von donop inlet

Von Donop Inlet was on the recommendation list of more than a few people that we've talked to on the way up, so to Von Donop we went. The anchorage is tucked back into Cortes Island by a narrow channel about 150 ft wide in some places. The anchorage at the end of the channel opens up and can fit a ton of boats, but we were only among 3 boats anchored there. We decided to check out the path to Squirrel Cove - it was lovely - 3km of a few hills, great forest and lots of spider webs to walk through. The path was in great shape, as most of the BC Parks paths seem to be - even marked every 0.5km as to how far we had gone and how much further to Squirrel Cove. Once we got to the end of the path, however, we were dumped out on to a road. Signs? No. We both guessed left, so left is where we went. Left was downhill, and the cove, on the water, must be downhill, right? Well, it was a HUGE hill. We got about half way down and Jason started having doubts. I convinced him to keep going with my clever deduction skills - there were McDonalds wrappers on the left side of the road; therefore, a chocolate shake was waiting for him at the bottom of the hill. We continued to the bottom of the hill - no Squirrel Cove. We proceeded to hike halfway back up the hill (to approximately the McDonalds wrappers) when I flagged down a truck.

"Excuse me, could you tell us how to get to Squirrel Cove?"
"Sure - you get to Squirrel Cove by hopping on the bed of the truck"
"Sweet!"

And there it was. We got a ride back down the hill, just passed where we had turned around, and dropped off at the cove - which consisted of a general store, a craft store and a restaurant. No McDonalds, sorry Jason. I gave the entire town (population 5) a good show as I jumped off the bed of the truck as my skirt decided it wanted to stay on the truck. Hello Squirrel Cove! We picked up a few groceries and headed back up the hill, once again. Nice hike back and just thankful that when we got back, the dinghy wasn't floating in 4 ft of jellyfish infested water. :)

50°08.789'N 124°56.763'W