Raven's Apprentice

By D Robert Hardy

Raven's Apprentice is a compelling true story from the west coast of B.C. that launches you into the world of Raven and our interconnectedness with all living things.

"Suddenly, without warning, they spun on a fin and started charging the boat. My thrill turned to real panic. Killer whales attacking a boat. Had there ever been such a thing? A paralysis gripped me. Now, within striking distance, they slipped into an arrowhead formation just below the surface. If the leader of the pack didn't bring the boat down, his flanks would."

"At about 20 feet off the bow, the frontrunner broke the surface, peeling waves off his rostrum as he continued his commitment to engage. Bracing for impact, my hands squeezed into the railing..."

"You have succeeded in bringing the reader on the voyage with you and into the deeper experience of transcendence and heightened awareness. Some of your experiences are literally skin tingling, many will leave your reader thinking and remembering for a long time to come."
- Sid Tafler – Writer, Editor

Travel with me aboard MV Lady Guinevere. Witness being charged by transient killer whales, stalked by wolves and walking creeks so pristine you feel as if you were the first human to experience the wonder of nature.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Jul 10, 2020
• ISBN: 9780228822301

Book preview

Preface

How this book came about:

Moira Armour, a former CBC executive, and I were engrossed in a conversation one day when she suddenly stopped talking. Her sight had fixed on a picture of our boat that hung on the wall behind me. You’re the boat people! You’re the ones who came to my little bay each summer, and then one day you never returned. Her voice was thick with emotion, And now you are here. She reached forward and touched my hand, the closest gesture to a hug that Moira ever gave. She wanted to hear every boat story, know every adventure. Once her appetite was whetted, her curiosity was relentless. I told her of my work with the Fisheries when I bonded with killer whales, was stalked by wolves, walked salmon creeks and became lost in the fog with my boat. When I finished, Moira sat silent. You have to put all this in a book! she suddenly proclaimed as she slammed her fist down on the table. This is the stuff that makes armchair adventurists like me want run out and buy a boat. So, you must do it!

Moira, bless her, has since passed on, but I have now fulfilled her wish.

All the stories in this book are true. All the people I met along the way were real, but their names have been changed to respect their privacy. Some events unfolded at different times in my life with other vessels, and in other areas of the B.C. coast. All contributed to my deeper understanding of interconnectedness and the sharing of the primal presence of the killer whales, wolves, and Raven and what that means not only to me, but to all of us.

It was a journey like none other I have ever heard of and, while much of it is impossible to explain, I did my best to bring you along to view for yourself the adventure that led to my apprenticeship with Raven.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Gail Kirkpatrick for guiding me through the editing process. Ian Lidster, my high school English teacher, for his early edits. Sid Tafler, for his inspiration and editing skills. Kathy Vanderlinden, for her honesty and editing skills. Caroline Bateman, for her encouragement and editing skills, and Lorraine Gane, for her contribution to edits and words of wisdom. Without all of their support, the book would be a list of events in a vessel’s logbook. Thank you!

Chapter 1

GETTING UNDERWAY – DAY 3

We leave something of ourselves behind when we leave a place, we stay there, even though we go away. And there are things in us that we can find again only by going back there.

– Pascal Mercier, Night Train to Lisbon

I stepped out on deck and took a deep breath. The air had a crisp bite and smelled of brine and dried seaweed. It cleared my head. Even though I was three days behind schedule I didn’t feel anxious. I felt ready to go. It was time.

I ran my hand along the side of the wheelhouse. It was wet – an early morning mist had settled on the surface. It was a good sign. It meant a warm sunny day, perfect for travel on the water.

From the wharf I admired my boat’s 36 feet of vintage lines. Her gentle sweep from stem to stern, her proud bow, her … She was beautiful from every vantage point. Even the lighting was different. Perhaps it was my imagination, but she seemed to glow as if she knew we were doing something special today.

The old girl’s motor chugged away reaching her warming stage, then slipped into a quiet purr. This was going to be a long journey for her, probably the longest in her life. She had spent many years in service during the 1930s and 40s as a twelve-passenger ferry between Salt Spring Island and Vancouver Island, and she had done her job well. Back then she was known as the Constellation. Later, she was sold off, and spent most of her life with one owner. He renamed her Nash Bon, which gave reference to his family name Nash and Bon meaning good in French. Not something I would name a boat.

It wasn’t until 1977 when I was talking with a boat broker about what I was looking for in a boat: Older wooden boat, something with traditional lines and lots of brass, that he sent me off to Sidney where I spotted the old girl.

It’s mostly cosmetic, said the old Scottish boat surveyor. A lick of paint here, lick of paint there, and she’ll be as sound as ever. Mr. Nash, the previous owner, had loved his mistress of the water for thirty years. He kept her secretly tucked away in a boathouse in Sidney, running the oil lamps night and day throughout the winter and giving her regular bottom paint in the spring – then slipping away with her for a couple of weeks here and there. But Mr. Nash had grown too old for her. He had kept her too well and she had outlasted him. He sadly knew he had to give her up or she would die a wooden boat’s death.

After I purchased her I renamed her Lady Guinevere, but I liked to call her Lady Guin for short. Although she was a lady, she didn’t hold to put on airs so Lady Guin was just fine with her. When you admired her from any angle, she could make your heart swell: her classic lines – sharp, square bow and matching wheelhouse, her narrow beam, open aft cabin and swim grid completed the picture. She retained her original Grey marine engine, which sipped fuel and was as dependable as an old Rolls Royce engine. I dressed her hull in creamed coffee paint with a touch of forest green trim aligning her with her traditional heritage as a workboat and, when she was brassed up, she was a lady of elegance and pedigree. I would comment further on her loveliness, but she could get a little narcissistic, and would want to hear more, so I will leave it at that.

Now it was 1978, a year later and time for me to leave Victoria for Bella Bella. Toby, the wharf cat, was curling around my leg, and squeaking like a rusty hinge when he purred. It was the cost of defending his domain over the years. I gave his big, scarred head a rough scratch just the way he liked it and bade him goodbye. I wondered if he would still be here when I got back.

I had said my farewells to the liveaboard wharf rats: a tribe of misfit-males living the dream of life on the water, but never actually leaving the Victoria dock. They all had their stories of waking up one day and saying, This isn’t my life, this is not what I want to do! They left their jobs and relationships and bought a boat. Reckless courage!

At this time in my life I had no ties, no obligations, no responsibilities, and no love of my life standing on shore. This would be my first real job and sense of responsibility, so I wanted to get there on time and make a good impression.

I would miss playing music and my musician friends. The idleness of showing up and sitting in on a session, that effortless style of living that always felt so natural for me. But now I would develop another sense of time, the time the working world stepped to.

I slipped the dew-soaked mooring lines, tossed them on deck and gave my Lady a nudge. The thrill of the adventure was giving me chicken skin, as an old Dutch friend used to call it. I was afraid and I was excited. I was leaving my safe haven of noisy planks and squeaky boats.

The sun was just splitting the horizon as we chugged out of the Victoria Harbour entrance at Ogden Point. I thought of the armada of ships that had passed through this port over the years. One stood out, the SS Ohio, that would eventually pass beneath the hull of my Lady in the shallow waters of Carter Bay up north.

The SS Ohio had been bound for the gold fields in the Yukon. She left Seattle the morning of August 24, 1909, carrying gold prospectors, shopkeepers, schoolteachers, immigrants and their children. On that beautiful August morning, she passed Ogden Point making her way into the harbour and dropping off and picking up passengers, then headed up the coast for Nome, Alaska. I was to follow her same route.

Out past the breakwater, I viewed Victoria on my port side. It was not a colourful port, too many whites and greys and indecisions. She needed vibrancy – reds and greens, blues and yellows – to match her east coast sisters.

A drab concrete wall lined the beachhead. It shored up the craggy rock and blocked the sea from taking over the city. The wall was crowned with a thorny metal railing that ran a mile or so from the harbour entrance to Beacon Hill Park. Joggers stopped and watched us, saluting to shade the morning sun from their eyes. We were their view, and not just theirs, but those of all the eyes on the waterside of the street, waking up to see us: a small antique vessel plying her way to some distant regatta. Looking smart and seaworthy as they safely sipped their tea and observed us through spectacles, telescopes, and panes of glass. I imagined they were all wondering – all fantasizing – our route and destination. We were part of a scene, a segment of a perfect day, a discussion of the weather, an affectionate kiss or the inspiration for an artist who would paint my Lady into immortality.

As I motored up to Trial Island Lighthouse, the waters were gentle and serene, not the usual mood, all tempestuous and rough. I stood out on deck and guided my Lady through Enterprise Channel between Gonzales Bay and Trial Island, a shortcut used by the locals that was as dangerous as it was picturesque. The channel was not marked for hazards, but if you stood out on deck and stayed mid-channel away from the bull kelp and its beckoning arms you could avoid the hidden pinnacles that dotted the inner waterway.

