Tourism by Post

Nick and Val Martin have operated the Pelorus Sound mail boat for the past four-and-a-half years transporting both mail and passengers from the mussel-farming town of Havelock out to the farthest reaches of the Sound. The Georgia Strait’s Heather Cleland hops aboard for the day. “The people of the sound are as varied as the terrain,” Cleland describes. “Our first stop is Pohuenui Island, owned by a German family, where you can bunk in a dorm for $35 per night or rent a whole lodge for $900. A life spent with outsiders looking in seems to be part of the package for those living here. The local paper paints a picture of modern-day renegades bucking the norm and doing something that, deep down, most of us wish we had the guts to do.”