Brewer 42 Vancouver BC to Vashon Island

I must be getting lackadaisical with delivery applications because it was day two on this delivery when I realized that my folks had owned this boat and sailed it extensively.

Back when my folks owned the boat.

A rig you can’t miss. More about it to come.

My folks have owned quite a few boats, and in my defense I’d only been aboard this one once and I think it was at night. Several things should’ve alerted me other than the name. The tall fractional rig for one because I remember reading something in Brion Toss’s Rigging book “The Rigger’s Apprentice” where he used it as an example of a performance-oriented cruising design. Also, the fact that it is an aluminum boat, which is fairly unusual in the Northwest or the United States should have tipped me off.

The thing that made me finally realize that it was my folks’ old boat was the Data Scope, and its custom-wood holder that had been made for the boat we cruised on as a family when I was a kid. That, and then later noticing the upside-down compass we got my dad for his birthday was mounted in the v-berth. 

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The delivery started a little bit more awkwardly than most. Traveling to Vancouver BC shouldn’t be as hard as it is without a car but there we go; two hours late on the train from Bellingham to Vancouver. A brief orientation from the broker who acted like selling a boat worth less than a million was an act of charity, and I am off. Off to spend the night at Cabbage Island just Northeast of Saturna Island, or at least that was the plan.

Once underway in calm water, I checked the forecast for the following day and the current at the Eastern point of Saturna was going to be Max flood against me in the morning on top of an adverse southerly. So I changed my plans and continued into the night landing in Friday Harbor at 11. The following morning went through the customs process with the additional stress of dealing with the importation of the vessel without the proper documents the import brokers were supposed to have waiting for me. I could say many things, but I won’t other than that I wouldn’t recommend “Border Buddy” to anybody looking to import a boat. Once cleared, I provisioned the boat with my first mate and we left for Watmough Bay (an anchorage on the South end of Lopez). I made this decision because there were a number of logs floating in the area and I didn’t want to damage the propeller unnecessarily or risk more night running than I already had. I don’t mind running at night but it is an added risk and it needs to be weighed against the benefits.

Once in Watmough we grabbed a ball and had a nice dinner and I worked on getting the bulkhead heater working with no real success. The following morning we headed south without much wind but not much adverse current. That evening we found a spot in Eagle Harbor and grabbed some dinner ashore. Back at the boat later I struggled more to get the bulkhead heater going. It looked like the former owner had never cleaned it and unfortunately, the forced air Webasto Heater no longer was serviceable after a conversation with the nice gentleman at Sure Marine in Seattle. The next morning, just after clearing the breakwater, the engine stalled and wouldn’t restart so after rolling out the jib and passing the helm to my mate I started to look for a set of wrenches or a crescent wrench on board. Finding only a pair of channel locks I thought twice about whether I wanted to risk damaging the fuel hose nuts trying to bleed the fuel system on the old Westerbeke. Not too far from Quartermaster Harbor inside Vashon Island where we were heading and the Salty Boy’s Marine Repair headquarters are, I reached out and asked if they would be able to make it out and assist us if I couldn’t get it going, and they kindly obliged, but not wanting to be beat by something as simple as air in the fuel line, I jumped in the engine room while my first mate steered under sail. Not much cranking later and the old red beast came to life and we were off again adding a little delay and perhaps disappointing our Salty Boys that they couldn’t save the day.  

Autopilot from a galaxy far far away and a long long time ago that works only when under power. And the cutest shipmate a salty dog could hope for.

Click on image for Brion Toss’s words on the design from his book The Rigger’s Apprentice.

Rental upgrade!

A fine boat for ocean sailing but the mainsail as it is, is more headache than I would want to deal with sailing in the close waters of the Puget Sound. Speaking to the owners, they said that they were planning on cruising the world and skipping the intermediate boat that would have taken them from their previous starter boat of a Tanzar 27 to this ocean beast.

I connected them with my folks who it sounds like got much more use out of the boat than the guy these people bought it from. 

Lessons

Be very careful when using companies like Border Buddy that have amorphous areas of operation. It’s better to use a company local to the area and well-established in that field. This instance showed that talking to the customs officials ahead of time to ensure that things would move smoothly was not helpful.

Bring a crescent wrench in your kit and if it’s your boat be sure and have good tools aboard. I also recommend a start switch like this so you can jump the starter while you bleed the fuel line.

