We’re voyaging north to further explore the Hakai Luxvbalis Conservancy Area and the outer islands north of Seaforth Channel, so we won’t be blogging again until we’re back and caught up in the mid-August time frame.  More then.

Jennifer & James Hamilton

Jennifer@mvdirona.com / jrh@mvdirona.com

While heading south through Colvos Passage on July 3^rd, we heard on the radio that Quartermaster Harbor was closed to all boats until 6pm that day due to the Tall Ship Parade of Sail. We arrived in the area just as the last one, the CGC Eagle, was leaving Quartermaster Harbor. An impressive number of pleasure craft surrounded the parade, and an equally impressive security contingent guarded the boats. The Eagle had a particularly large entourage: two 110-foot patrol boats, the Sea Lion and the Orcas, and two large tractor tugs, the Henry Foss and the Wedell Foss. A myriad of other small Coast Guard and Coast Guard Auxiliary craft in everything ranging from Coast Guard 27-foot utility boats to 50-foot pleasure-craft to jet skis zoomed throughout the crowds and the parading ships, while the Coast Guard’s 175-foot buoy tender Henry Blake stood off the entrance to Quartermaster Harbor.

We idled off the Ruston shore to watch the ships pass, then joined the crowds in the Foss Waterway as the ships docked and fighter planes swooped overhead.

A few years back, we arrived one Friday night at Silverdale at the head of Dyes Inlet. It’s usually not a very busy place, but the docks were packed and a fair number of boats were at anchor. We dropped the hook away from the crowds a bit, nearer to the head, and settled in for the evening. About 9pm, a tug with a barge arrived from the south. The tug captain slowly picked through the anchored boats and eventually stopped near the head a few hundred yards away from our boat. We couldn’t figure out why a tug would be arriving at night like that and what it would be doing at the head. No docks or industry were there and there just didn’t seem to be any good reason for it.

We got our answer at 10pm. Explosions erupted on the barge and light filled the sky. It was a fireworks barge and we had the best seat in the house. We’d arrived at the beginning of Whaling Days. The annual event includes an always-impressive fireworks display, a street fair with live entertainment, and outrigger canoe races. It’s a real family affair—with kids and adults of all ages. On a hot summer day, the warmer waters of Dyes Inlet are ideal for swimming. The festival atmosphere extends to the docks—they’re packed and everyone is having a good time. Each year we’ve been, several dozen cigarette boats roared in on Saturday as part of a poker run and roared back out again just as quickly. We could hear their engines for miles.

Andrew Anderson Marine Park, operated by the Anderson Island Parks and Recreation District, is a lovely park on the southwest side of Anderson Island in the south Puget Sound (map of area). The nature preserve, sometimes called Andy’s Marine Park, provides the only public saltwater shore access on the island and is part of the Cascadia Marine Trail system. Little-known to boaters, the park is popular with locals and kayakers and makes a great afternoon picnic stop.

The park meets saltwater at a sloping gravel beach packed with sand stars. Behind the beach is a delicate, protected lagoon. An old wooden floating bridge crosses the lagoon, where the sounds of chirping birds fills the air. Once across, a well-maintained trail climbs up into the woods behind. Signs along the way indentify the local where flora and fauna.

We moored at Tolmie Marine State Park and ran the dinghy across. Other moorages are at Oro Bay and Eagle Island Marine State Park. The Anderson Island Historical Society has a detailed map of the island. The terrain around the lagoon bridge can be very muddy—duck feet or rubber boots are helpful.

Last weekend we anchored off Blake Island Marine State Park.  The high temperature for Saturday was 59F. A few other boats were about, but the marina was half-empty, all the buoys on the north side were free, a handful of boats were on the west side buoys, and a few kayakers had landed on the spit at the northwest corner. We walked around the island and met only one other person.

This weekend, the high temperature was a record 89F and the island was packed. Friday night a constant stream of boats entered the marina and returned back out a few minutes later because no moorage was available. We frequently anchor off the north side of Blake Island for the fabulous city views. The north-side buoys, despite the view, are rarely taken because the anchorage is exposed to wakes from large ships travelling through the nearby vessel traffic lanes. This weekend, all the north-side buoys were taken and as soon as one boat vacated a buoy, another quickly took it’s spot. It felt like the San Juan Islands on a busy long weekend. And on the west side tents and people packed the shores, while a mass of over 30 boats filled the anchorage. We’ve never seen it so busy.

