Now, on a lighter note, here is a recipe for a wonderful gluten free cake.

You will need;  a pan for baking, either a loaf pan, for a single recipe or a 8×8 pan for doubling it.

Ingredients;  2 eggs        1/4 cup of oil, i use canola     1/3 cup of honey      1 cup grated carrots        1/2 cup crushed pineapple       1/2 cup almond flour (i use ground almonds, a lot cheaper then the flour)      1/4 coconut flour     cinnamon     1/2 tsp. baking soda

Beat the eggs, add the oil and the honey, beat again, then add all the other ingredients , mix well, heat oven to 350 degrees, pour in pan, sprinkle a bit of demerara sugar on top for fun, it becomes nice and crunchy, and add walnuts if you like. bake for about 40 minutes, then test with wooden toothpick, centre has to be done, enjoy!!!!!

Before i continue, here is a little story, while sailing in the Strait of Juan De Fuca, i was at the wheel, Bert was fiddling with the rigging, i noticed a funny looking buoy, way up ahead, i had never seen anything like it, plus, it was not on the chart!!!    As we came closer, i noticed this “buoy ” had a wake, and the thought “submarine” came into my head.    As i slowly realized this, two very fast Coast Guard boats came racing towards us, on either side of the  submarine !!!     Here we were, two very innocent Canadians, in our sailboat, being screamed at by the skipper;”To port, to port!!!!”    Big machine guns on the front of the coast guard  boats, our wheel was turned very quickly to port, out of the way of the sub as it cruised right by us!!!!   I didnt dare haul out my camera, they might have shot it, but i would have loved to take a picture.    We realized later that we were just at the edge of the restricted area, but , as innocent as we are, plus, i was following the GPS route, we had no idea. Welcome to the USA!!!!

May 15th, we headed to Roche harbour, check in at customs there and anchor for a night. The customs officer treated us very well, plus his name is Specht, well, how dutch can you get!!   Specht means  Woodpecker!!!     I really like Roche harbor, it has history and the waterfront is just beautiful, wonderful gardens and buildings, i didnt get a chance to take some photos, but hope to do that on the way back.  Then, i can also tell more of the history, and be able to show some pictures.     Most of the islands around Roche Harbour are deforested, no trees at all, which is because of the lime kilns in the early 1900’s. I will tell about this more later and show some pictures.

We headed out May the 8th, inside the harbour it was not blowing all too hard, SE, but Malaspina Strait becomes very nasty, its not that deep, so the waves out there were very uncomfortable, wind on the nose, no fun, so we turned around and stayed another day at Fishermans.  Next day , things had quieted down and away we went, still could not do any sailing, but we were on our way.    End goal was Clam Bay, so we went through  Porlier Pass, at slack, and then motored strait into Clam bay.  Always like anchoring here, lots of room, and never too busy. On the 10th we headed for Tsehum Harbour, Sidney, even did some sailing , but it was very uncomfortable, ferries every where, i had forgotten about those ships, and their wakes are large!!!  We anchored at the head of the bay, the whole bay is mainly taken up with buoys, it is actually hard now to find a good anchoring spot.  Once settled  , again, we saw many friends, many awesome dinners together, and catching up on all the stories.     Vaughan and Rita let us tie our dinghy up at their boat, which was just great, we could walk into town easily, plus, two marine shops are right there, a happy Bert!!       We stayed 5 days, visited, shopped, and had a wonderful time.

Yes, the best part for me was the birds!!!   The gulls, and the crows, who all recognized the boat, as we came in, the gull pair circled and circled us, screeching as loud as they could, the crows waited till we had tied up, and the couple, who i know so well, walked up the ramp, sat there , very close, and waited, I MUST have brought some goodies with me!! The female now has a lot of trouble walking with the broken foot, but she seems to manage,at least she was not nearly as shy as last year.   Brenda has been feeding them while we were gone, and knows them well enough now too, she is convinced too, that they talk to her.    The male crow began his dance and song, going back and forth in front of the boat, hopping on top of the elec. box, so he could see inside the porthole!!!!   Again they flew off with tidbits, some ham, some cheese, and hit it all in another boat!!!  ( mainly under sailcovers!!)