Skookumchuck Rapids and Powell River

Okay, well I guess that was a successful pit stop. We salvaged our luggage rack and by Reinforcing it with new bolts and wing nuts that I can tighten up with pliers easily The smaller nuts I couldn't get inside Anyways, the wing nuts work. Took the seat off so it doesn't crush the heck out of it and now we're just Okay, we'll see how this works and It's raining a little bit not much I don't care. I just want to hit the road again and Supposed to be sunny for the next four days So let's hit the road. I wasn't sure if I was gonna make it. I just screamed on the end. Usually they put you on First or last with the motorcycle so you can squeeze you in So you have to put the locks on so you don't tip over in the waves so we just Squeezed in the end on our way to Langdale All right, we haven't left yet we're in the Horseshoe Bay Terminal we have ferries leave here for Bowen Island Langdale and Nanaimo. Nanaimo goes to Vancouver Island We're going to Langdale which is beside Gibson which is beside Seashell Little past house, take a second ferry to Paul River Langdale Sunshine Coast All right, this is the road from Gibson to Seashell These these destinations are going to be a lot shorter It's very scenic very nice All right, we're just outside of Seashell Obviously the Sunshine Coast is on the coast of the ocean All right, this is Porpoise Bay Provincial Park and campgrounds There's lots of tent sites here RV sites Nice location The rest of the park, campsites are further up. Nice All right, this is Pender Harbor It's a nice outside of Seashell up to here the road has a lot of Arbutus trees on it Stop and take a picture when the clouds the Sun comes out. Those are the red bark. Sorry the red tree with no bark Water lilies with the exact same that's the exact same white one that I bought for Xi Jinping And here they are Natural native To BC Blaze was saying that they're an invasive species. The ones I have it says non-invasive and they're from here It's a lying piece of garbage. I Have really liked them. I think they're beautiful the flower It's kind of like a Canadian Lotus kind of thing it's a water lily not a Lotus but it looks like a Lotus to me Okay, this is the dock at Edgemont and right around the corner from here It's a 45 minute hike it's Inlet narrows and then when the tide goes in and out it creates rapids so kayakers like to go up and down the rapids and during the tide change Girl said today high tide the rapids about 2 in the afternoon Interesting I'd like to see that Okay, this is the trail that you hike into the narrows to see the rapids and there's a bakery Skookum Chuck Skookum Chuck Skookum Chuck, that's the name of the rapids and the bakery Okay, they have a sign point here and then on the left there's a table the best viewing times and hide-and-load ties for everyone for the day That's convenient Now it's a proper trail Cedars and ferns lots of moss and the trees like the Wigeon Creek Wigeon Falls, sorry hike Pretty cool. This is Brown Lake on the way to the rapids for the narrows We have some Douglas fir on the trail Okay, this is a north point view point and we can see that the tide is starting to come in or the current is starting to roll and I guess down there. We see that it's a A little bit faster and that's where the kayakers are Okay, the guy said you can get to that rock from the other trail Rolling point or whatever. So I'll check it out. This does look kind of cool. The guy have a ocean kayak I don't have a whitewater kayak But that looks kind of cool I think that's pretty cool. I guess that's what he meant by surfing it Next up Pretty cool. Everybody's like it's more than an hour So everybody gets takes turns playing in the little rapid thing. It's kind of cool. I Wouldn't do it in my ocean But I could go on the outskirts. I Could do that. I guess that's what the The other guys called rollers I thought we were going down there was in the Voyager canoe That's right, you doing a little freestyle there Okay, that was interesting The last girl she went down and she went around and she kind of she's coming around if you notice You can see you can see the eddy Like on the side the water is flowing up straight Those are those are Eddie's that's what they taught us in the Voyager That's why you know when the First Nations guys met the salmon you put the drift nets on the side Close to the shore because that's the current It's easier to swim up That's why these guys that obviously that's very fast water but when they come around They're just chilling in the eddy here And you can see the seaweed and barnacles or whatever That we're not quite at high tide yet That's a really interesting illustration about the rapid and then the eddy on the side of the eddy the current travels in reverse It's a lot easier to paddle up the eddy I'll keep paddling on that crazy thing Okay, that's I think that's the girl from Calgary There's a girl and a guy from Calgary that I met in Edgmont they were putting in The girl had a paddle board. I said you're gonna surf the paddle board? Is there something wrong with that? And her boyfriend said that he takes the kayak and she takes the paddle board So that'll be very interesting Totally proud Now watch the guy, he comes up the eddy See that's how he that's how he enters the wave He comes up the eddy on the side That's how they all do it The waves is very rapid, the eddy comes around and they come up the very side and that's how they enter the wave That's how they enter the rapid current They come up the eddy With this girl on the paddle board Wow Very courageous I'm gonna stick around for that I noticed they all have dry suits on Wet suits you get wet, dry suits you sit dry And they're supposed to be Here comes up the eddy And in Alright she's gone Up the eddy on a paddle board Wow She's over She's still wet though Good She'll try again She's trying to get back to the eddy She's got it, now she's in the eddy The water is flowing She's not quite in the eddy but it's a lot The water is Yeah she's in the eddy, it's really calm now I think