THREE NIGHTS TO REMEMBER

The first wasn’t a night, really—more a twilight, then early morning. Cockle Bay, “Sugway” the Kitasoo people call it: Good seaweed place. Son Eric, daughter-in-law Brenda and I were out on a kelp patch, harvesting a plentitude of rockfish and lingcod. Elizabeth and daughter-in-law Cheryl were on a lovely clamshell beach island gathering berries and greens. Son Bruce was aboard playing his flute.

Cockle Bay 2004

Just coming dark and the wolf chorus began. Almost a call and response pattern: one wolf quite close at hand answered by a pack farther away. Eerie, mournful, exquisitely beautiful. The next day a young Helsuik man described to Elizabeth where the den site was. “I know that cave,” Elizabeth said; “It’s on the way to my favourite berry patch.”

wolf tracks on the outer coast, Connell Islands

The next morning I was hauling the dingy, getting ready to raise the anchor. Elizabeth was ghosting along the shore in her kayak when she put up a pair of sandhill cranes. Their wonderful tremolo cry echoed across the bay. Landing on the rocky beach by the boat, they proceeded to nonchalantly go about their morning business, emitting their typical feeding chuckle from time to time.

Cranes have only recently returned to the Coast. The elders say that, though they figure in Heltsuik mythology, they had never seen one until ten years or so ago. A pair of biologists studying nesting sites explained that it was the restoration of wetlands on their south of the border wintering grounds, and a ban on hunting, that account for their revival.

Wolf call and crane cry: two of the more rare yet most exquisite voices of the Coast.

wolf tracks on the beach in Cockle Bay

Sandhill crane tracks

The next night we arrived in our anchorage just at dark. It wasn’t where we had planned to be. A delay at Bella Bella and a lovely though not particularly strong combination of wind and current through Llama Pass had put us behind schedule.

About three in the morning we awoke to a bumping noise against the hull. I hadn’t been entirely happy with the set of the anchor so got up to look. We were surrounded by bio-luminescent salmon, darting this way and that like rockets going off in a Du Maurier fireworks display. When they broke the surface star-shells exploded, lighting up the cove with an eerie brilliance.

The third night was at Safety Cove. We had sailed from our bio-luminescent salmon anchorage the length of Fitzhugh Sound, catching a lovely coho en route for Bruce’s birthday. Now we were waiting for weather to cross the open water of Queen Charlotte Sound.

We had anchored quite far out as Eric wanted to try for halibut. Three Alaskan trollers, their slender poles lowered for stability, were anchored inside. Putting the sails away and cleaning up the deck, we noticed the sides of the anchorage dimpled with shoaling herring. The heavy breathing of sea lions alerted us to two groups of Californias, slimmer and more graceful then Stellars, working the edge of the shoals. They’re curious creatures. Out they would come to look us over, then in again to cause great consternation among the herring.

Stellar sea lion looks us over

Then came utter majesty. In past us, weaving through the trollers in a ponderous do-si-do to lunge through the shoals of herring: a magnificent humpback whale. Out past us again, into a shoal on the other side, herring exploding in every direction.

All evening long the sea lions and whale worked the herring. At dusk, however, a slimmer, smaller white-tailed humpback swam by. Our last glimpse was of white-tail and black-tail disappearing below the surface, side by side. To a handsome young male humpback, there is obviously one thing more enticing than shoaling fish! Eric called it “A Romance of Two Tails.”

The next day we had the calmest crossing of Queen Charlotte Sound ever.

Goodbye!

AN ECONOMY OF SHARING

Lots of folk on the Coast still subscribe to the old adage: “If you’ve got it, share it.” There’s even a sense that if you don’t share, the fish will stay away from your nets, the crab from your traps, and the slugs will have a field day in your garden. It’s part of respecting the creatures that are our food.

Our surpluses are usually crab and shrimp or prawns, sometimes berries or garden greens. As often as we can, we take crab and shrimp to church. For some of the older folk, it’s the only seafood they have access to. Jim brings rhubarb, herbs and garden vegetables to share. Donna brought down a wonderful Smithers cheese. Gil saved out some brass fixtures he thought we might use from the rummage sale.

