Indulgences at sea are far and few as Jupiter navigates remote coasts and passages in worrisome weather. Her Crew confess to a longing for leisure and whatever luxury the ship’s latitude can provide.

Fine forecasts and tempered tides attract Jupiter to the companionship of mariners finding their ease like gamming sunfish. We approach Desolation Sound which George Vancouver named in 1792, noting that the region provided “not a single prospect that was pleasing to the eye.”

Sloth

Captain Vancouver’s low opinion notwithstanding, Desolation offers excellent, protected and beautiful anchorages for many boats – occasionally too many boats. Jupiter finds a lacuna at Prideaux Haven with adequate swing room and magnificent mountain views. No waves overhaul the rocky shores, light winds barely register on the anemometer, and bright sunshine prevails throughout long days.

The tranquility of the place pervades all vessels, and excursions from motherships are predominantly by paddled craft. Aboard Jupiter a languid lifestyle takes hold, and for five days the crew sleeps late, finds interest only in the comings and goings of vessels within their watery precinct, and Jupiter’s lento changes of bearing.

Oystercatchers find rich pickings along the tranquil shores of Prideaux Haven and a juvenile Brown-headed Cowbird rests on Jupiter’s wing door.

Sunset brings the anticipation of an evening meal, perhaps a neighborly wave or chat with passing paddlers, and the thrill of toggling on the anchor light. The timing of this required action to display an all around white light from sunset to sunrise gains importance in this place devoid of other stressors. Starry mast lights float an acronycal in the moonless darkness.

On awakening crews find their boats shifted by the tide into unexpected relationships with their neighbors, and judging by many anchor lights shining long past dawn, the residents are late risers. Jupiter’s crew finds wicked joy in making an unnecessary foray from warm bunk to electric panel to extinguish the mast light promptly at first light – before returning to bed.

Pride

Jupiter, having absorbed all the exuberance found at Prideaux, retrieves her deeply rooted anchor and makes way for Toba Wilderness, a marina where moorage with a view is found for the fortunate few. Toba offers an isolated place to meet other seafarers, to share tales about marvelous exploits and tattle about occurrences only partially known.

Boats here are displayed and admired, often washed and chamoised with abundant fresh water tumbling from a mountain stream. Jupiter looks salty and scruffy from lack of exposure to rainfall and the crew’s recent slovenly inactivity. The crew, nevertheless, is proud of her two thousand miles of wanderings and survival in dodgy seaways this year. She is weathered, and wears it well.

Toba meets The Talking Heads’ vision of heaven: Heaven, heaven is the place where nothing ever happens. There are hiking trails and and a magnificent pavilion from where captains and commanders can admire their yachts and each other. The remote prospects are beyond imagining, but nothing ever happens.

Gluttony

Two days in heaven has whetted the crew’s appetite for fine dining devoid of dish duty.

Food and more await Jupiter at Dent Island Lodge where dock access and egress are possible only during periods of slack tide. Arriving vessels are called to the dock, tied up and plugged in with fastidious efficiency. Your lunch table is already set, but first order your evening meal, and book a table for breakfast the next morning.

Fine food and first class service flow like the rapids running past the marina. We manage six sumptuous meals during the same number of tide changes and are here to tell of it.