Cortes Island

Cortes Island hosted a double header last weekend. Oysterfest was on Saturday and the 3rd Annual Cortes Casual Cup occurred on Sunday.


Cortes Island was named in 1792 during the expedition of Galiano and Valdés, presumably after Hernán Cortés, the Spanish conqueror of Mexico. The island has a permanent population of roughly 1000 (as well as wolves) and is 150 km2 in area. Cortes has an isolated hippy atmosphere with many artists living on the island. Five of us journeyed to the island via two ferries, crossing from Campbell River to Quadra Island, and from the east coast of Quadra catching a second ferry to Cortes.

Aboard Tenaka travelling from Heriot Bay on Quadra Island to Whaletown, Cortes Island.

We pitched camp at our friend Darrin's uncle's house on Hague Lake, and continued on to Oysterfest at Squirrel Cove. The Cortesians put on quite the spread. The feature dish was done in several styles, breaded, fried, barbecued, and of course raw, with sauces and flavourings adding to the taste. Bacon-wrapped was a particular favourite. Sarah devoured the raw oysters, especially a new favourite called Black Pearl. Also on the menu were Manhatten and New England clam chowders, steamed mussels, barbecued spot prawns and chili-style little neck clams. We feasted.

Hague Lake

To work off our gluttony, we played the eighteen holes of the Cortes disc golf course. The course flows through second-growth fir and alder stands on the side of a ridge. The layout was easy to follow for newcomers, but challenged our skill level. Highly recommended.

We finished the night at the registration for the Cortes Casual Cup, an ultimate hat tournament. Ultimate is a seven-a-side sport in which two teams score points by passing a 175 gram disc (Frisbee is the brand name, and not generally used) to a player in an end zone. Ultimate is self-refereed and non-contact and relies on "spirit of the game" to avoid undesired conflict. A hat tournament involves players being "drawn from a hat" and placed in teams, with the intent of creating balanced teams. We registered and played pick-up with the welcoming Cortes locals.

Next day we arrived and divided into our respective teams: Flirts, Hugs, Kisses and Smiles. I played for Hugs with a mixture of Cortes Islanders and off-islanders, all from locations around Vancouver Island. We won our first two games, defeating Sarah's Flirts in the second, despite their goosing tactics. After lunch we played Smiles. The game was competitive, with scores level at 3-3, when I tweaked my hamstring. I was done for the day. Smiles started playing zone defence, not exactly in the spirit of the Casual Cup, and Hugs, lacking experience of zone, found it difficult to respond. We were smoked. The final was between Smiles and Kisses. Smiles took it 13-10.

Whaletown