Day 26, July 13 -- Chapel Island to Clarke Cove at Marble Mountain -- 14.3 NM

Remember all that thought yesterday about which spot to visit next, based on which way the wind would be blowing today? Answer: No wind at all, well 2-3 knots at times -- which is no wind at all. So we selected Clarke Cove at Marble Mountain -- a former quarry--  because it is "on the way" and promised a hike to the top of the hill for good views of the whole West Bay.

We took the hike on the morrow, starting at the end of a two mile dinghy ride, when the weather was clearer. White beach is marble chips. Dinghy dock with our dink is at right just above the indentation for the small bay. Not the top of the hill but elevated.

For the record, the passage of 14.3 NM was between 1145 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.  All of the passages we plan in the Lakes should be short mileage. (There is a place called Whycocomagh Bay, at the extreme western end of the North Lake, said to be eighteen NM from Baddeck -- which we plan to skip. At the far eastern end of North Lake (called The Great Bras d'Or, are other places that are not on even on the charts I bought, which we will also skip. That is where the lakes have a natural passage to the sea -- the route to Newfoundland.) 

I tried to sail with main and jib; the dog leg to starboard in the long NE diagonal (yellow line I drew on chart) was both to clear the shallows off the mainland coastline and to get a better angle on the wind for a hoped for sail across. But no wind is no wind -- so we motored.

One nasty thing I discovered was that the C-MAP chip I purchased for the Raymarine Chartplotter, with the charts of this area has no chart of the north coast of East Bay except one at the six mile range. With six miles of the earth's surface compressed into 2 x 4 inches of an electronic screen, everything is so jumbled together to be useless.

We had to weave between the islands marked by

buoys at the NE end of the yellow line. Here is the cruising guide's diagram of the entrance including the lighthouse. Fortunately, Lene's iNavix had a useful chart of the entrance to the harbor. Six miles is good enough for crossing the lake, but woefully inadequate at the coast!

The mini Cove in the NE corner of Clark's Cove (at the top end of the pink line above) is very sheltered. The CCA cruising guide which we used exclusively from our beginning in NS to St. Peter's, is the more opinionated of the two. The other, YachtPilot's Guide to the Canadian Maritimes, does not describe Nova Scotia's Atlantic coast, but covers the Lakes well and Newfoundland. CCA claimed that they had made Clarke Cove so popular that now power boaters hog the place and make too much noise.

But ILENE was the only boat in here and anchored in about ten feet of water, protected from wind regardless of direction. Two power boats rafted up quite a bit behind us, later.

The only problems are  that mosquitoes like it here too, and this is the first place on this cruise with zero internet or phone access. That is why this post is so late. I have several others since then but have had difficulty getting them our to you my dear readers.

I lowered the dink, for the first time since Nantucket and cleaned the stern of the boat, which the raised dinghy bars access to. Not just a lot of grime and yellow stains but hundreds of small dead insects.

Nova Scotia means "New Scotland" and the biggest influences to the culture here is the Celtic/Gaelic, Scots/Irish, with a dose of French and Native American for good measure.