Port Townsend to Bainbridge Island

Went Into town and found a guy to scrub the bottom of the boat. He came out next morning with full scuba gear and spent 45 min. scrubbing what he called 2 inches of carpet off the bottom. We did a little shopping and went back accross to anchor by the park for a little peace from the rolly city front anchorage. Lovely weather and an immediate jump in boat speed under power from the clean bottom. Suddenly we can go 7.5 knots at 2500 rpms instead of 6.5 at 3200. Should save a lot of fuel, hopefully it will make sailing a bit more fun. Cloudy and cold next couple of days. set up the watermaker, but the water in the cove has too much organic junk drifting in it to try it out.
We get a break in the weather with a little wind, so out into the sound for some sailing. Hot Sauce lives up to her name as we sail along in about 10 knots of wind going 9-10 knots boat speed. It is dificult to tell how fast the wind is blowing once you get moving, because you are moving into the wind making it seem stronger than it is. So when we sail at 10 knots, the wind instrument thinks the wind is blowing 15-16, while the discrepancy is largely the fact that we are moving toward the wind at 10 knots. Yes, it is supposed to be confusing, but you have to experience it to really understand it. We tack cleanly several times and rip back and forth between the open sound and the marina area,. One tack we tried right in the middle of a tide rift, and one of the sheets caught on some mast appendage and we got completely stalled. I tried drifting backwards to use the tiller to position the boat accross the wind, but each time we started moving she just rounded up into the wind. After about 3 iterations of this, I started the engine and forced her back on course. Probably a really good idea that we didn't try to sail off the anchor the other day.

Ran into Russel Brown and Brandon Sanders while sailing, they liked the boat.They are both kind of local legends and are the main reason I got the new board made. Brandon is making the board next week while we will be in Seattle getting the dodger put on. We went back to anchor in the city front and no sooner had we settled in than a bunch of sailboats started sailing by at really close quarters. Turns out we had anchored in the first leg of their Wed. night race course. As the race started they all came blasting down on us scowling at us for being in the way. About this time the ferry tooted its horn and pulled out of the terminal only to stop in front of the fleet. Some started to go in front, when the ferry tooted at them and proceded to park next to the ferry dock right in their path. We laughed a lot at them all milling about trying to wait for the ferry to get out of the way. We could have pulled up anchor and sailed along, but they don't seem to like us going by them as though they were sitting still. We went to town the next day and bought some groceries and diesel, so that we could catch a good tide the next day to go down by Seattle to get the dodger made. We tried out the watermaker, and at first it had a chemical taste( residual biocide from preserving the Reverse Osmosis membrane ), but after a while it cleared up and appears to work well. There is a little water leakage while it is running, so I may have to take it apart and replace a couple of o-rings. Good to know we can make water, now just need to find a permanent installation point. It is rather awkward in shape and takes up a good bit of space.
Friday morning we went to the marina for showers and last minute preparations and hauled anchor at noon to catch a good flood tide to take us down Puget Sound. We set sail immediately and were ghosting alnog at about 7-8 knots with a following wind. We sailed for about three hours, but the wind started fading and we went with the iron genny(motored). The rest of the way down to Bainbridge Island. Got in and anchored about 6 pm. While setting anchor, the dinghy painter got under the boat and fouled the prop. Couldn't pull it free or run the engine, so I broke out my mask and snorkel and jumped into the 16 degree( Centigrade ) water to unwrap the prop. Brrrrr that was cold, but only took a few minutes to get done and the sun shower had been sitting on deck all day and had some nice warm water to rinse off with. Grilled steaks for dinner, and all was right with the world again. I had just read a forum discussion about towing your dinghy while sailing and 2 of the main concerns had happened to us in the last week. The only one left is for the dinghy to get swamped by a wave or wake and sink. I guess I will carry the dink on deck from now on, as I kind of like it and don't want it to sink. Tomorrow we go to Seattle to a marina where the dodger work crew will show up on Monday and begin our new dodger.

