Lisa bought me a new rock tumbler to replace the vibrating one I finally wore out (it lasted 8 years). The tumbler takes longer to polish the stones, but I think I will get a better finished product.

The young men from the two church wards in Anacortes held their annual “high-adventure” outing earlier in the week.  Ian is the Young Men’s President in the Anacortes Ward and he was short an adult leader for the trip so he asked if I would go. There was no way I going to turn down the offer. While Lisa kept the home fires burning I spent five days in Canada. Let me tell you about it:

Bishop Gary Grimnes is part owner in a cabin on Vancouver Island. The cabin is located on the Uchucklesit Inlet, about a mile northwest of the Kildonan Post Office (see map). The cabin, additional buildings, and docks are all floating on the water. The cabin is off the grid, not relying on public utilities. Water is taken from a stream behind the cabin and power is generated from electrical panels and stored in batteries. Cooking is done with propane. 


Ian, myself and Lance were the assigned leaders from the Anacortes Ward. We rode in Lance’s 30 foot Kingfisher, along with five other boys to Gary’s cabin. We took the water route from Anacortes to Victoria, then checking in with Canadian customs officials. On our way to Victoria we came across a pod of Killer Whales south of San Juan Island. From Victoria we motored up the south side of Vancouver Island, through the Strait of Juan de Fuca to Port Renfrew to refuel and then further up Vancouver Island to Barkley Sound. The waves were incredibly rough, so much so that I registered 30,000 steps on my fitbit without every leaving the cabin on the boat.

Barkley Sound is just north of Bamfield on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island and forms the entrance to the Alberni Iinlet. The Broken Islands Group lies in the sound. Barkley Sound is part of the traditional territory of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations Indians.  In 1787, Captain Charles Barkley explored the sound and named it after himself. The Nuu-chah-nulth, also referred to as Nootka Indians, are one of the indigenous people who still reside in the area.

Entering the sound we motored north up Alberni Inlet and then northwest into Uchucklesit Inlet, which is where the cabin is located.

The other half of the group drove their boats up to Vancouver and took the ferry to Nanaimo and then drove to Port Alberni. After putting their boats in the water at Port Alberni, four in total, they motored south through the inlet, arriving shortly after our arrival.

Gary’s cabin is one of many located on the water in Uchucklesit Inlet and they are all off the grid. If you need supplies from the grocery store, hardware store, or lumber yard, you can place your order by phone to Port Alberni and the ferry will deliver your items to your door the next day (beat that Amazon).

View from the front of the cabin

After dinner on Tuesday, Ian and others went fishing.  Ian caught a nice salmon on his first cast. The remainder of the week included a lot of fishing for everyone. You can tell from the pictures below. Unless you are Native American you can’t fish directly out front from the cabin in Uchucklesit Inlet. The local Indians own the Sockeye salmon run. 

There is one post office in Uchucklesit Inlet and it is open two days per week. The ferry will pick up and deliver the mail.

Post Office

Ian caught a small rockfish one afternoon. A bald eagle was circling overhead so Ian tossed the fish out in the water for the eagle. The eagle dive-bombed for the rockfish, caught it in it talons, and flew away. No sooner had the eagle done so that another eagle swooped down on him and forced him to drop the rockfish. When the rockfish hit the water another eagle grabbed it and flew away. We decided the two thieving eagles had worked together.

Can you recognize the face in Mohawk Mountain (picture below)? The uncut tree line forms the mohawk. Funny thing about the face. It points directly across Alberni Inlet to a hidden Native American burial cave.

Can you see the cave entrance at the water line in the picture below? 

Here is the entrance into the cave

Inside the cave are a number of burial boxes and skeletons.

Ian and I didn’t stay in the cave very long (who likes to look at human bones?). The boys loved being in the cave and took their time getting out.

That is the trip in a nutshell. We saw some beautiful scenery and shared in many new experiences. It is great to live in this part of the world, to have family and friends close by. Friends with boats and cabins (ha, ha, ha).

