First time ever in a C-Dory

H

Hunkydory

New member
Where as I have little interest in boat gidgets and widjets and lean toward the anti-social, my interest in exploring and the hearing of others doing the same or at least taking there C-Dory to a seldom seen place is very high. Something Wild Blue Jim said on another thread definitely caught my eye and attention. What He said was "very few boaters among us have ever gone to where no other boater has been before". And with this I agree entirely. What I'm wondering----is whom among us has gone or think they have gone with with there C-Dory where no other C-Dory has been before or perhaps even since. I know the answer to this would be interesting to me and perhaps to others too.

Jay
 
Hunkydory":35jnlv2q said:
What I'm wondering----is whom among us has gone or think they have gone with with there C-Dory where no other C-Dory has been before or perhaps even since.
Jay
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IN MY SHOP..... :lol:

(Sorry Jay, couldn't resist a little humor late at night..... :wink )

(Airborne....All The Way!)

(Seriously, it will be interesting to "hear" the more serious answers to your question).
 
Great idea for a thread Jay! Should generate lots of good stories...

I believe I did when I went to Johnson's Lee on the backside of Santa Rosa Island 2 years ago and overnighted on the hook. It is entirely exposed to the 'Japan' side of the ocean, about 80 miles from the marina. We went there to see if there were any remains of the WWII radar installation and compound they had there as a first line coastal defense site. We saw two other boats, about 70+ feet long.

Here is a commercial video link showing location and other facts about the island (thanks Islander Ron):
http://youtube.com/watch?v=1n1dkoEgmMs

At just about nightfall some big NW winds kicked up, we estimated them to be 50-60 mph at least, with spindrift. Wind was coming from shore about 100 yds away, generating 4 ft waves in that short fetch, ripped out all the seaweed in the area that 'used' to surround our boat. We also watched those two big cruisers nearby drag anchor for about 1/2 mile before they started their engines and headed away.

By midnight the wind died down, we went to bed, our CD25 with our Delta 22lb anchor, 30 ft of 1/4" chain and 7:1 scope in 27ft of water handled it well, didn't drag even 5 ft. I was concerned at the time, not particularly afraid, but didn't know if the conditions were going to get worse from a windshift away from shore, it didn't thankfully. Quite the memories, haven't been back since! Here's one of the pictures of us anchored while we're on shore exploring. The rest can be seen here.

PICT0017_001.sized.jpg
 
In the 60's there were still quite a number of the left over military Buildings in the Johnson's Lee area of Santa Rosa. It can get mighty rough up there. We would take each "new to us" cruising boat up there and stand offshore for two or three days, to see what broke before we set out on a voyage.

Thanks for the great photos of this area!
 
Dave S

Good one :lol:

The reason I stay away if possible from all those gidjets and widjets in the shop type areas and the accompanying tools to try to make them do what you want is the terrible hazards involved. There's been much more blood flung around these type areas then the ones I prefer. :wink

Steve

Unlike Bob, I've never personally seen the area you described and your photos have depicted so well. Really enjoyed your story and photos they made me much more appreciative of that area. Bet that was a challenge getting the dingy back to the C-Dory. At least you had some good patches of sea weed to kinda help mellow things out during the wind storm.

All

El and Bill could fill in several hundred pages of good first time stories and in-fact already have on there website. Is still one of our favorite web places to return to and enjoy.

Hope there's some more willing to share here.

Jay
 
Iam new to the cruiseing thing and spend most of my time in the sound or sanjauns with only a few trips to B.C. Barkly sound is the most out of the way place I have been but heard about it from other sea brats. Same goes for Princess Loueisa inlet. As far as first in a cdory I made it all the way to crab bar on the snohomish. That is a first in a cdory but it was short lived as there were four more dorys right behind me. They sohould know not to follow me by now.
 
Hunkydory wrote:
Bet that was a challenge getting the dingy back to the C-Dory. At least you had some good patches of sea weed to kinda help mellow things out during the wind storm.
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Actually Jay, the violent winds didn't come up until about 1/2 - 1hr after we got back to the boat, the dingy ride wasn't too bad. Funny thing about the seaweed, there's a bit more to the story. When we arrived about mid-morning, I noticed the two big cruisers about 1/4 mi South of Johnson's Lee and outside of the heavy kelp line. I decided to anchor in 'front' of the seaweed to get into shallower water and closer to shore. I throttled up and just before hitting the seaweed, shut down the engines and tilted at the same time, we glided right over all the seaweed into a clear area between more seaweed and then the shore. We anchored in really good sand, 27 ft deep, added 5 ft for the bow height and figured line length for 7:1 scope.