One of the great things about yacht delivery is getting to try out different designs and sometimes designs you think that you would really enjoy turn out to be a pain. If I compare this rig to the Cal 40 I have a lot of miles on I would say that I prefer the lower aspect masthead rig. I could hoist that main without a winch by myself and even though I didn’t have furling and carrying a variety of headsails was a bit of a pain - the ease of hoisting means sailing more and that’s what it’s all about. Now that said I am sure that the Brewer goes to weather better and more comfortably than the Cal with its flat bottom and outboard chainplates but it’s the rigs I’m comparing not the hulls.

Long may you run as Mr Young says.

Fountaine Pajot 42 Friday Harbor to SF

I’ve been teaching sailing for 24 years full time and have been delivering boats for 15 years and unfortunately, I don’t get to do things how I have learned they should be done very often. This was a wonderful exception. I was first contacted by the owners of this very new catamaran to help them sail their boat to Mexico. They wanted the boat in Mexico because they were retiring and Mexico would be their first adventure and winter abroad and if it went well they would sail to the South Pacific the following year. I told them about the differences between delivery and training saying that delivery was best done with a crew I selected but that training would take them further. We understood each other and they said they would like the focus on training. I said I could oblige and asked who their crew was going to be to which they said they had some family and friends in mind. I asked which of them were the best sailors and unfortunately, they admitted none were sailors. I pointed out that it is important to be a sailor to be counted as crew and that they should cultivate some relationships with the potential crew to help them on future passages. So they said they did have a friend who was particularly keen but only had crewing experience on racing rowboats. That’s a start I told them. Enthusiasm and respect for the elements is a perfect foundation for any aspiring mariner. So I advised that this person join some cruise and learn courses offered in the area or better yet break up the classes into weekend courses on boats appropriate to the cert level. Unfortunately, the classes were very full in the area at that notice so we decided to run a cruise and learn for them on Tula and it would serve as a review for the rest of the sailors. This worked out very well. We took some of the pressure off the certs and more focus on learning the boat. These days spent cruising the San Juans in the spring provided everyone myself included a great sense of what the boat could do. It turned out to be a windy week and we saw 40+ knots at one point.

After this educational cruise, we planned to meet for a 106 or Advance Coastal Cruising Class on the boat where we planned to take the boat out to sea and get to know the boat in the ocean before the jump down the coast.

Doing crew overboard drills on ocean swell is a great exercise and always creates huge development in boat handling and cooperation. These big cats are made to be short-handed so everything is led to one place at the helm which can be good solo and short-handing but as soon as you want to put a person on each job to do tight maneuvers like this you start seeing some of the limits of the design and this of coarse is part of why we must do it. The practice and review with new crew of these drills is essential for being able to both get back to a person in the water and how to maneuver the boat in a tight spot under sail if you have to pick up a mooring ball under sail or sail back to the dock if you loose power.

Stowing on multihulls is something to get used to.

Tattoosh off the port bow. Southing next!

Going soft with this sort of treatment.

We departed in settled weather and did a last fuel-up at Neah Bay. The forecast called for some 15 knots offshore so we added some Westerly into our southerly heading and did eventually find some wind. I could see it wouldn’t be enough as it was right behind us and would have required lots of jibes and a slow VMG. (velocity made good: basically the shortest distance between two points is a straight line). I could see the crew wanted to hoist and try it out so I briefly explained and acquiesced realizing it was a good way to make my point and earn some credibility for future calls. A two-part main halyard is tied to the top of the mast and runs down through the shackle at the top of the main and back up and over a sheave on the masthead. This means you have to pull twice as much halyard but it’s half the load. My biggest concern was coming from the dead reckoning I was doing on the capes further south. It was looking like if we kept the vmg at 6 we could make it in one shot. Fuel was less an issue than most boats as they had added a hundred-gallon tank.

Regular engine checks are key to successful passage making and I included it in the standing orders and watch log for the end of the watch to check the engines. This does require a keen eye as some of the mechanical problems can be hard to see before they are catastrophic.

It was on one of these checks that I noticed the bar that connects the two rudders was torquing with the loads of the waves and the autopilot.

I brought it to everyone’s attention and learned that prior to leaving and after much research before buying the boat. They decided that the stock design was not good enough and hired a local machinist to add some hien joints. Unfortunately, they used the existing hardware as well and it was torquing the rubber bushing and this was causing concern as once it wore through the rubber it would gall the aluminum tiller end.