There is an exuberance attached to adventure on the water when nature is at her best. It elevates the spirits no matter what your mood and gives life a purpose to be lived and explored.

Years ago, when I was an impressionable teen, I would stay up and watch late night CBC movies, the only time the network broadcasted anything that interested me. They would show art films and cutting-edge movies made by Fellini, Francois Truffaut, Ingmar Bergman and Kurosawa, to name a few. But one evening the TV guide announced I Heard the Owl Call My Name. The title intrigued me. It was about a young priest who was dying and had been sent to minister a native village up the coast of B.C. While he was there, he learned true compassion and what life was about through aboriginal ways. The movie left such an impression on me; I knew I had to explore the coast at some time in my life.

And now, here I was … heading north to Bella Bella with eleven days to get there and it all began with a knock on the side of my hull.

As I sat deep in meditation, I heard someone coming down the wharf. You could always tell which way they were coming or going by the sound of the old wooden planks. Each plank had its own note like the wooden keys on a marimba. Some were loose, some firm, some split, and some rattled, but all were distinct. If they were coming towards you, they would sound like this – plink, plank, plink, plink, plunk, planka, plank. But if they were headed away, it would sound like this – plank, plunka, plunk, plink, plink, plank, plink. Whoever it was, he was coming up the wharf towards us. I glanced at my watch: 8:23 AM. It wasn’t a wharf rat, they would be heading the other way to work, and the wharfinger didn’t do his rounds until nine-ish or so ...

I closed my eyes and the footsteps stopped. Were they lost, confused or looking at one of the boats? Then, they were on the move – then they stopped again. Now they were alongside my Lady Guinevere. I said to myself, Now what’s he doing? I wished he would move or something. I couldn’t tell if he was scratching his head or winding his watch, but he was restless. Then, like wax turning hard, he was silent. Even the boat stopped moving as if anticipating his next move.

KNOCK, knock, knock. It was a polite knock; not too firm, not too shy. I folded back the duvet and slipped out of the bunk. Although the fo’c’sle was warm on the top half, there was nothing like hitting a cold cabin sole with your warm feet to wake you up. Even if you had slippers waiting for you, they would be chilled right through. It’s just the nature of life below the waterline.

I decided not to respond to the caller right away. I always thought it was rude to yell at someone through the hull of a boat anyway. The sound of a disembodied voice coming from the insides of a wooden hull was kind of like yelling back at someone from inside a coffin. It just wasn’t done.

I slipped on my clammy jeans and stepped lightly from the fo’c’sle into the galley and up into the main cabin. I slid the cabin door along its railing and popped my head out.

It was an officer, but he was dressed … oddly. Like a mix between a traffic cop and an army sergeant but he didn’t have that … officer of the law arrogance. He seemed like plain folks, but in uniform. Maybe he was recruiting?

His lined face had spent a great deal of time squinting into the sun. He wore glasses that were practical and could take a fall occasionally. He had a slender build and probably burned more calories than he consumed. It was obvious he didn’t like public contact, but it was part of his job, so he got that part of the day out of the way so he could enjoy the rest of it at his desk or communing with nature.

The first words out of his mouth tumbled over each other, Is this your boat, can you be in Bella Bella in two weeks? He said it like he hadn’t talked to anyone in a while, like he had been rehearsing the words in his head, but his lips were eating a sandwich.

Are you the owner of this vessel?

A flash of panic, why is he asking? What does he want with me? I knew I should have jumped ship when I had the chance. Why do we sometimes have a flash of panic when a stranger asks our name? Especially when they are in uniform and we are in bare feet?

I looked him in the eye and affirmed I was he and asked who he was. He blushed, Yes, of course, and he introduced himself as a Fisheries Officer and that he was there to see if I was still interested in chartering my vessel to the Fisheries Department. He held up a letter. You wrote to us. I recognized my scratch and scroll. Suddenly it all flooded back to me. On a whim, I had applied for a posting with the Fisheries Department back in February – with no response. So, I forgot all about it. It was now the last week of May.

Then he started again with the rapid-fire questions, not letting me get a word in between his. He said that one of the patrolmen that chartered out of Bella Bella had cancelled and they needed someone up there in a couple of weeks: sooner than later. Again, he asked, Can you do it? Can you leave right away? I blinked for a second to five minutes. He fired off another round, Do you have a single side band radio?

Another blink – thinking, thinking, thinking – something relatively intelligent popped into my head. I have an old Daniels’ A.M. radio on board, and he came back with, Good enough! On that, he spun on his heels and hot-footed it down the wharf. But like an annoying neighbour, he turned to say, Oh, could you drop into the Fisheries office at old Bella Bella, they will be expecting you. I’ll send them the paperwork.

