Van Isle – Day 13: The Apocalypse

This was the final leg of the 2019 Van Isle 360 from Victoria to Nanaimo, right back where we started a full 2 weeks earlier.  This last leg was unique though, because the route options were numerous with at least 4 clearly different routes through and around the Gulf Islands proving a winner in the past.  For the most part, currents determined which route would be the best on a given year, as 3 of the route options had a narrow pass where contrary current could easily exceed boat speed, even in good wind.

Right after the start in Victoria. First look at our new Code 0. Photo credit: Andrew Madding.

It turned out that the start leaving Victoria had a mix of route options with the fleet spread out over 4 different routes around Trial Island and Discovery Island.  Initially it looked like going south of Discovery was the winning move with those boats quickly hitting the shore of San Juan Island while boats that passed north of Discovery struggled to get away from the island in less favorable current.  We opted for the middle route south of Trial Island and north of Discovery.  Definitely the minority option, but it worked out well for us.  As the fleet moved into Haro Strait the breeze filled in more on the left side of the course and what looked like a mistake earlier became the winning move, vaulting the boats that passed north of Discovery into the lead.  When the breeze settled in from the south, making for a nice spinnaker run passed Stuart Island and into the Gulf Islands, we had a slim lead over Zulu in our division and were feeling quite good about our situation.

The majority of the fleet sailed into the Gulf Islands west of the Penders, and the breeze continued to strengthen making the run quite enjoyable.  For us the key decision point was then when to exit the Gulf Islands.  Via Active Pass, Porlier Pass, or Dodd Narrows?  The choice seemed obvious to us.  We could get through Active Pass before the tide turned.  If we sailed further up the inside we would have to fight the tide through either Porlier Pass or Dodd Narrows.  Not expecting the breeze to hold into the evening up north, we made the easy decision to exit via Active Pass, along the division leaders for 0, 1, and 2 (we were in Div. 2).

Getting through Active Pass was relatively easy with a nice push… until it wasn’t.  95% of the way through the pass the tide turned, the breeze lightened, and we found ourselves going backwards, putting the kite up and down, sailing on opposite tacks in the same direction as boats 100 yards away.  It was a frantic moment as we barely escaped to the Strait of Georgia and good pressure from the south.  That took a lot longer than we expected, so the big question was whether the boats that elected to go further north on inside would be able to exit via Porlier or Dodd.  We watched the tracker and saw the boats behind us in Active Pass struggle even longer, with one boat giving up completely and heading back to the inside of the Gulf Islands.  Only 2 boats made it through after us.

It didn’t take long to figure out our move was dead wrong.  3 boats popped out of Porlier Pass miles ahead of us.  As we approached Porlier, Mojo, who was well back when we entered Active Pass, sailed through about a mile in front of us and much to our surprise we could see boats sailing passed Porlier headed for the shortest route through Dodd Narrows.

Long story short, we ended up becalmed on the north end of Gabriola, about 5 miles from the finish.  As we bobbed around going nowhere fast, we could hear the repeated calls of boats passing through Dodd Narrows, approaching the finish line.  Not a fun moment – it was the first time in the race that any Division 3 boats crossed the line ahead of us.

We ended up crossing the line 4^th in our division and correcting out to 5^th, a full 4 hours behind the first boat in our division.  Two boats that exited Active Pass and were slightly faster on the run north finished 2.5 hours ahead of us.  It was a painful situation that played out perfectly (wrong) for a boat of our speed.  Had we been slower earlier in the race Active Pass wouldn’t have been an option, and we would have continued north on the inside out of necessity.  Had we been slower still, we would have arrived at Dodd Narrows after the tide changed and made the shortest route work.  As it turned out we could have sailed up to Dodd Narrows, anchored for an hour or so and sailed through as the unfavorable current eased and finished at least 2 hours earlier.  Hindsight is 20/20.  Not sure we could have seen all of that play out ahead of time.

On the bright side, the last leg didn’t affect our overall result.  We still ended up 3^rd in Division 2, a finish we are quite happy with given the experience and previous results of our competitors.  We’ll post a wrap of the entire Van Isle 360 experience in the next few days.

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