05/10/08, looking northeast towards Seattle from the spit at the northwest corner of Blake Island:

05/10/08, looking south from the spit along the west side of Blake Island:

05/10/08, the half-empty marina at Blake Island’s northeast corner:

05/18/08, looking west along the north side of Blake Island, every buoy taken:

05/18/08, looking south towards the spit and the west side of Blake Island:

The only thing worse than no backups is restoring bad backups. A database guy should get these things right.  But, I didn’t, and earlier today I made some major site-wide changes and, as a side effect, this blog was restored to December 4^th, 2007.  I’m working on recovering the content and will come up with something over the next 24 hours. However it’s very likely that comments between Dec 4^th and earlier today will be lost.  My apologies.

Update 2008.04.13: I was able to restore all content other than comments between 12/4/2007 and yesterday morning.  All else is fine.  I'm sorry about the RSS noise during the restore and for the lost comments.  The backup/restore procedure problem is resolved.  Please report any broken links or lingering issues. Thanks,

                        -jrh

James Hamilton, Windows Live Platform Services
Bldg RedW-D/2072, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, Washington, 98052
W:+1(425)703-9972 | C:+1(206)910-4692 | H:+1(206)201-1859 | JamesRH@microsoft.com

H:mvdirona.com | W:research.microsoft.com/~jamesrh  | blog:http://perspectives.mvdirona.com

We always spent Christmas afloat, usually in Canadian waters. Some years we've travelled to the Sunshine Coast, Desolation Sound, or the Broughtons. This year we stayed closer to home, in the San Juan Islands. We had considered going to Barkley Sound on the west coast of Vancouver Island instead, but didn’t have time to research safe anchorages for winter storms. In the end, we were glad we didn’t go—the storms were worse this year than any previous Christmas afloat, and the west coast of Vancouver Island receives the brunt of them. While winter storms are the downside of winter boating, the upside is that we have all the best anchorages to ourselves. And we love being safe at anchor while a storm rolls through, especially if we have a view out to the wind and waves.

Pictures and stories from the trip are posted at http://www.mvdirona.com/trips/SanJuansChristmas2007/.

While anchored in Blakely Harbor over the weekend, we watched an example of neighborly support. [Map of area.]

About 7:30 Sunday morning, a dinghy sped across the bay east of us. This was a little odd, because it was a cold and rainy morning, not ideal for a dinghy tour. Then we saw its destination—a sailboat aground near pilings along the north shore. We were surprised that we hadn’t noticed the grounded boat the day before, but then realized a sailboat was missing from its mooring along the south shore. We anchor at Blakely Harbor a lot, and that sailboat almost always is moored along the south shore. The boat must have come free overnight and blown across to the north shore. The winds weren’t very strong, at most 20 knots at West Point on the opposite side of the Puget Sound, so that likely wasn’t the issue. Unrelated, the Coast Guard reported another vessel blown aground east of nearby Eagle Harbor that morning also.

The dinghy then travelled towards the head, and met up with a neighbor in a capable-looking aluminum power cat. The two then set off to try to free the sailboat. The cat maneuvered between the pilings and a line was run from the cat’s bow to the sailboat. Water churned up behind the cat as they attempted to pull the sailboat free, but the ground vessel did not budge. The boat was well over on its side and the tide was falling. The dinghy crew had climbed aboard the sailboat and were trying to apply weight up high to tip the boat over further and get the keel out of the mud. Eventually, they were successful and the boat came free. They then worked the sailboat through pilings and tied it off to a nearby dock. The boat didn’t appear to have any exterior damage—if so, they were lucky that it didn’t smash into those pilings instead of grounding. And they were lucky to have such a helpful and capable neighbor.

In the pictures below, the first picture, looking east towards Seattle from our anchorage near the head of Blakely Harbor, shows the sailboat at its mooring the night before. And in the last photo, the boat moored beside the sailboat is Our Island, a 68-foot DeFever-designed steel trawler featured in the current (April/08) issue of PassageMaker magazine.

In busy Pacific Northwest anchorages, stern-tying is a common option to allow more boats to fit in than would if they all swung free at anchor. Smuggler Cove Provincial Marine Park along the southern BC coast is a good example:

We aren’t often in anchorages that busy, as we tend to favor less-traveled areas.  Nonetheless, we still stern-tie frequently.  We do it as a way of tucking into beautiful little anchorages where there just isn’t the space to swing free.  One of our favorites is this little nook in the south end of Jedediah Island in Jedediah Marine Provincial Park:

We sometimes use a stern anchor instead of a stern tie when swing room is limited and no suitable shore tie exists. This can happen when the nearest shore is private property, or too far away, such as this anchorage at Rupert Island in the Hakai Luxvbalis Conservancy Area:

I recently came across a set of pictures from Sweden that are notable for two reasons: 1) the anchorages are amazingly beautiful and 2) the local style in that area is to drop a stern anchor and then pull the bow up to shore.  Have a look at these pictures: http://baylinerownersclub.org/forum/showthread.php?t=6139&highlight=carman. We’ve just got to find a way to go boating in Sweden.