The makings for a rhubarb and salmonberry pie

Anne, Ron and Elizabeth

When Anne and Ron came down with all their goodies, they had hoped to take back, along with crab, shrimp, etc., some salmon. But the one lovely spring we had on got away. Coming back into the yacht club, Jo’s friend Steve called out from the fuel dock: “Did you catch anything?” Ron answered, “Rockfish, but no salmon.” A fisherman, overhearing, reached down into his hold and held up a sockeye: “Here, take this.” And Jo had a coho in her freezer she wasn’t going to use.

Anne and Ron on La Sonrisa

We had hoped to be able to begin canning some salmon ourselves. The next morning, neighbour Mark kayaked over: “My motor isn’t running and I need a ride to the ferry. And by the way, I have three jars of sockeye that wouldn’t fit in my canner. Can you use them?” A day later Gordie phoned: “We limited out yesterday. Do you want a coho?”

Discussing fishing plans
Kimbo in his life jacket, ready to go fishing with Gord

Aunt Chris loves her crab. She shares it with sons Lennie and Herman and families, and always takes some down south to her sisters. She also loves going to garage sales, which is great for us. We put in our order and Chris keeps a look out!

Aunt Chris makes sure Thomas keeps warm

Cooking crab on the beach at Crippen Cove with Chris, Herman and Lennie

Foster and Hilda and Gordie are the last of the moose-hunting men, bridge-playing couples mom and dad were so fond of. Foster and Gordie are constantly offering to drive us around town, inviting us up for a meal or to do laundry, etc. The other day Gordie came up with a last package of moose burger from his freezer; earlier Foster contributed (along with making the most wonderful smoked salmon) four delectable octopi.

At least half the crab we give to Foster and Gordie get given away to others. It’s one of the ways Foster and Gordier continue to participate in the economy of sharing.

Gordon, Foster and Thomas telling after dinner tales

Hilda and Elizabeth

Scripture says that it is more blessed to give than to receive. Certainly it is a blessing to be able to share. But to receive is almost a double blessing. First is the delight in the gift itself; second is the delight in the pleasure people derive from giving. We are discovering that gracious receiving is, in itself, the giving of a gift.

Tonight Foster is serving fishcakes… and Gordie is picking us up! And tomorrow we head over, by ferry, to Haida Gwaii, with crab, shrimp and garden greens for Sara.

Appalachian Porch

Rocky Mount, Virginia home

Some of my most cherished memories are of my grandmother’s porch. Extending around three sides of the early 1900’s large wooden house, it has been the scene of many chapters of my life. The two porch swings on either corner have been there since before I was born, looking out on Court Street, in Rocky Mount, Virginia. I’ve just returned from a summertime visit.

Here’s Thomas telling one of his stories from the porch swing, Sept/07

This is my mother today. In my mind there’s another picture of a much younger woman on the swing beside my once-handsome father, reduced to skin and bones by cancer in 1984 but still with those same intense blue eyes. And way before that, the 1944 wedding pictures on the porch and all the beautiful bridesmaids in their pastel dresses. There are all the memories of coming to visit Aunt Ebby and Mammie/Mama Emma/Miss Emps. Of playing on the porch with cousins, and finding neat places to hide in the wonderful expanse of bushes and paths, and little secret places. Of the 2 gigantic elms that used to tower above the porch, and the Franklin County red dirt. Listening to the wonderful night sounds and catching lightning bugs. And most of all the feeling that there was so much love around me that no matter what I would always be cherished.

Appalachian red dirt

There was the year my first two children and I spent with Mom and my sister Ebby, when I needed a break from an abusive marriage. I have a photo of 7-year-old Cosmo in cape, tights and underpants, Superman about to fly from the porch rafters. Then there was the summer Cosmo bought an old van so that teenage Josh and Will and I could drive across the hot, humid continent - we finally got cool on the porch swings. Grown up Tamaya brought her handsome beau from North Carolina and his handsome dog Cisco to sit on the porch swing, before she brought them home to BC.

Maybe it was the cold spring and summer on the north coast that made me unable to resist this summertime visit to a beloved place and people. It's my sister Ebby's house now and she's doing a wonderful job of restoring a much loved home.
This is cousin Emma, one of Franklin county's best loved teachers. She's now retired but all ready to give nephew Matthew a chance to learn about taking pictures - of the porch swing.

Niece Kristy and Jenna and Ryan with grandma on the swing.
So many cousins have spent time together on this porch!
Freckles the cat was a stray that chose this porch, and family, for her own.
The ministers came for dinner – John and Rachel are the husband and wife clergy team at Trinity Episcopal Church (my father’s first parish)
John and Rachel's son Boyden loves watermelon

and so does Matthew.

Mom appreciates her walking partner Susy
and the return home to the porch.

Ebby and John's wedding anniversary on July 11, same day as my mom and dad's.

This time of year it’s hot in Virginia

Nephew John keeps cool on Court Street
The pond behind the school was rumored to have trout -
but they must have been hiding in the cool pond bottom

Too hot for a zebra even – nephew John knows we love animals and wanted us to see some different ones at the drive through animal reserve near Natural Bridge, Va.

It’s still wonderful to visit Mama Helen – now at the Franklin County nursing home. Here with Mom, my sister Ebby and cousin Randolph.

We also visited Uncle Skeeter. And had our traditional smorgasbord lunch at the Dutch Inn in Martinsville – now how did they know how to fix Mama Helen’s brown beans and corn bread?
Uncle Skeeter has long been a gardener, and knows every bird in southwestern Virginia. I had to ask him about that sweet singing mockingbird that calls me out to the porch swing every morning.
Here’s Ebby’s garden. From it we ate tomatoes, cucumbers and green beans – a real treat for me on my 100 mile diet!

Virginia full moon July full moon shines on Ebby’s garden

Here’s a website link for anyone wanting to learn more about the joy of local food.
http://animalvegetablemiracle.org/index.html

One of my favourite authors is Barbara Kingsolver. She’s the one who restored my love of literature with The Bean Trees. Then came Prodigal Summer some years later. And what do you know – she set this wonderful book in a fictional county next to my own Franklin County. And now guess what she’s done – moved to the Appalachians herself! She and her husband and 2 daughters are on a local food diet, and growing most of their food. There’s some challenging stuff and lots of new inspiration in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, A Year of Food Life. From her website (above) we found a source for locally grown heritage turkeys. We 've ordered one for the family reunion at Thanksgiving.


An important part of the live-aboard lifestyle are the book exchanges along the coast. Reading material comes along in its own way. When I opened Up from Slavery, written in 1901 by Booker T. Washington, I read: “I was born a slave on a plantation in Franklin County, Virginia.” I slipped the book into my pocket. Being also born in Franklin County, some 90 years after him, Booker T. Washington feels like a familiar part of where I come from. He would have run barefoot in the same red dirt. As a child we often drove past the Booker T. Washington Memorial, and I learned in elementary school that he founded the Tuskegee Institute, but what a vision he had! His own struggle from illiterate slave to world-renowned educator gave him great confidence in education for others. He writes of “this experience of a whole race beginning to go to school for the first time.” (I was reminded of Pablo Friere and the powerful literacy movement of popular education in the 1980’s in Central America.) He had a way of powerfully challenging and uplifting without being confrontational. It was the respectful approach needed during the chaotic reconstruction period in the South. It was right for his times, and he was able to accomplish major fundraising – people from so many perspectives appreciated his work at Tuskegee.

What I loved most was what they did at Tuskegee. The students learned practical skills along with their academic education. They built their own dormitories, and beds, and ran the laundry. They built all the buildings at Tuskegee, and made the bricks in the foundry they built. He didn’t think to even mention that of course they grew their own food.

Booker T. Washington had a combination of compassion, vision, intelligence and unstinting hard work. And now in our century we have such another among us. I just wish I could find my old US Social Security Number so I could register to vote for the Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama.

Sharon's Garden

Sharon's Garden in Dodge Cove

By now it’s pretty obvious that we’re into some kind of (modified) 100-mile diet. We’ve recently heard of a local meat cooperative and even a cheese-maker (wonderfully tasty and reasonably priced) in Smithers. So maybe as far as Prince Rupert is concerned it’s going to have to be a 200-mile diet!

Friend Ken, who teaches at the local community college, is planning a “Geography of Food” course. We’ve suggested making some of the classes evening sessions, inviting the community to sit in and featuring PR people who actual grow food. Students could follow up with interviews and maybe put together a handbook on growing food in Prince Rupert.

