Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/118159
marketplace Your One-Stop Guide to Travelling & Leisure Aurora Continued from page 35 – and funky Cortes are home to 2,700 and 1,050 year-round residents, respectively. Farther south, we push the beach on Savary, purely for pleasure. Ashore for a two-hour legstretch, we stroll past long-time homesteads disguised as veranda-rimmed cottages, where families take pride in being reachable only by boat or weekend "daddy" float planes. hawaii "GOOD MORNING, COMOX. AURORA EXPLORER. british columbia oregon TO ADVERTISE IN MARKETPLACE , PLEASE CONTACT M ICHAEL O LDEWENING 604.299.7311 We're just checking into the system coming out of Desolation," drawls the skipper over VHF radio channel 71. It's Day 4 and, reluctantly, we're headed for homeport. We've logged 216 nautical miles, but we still want more time on board, more north. "If we could offer only five-day Broughton cruises with premium staterooms, we'd do it in a heartbeat," admits Adams. "This has been a much deeper experience – much deeper – than I expected," muses British-born fellow passenger Trinita Scott, from the 80-something-year-old's favourite perch in the wheelhouse. South of Cortes, we power past tiny, private Twin Island, where Queen Elizabeth stayed post Expo 86. Did HRH hear tales, I wonder, of the besotted British couple who set up housekeeping on Twin? (Missionary nurse Margaret was 48, Anglo-Irish aristocrat James Nixon 23, when they wed in 1912.) Slowing to film herring gulls and solemnfaced cormorants, we pass scrubby, windswept Mitlenatch Island Naure Provincial Park. The Aurora's dozen rail-side passengers receive a final fishy salute from belching sea lions. A tug passes, pushing north with a barge of road salt for Alaska. The ocean traffic thickens. But if I squint, I can block out passing tugs and pleasure boats and imagine a strapping Norwegian in a clinker-built rowboat, leaning into the oars, heading north into possibility. shipping out ONBOARD READS Coastal Villages, by Liv Kennedy (1991, Harbour Publishing; $42.95) • Tidal Passages, by Jeanette Taylor (2008, Harbour Publishing; $36.95). DETAILS The Aurora departs weekly from Menzies Bay, March 27 to October 30. • Fares from $1,110 per person for a three-night sail (double occupancy). • 250-286-3347; marinelinktours.com Y Member coastal travel, including maps, TripTiks and savings: bcaa.com/thewestcoast p32-35,44-45_Aurora_DriveSmart.indd 44 1/27/12 8:34:16 AM