A little while after we got back to the boat from exploring on shore, the wind came up and grew quickly and steadily. I kept watching this large "seaweed beard" collecting on my anchor line and thinking how much additional drag it was creating in these high winds. About 1/2hr before dark I told my son to get his lifejacket on, take a knife and go up front and cut that off our line. He opened the cabin door and that's when we all learned how windy it really was. Then he stuck his head around the corner of the rear part of the cabin and got hit with a piece of seaweed going by at about 50-60 mph. He came in immediately and said he wasn't going forward. So I said OK, then I'll do it. I put on a lifejacket, went outside and started to put my foot up on the side to walk up front, my foot immediately blew off the side. I came in and said, well, looks like we'll just leave it there!

I turned on my GPS, put it on anchor watch and set it for the highest resolution to monitor our position. We had dinner, several waves broke over the bow and hit the windshield with great force (and noise), but the boat's position did not move (fore/aft). The next morning it was beautiful, calm with absolutely clear weather and water. What was missing was all of the seaweed, we didn't see any in front of us, behind us or even on the anchor line!
 
Not to be contrary to the theme in this thread, but it doesn't matter to me if I've gone where no one else has ever gone, nor ever gone in a C-Dory.

What matters is that I've never gone there before and it's a new experience for me.

Simple as that for a simple guy too old to blaze new trails!

Joe. :thup :teeth :rainbow
 
Joe---For some reason I kinda doubt you blazed many wilderness type trails in your younger days either :lol: and if there was ever any Scots-Irish in the past gene pool it must be way diluted now. Gotta agree with the "what matters is the never gone there before and its a new experience for me part" being the most important.

Don't know if in our travels with the C-Dory we have ever taken it where no other c-dory has ever been or not. Do know that thousands of boats came down in one year during the Yukon-Alaska gold rush days in the late 1800's the same section of the Yukon River we ran up and down in 2003 and still count it as one of our top three experiences in our c-dory. The other two being two trips to Terrors Ford Inlet and this years being able to reach and explore Sister Lake. A very difficult to access salt water chuck accessible only from the outer Alaska Coast through a narrow extreme tidal entry maze.

What made these experiences special and unique to us was the challenges involved and the isolated wilderness beauty with its assorted wildlife to see.

I realize our type cruises go way beyond enjoyment for many, but really thought just exploring in a boat that is perfectly made for just that would draw more into at least exploring to the degree they are comfortable and then sharing it with us here and in the process may have created great experiences similar to "DoranJean" to share in this thread.

It would seem that we are again in the minority and the majority of c-brats feel the same as you evidenced by the lack of experiences shared. Now if it is the case that being first don't matter I'm fine with that, because like I said I have no idea if the Hunkydory has ever been anywhere no other c-dory has been or not. How about just a true interesting c-dory boating experience involving some type of exploring that was new to you.

Again being the c-dory boat is the perfect boat for this type of experience the stories shared are sorely lacking from the group as a whole and I thought this thread may be a way to rectify it.

Jay
 
Dora~Jean":3gofhogo said:
Great idea for a thread Jay! Should generate lots of good stories...

I believe I did when I went to Johnson's Lee on the backside of Santa Rosa Island 2 years ago and overnighted on the hook. It is entirely exposed to the 'Japan' side of the ocean, about 80 miles from the marina.
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Sorry Steve- We have you beat. We spent a night on the hook at Johnson Lee in the fall of 2002. We went over in Fishtales, buddy boating with our friends in their Parker.

We had better weather when we were there- not quite as eventful as your trip.
We did have a rough time coming back across the gap though, with 25knot winds.

I've had Fishtales all around Santa Rosa and over to San Miguel. I made a solo trip over to Beachers to spend the night, then cruised around the island the next day. Went over to Cuylers on San Miguel then fished Talcott Shoals on the way back.
 
Ahh shucks Roger, oh well ...but do you have proof? Just kidding. Great places I plan to visit as well, been to some of those by 26ft trailerable sailboat but not in my CD.

