After working yesterday morning at Starbucks (and running into our friend Mark Bunzel there!) we left the Port of Sidney and over to nearby Sidney Spit on Sidney Island. We wanted to give this whole crabbing thing a shot, and we heard there was good crabbing out there. I got a three-day license online and printed it out on the boat. (Boy is THAT different than getting a fishing license in the U.S….Canada is so chill.)
We grabbed a mooring buoy, and then set up our crab trap (we got one of these cool Flex Fold collapsibles to keep in the lazarette, and I think we may get another). We put it all together with the bait container and the 100ft line and the red and white buoy with my name and phone number on it, and out it went in about 30 feet of water. In 45 minutes or so, we had our first Dungeness crab! It was a male and it was a keeper, so in the bucket it went.
We set the trap back out and took the dinghy into shore to hike around a bit.
Sidney Spit is a very popular park in the summer due it its close proximity to Sidney. There's good hiking and quite a few campsites to reserve. There's even a ferry that shuttles people out here several times a day. But today, we were one of two boats out here, and never saw another person.
The spit disappears at high tide. (This morning all that was visible were some pilings and the waves crashing over the tip top of the sand bar out there.)
More good moss:
In the early 1900s Sidney Island Tile and Brick Company operated here on the island. Today, a few remains of the factory and tons of broken red bricks can still be found along the shoreline.
Hey, lookit! Oysters!
We did a little research to make sure gathering a few of these oysters was legit, and it was, so I guess we're having oysters AND crab for dinner!
Heading back out to Airship (white dot there among the pilings):
Looking pretty with Sidney in the background:
Checking the crab trap:
We got another one! Quite a bit larger than the first, and another male! Our luck so far with the whole crabbing thing has been great! (Also: we caught crab, in Canada, using Canadian bacon. I'm serious. There's probably some rule we just broke…like feeding chicken to chickens or something.)
Dinner was fresh crab and some local organic beer for our first course, and then we fried up a couple of fresh oysters for the second course. Those seem to reheat really well in the oven (from frozen!) so we froze the rest for another meal. (Also, we need a bigger pot for cooking crab. We had to cook one at a time…so uncool.)
We used the leftover crab in omelettes this morning (with some spinach) — yummy!
Yesterday's route (2.74 nautical miles):
Next stop: Ganges Harbor on Saltspring Island!
