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The Rest of the Fourth Day - To Chatterbox Falls

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We found Malibu Rapids quite by accident. We were sliding along under sail having a good ole time when I noticed
on the GPS that we were coming up on the entrance to Princess Louisa Inlet. Almost simultaneously Donna mentioned
a very nice vacation home over to the right. We both wondered who could own such a nice, large home way out in the
middle of nowhere. It looked like the entrance to Princess Louisa was over there too so we decided to go have a look.
About the same time, we both came upon the brilliant notion that this tiny slit of a passage was the entrance to Princess
Louisa Inlet. WE HAVE TO GO THRU THIS?!... I guess I shoulda read the sailing instructions more carefully. I didn't
remember anything about this. As we got closer it looked like the water was going downhill.... I didn't know it at the time
but this is called an "overfall". It really makes sense. It's when the water we are in is higher than the water that we're
going into so the water has to flow downhill... kinda like a river. As all this thinking was going on, I noticed the speed of
the water that we were in on the rocks that we were going by. It was clear that there was no retreat... We were going in...
From here on it was just a matter of keeping the boat in the middle of the channel. For no other reason than I couldn't
think of much else to do, I started watching the depth gauge. From the readings we were getting, there didn't seem to
be much water under us... just a couple feet under the keel. However I knew that some pretty big boats came through
here so I comforted myself by thinking that it was just all the turbulance messing up the depth sounder... it had to be
much deeper than that around here. I found out later that no... it's that shallow. Oy! It's a good thing I didn't know all
this stuff before. My sphincters woulda been totally puckered up. However as it turned out, the passage was a piece
of cake (in spite of the fact that many minutes went by before my heartbeat returned to normal).

Once we got into Princess Louisa, it was like we'd been spit out into heaven. Shear cliffs... waterfalls... snowy mountains...
gorgeous boats... and when we got to the dock.... insanely warm water. This place was unbelieveable. As we rounded the
last corner, off in the distance we could see Chatterbox Falls. This is a very large waterfall at the head of the inlet. We could
hear it as we approached. It was a comforting sound.

Speaking of getting to the dock... when we arrived, as expected, there was no space on the float for a sailboat to tie up.
Usually the powerboats blast in and scarf up all the places on the docks. So the under powered sailboats end up having to
deal with anchoring in the deep water (and it's really deep). In the grand scheme of things this is probably for the best
because judging from the power boaters who we talked with, they clearly didn't have the skills to do anything nearly that
troublesome. Deep water anchoring it difficult. However, in our case, as we approached the dock, we could see that
another powerboat was casting off their mooring lines. SCORE!!! We squirted into that parking spot faster'n' a duck on
a June Bug (to quote one of my brother in laws). That was one of the benefits of my oversights at Malibu Rapids. All of
our powerboat parking spot competitors were still waiting for a safe opportunity to pass through the rapids.

As soon as we were tied up and had said hi to our neighbors, it was time to go off and explore. That evening we went
swimming, checked out Chatterbox Falls and had a lovely dinner. It was simply delightful. That night the moon came
up and illuminated the cliffs that towered over us. It was absolutely cosmic.

That's a pretty nice vacation home... or could that be the entrance to Princess Louisa Inlet?		Not sure... let's go over there and check it out
Some of the mountains overhead
Look at the water rushing around the rocks on this aid to navigation		This looks like the entrance to Princess Louisa Inlet... Quite a bit more narrow than we had anticipated... What do we do now?
Hey... I think that we're commited to going through		Well then... let's do it. Have to stay in the center of the channel
My goodness... this doesn't seem good		Oy! And check out the folks on the rocks. This is a church camp where I think the main pastime is watching boats zip through the rapids.
I wish I could have enjoyed this. It really was quite a ride.		This power boat thought it was safe and came in behind us. In this picture he's in the process of getting spun around in the current.
Look at this current...		He's okay now... But I'll bet he's not so happy that he followed us in.
Some of the waterfalls...
Our first look at Chatterbox Falls in the lower right. There are also lots of other falls throughout the photo		These falls are near Trapper's Cabin. We will hike up to these falls tomorrow.
Chatterbox Falls		Jack testing out the water next to the dock
We were amazed with how warm the water was...		The next day, I swam over a couple miles in this water and was not chilled
		Find the the tallest mast in the picture... that's where our boat was
Exploring the falls
At the base of the falls looking out to the inlet
A better view of the float. Again, our boat is the one with the tallest mast		This is where we probably would have anchored if there hadn't been any dock space. There isn't much room to anchor because the water is incredibly deep. Our anchor line wasn't nearly long enough to reach bottom except in a few tiny locations like this.
Our evening Yahtzee game. I think I was kicking everyone's ass in this game (or was that another game)		The sun was going low
This was the best picture we have of "Harpy". Harpy was a harbor seal who seemed to live in the inlet. He/she was a frequent visitor

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