Travel Day 1: June 23. We left Portland, Oregon around noon and went by car with our kayaks and gear up through Washington State and across the border into Canada. We stayed overnight in Tsawwassen, British Columbia so we could be ready to catch a ferry over to Vancouver Island early the next day.
Travel Day 2: June 24. We caught the ferry from Tsawwassen to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island and then drove up Vancouver Island to Port Hardy where we stayed overnight.
Travel Day 3: June 25. We traveled from Port Hardy to Prince Rupert via the Inside Passage Ferry. The ferry left Port Hardy early in the morning and we had to be there around 6am. We walked our kayaks on to the car deck and laughed as the crew placed chocks on the wheels of our kayak carts, treating them just like all the other vehicles. We took our therma rest mattresses up with us to use for sitting or snoozing inside and on the deck.
Our Ferry ride ended at Prince Rupert at 10:30 pm just as it was getting dark. We used our carts to wheel the kayaks off the ferry and went to the pick up our bags of gear that the ferry workers drove out. Nothing near the Ferry was open and the Ferry building soon closed as well. Everyone left the area. There is no overnight camping at the ferry terminal.
We scouted out the area and found that the closest launch would be the marina about ¼ mile away. We took our time hauling our boats and bags of gear to the marina. Once there, we proceeded to pack our boats and get everything ready for our launch even though it was a few hours before dawn. Every last inch of space was used up. Since it was too dark to launch we tried to rest a bit and take a snooze under a small shelter near the marina. Our plan was to paddle at first light then camp after a couple of hours and catch up on sleep then, since there is nowhere to camp near the ferry terminal and there was no easy way to move our boats and gear up into town to sleep there.
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On the ferry to Nanaimo
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Wheels chocked all ready for rough seas
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Sleeping on deck outside, but undercover, until it got too wet and windy
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| On the "Northern Expedition" to the start of our own Northern Expedition to Victoria |
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Somewhere along the Inside Passage
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Near the northern end of Grenville Channel with a couple of hours to go
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Jenny wheeling her kayak off the ferry
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Kirti catching some sleep before our launch at first light
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