Who knows, it might be the beginning of the PR 200-mile diet club! Maybe half a dozen families could get together and purchase a gillnetter-load of fish and have a block party cleaning, cutting, freezing and/or canning. Maybe half a dozen families could take turns traveling to Smithers for cheese, meat and farm produce. Maybe half a dozen families….

Several years ago I sketched out an article entitled “Cousin Sharon’s Garden.” As I remembered it, she had three raised-beds, a simple plastic-sheeting 8’ x 12’ greenhouse, half a dozen berry bushes, some raspberry canes, and a clump or three of rhubarb. Quite modest. But there were only her and Rob at home then, and they were away fishing half the summer.

Early Spring garden
in the greenhouse

I remember Sharon saying that raised beds are the key in this rain country. Build them high and half fill with rock before adding back the topsoil (enriched with starfish and seaweed). That way you get good drainage and save your back as well.

Crippen garden

Sharon’s garden was the inspiration for our own raised bed at Crippen Cove, our Digby Island northern home. And much to our delight this year we discovered that young Sean, a second-generation Crippen Cover, is experimenting with a small market garden, selling his produce at the Thursday craft market in Rupert.

raised garden bed in Crippen Cove

Sean’s newly planted garden.

Sean's produce ready for market

path to the greenhouse

Sister Anne and Ron came down from Telkwa for a few days bringing strawberries, local chicken and lamb, and a wonderful box of preserves. They took back fish, crab and shrimp.

The really good news, though, is that niece Margi (Anne’s youngest), who teaches in Osoyoos, has received a grant to enable a “Farm to School Salad Bar” program. The program links a school with several local farms. The farms provide fresh, nutritious food for the school lunch program, and school children visit the farms to learn about composting, greenhousing and growing food in general. What a great idea!

A sad time, Sharon preparing cousin Rob’s boat, Ganhada, for sale.

Cousin Rob is gone now, and greatly missed. But Sharon is busy tending her garden, which seems to have expanded considerably. And we’re busy resurrecting a second raised bed at Crippen Cove.

Sharon's peas

The 100-mile diet seems to naturally begin in your own backyard or balcony. Growing a lot of food may not an option for everyone. But growing some food is a pretty fine thing!

Ebby's tomatoes on the porch stairs

SALT AND WHEAT

Son Bruce and daughter-in-law Cheryl are musicians. They travel across the country leading workshops and giving concerts. Somewhere in Saskatchewan an elderly gentlemen came up after an event and said: “I would really like one of your cd’s but I don’t have any money. Would you take a bushel of hard winter wheat in exchange?” Bruce, much like his father, will barter anything. “Sure,” he said, not realizing that a bushel of wheat weighs 55 pounds!

Somehow they got it home. And now we have bags of wheat stashed in every corner of the boat. We sprout it for salads and stir-fry. We crack it and add it to bread and muffins. We made sprouting kits for our children and grandchildren. We trade it away. But we’ve still got a lot of wheat stored in nooks and crannies!

wheat berries in sprouting mix
jam tart

The other day I was up in the attic of the cabin at Crippen Cove.

There, stored where it keeps nice and dry, is a 20 kilo bag of “fishermen’s” salt. Under the sink in the forward head is another 20 kg bag, barely opened.

Telling stories at the cabin

For years now we have salted surplus fish during the summer for pickling in the winter. Without refrigeration we have had to re-learn how to preserve food in the old ways—salting, drying, pickling, canning. Two years ago we discovered that if we salted the fish carcasses, prawn heads, etc. in the bait bucket, our guests on board and neighbours in an anchorage on hot summer days, appreciated it. But it always bugged me that we could only buy coarse salt in 1 kg packages, and at a price more expensive than iodinized table salt!

Salting bait

Last year, in an out-of-the-way corner of a store in Prince Rupert, I discovered fishermen’s salt: 20 kilo bags for 13 dollars and change. I bought three. We’ve got two left!

Paddling the kayak in Salt Lake

In earlier cultures a surplus of salt and wheat was a sign of abundance, of blessing. Looking in various corners of the boat, and up in the attic at Crippen Cove, are we ever blessed!