The Broughton Archipelago solitude.

[eliems]

Just got back from the Broughton, (northern BC) and 38 days aboard the Hunter 28. First 30 days were solo except for Boaz the Boxer and he doesn't say much.

Broughton in May is wild beautiful and solitude with many of the marinas closed and few boats. Only once did I share an anchorage with another boat! This time of the year there is wind to sail and weather patterns are constantly changing. ie if you don't like the weather just wait ten minutes.

While I was there a sailor chopped up his wife and another collided with a Humpback whale, (or the whale collided with him as it broached and came down on his bow while he was running a 22 foot speedboat at full speed sending the operator through the windshield!).

Highlights were a dozen dolphins surrounding my dingy and circling just feet away at 30 plus mph doing some sort of fish round-up thing, and First Nations villages long abandoned after small pox killed most of them in the fifties. Seafood galore and great fishing. Odd and interesting folk living as hermits, (as one guy told me, "it isn't that hermits don't like people, we just don't want to be around them").

In the fourth week I got a strange feeling almost like panic that drove me south and back to civilization and fortunately the weather got hot and my wife flew up for the last eight days and the trip south with me. I think I was going a little nuts although I didn't feel the need to chop up my wife!

All in all a wonderful and special time.

Posting the videos now if anyone is interested ... Greg Fothergill - YouTube