And he was gone. I guessed his thinking was to leave as fast as possible before I changed my mind. Of course, I was still wondering, What the …? Where? When? Who’s goin’ to pay …? How much?

I had no idea what I was getting into, nor the vaguest idea of how to prep a boat, navigate in real time or haul anchor. After he left, I wondered if that was one of their recruiting tactics – no paperwork, no handshake. He just turned and bolted, afraid I might stop and ask questions.

Chapter 2

ENCOUNTER WITH RAVEN

The Chain Islets were coming up on my left side as we motored into Plumper Passage. Dead ahead was Discovery Island, named by Captain Kellet after the British vessel H.M.S. Discovery, commanded by Captain George Vancouver.

I couldn’t imagine navigating this stretch of water and all the rock outcroppings that lay between in a hail of rain or fog under the duress of wanting to get to a safe haven. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all. I attempted to get out of going to Bella Bella, thinking it was too much adventure for me.

***

After my encounter with the Fisheries guy, I sat with a cup of tea. The brass candelabras and burgundy curtains that adorned the galley were comforting and familiar. We always heard stories at the wharf of seasoned fishermen going out one day and never returning. Reports would say, All hands lost at sea or Fishing boat sunk off so and so reef.

I investigated the dregs of the tea leaves and didn’t see my future. That’s it – no venturing off to a place you had to say twice. I would drop by the Fisheries office and tell him it was off … too short a notice – they would have to find someone else. I slipped on my jacket and was out the door. I wanted to do it quickly while my wind was up and my bearing set.

Just as I stepped off the boat, a raven landed on one of the pylons. Not just any raven but the biggest I had ever seen. You don’t realize how big they can be until they are in your space; they could take your dog if you had one.

Crows are different. They will do anything for a meal. They are small and noisy and love to perch overhead and relieve themselves just as they take flight. But this raven knew he was intimidating. His presence was commanding. He was so close I could see his aged feathers were nipped and frayed. A long white scar exposed a break that had healed badly and he favoured his right leg, catching his balance with every hop. His affliction reminded me of a shaman and his rite of passage. A shaman had to withstand tremendous hardship to transcend the physical world. Through these trials he would become aware of the hidden realms he must learn to work within.

The raven had a quietness about him that deepened the silence all round, forcing the dock noise, harbour traffic and the rumble of the city to fade into the background.

The word Nevermore drifted into my thoughts and planted itself there. I immediately thought of Edgar Allen Poe’s poem The Raven. The word was foreboding. Was it a premonition of my journey north? That I would be nevermore: that I might not make it back?

It was a twilight moment, and, in retrospect, things seemed to slip sideways from then on. There were lessons unfolding that required reflection and time to digest. I felt I needed to pay attention.

The raven tucked himself in and burst into flight. The din of the city noise returned. I looked around. I felt … transported, like I had just returned but never left. It was surreal, I was living in the same world but … not.

I gathered my thoughts and bearings and continued walking down the wharf to the Fisheries office, oblivious to the planks announcing my departure. I was lost in a moment of survival and travel and if I had a future. I began a reflective conversation. We’d never ventured past Trial Island, which was not that far from the Victoria Harbour. I had no experience – no training! A couple of night school classes didn’t make me a skilled navigator.

YOU said you wanted to work for the Fisheries as a patrolman, YOU wanted to contract your boat to them … did it not occur to you they might want to hire YOU?

My response to self was small, Sometimes I dream out loud … not expecting anyone to respond. I sent a letter off to a faceless address … I guess part of me didn’t expect a reply.

Well, you got a reply! Now, it’s your move, my inner self continued, making me feel foolish. You haven’t got a clue what you would need for equipment. Your navigating skills have only been on paper. You don’t even know if your radio works, or if your compass knows north from south.

I do want to get there – but I also want to come back! I replied firmly, Because it’s not an adventure if you don’t come back home.

We can’t dwell on the negative or we will end up on the couch reading someone else’s adventure. We have opportunities in our youth and the fearlessness to pursue them. There’s plenty of time to reflect on life when we are old and comfortable. But when the fast pace of youth gives way to quiet teas in the garden of contentment, our life’s meaning and purpose blends with our daily thoughts. Was it fulfilling or was it not? Was there a point to it all? Sometimes deeper thoughts surface when you least expect them.

I had been living with an emptiness in my heart for as long as I could remember. It