Whiteout!

Day 22 we woke up to a complete white out.  No, not snow, the fog was so thick we couldn’t see anything but white!  We waited until the fog started to lift then took off for Sidney just 6 miles away.  At least we thought the fog had lifted.  It was fine at our anchorage but as we motored toward Sidney it became apparent we were going right into it.  While still in the clear, Julie went below to take a shower.  I weaved my way through some tight passages trying to create a more direct route but that only added to the stress of the increasing fog.  Thank God for chart plotters, radar and AIS!  When Julie emerged from below we were in a complete whiteout situation, all you could see was white.  What happened! She said, thinking everything was fine when she went below.  It was nice to have some more eyes on the situation.

About 2 miles out from the entrance to Sidney harbor, we heard a distress call on the radio.  A sailboat was on the radio with the Coast Guard explaining how smoke was coming from their engine room, electrical components had stopped working, and they could see sparks from below.  No fire yet but the smoke was thick.  As we approached a sailboat still in the water, I was surprised to see it matched the description of the boat in distress.  By this time they seemed to have it under control and another boat had come over to help them.  It was kind of fun (not for them I’m sure) to hear the whole thing unfold on the radio then come upon the vessel in trouble.

30 minutes later, once inside Sidney harbor the fog completely lifted.  What a difference a few minutes makes.  Lunch at Rumrunners overlooking the harbor, then off to the Sidney aquarium.  Ava has been talking about this extremely small aquarium at least once a week since we were here last year.  We would be taking the boat for a cruise around Tacoma and she would get all excited and say, “lets go to that aquarium in Sidney!”  Ava, its over 100 miles away in Canada and would take at least 2 days to get there.  Sure will be nice when she has a concept of time and distance.  She loved it!  We stayed there for a couple hours going back to each display at least 4 times before Ava got her fill.

In town I was able to get a much-needed haircut then scan some documents at an office supply place I needed to send to the bank.  We had a great dinner out then a long evening dock walk to look at all the boats.