Remember Paul Harvey’s “The Rest of the Story?” Here is the rest of the story I didn’t share above:

What do you think your body does when it has too much calcium? It will stockpile it in your kidneys, slowly building a future present for you. That present will be in the form of a calcium oxalate kidney stone. I received my present on Tuesday.


I had suffered from a few mild reactions to kidney stones prior to the days leading up to our departure on the boat to Gary’s cabin. At home Tuesday morning I felt great, assuming I likely passed a small kidney stone and I would be fine for the trip. On the boat, at just about 11:00am and south of Victoria Canada, I discovered what maximum pain really means. Suddenly, without warning, Babe Ruth entered the boat, swinging and hitting a home run into my groin. 

This powerful blow took my breath away and I looked at my groin to see if I had been shot. There was no blood but there was plenty of pain. I tried my best to be a hard-guy, like Stallone was in Rocky or Rambo. I wanted my son Ian and the boys to see how tough I was, how I could handle the intense pain. But it didn’t work. I eventually slid from my feet to floor below rolling up into a ball. For the next few hours I was on a journey of a lifetime. Ian and others on the boat were sympathetic, but there was little they could do. Lance, the boat owner and physician, gave me 800 MG of ibuprofen which attacked my pain like a kitten fighting a lion.  

I don’t know if the roughness of the boat ride contributed to the passage of the stone down my ureter or not. I’ll never know. I simply know the boat’s bouncing off the waves did nothing to add to my comfort. 

By the time we reached the cabin the episode was over. My research told me to drink large quantities of water, which I did. That was the best advice I could find. At this point, I thought I was now OK. I was comfortable, the worst was over. The bad news was I was on borrowed time.

Just before dinner I was hit back into reality with the same forcefulness as the initial Babe Ruth home run. While all this was going on, I was thinking about the most painful episodes of my life. I was trying to compare the kidney stone pain I was experiencing to how I felt during the worst times of my life.

I remembered the removal of my wisdom teeth when I was 20 that forced me to cry like a baby once the novocain wore off. I remembered being squished for hours by the tractor on the farm when I was 21.  And I remembered seeing dad in the Alzheimer’s unit of the care facility after the doctors turned him into a vegetable. I can’t say which came in second to the torture I was now experiencing.

The dinner episode finally ended, only to be replaced with another at bedtime. I awoke the next morning pain free, but was soon on the floor once again. Ian spoke with the other leaders and determined the best solution was to put me on the boat and take me to the clinic in Bamfield, a small fishing community at the mouth of Barkley Sound. Bamfields main street is the waterway with homes and commercial buildings flanking both sides.

 Bamfield waterway

When I got to the clinic my kidney stone pain level had reduced from a 10 to a 3. The nurse at the clinic mentioned if I wanted to be seen or treated, because I was not a Canadian citizen, I have to hand over my credit card and agree to pay the clinic fee of $765.00. My emotional pain level then jumped from a level 3 to a level 10. $765 dollars? Are you kidding me! There was no way my suffering, no matter how bad it was, would make me fork over that much money. Then I came to my senses and decided to call my insurance carrier to determine how much, if any, of the bill they would absorb. To my surprise, my medical coverage would take care of all the bill except $30. I handed over my credit card and went ahead with the evaluation.  


Yes, I was passing one or more kidney stones (I knew that). Yes, there was blood in my urine (I knew that). The nurse contacted a doctor in Victoria and he agreed with her assessment, then recommended she dispense Tylenol 3 to help me with the pain. I got 20 tablets. The  most expensive medication I’ve ever received.

While at the clinic I passed my first stone. I knew I was passing a kidney stone because it felt like I was passing razor blades. That is the most descriptive interpretation I can come up with. For the next 24 hours, each time I went to the bathroom, it felt like razor blades. 

I had two more episodes during the day but my pain medication made them tolerable. Come Thursday morning all was calm, all was quiet. Could it be I passed all my kidney stones? As of this writing I have been pain free. Grant Cochran, one of the leaders at the outing and also a physician, said that passing a kidney stone is said to be more painful than giving birth. I think I would rather try giving birth than to experience another kidney stone.

Other pictures: