Log Entry: Sunday, August 1st, 1999

Echo Harbour to Limestone Island via Skedans: 24.0 nm

Paikea looked at us hard through his binoculars as he left.  We went for a row and a walk into the inner bay: beautiful!!  Saw a raccoon and a deer; as we rowed across shallow water, we could see rock crabs and salmon fry.  There was an eagle feather at the waterfall; Nathalie picked it up, then gave it back to the water. 

We went to Skedans after scouting the Limestone anchorage.  Again, very peaceful.   Lots of poles are still in evidence here, some remarkably well preserved.   Myanne, Mandy, and Joe were the watchmen there.

While we were still ashore, two sailboats radioed asking for permission to come ashore, which was given.  We left just as they were dinghying in, two dinghies, one motor, rafted together.  We passed each other, and waved; someone called over: was it good?   We didn't respond.  Their sailboats were also rafted together.

We lounged in the hot sun for a while; it wasn't long before they came back, maybe 20 minutes: such a short time to view so much!  One of the dinghies wen off to fish, and they had almost immediate results.  This prompted Nathalie to suggest that we put a line over the side.  We weighed anchor, and trolled.  (I had received some invaluable advice in Prince Rupert, which had made us realise that our lures were improperly set up.)  After preparing the lure, and determining the correct weight and depth, I worked the line for a while, then Nathalie took over.  After about two minutes, Nathalie got a bite!!  Then the reel didn't do what she wanted, and the line went quite.  She said, It got away.  I took the reel, and started reeling it in.   The fish was still there!  Nathalie got into the dinghy with the net.   There was a lot of excitement, Jane warning Nathalie not to fall in the water, and Nathalie saw two fish, the one that was hooked and another swimming free beside it.   She tried to net the free-swimming one, and then realised that it was the wrong one.  Anyway, we got the fish netted, used our fish bonker, and had ourselves a 5-6 pound Coho.

We did our first line to shore anchoring at Limestone.  Being our first time, we made mistakes: the line wasn't quite long enough, and so I was perched on slippery rocks, with a line all the way back to Ilari, shouting at Jane to put it in reverse, while Nathalie scrambled up to the tree above me to try to get what line we had around the trunk ...  It all worked out, but I decided that in future it would probably be better to tie the line to shore and bring the other end back to the boat, instead of the other way around, unless we're sure that we have enough line!

Jane's log:

"Went ashore at Echo Harbour to explore the waterfall area. The inner harbour is really wonderful. We saw lots of eagle down and feathers: it must be a great salmon river when they run.

"Motored via Tanu to Skedans where we went ashore to visit the Haida village. The workmanship on the remaining poles is incredible and they give a real sense of how things were. Mandy, Joe, and Mianne made us feel welcome.

"Lots of fish jumping in Skedans Bay so we decided to troll. The first Coho came aboard after ten minutes: about 5-6 lbs."