Last time I was here, I wasn't sure where the old Honeymoon Bay lumber mill was exactly in relation to the current shoreline. I swam out to the left pretty much at random last time. I recently noticed a square "indent" in the shoreline on the old plans and photos where the mill's dock was located. Checking the modern satellite image, I could see that this indent was still there and there was a dock in the same place. This was a newer floating dock related to a trailer park on the site. I wanted to see what was around this dock underwater. I wondered if there were more old relics of the mill clustered underwater in this area. I drove up on April 16, 2015. Visibility near the surface seemed great, maybe 30'. I descended and there was a layer of suspended sediment about 4' deep that continued down deeper. Visibility in this layer was only 10-15 feet. I swam down the silt slope and turned right towards the dock. There were the usual logs and sawmill wood/bark debris on the bottom. There were quite a few lobster trap-looking things. I assume they were for catching crayfish. I didn't see any fish, but I expected that. I usually don't see fish in Cowichan Lake before June. I kept swimming down the slope. It was pretty steep. Below 60', the water became clearer. I could see about 30', but it was dark. I briefly went down to 80' deep and there were still scattered logs down here. I swam back up the slope to the dock area. I didn't see anything too dramatic here either, just several more-modern plastic chairs. I continued a bit past the modern floating docks. The sunken logs and wood debris seemed to thin out. I swam back in the shallows, where there was a field of water plants. "Water plants" seems a silly thing to call them, but I can't call them kelp.
I probably won't be back to this particular spot, but for some reason I keep coming back to Cowichan Lake. I think it's the way fresh water preserves the underwater history of the surrounding towns. The old lumber mills on this lake used several wooden steam tugs to pull the log booms, etc. around. In the 1940`s some were replaced with steel diesel tugs. I wonder what happened to the old, obsolete vessels. I fantasize about them being left to sink somewhere in the lake. After my dive this time, a guy at the local coffee shop told me about the steam locomotive that fell off a barge into the lake during a storm on it`s way to Youbou. This is the 3rd time a local has told me this story. I`m skeptical since every lake in B.C. has the same "locomotive falling off a barge" story. Cowichan Lake had several rail systems bringing logs to the mills and some of the locomotives would have had to be delivered by barge, so you never know...