she'll try again It's good water She's got more balls than I do Guys suck on paddle boards They have a hard enough time keeping up Keeping up Ok next paddle boarder up Ok She didn't even make the eddy She should have come up the eddy She's a little too far over But she's a lot better than me A lot better than me See watch, yeah she comes further closer To the side of the eddy It's easier to paddle She was asking her coach For tips about her edges There you go now she's on it She's got it Look at that And over she goes But she's attached to the thing That's good And the other rural paddle boarder Is up She's going out further Smart little girl Riding the wave It's a stationary wave It's the best we have here But the real wave she's going to go to Cali North Hawaii Off she goes And she's out Is she attached? Got her whistle And there's a guy there going to go help her Good thinking Does she not have a tether? For her And it's a rescue See they got safety here They have the whistle They already stopped Doing their recovery I'll catch her when they come up Okay he got her back to her paddle board So she's on her paddle board paddling She's hitting the eddy So she's safe When she hit the side eddy See this eddy here is fine The other girl was saying that The big wrapper She says that doesn't scare her But the rollers down here Where this other girl just went down She says that scares her See that's the thing too I don't know about the undertoes Having grown up in Lynn Valley Lake Canyon A lot of people died because of undertoes I don't know how the undertoes work here I imagine they don't have too many But I don't know I remember we went to that Moving water Down the Fraser at Yale And I saw a whirlpool I was like woah It was a whirlpool It was with moving water I was like wow You don't see that in the ocean You can see big waves in the ocean No question about that There we go she's safe Okay this is from the back side I was asking One of those kayakers About undertoes Oh yeah there's lots of things going on She mentioned whirlpools And I thought nope That'll suck you down And the other guy was explaining About boils Like right there You can see kind of a circular thing It's kind of like a whirlpool But it's called a boil And in the middle A whirlpool in the middle The water goes down But in a boil In the middle the water goes up But if you're around the edges of the boil It'll suck you down So I guess if you're Displaced If you're in the water And you're near a boil Either you gotta get in the middle Or you gotta get outside The line And there's our lady back I'm not sure which one went down They're both back Nice There you go I'm not sure if that was recording Or not but the girl's tether Broke that's what happened That's why she blew the whistle Because her tether broke And she was separated from her Paddle board And the lifeguard came and helped her And he came to her And then he got her To the paddle board And she came up And I was saying like If I'm looking at this here So if I'm coming up I'm coming up the eddy If I'm coming up I'm coming down the eddy That's what I'm doing I mean it doesn't look so So scary Like when you're right here But that's I don't know There's our other girl On the paddle board Oh she's going to make it Ok Because she's not standing up She's on her knees But it's still harder than the kayaks And these little tiny kayaks are built for this The paddle boards aren't really built for this I guess she's doing stunts The crowd's cheering She's up on her knees Oh she's standing up She's freaking standing up And she's down I think she was standing up I couldn't tell because I'm on the other side of the wave See she's tethered She grabs it by the side And she paddles For the eddy See she's in moving water On a paddle board Now they have a freaking tour boat Whatever They got a tour boat Powering upstream Watching the river rafters From the From the boat That's pretty cool They do have lots of different boat tours here They have lots going on This is Edgemont Edgemont just past Seashell Just before the Earl's Cove barrier If you go to Powell River Nice Ok it's 10 to 2 2.15 is when it peaks The other paddle boarder is going again And she was standing up She's going to try and stand again Oh almost A little shaky Almost She was standing before So good for her And her tether is holding So she's good On the board To the eddy Yeah she made it to the eddy She just took a ride down the rollers That was pretty impressive Ok we made it That was a long 45 minutes Somebody told her it was an hour But there's a BMW parked behind me Beside me And they've got those hard Saddle bags You know BMW's are very good touring bikes And the hard saddle bags Are a lot better than the saggy thing Because I'm having trouble with It's sagging again I don't know man It's tight and it's sagging I don't know man I don't know But those hard saddle bags are a lot better Oh there's a couple more bikes Nice A Harley and a BMW See a BMW with the hard Saddle bags They're popular for touring There we go Alright So this is the Ferry to Powell River It's just coming in And the good news is it looks like it's a free ferry Like the Albion Ferry used to be I don't know nobody's asked yet Nice And it was This is new territory for me I've been to Edgemont To the dock I haven't hiked into the rapids before Hiking into the rapids was a first for me And taking a right hand turn And coming down the street to here Is new for me From here on it's new territory But this is good I think this is a really nice place to visit Here we are First on First off As long as you get here Before it starts flowing And there's a custom Custom luggage rack there That's pretty cool He said it's an hour trip This is nice And we're off Off and running It's a bit slow on my push unit On the other side Are the ferry docks There's quite a few campsites They have regular campsites With a black teepee The grey teepee on the map are Backcountry campsites I think Sarah Point's a backcountry campsite And that's where I want to go I want to see what the road is like To get