Over on Cruiser’s Forum we got into a discussion about who was going to cruise around Vancouver Island this year. One thing led to another, this and that, and pretty soon we were decided that Njørđson and I, and possibly family, would be making the circuit again.

And we talked about stages, breaking down the trip into smaller bite-sized bits to be approached and accomplished. I checked out the sailing distances for these stages and compared them very simply to a base speed through the water of 5 kts, and made estimations for the number of days based on keeping the average number of hours underway to about 8-10 for a day. Here’s a paraphrase of how that breaks down:

Route	nm	hours	days
Deadman Island (south entrance to San Juan Channel) to Nanaimo, including a stop at Bedwell Harbor (Poet’s Cove)	63	12+	2
Nanaimo to:
Gowland Harbor, just south of Seymour Narrows	80	16	3
Waiatt Bay on Okisollo Channel north of Surge Narrows	90	18	3
Read Island General Store	85	17	3
Discovery Passage to Bull Harbor	125	25	3-4
Bull Harbor to Winter Harbor	57	11.5	1
Winter Harbor to Sidney Inlet	108	22	3
Sidney Inlet to Tofino	21	4	1
Tofino to Victoria	120	24	1+

The conversation is still ongoing about whether or not sailors can plan to meet up on their trip ’round the island. The problem is usually one of departure—when people are starting is staggered from mid-May through the end of July. And some people want to get around in 4 weeks. Others plan 6 or 8 weeks, or even “as long as it takes.”

So, instead of a strict schedule, talk is shifting to how to keep in touch with others who are in the planning/preparation stages, and then maintaining a few threads as we move our boats around. Here on this blog, though, I plan to slowly build a large reference of articles, online resources, and hopefully active contributors who can help flesh out the stages of a circumnavigation of the “Big Island”.