Around noon on Monday, we took Kestrel the mile across the channel to the eastern “anchorage” for G̱andll K’in Gwaay.yaay (Hotspring Island), between it and the restricted ground of House Island. While the depths are reasonably shallow, it isn’t very protected, and despite solid holding, we had small rollers coming through the gap between the islands from the northeast the entire time. The time slot we’d been given by the Watchmen was for 2pm, so we made lunch and relaxed before taking our dinghy Shrike to shore and walking the short hike to the Watchmen’s cabin built near the hot springs.

With three hot springs, all three a gradation of different temperatures, you’ve got options. After a (not cold!) shower we were given all the time we wanted, though we did need to keep in mind the tides, because while we’d set Shrike’s anchor high up the beach we’d landed on, we didn’t want to risk anything with the large incoming tide. The hot springs were wonderful, with both of us spending most of our time in the least hot one. I spent a fair bit of time in the one in the middle of the scale, though it was too hot for my partner to want to spend more than a minute in, and the hottest one was too hot for me to even keep my feet in for more than a few seconds. After the past few months of travel, heating and loosening up my muscles was a bit relief. The view was just as good.

With some high winds (gale warnings) coming out of the northwest the next several days, hunkering down in a protected anchorage and slowing down seemed like the right call. Just six nautical miles away from G̱andll K’in Gwaay.yaay is Hutton Inlet, set a mile into Moresby Island, with the entrance protected by Hutton Island. We dropped anchor in 40 feet of water (52° 30.108′ N, 131° 33.921′ W) and settled in to relax for the next few days.

We ended up spending three whole days in Hutton Inlet, and were joined in the anchorage on Tuesday afternoon by s/v Snowbird, a 2013 Catalina 445. They were doing the same as us: staying put in a protected anchorage while the high winds blew for a few days. I invited them over for beers on Tuesday evening and we got to know Rob and Maureen a bit. Retirees in their mid-60s, they spend several months each summer on their boat exploring northern BC. Like us, this was their first time in the Haida Gwaii. On Wednesday afternoon, Rob and I went fishing in our dinghy, jigging for rockfish in the outer bay of Hutton Inlet. We pulled in a few small fish, but the only one big enough to keep was a yellowtail rockfish I pulled in; on the upside for Rob, he got his first experience using a descender on a rockfish that was just a little small to keep.

That evening we had dinner on Snowbird with Rob and Maureen, with my partner cooking up the yellowtail rockfish along with a quillback rockfish we’d caught a few weeks previous, vacuum packed and frozen just after fileting. I brought fresh focaccia I’d baked that day (I’d also backed a loaf of bread and had another dough ball for focaccia sitting in the fridge for the next day), and Maureen had cooked up some root veggies and had a lovely leftover salad. It really brought home how remote and alone we’ve been: I had realized that Tuesday evening beers were the first time since we’d left Seattle that my partner and I had been able to spend time with more than one other person aside from each other, and that one person had been my partner’s friend in Nanaimo! So, I got some much-needed socialization those two days, and we made some new friends. I assume they will probably read this blog entry, so hello Rob & Maureen, thank you for spending time with us and providing such lovely conversation and tasty beer!

Thursday the high winds made it into the anchorage. Oddly, though the winds for the region were mostly coming out of the northwest, with the geometry of the geography around us, the wind shot out of the southwest for us through the anchorage, holding steady at 15-17 knots most of the day and regularly gusting to 20-25 knots. A very good day for relaxation, napping, and reading, which is what we did until around dinner time, where I made us some chicken tikka masala for dinner, modified with a few fat dollops of mango chutney. We ate it over rice and with the focaccia I’d baked in the late afternoon.

I’ve been watching episodes (mostly at random) of Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown while making dinners recently. I’ve got most/all of the series in my media archive (as well as a large proportion of No Reservations), and this is the first time since his death I’ve been able to bear watching it. His was the only celebrity death that has seemed to have any effect on me at all; when it happened, I remember being bummed out for days, a week, maybe longer. I don’t even know exactly why, though it might just have to do with his approach to the world and people, and my sense that the world losing him meant losing out on an important perspective. I know there are others carrying on pieces of what he did, all in their own way, but his approach, his cynicism mixed with hope, his interest in others and passion for food and travel, those were unique to him, and I know small but important parts of myself are modeled on my perceptions of Bourdain’s approach to the world.