                                                --jrh

James Hamilton

jrh@mvdirona.com

We were travelling north through Wells Pass in the Broughtons one year when Jennifer yelled “Bear!” We were a good half-mile from any shore, so a bear sighting seemed a little unlikely. But the bear wasn’t on shore, it was swimming about 20 feet off our port bow. We’d been running at about 7 knots, but immediately stopped. When our wake caught up to it, the bear stopped swimming, waited for the wake to pass, then started off again.

The bear paddled with its nose in the water, lifting it every few strokes to take a breath (http://mvdirona.com/blog/content/binary/BearSwimming.mov). It was paddling at reasonable speed across the channel, and seemed a competent swimmer, but we were pretty concerned that the little feller wouldn’t make it. The nearest shore ahead of it was a half-mile and behind it was a mile. So the animal likely would have to swim at least 1.5 miles, if not farther, between shores. Not wanting to witness a bear-drowning, we tried to come up with a plan for what we’d do if he started struggling. We figured sacrificing one our inflatable kayaks probably was the best bet.

But the bear eventually reached shore without problem. It didn’t even seem particularly tired. One ashore, it pulled itself out onto some rocks, looked around a bit, shook off the water, then lumbered off (http://mvdirona.com/blog/content/binary/BearLanding.mov). Wild.

While docked in La Conner recently, we were fortunate to walk past the Pacific Mariner plant at just the right time. They were wheeling a huge, empty hull, likely of a Pacific Mariner 85, around the building. It appears that they mold the hulls on one side of their property, then transport them to the other side for completion. Another large boat looking near completion was next to the slot where this one was destined.

The tractor operator did an amazing job—the clearance at many points was barely inches.

On a recent trip from Elliott Bay to Mats Mats Bay, we passed the Washington State fast ferry Snohomish running south. The last we’d heard, the ferry was still mothballed in Eagle Harbor. A successful lawsuit by Rich Passage residents had taken the passenger-only Snohomish and its sister ship, the Chinook, out of service to prevent further erosion caused by their wakes. Both are to be sold.

When we saw the Snohomish that day, it was in temporary service between Port Townsend and Seattle. The two 80-year-old ferries on the run between Port Townsend and Keystone recently had been condemned, and no other car ferries in the fleet had a shallow enough draft to negotiate the approach to Keystone.

With gale force winds forecast for the Strait of Juan de Fuca, we anchored last night in Watmough Bay at the southeast tip of Lopez Island. The bay appears to have good protection from southeast weather, but we saw exactly the same winds as at unprotected Smith Island at the eastern end of the strait: steady winds above 30 knots with gusts to 54. This is the highest winds we’ve seen at anchor. The wind speed slightly topped the 52-knot gusts we saw in Pender Harbour a couple of winters back that blew our patio table overboard.

The waves certainly were much smaller than out in the strait, but big waves rolled into the anchorage all night, tossing our boat and making for a sleepless night for both of us. Our 66-lb Bruce held well with a 6:1 all-chain scope, and boy, was it in there when we left.

Snow fell in the Puget Sound this weekend as part of a big winter storm that swept the country. We were anchored at Port Madison, on the north end of Bainbridge Island, when the white stuff started. Even though the temperature was several degrees above freezing, snow began building up quickly. It was a wonderful winter scene.

Port Madison was a fitting locale for a snowy day in the Puget Sound. Bainbridge Island and Walt Woodward, editor of the Bainbridge Island Review, were the inspiration for local author David Guterson’s novel, Snow Falling on Cedars.

This year we spent Thanksgiving aboard in the South Puget Sound (the area between Olympia and Tacoma Narrows). With extreme high tides above 15 feet, we were able to explore the drying heads of several inlets: Henderson, Hammersley, and Eld. The weather for the most part was excellent—bright blue skies and little wind. Temperatures were often near-freezing, but we’ll take that over rain.

Pictures and stories from the trip are posted at http://www.mvdirona.com/Trips/SouthSoundThanksgiving2007.

Earlier today as we sailed out of Henderson Inlet, just north of Olympia, we heard the Coast Guard asking for assistance for a downed aircraft in Commencement Bay.  At around 12:40 the vessel Grand Madison reported that it had rescued two people from the water, one an elderly lady slightly hypothermic.  At 12:50 the Coast Guard reported the other aircraft was still in the air.

At 1:21PM, the King5 web site reported that the downed plane, a Cessna, had two passengers both of whom were rescued. The other plane was reported to have successfully landed at Thun Field in Tacoma: http://www.king5.com/topstories/stories/NW_112007WAB_plane_crash_commencement_TP.21332183.html.

                                                --jrh