Heading up to the San Juans

After waiting a few more days for suitable conditions, we motored up to Kilisut Harbor a lovely secluded spot between Fort Flagler state park and Indian Island naval Ammo dump.  About 2 miles south of Port Townsend, if neither of those show up on your map. The right conditions largely are made up of  not raining and terribly cold with as much ebb tide as we can manage. We  had to go through Agate Pass to get to Poulsbo and out it again to exit. It is a narrow, pass between land masses which has  ripping tides of up to  seven knots at times, which can make pretty slow going in a sailboat with a top motoring speed of about 7.5 knots. With an anticipated trip length of aobut 6-7 hours, you must get a favorable tide through the pass early enough in the day to complete the  trip before light fails. The week end of July 9 had tides which would have meant leaving at about 5 a.m. or 5 p.m., So we waited till July head 12th to head out at 7 a.m.on a clear sunny day with light following breezes. Tried putting up  the sails a couple of times, but with the tide carrying you the same direction as the wind, 8 knots turns to 4 in the sails. Beautiful place, very quiet with little traffic.

Next morning dawned to cool drizzly  perfect for a 2 mile dinghy ride into town. The tide was out and as I wound my way out of the harbor, I saw a bald eagle on the exposed bottom with Hot Sauce in the back ground. Got to Port Townsend to catch a bus to Poulsbo to get the car. Had local craftsman make sliding tubes to go inside dagger board to allow us to pull it down from the cockpit, as the new board will be quite bouyant and won't go down on its own. The current board weighs about 400 pounds and is kind of hard to pull up with a winch, so it will be a switch. Should make a big diference in sailing performance too.

Had cables made up for electric winch. Got package from Jere with rings for us, so we can take off to the islands on Friday. Got back to boat for dinner and noticed shore was getting lots closer than it had been, so pulled up the anchor with a pice of kelp on it the size of a beach towel and a ton of eel grass. As the boat moves with the tides, it has to reset for each direction, but if it gets enough junk caught on it, it won't catch on the bottom again. Motored across the bay to anchor across from Port Townsend. Friday we got up, and went to town for some last minute shopping in town and to the state park for a shower. Coin op showers with hot water much prefered to cold  sponge bath on boat. Set out around 9 a.m. for the San Juan Islands. Sailed along in light winds for a while beam reaching in 8-10 knots making 3-5 knots. The tug which was next to us in Bainbridge Island came by us and said hi. Small world indeed. Beautiful day, but wind dropped off and we had to motor most of the way to the lower end of Griffin Bay to anchor for the night. Anchor drug in mucky bottom with lots of eel grass. Took two tries to get it set again. Saturday dawned cold and rainy with fog. Sat tight and watched everyone work thier crab traps. Must be the first weekend ot the season, lots of boats running about the anchorage messing with their traps. Anchor drug again as the wind came up in the evening. I switched to the other anchor which set and stayed hooked.

Sunday morning was fogged in heavily, but burned off as the sun warmed up, very pretty to watch. Tired of the anchoring routine here, so we set off for Jones Island State Park which was all full of boats so we backtracked to Deer Harbor on Orcas Island to anchor out and get to a dock and showers. It was windy enough to sail, but we were freezing and decided to bail. Next morning we had breakfast at the dock and did laundry and had showers. Hauled anchor and set out for Reid Harbor on Stuart Island for a little sight seeing. About 60 boats in the anchorage including a training yawl about 100 feed long named Osprey, which anchored right in front of us. Not quite the serene cruising style we had envisioned. Set crab trap out at dusk and caught seven crabs, 4 keepers.

Motored out early, tried to sail for a bit, but wind dropped off and current was dragging us off in the wrong direction. Motored past Waldron Island and the wind picked up from the South to 14-18 knots. Finally we get to do some actual sailing and try to figure out how to work this boat.We were immediately zipping along at 7-8 knots with a very smooth easy motion. On Rosa we would have beenheeled way over making 4-5 knots, what a change. After a few blown tacks the dinghy painter got caught under the rudder. The next tack we made, I realized the dinghy had gone its own way. We couldn't see it anywhere, so we sailed around looking for it for a while, and queried on the radio if anyone had seen a dinghy drifing about. Not too long after we gave up, a guy called the coast guard to report finding a dinghy adrift in the vicinity with possible missing occupant. We called the coast guard, identified the dink and were told that he was on the south side of Sucia and we could contact him by phone. We headed over towards the island and started the motor to drop the sails and go anchor. The engine ran for about 4 or 5 minutes and lost all power and stalled. The wind all but stopped, but we had only the sailing option at the time, as the water is about 400 feet deep between the islands. As we meandered toward the inlet, the wind dropped further making it seem pretty scary to drift into a rocky, tide swept pass with no power or helm control. There was a shallow spot outside by a rocky beach which he headed for instead. Got the anchor set in 30' of water, launched the kayak in hopes of going into the inlet and getting the dinghy. As I paddled toward the inlet, the wind picked up to 15-20 from the west making for a rather exciting kayak ride as I passed through the tide rips on the way in. No one had our dinghy in the anchorage, so I thrashed back out to the boat to find Joan on the radio with the dinghy finder. The wind shift put us in 3-4' breaking waves with a rocky shore about 60 yards behind us, not exactly a favorable position. The guy brought us the dinghy, but declined using his dinghy to try and tow us out to deeper water to set sails. He suggested vessel assist could fix us up. I made ready to try and set sails and sail off the anchor for a more sheltered anchorage, but Joan was pretty leery of trying such a maneuver with so little experience sailing Hot Sauce and the dire consequences which would follow if we messed up in such close quarters. Putting the boat up on the rocks had little appeal, so we did call vessel assist and they brought me a fuel filter, hung around till I got the engine started, and followed us into Echo Bay to anchor. They charge $225 an hour for their time from leaving the dock to return to the dock. As luck would have it, someone ran up on a rocky shoal and had to be rescued before we could settle up, so we got to share the travel time costs with them. Got out of it for less than $400, still kinda steep for a $35 fuel filter.. Hard to put a price on peace of mind, but staying on a rocky lee shore hoping the anchor felt like holding all night was not a very inviting prospect either. Had yummy boiled crabs for dinner, altogether a mixed bag for the day.

