1-2 meter mixed NW and SW swells. It’d give us a headwind for our whole route, but we’d take it. The first positive signs were the 5 aluminum outboard motorboats we saw in or heading to our inlet. The locals, likely from the village Kitkatla, were using the first decent day in the newly opened fishing season to fish and gather in Kingkown.
We paddled about 21 nm into headwinds as we paddled north, west and then southeast into Principe Channel. Once inside the channel, we’d never been so blissed out to paddle into headwinds and against current. For the next 2 days, we finished paddling the length of Principe. We realized, after paddling into a morning’s SE gale warnings and finishing 5 nm that felt like 20, that we probably wouldn’t have gone too far in the past 10 day stretch of gale winds, even if we were in more protected waters. The muck and bugs at our first new site made us realize we had been stuck in a fabulous camping area. As with most changed plans in life, things usually have some reason for happening the way they do.
After reaching the south end of Principe, we had one more rest day due to storm force winds. From that point on, we paddled with the theory of using every weather window, making sure every camp we used had an easy entry into inside passages in case another long stretch of gales hit. This led us inside Campania Island, the Estevan Group and Aristanzabal Island. It was like visiting an old friend when we felt the ocean swells in Caamaño Sound, Laredo Sound, on the west coast of Price Island, on our Milbanke Sound crossing and in the west end of Seaforth Channel. We finished our post-base camp section in 9 moves, averaging about 20 nm a day.
Our total loaded boat paddling distance was about 260 nautical miles in 16 travel days. Adding on our exploratory and play paddles in Kingkown, we paddled around 290 nm. About 112 nm were coastal and exposed to the swells of Hecate Strait and once we reached Price Island, the full Pacific (loosing the “protection” of the Queen Charlottes over 60 nm across Hecate). Paddling into Bella Bella made the trip feel very full circle, finishing our route along the same path we started our KIC on 3 years prior. The 2+ meter swells in the west end of Seaforth Channel and the squall we chose to cross in would have scared us silly back then, now they were completely reasonable. We spent our first day of our 2004 trip in Bella Bella on Kathleen’s birthday and now we were ending our 2007 trip at the same place on my birthday.
We consider our trip a success because we made solid choices under the conditions and in retrospect, we don’t regret any. We had only one month to finish a route and we felt that if we hadn’t attempted West Banks, we wouldn’t have been true to attempting our coastal goal. As in all expeditions from mountaineering to sea kayaking, the weather was the ultimate route chooser, and though we didn’t get to travel the exposed coasts of the Estevans or Aristanzabal, we were glad we didn’t have to resort to the true Inside Passage (just the thought of which bored us). More time is always the answer to being able to finish routes in inclimate weather, and maybe in the future we’ll have it. Until then, we have ideas for articles and books to work on, a slew of talented women paddlers to entice into joining our future journeys and a new appreciation for having a goal in mind but ultimately living with and making the best out of whatever is thrown our way – a mentality that is just as good in the real world as it is on the water.
