Isle aux Mort

I drove most of the day dodging fishing nets under full canvas with Cape Breton Island visible at horizons edge on our starboard side most of the afternoon while Andy installed the high frequency radio that had caused us so much trouble at the airport. Andy is an electronics geek to begin with so he was in seventh heaven as he planned and schemed and wormed his way through hidden spaces in the boat to run an antenna out of the stern lazarette and onto the backstay.

The ground for the radio was not as good as he thought it was and it took awhile for him to be able to key the microphone without lighting up all sorts of electronic devices on the boat. It was the propane alarm that sent Geoff ‘to the edge’. He thought the boat was going to blow! Finally Andy got it right and spent more than an hour checking in and gabbing with the communications boat, Burin Star. The electronics were much happier too.

By 01:00 on June 2^nd we could see the loom of the lights at Port aux Basque on the southern coast of Newfoundland. Andy’s plotted course had brought us within half a mile of some pretty nasty coastline. We talked about it for a minute and decided that discretion would be prudent. I fell off about 10° and the rocks slid on by.

We both were getting excited about our landfall on Newfoundland. For me it was a first time experience. For Andy, in many ways he felt he was returning home. We both agreed to ‘forget’ to wake Geoff for his watch so we could share the experience with each other.

Isle aux Morts sea buoy was dead ahead at 04:00 as the rising sun exploded over the low hills of Newfoundland to our east. Imagine Geoff’s surprise when he came on deck just as we entered the trickiest channel entrance yet. The channel is bordered by many low lying small islands and had several twists and turns in the approach to the harbor. The water was so clear I could see the bottom moving slowly under the boat as Andy and Geoff gave me my steering directions to the public wharf.

By 05:00 we were standing on Newfoundland dirt. Andy and I were wide-awake and keyed up so we took a look-around walk where I saw a model of a Newfoundland schooner that I immediately fell for. The schooner was fully rigged with sails up. The hull was not a solid piece but actually planked. Earl Billayd, the builder, only was asking $120 Canadian for it. The only thing that stopped me from buying it immediately was it’s size. It was 43 inches long and 36 inches high. I decided to take my chances and walked away from it until I could figure out a way of getting it home without destroying it in the process.

When I asked Earl about shipping it he said it could be made a little smaller by lowering the sails. All of the running rigging was totally functional! It now dominates my dining table as I sit here at home aboard Strange Bird typing this. Shipping it home cost me more than the boat itself.

Not all of the boats coming in to the harbor made it cleanly. Mister Bill had a steering failure and had to come in under emergency rudder and felt that they could not maneuver well enough to come to the dock to raft up. Andy and I talked to them via a hand-held radio and gave them directions to a safe anchorage marked on our charts.

Another boat, a Hunter Legend 35, was even less fortunate. They misjudged the water depth at the commercial wharf and ran aground, breaking off the bottom 3^rd of their rudder! Fortunately for them the harbor had a Travel Lift and they were out of the water less than an hour later. A phone call to Hunter in Florida resulted in a new rudder to be delivered in about three days.

The people of Isle aux Morts opened their hearts and their homes to the flotilla. An information booth was set up at the foot of the dock. One of the services being provided was a list of phone numbers of people who were willing to open their homes to us for showers and laundry since there were no facilities at either the public or commercial docks. Many people drove their cars to the docks and were offering rides to wherever anyone needed to go even if it meant going all the way to Port aux Basque 30 miles away.

As I walked around everyone I passed said hello and I was offered rides by people driving by. I had my shower and shave at Rosine’s house.

Our entrance to Isle aux Morts was made under perfect conditions but by the next morning the wind was blowing a gale with gusts into the 50 knot range. We spent the early morning hours re-positioning fenders and making sure our lines were clear. We were on the windward side of the wharf so we took a pounding throughout the day.

Mister Bill’s anchor dragged and they spent several hours motoring into the wind and then falling off and then doing it over and over again until finally they were able to reset the anchor. The people on the Hunter had been left hanging in the straps of the Travel Lift and decided to get off the boat until things quieted down.

I spent the afternoon in the local bar shooting pool and killing brain cells with Mike Battcock, an independent rigger from St. John’s, who had come to Isle aux Morts on the chance that he might be able to drum up some business. It was Mike who took my schooner to St. John’s so I could ship it home.

That evening I became an honorary Newfoundlander by being officially ‘Screeched In’ at the local bar. Back in the days when there were still plenty of Cod an important part of the ceremony was to kiss a cods lips (Yes they do have lips) or lacking a cod, kissing a Puffin’s butt was a suitable alternative. Since we had neither Cod nor Puffin the ceremony involved drinking copious amounts of Screech Rum, reciting a Newfie ditty (if you’ve ever talked to a Newfie you know how hard that can be), and eating Newfie steak (bologna) while wearing a huge pair of rubber sea boots standing in front of a bunch of drunks. Actually everybody was really into it and I got all sorts of congratulations when it was over. I’ll keep the certificate with my other nautical milestone stuff like my shellback certificates from the Coast Guard. We stumbled back to the boat knowing we would be paying the price in the morning when we got underway for Sainte Pierre aux Miquelan.