Wallace Island’s Conover Cove – A Hub of Activity

Wallace Island’s  Conover Cove –

Seems like our stay at Wallace Island was the first chance we got to relax and take a breath. The last month has been a flurry of preparation and packing for our trip, along with a grinding 8-day road trip from Michigan to the Pacific Northwest (PNW). Lots of things to remember and take care of before leaving home. We were exhausted! It takes a long time to relax your brain and your body from that kind of stress. No one had to twist our arms to get us to sit back and smell the roses after we tied Kismet up to the dock at Conover Cove. We finally had a minute to remember why we are doing this boat trip. Easy to lose sight of that desire when faced with all the details to get there.

Wallace Island Was Once a private Island in the Southern Gulf Islands

Last time we visited there (2017), we anchored in Princess Cove. It is a short hike over from there to Conover Cove. So, we had seen the dock in that cove during our last visit to the PNW, and this time we decided, if there was room, we would try to get a spot at the dock. It would be our first night in Canada and the Gulf Islands. Because we stayed at the dock this time, we did more hikes in the woods during our two-night stay.

We had a fun two days! There was a lot of activity: boats coming and going, campers bringing gear to camp in the open, grassy area near the dock. What especially surprised us were several adventurous people with decked-out kayaks, some with two little sails, one with pedal power, anchoring or tying up to the dock, one sleeping in her kayak at anchor, believe it or not. She arrived in the middle of the night, at 2:00 in the morning. She said the paddling was so good the night before that she just kept going. As she filled her water jugs up at our boat (there is no water available to boaters on the island), she shared with us that her end-goal was Alaska.

A Fun Story…

The island features a popular driftwood shack well-known to local and visiting mariners. Last time we were at Wallace Island, we did not have any tools or paints to carve a personalized plaque to hang on the shack, so we picked up a nice piece of driftwood from the shoreline and thought we would take it with us and bring it back with us when we returned. We thought it would be on the way back from that trip, but we never made it back that year.

We took that driftwood back home with us, and it sat on a shelf in our garage for eight years. In the craziness of departing, we totally forgot that piece of wood. After locating an appropriate piece of driftwood, Jim put on his McGyver hat and used a mallet, screwdriver, and a punch tool to fashion a rustic plaque for the crew of Kismet to leave behind. He did a great job. We took it over to the shack the night before we left and proudly hung it on the outside near the door.

The leaves of the madrona trees are turning yellow and floating to the ground like butterfly wings (above-left). The old-growth forest is an absolute delight to take a hike through. We can’t get enough of it.