Went for a dinghy ride the next morning and it was very beautiful with only about 20 boats in the anchorage. Walked on the Island and it is really a beautiful place with campsites on bluffs overlooking the various anchorages and other islands. Spent another night there waiting for the Weather to change, got heavy rain in the night with the wind still from the south. We decided to go out and sail around some and head to somehwere that had spare fuel filters, so we would not repeat the prior episode. Had 15-20 from the south and ripped right along at aobut 7-8 knots, nailed the first tack and headed west back toward Friday Harbor to get some food and other necessities. After about 8 miles on the same tack with the wind shifting towards the north, The wind suddenly became northwest and we tacked to broad reach toward our destination. Perfect execution, except the wind died after about 10 minutes and slowly came back to the south at about 8 knots. So we switched to the "iron genny"" and headed south to Friday Harbor. After some wandering about we found a spot to anchor which suited us and settled in for a couple of days. Weather has been nice, sunny with a southerly breeze.  The San Juans are a major tourist destination and this is the heart of the season. You can get a ferry to most of the larger islands and drive around in your car, so it makes it seem a little less off the beaten path than we had expected. There are boats from the inhabited islands that bring groups to the marine park islands, so there are always people around. Quite a few people get off the ferry with full camping gear and catch a boat to the park to camp. It seems that nearly everyone with a boat in northwest Washington comes out to the islands for summer vacation. They had Friday evening race right by our anchorage.
We are going to head down to Port Townsend and get back to work on the boat. We feel like getting more prepared to go offshore would be more in line with our goals than riding around in a dinghy looking at other boats and the islands. Made it to PT after about 7.5 hours mostly motoring. Long day,

Joan finally  admits being happy with the boat.

Hangin at Poulsbo

Had a long not too productive day yesterday blogging at Starbucks and driving around in the rain. Set me up for some good pain today. Pulled the old head out, removed all the plumbing, hoses, valves, pumps, and the holding tank. Quite a relief to get it out of there, but wrestling with old rubber hoses that have been in place for many years is really hard work.

A bit of cleanup work and we will be able to mount the watermaker and the new composting toilet. We also plan to add another water tank on the other side of the boat under the floor to make water into and transfer it to the other tanks as needed. The water in the harbor here is pretty nasty, has lots of bits floating in it, and I suspect a lot of old rotten sererage systems on the shore. We went up to Port Townsend by car to get some mounting brackets made for the primary winches. Those would be the big ones on each side use mainly for the jib sheets.

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 We finalized the details of the new dagger board and it is in the mill. Found a storage place to leave the car while we are out in the islands. We went to the local farmers market this morning and got caught up on the laundry. Perhaps if I get the hardware mounted and the new toilet intalled this afternoon, we can move to a new anchorage tomorrow, or at least go for a sail.

Off to Poulbo

Now that we know we will not be receiving documentation any time soon, there is no reason to sit by the mailbox. July 3rd we cast off the lines and motored out of Bainbridge Island, headed up to the Poulsbo 3rd of July Fireworks Extravaganza. We still had most of the hardware stripped off the decks, so we were compelled to motor the whole way. As fate would have it, the wind came up to about 20 knots or so directly on the nose.

