| Monday morning, June 7th, we raised anchor and headed out from Garden Bay and Pender Harbour, turned north and went up the Agamemnon Channel, a 10NM long curved channel leading to the confluences of the Jervis, Sechlet, and Princess Louisa Inlets.
The Egmont Marina, is located at the top west side of the Sechlet Inlet, and stands all by itself on the hill. The town of Egmont is south of the marina, around the next point. |
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| Egmont Marina | Marina boat slips and lively hillside Marina Pub! |
| We choose to stay at the Egmont Marina, so we could top-off our water tanks before heading on to Chatterbox Falls for a few days, where there is NO DRINKING WATER available. We also wanted to look around a bit, possibly visit the town of Egmont, and the Sechelt Rapids at the Skookumchuck Narrows, that I had read about.
Egmont Marina is the only marina in that area and they charge a lot for moorage and shore power. Their potable water is from a deep under-ground water source and there is a lot of iron and other minerals in it, and it has the taste of cedar in it. Connie didn't like its taste or smell. The Marina's warffinger gave us a bit of a hard time when we asked to 'top-off' our water tank, thinking that 'we would drain their well-head' as he put it. We worked out an agreement where I would take water for 15-minutes, then shut-off the hose off for 30-minutes, then I could have another 15-minutes, like that for an hour. I thanked him very much and began to take-on water. |
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| While at Egmont, we wanted to visit the Sechelt Rapids. We had read about the mighty rapids in the tour quides, when we were doing out trip planning. We quickly got our boat chores done, then checked the Canadian Current Tables for the Sechelt Rapids. We found that we had barely enough time to get there, before the rapids were to ebb North at 12 Knots!!!
We dingied down to the Town of Egmont, tied-up to the old beaten-up government dock there, walked-up to the Egmont General Store, then up the hill/road behind it, until we came across the Skookumchuck Narrows Provincial Park sign on the left, leading to the Skookumchuck Narrows Park trail sign below. The easy hiking trail is 3-miles long (we hiked it in 3-hours of steady walking), and goes south along a heavly forested ridgeline overlooking the water, through a small rainforest, around Brown Lake, before emerging at the Skookumchuck Narrows and Sechelt Rapids. There are two different viewing spots, depending on whether the current flow is ebb or flood. |
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| Brown Lake filled with Cutthroat trout |
| Within minutes of our arrival, the current was ebbing (going out - north) at +12 knots. It was beautiful, fast, mighty and wild!!! The whirlpools formed by the rushing swirling water had sidewalls of 6'+ !!! |
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| 10 minutes before Max flow | |
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| 5 minutes before Max flow | |
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| At Max flow 12.1 knots at 1340-hrs on 7 Jun 04 |
| Wow!!! Quite a show!!! And well worth the walk... both ways. Would have been better though if we had brough along some drinking water. |