there There's lots of stuff going on I'm keeping my head inside There's lots of boat tours And stuff out on land Land looks really cool Looks like lots of cool stuff to see Okay And that's just where we came from That's Pearl The campsite really did something Right on the beach I'm going by the others And it seems nice That's cute Alright 6 o'clock We set up camp I got two nights At the same camp Two nights at that Willingdon whatever I chose two nights at the same coast It's right close to Powell River And there's lots of stuff to hear Like restaurants and stuff So I chose two nights at the same site And it's right on the coast That's the ocean right there So we're not beachfront But this site is oceanfront There's tons of other campsites around That I'm going to check out And this is Thursday Thursday, Friday, Saturday They're all booked up But then there's lots of backcountry Camping like that Sarah Point So I'm going to drive up to Lund See what that road is to get to Sarah Point But there's other backcountry sites And I want to see I want to see what like maybe One of these boat tours Like a Zodiac tour Or running a kayak at Lund There's lots to do here So I'm going to check it out Ok so that's the campsite And this is the beach access Volleyball nets on the sand Nice Now I'm not sure if this is a public park Here or not Got some pretty big ass speakers Going there Willingdon Beach Nice A little walk out Ok so that's the campsite beach This is a little I was going to say dock A rock dock You can launch a kayak here I'm not sure how you get it down Oh I guess there's a parking lot over there You can do a parking lot right over there I guess this is a public park here Nice Weather sure cleared up I thought it wasn't going to clear up until tomorrow Good thing I made it out today Good thing because I think I got in Just before the office closed And there was the last two walk-in sites And I could ride up on my bike on the walk-in site So that was a good time Paddleboard action Kayak Haywire Bay campground Finally Uh oh car coming Ok this is Haywire Bay Campsite On Powell Lake Dirt road access Looked like there was a couple empty spots 25 bucks a night Oops always got a fire And uh It's right on the lake Couple of Douglas firs Ok well lots of places To put in your kayak or paddleboard Ok Rocky Lake White Cliff This is nice This would be a nice place to watch the sunset This is Haywire Bay Bay area Right beside the campsite On Powell Lake Which is part of a chain of lakes That you can kayak Or canoe Blah blah Just like Bowron Lakes So this is my test run For my Alaska trip And this is We've gone from Bowron Lakes To Powell Lakes I say that plural Because there's I mean inland lake is pretty small It's right beside here We're going to see how This How the chain works Where you put in I think you put in closer to The main freeway Where I set up my camp At Willingdon This is nice Ok this is Cranberry Lake You pass by this to get to Inland Lake and Haywire Bay Campsite that's right But look more water release It looks like the same white ones except This is what happens with mine At night time when the sun goes down They close up In the morning they open up Right now you can see It's a white one and it's closed In the morning time they open up They're very animated like a Venus flytrap They freaking move So this is Indigenous to this area Just like they have In Vernon too I'm pretty sure There's Cow Beach and Ken Beach The smaller one whatever I can't remember Which it is This is nice I think it's really sandy on the other side Nope those are more Water lilies I haven't seen the other side They had live Music In the public park beside the campgrounds I missed it but maybe I'll get it tomorrow I wanted to I'm glad I did that like 7k on a dirt road I hate washboard Potholes But I'm glad I did it without my gear And 7k wasn't as bad as 28k But I'm glad I saw it And documented it And I think for that Sarah Point one I might just hike the trail We'll see how I feel tomorrow Another reason I don't like the dirt roads Or the potholes is because my bike is pretty much Like a rigid frame It's like my Virago It's shaft drive It's not belt drive And the frame bolts directly to The rear axle And the only difference is My Virago had an air shock You put air in it It has some kind of shock in the front But it's really not much If you're on the freeway and you go over a bump You feel it So that's the one drawback of my bike It's kind of like a rigid frame But anyways I like it for the street The sun sets On a good day This is the park right beside the campsite One of the reasons I chose this site Is because it's right downtown It's on the water You can see the sunset But it's also near a whole bunch of restaurants So I'm getting pizza to go Nice They've got some kind of craft fair Going on here Sunrise Sunset As the clouds are on the Bottom of the horizon So I guess that's the best we're going to get But it's nice We'll take it There's still someone packing up The little art festival thing Nice And this is that freaking pizza Nice Ah, here we go What's that saying? Every cloud has a silver lining I don't think that's true But these ones do right now From this perspective That's a goose I saw some Canadian geese flying In a formation the other day And it's like, who's with that? It's just August They're starting to fly south Kayakers, silhouettes on the sunset Nice I think these fires They have it's propane Kind of fire like you get from Costco I think I think those are allowed Because right now there's a fire burn Nice Sometimes they have Done the Late night paddles Out of Third Beach With a headlamp On a full moon, clear night It's nice And over here I can't see I can't pick up anything at night They've got beach Oh, there you go, it just lit up They've got beach volleyball going on They're all like right into this It's about 9 o'clock And they're all into it, it's nice Something positive This is where they had the live music From 7 to 8 I missed it because of my little road trip But maybe tomorrow I'll be able to catch it Nice