 It ended up taking us about 4 hours to go the 16 miles, even though we were going 6 knots pretty much the whole way. The anchorage was filled with boats, aobut 7 or 8 hundred by my guesstimation. We went in, found a reaonable looking spot, and dropped the anchor. We realized that we take up a lot of space and were uncomfortably close to another boat. We got a hint from the other boat owner standing on the bow of his boat shrugging his shoulders at us. After a little discussion, we decided to look for a bigger opening in the crowd. The anchorage is huge and it was easy to find a spot with plenty of room. We settled in for the night and watched a huge fireworks display. It was absolutely freezing, I stood on the companionway ladder with just my head sticking up for most of it. When the display was over, the local boaters streammed past for hours heading home. The next day was more of the streaming out of boats that had come just for the nights fireworks. There were 20-40 boats streaming out of the anchorage all day long on the 4th. Next day we moved up near the town to practice the anchor drill and make access to town easier. The anchorage is beautiful, with Mt Ranier off to the SE, and seals on the breakwater. We hope to get a couple more projects finished here and move on to the San Juan Islands for a few weeks.

Sigh, still in BI, WA

Another interesting week.  We were only promised a month of dock space, so I guess it is time to move on.
The Coast Guard Vessel Documentation Service has now charged my credit card twice for their services, but I still hold no paper in my hands. I called them up and explained the situation, only to be told that they are way backlogged, and it is unlikely they have started ours yet. He suggested making an e-mail request of the webmaster to get something to that effect on paper and try to use that as an excuse for not being properly documented. We feel no warm fuzzy feelings about that. We still don't have the boat put all together, but it is in a state that we could move it. There are so many terrorists coming into the country by sailboat from Canada that we fear being mistaken for one of them and possibly being treated shabbily if we go out riding around in the boat. We were going to go up to Liberty Bay to Poulsbo for their July 3rd celebration, but don't want to risk any complications. Maybe tomorrow would be a better day, as there will be 2 million boats out running about, but alas, that's usually a good time for crackdowns, too.
Day to day life is about the usual. I found some trampoline material that we like, but it is up in Bellingham, about 3 hours from here. Went out to the car on Tues. and the battery was dead. Had no way to jump it, but decided to try a battery from the boat. Surprise, surprise, they all have the terminals on the wrong side to put in the car. Called around an found a new battery aobut 2 miles away, but I have no inclination to try and carry one that far. Decided to go rent a bicycle by the ferry docks and ride up there. As I was strolling over, I came upon  a scooter rental sign and asked a guy in the parking lot about renting a scooter. He started to tell me what a grand way that would be to take in the island, but when I explained, that I just needed to get a battery, he offered me his car keys. The kindness of strangers can be both heart warming and handy at times.
Went up to get the nets the next day, and stopped by in Port Townsend to pick up some led lights for the boat and drop off a winch for a pattern to have new winch mounts made in aluminum. On the way out of the dock area, the maintenance guy informed me that I need to move my car by Thurs. So I now have another project, to find a spot to park the car while we are gone, if we should ever leave. We no longer have dock priveledges at the private docks, sigh, no hot showers, free laundry, free parking. It appears that our dockage provider is no longer affiliated with the dock and we are kind of on our own.So, the week is rapidly dwindling, and not a whole lot of progress to report. We did receive the remaining packages we were expecting, so now we just need to plug it all in and go.
One of the other reasons for not going out in the boat is that the head has no pump out facility, and the coast guard likes to give courtesy inspections along with citations for $250 if your head open to the water. I can't tell if there is a valve under there or not, so maybe they won't be able to figure it out either. The new head is a self contained bunny hugger certified composting toilet, which will allow us to remove a bunch of stinky plumbing, and a metal holding tank and macerator pump. No issues with through hulls if you have none. This will free up enough space and water connections to install our water maker.

The water in Eagle Harbor here at Bainbridge Island is certified foul in many ways and not a good spot to use a watermaker. The harbor used to have a creosote plant which built boats and treated timber and is a designated superfund cleanup site. The city has a hundred year old sewer system, which is bing replaced now, but swimming, shell fish taking, crabbing, and taking of bottom fish is forbidden, along with a few more delightful cautions. Did I mention the algae bloom( see pic)? Kinda dims my enthusiasm for going kayaking around here.

Just got a reply from the coast guard about the status of my application. They are now reviewing cases from april 27, so it may be a while. We can't go to Canada without documentation, so that is off the list of featured activities. Think I'll go for a swim now.