I like what Jay said and Joe wrote:
What matters is that I've never gone there before and it's a new experience for me.
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That's what counts!!! 8)
 
I'll play, although we didn't actually go there, we did drive by, but I'll wager that not many C-Dorys have been there....ended up, unknowingly, floating past the nude beach on Suavies Island when it was in full bloom...it was not a pretty sight

Damn,you're getting a new boat Roger? what kind? I thought you had yours all fixed up
 
Yea- I did have Fishtales all fixed up. Dang it :evil: PJ loved that sofa!
Getting a new boat was not what I was wanting to do!
Ya know, these boats are great "little" pocket cruisers, but unbeknownst to us, there was something seriously wrong with the hull- we're just damn lucky it didn't go wrong while we were out on the ocean.
We missed some of our best cruising weather here in our area. Fishing is down for the next couple of months, but if I go diving, I'll have to be a boat ho.

Scot Reynolds at the Factory promised to take care of us----- been 3 months and we are still waiting. :evil:

Sorry don't want to vent too much- still wanting to give the Factory a chance to make it right.

Roger
 
My "C Dory never been there" tale is rather mundane compared to the swashbuckling adventures just recounted. We are Tennessee River rats up here in North Alabama.

I often use C Eagle for wildlife photography and find huge advantage in the shallow draft and access that it affords.
Late last January I got wind of some American White Pelicans who had temporarily migrated into the end of Limestone Creek, part of the Wheeler National Wildlife Reserve, and decided to mosey downstream from our home port of Ditto Landing in Huntsville.


The water was already somewhat low but we eased into the creek and headed carefully toward the swampy flats to find our quarry. The water was only 6 ft near the main river and dropped steadily. As we idled into the shallows with eyes on the sonar, the pilgrims (perch jerkers) along the bank ogled us mightily as they expected us to run aground any second. We made it in close enough and stopped at 16 inches of water to take our shots.

No real problems getting out with the moter tilted up a bit. I don't know of any kind of live aboard cruiser that would have allowed us to go into such a place.

I believe that the pilgrims were dissapointed that we did not get stuck>

:lol: :lol:
 
dogon dory":2cquohcv said:
HunkyDory":2cquohcv said:
...It would seem that we are again in the minority and the majority of c-brats feel the same as you evidenced by the lack of experiences shared...
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You may also want to consider that you're getting what you asked for when you started the thread. The thread title is "First time ever in a C-Dory" and you asked for people to share if they thought they'd been where no C-Dory had been before. You didn't just ask for cool places people have been. Personally I have no idea if anyplace we've been is a first for a C-Dory. Even if it is, so what? I'm sure natives were there hundreds of years ago in a kayak. Are you really asking what is the most remote place people have been? The most unusual place? The least populated place?

As far as a first, I can say with certainty that our C-Dory is the first and only one that's ever been parked beside our garage. There's a first for ya. And I'm darn proud of it :teeth
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Was considered and you may want to read or possibly reread the opening statement of this thread made by me, where the first sentence states "Where as I have little interest in boat widjets and gidgets and lean toward the anti-social, my interest in exploring and the hearing of others doing the same or at least taking there c-dorys to a SELDOM SEEN PLACE IS VERY HIGH." Is it really that difficult to see the direction I was aiming for in this thread. To extrapolate parking your boat by your garage in any other way then humor would sure seem a stretch to me and I think DaveS already covered that well with humor that I did enjoy. Of course there's no way to know whether you’re the first or not, but any time you are exploring and seeking SELDOM SEEN PLACES its sure going to be a cool and unusual thing to do. I also really don't quite understand the put down to the thought of maybe being the first to do something. Seems that being first in any human endeavor has always been a time-honored tradition for the more adventurous among us. Thought there would even be more examples shown like Steve thinking he was there first to visit a remote site and then finding out Roger had been there before. Enjoyed both their stories and all the others shared thus far. All of their contexts have been in the intent of the thread title and opening statement and recognized as such by the contributors and me. If the gap between the title and the intent was a bridge to far for some, perhaps just a simple clarification question would have sufficed like is commonly done in the gidget and gadget forums.

On the other hand you may want to consider a cruise to Sister Lake, Chichagof Island, wilderness area in Late May. No concern at all about being first and you just may be as proud of it as parking your c-dory by the garage. With your past boating experience it should be a piece of cake. If you decide this is a worthy adventure even though I know you don’t really need any advice, I suggest you now know me well enough to read our account of making this trip before you attempt it. It might be worth your while to read it even if you decline the suggestion to go. I personally would be enthralled by another written account of this cruise in a c-dory boat even if it was most likely only the second time a c-dory has been there.

Jay
 
Hi Roger,

I was wondering why you where getting a new 22! Now that you have spilled the beans maybe you will start a new thread and give us the details. Do we need to check our boats for a major problem?

I like your new boat name.
Steve
 
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