Book Review - June Cameron: 26 Feet to the Charlottes

26 Feet to the Charlottes26 Feet to the Charlottes by June Cameron

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


June Cameron is writing about an adventure some 40 years in the past, a cruise on a 26 foot wooden sloop to the Queen Charlotte Islands in the waters north of Vancouver Island, British Columbia.  She writes with fond remembrance and respect, both for her own past and the vanishing traces of the first nation residents of the area.  The book was of particular interest to me because I expect to sail these waters, and in a similar sized boat.  Every morsel of experience, even vicarious, is important to a latecomer, and I came away from these pages with a feel for what awaits me.  I wonder if it is still possible to harvest as much from the bounty of the sea as did June and her companion?
There is a measure of melancholy in the tenor of her relationship with her shipmate, who owned the little sloop.  She is vague about the what went wrong: I couldn't decide if it was the conflict of their respective cruising and the racing cultures, or something else, but the voyage was apparently their last hurrah.
Anyone with an interest in the Salish Sea is likely to find this book entertaining and a worthwhile read. Can't wait to go.



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