We made the call to go into Newport and a friend brought some materials to make new temp bushings.

To prevent ongoing boat repairs and compounding failures at sea, I have included a clause in my delivery contract stating that repairs during a passage will cost more than those made beforehand. This financial incentive encourages boat owners to complete repairs before the journey starts.

In this case, I guided the owners in the repairs while we added two lay days. Fortunately, this looked like it would not cause too much issue with weather routing.

Special delivery of hard to find materials and cookies and in a TCYC bag no less. Day saved.

While in Newport Oregon the friendly fuel dock attendant let us use the grinder wheel in the back shop. While doing this work we managed the fend off most of the Coho Hoho rally boaters strolling the docks with the beers looking to distract our progress and perhaps get a tour of the boat.

I warned the crew that these seem to be opportunities to glean what they can from others about weather routing advising them that they should try and qualify any information with the sailor’s vessel and experience.

One boat had the dinghy lashed over the jack lines on the bow. One boat didn’t have fenders down at the dock and the one boat owner, most interested in looking at Tula because he had an older FP admitted he his starboard engine had discharged all its oil into the bilige.

Sunrise off the Oregon Coast

You can see the rubber coming out of the bottom of the tiller here and note the pin for the steering cable is about to come out.

yikes

retrofit heim joint. I wonder if they had to mill that much off the end fitting….

Custom bearings out of HDPE

Two beautiful new bushings were milled and the steering was put back together and we were off again. There would be a little wind rounding the cape but were would miss the worst of it. Our approach to the gate would be in adverse current and in bad viability so we opted to anchor in Drakes Bay and enter the bay in the morning.

Night time “Shy Jibes”. (Tacking instead of jibing)

Being out of cell range has its advantages.

Anchored just out the gate in Drakes Bay waiting for a better tide in the morning.

Pretty momentous experience for this crew. Honored to be a part of it.

What a great trip and feeling of success. I feel confident that the Tulas will do well in their future adventures.

Leopard 40 Friday Harbor to Eureka

With this log, I’ve tried to review and share what I’ve learned on these adventures so I can improve my work and share what I’ve learned.

In the past, I’ve gotten in the habit of sharing my logs and personal notes in greater detail and now I think that I need to focus more on the particular lessons because I am getting behind on editing these logs that often exist in pretty cryptic short-handed form.

I think every mariner should keep a log so I’m demonstrating one way of doing it. In 2024 I hope to streamline this process more so the most important lessons are shared more quickly. I will share more about this process as it unfolds this year.

First I want to share a little about a sailor who started as a student and who I now consider an offshore shipmate and crewmember of the highest order. I met John Palmer in 2017 teaching a Cruise and Learn in the San Juans. John and his two grown boys made the class a very fun week. When I started GBA his wife reached out and asked if I would offer a gift certificate for John's birthday. He and his sons joined the crew of Journeyman GBA’s Cal 40 and training vessel at the time to do an Advanced Coastal Cruising class and the Oregon Offfshore. John joined for the delivery down to Astoria and we ended the race with a second place. After John expressed an interest in joining deliveries and hired me to help him buy a boat of his own. Six years later John owns a fine Wauquiez Centurion and has joined on many deliveries. He now has thousands of blue water miles and coastal miles under his belt on a variety of boats. John is top of my list of crew to call for deliveries. He has all the merits of a good delivery crew member. Ready and stoked to go, trusts me and my choices, has all of his own gear, has a stomach of steel, can make a meal for a big crew out of almost anything, and most importantly is a good conversationalist yet capable of long silences. John is a retired fire captain and has many great stories and there seems to be an overlap between our work and life choices, oh and we like the same music. In the delivery of this yacht, John would serve as the first mate.

It was the spring when the owners of this 2005 Leopard 40 contacted me about helping them deliver their boat to SF. They told me they hoped to learn something along the way so they could continue to Mexico without help.

To think of all the strange places I’ve had to sleep on deliveries…

Their sailing background consisted of a cruise and learn aboard a catamaran in the Caribbean with four other people. I later learned that in the week’s training cruise, they only got 15 minutes of sailing experience. Since buying the boat they had been out a few times but boat work had prevented them from getting much experience. Built in the early 2000s the catamaran had presented a number of serious mechanical failures and found its new owners more handy than they had thought they were (if not behind on getting to know their new vessel underway). I told them we were going to proceed with the planning necessary to make a trip like this with a green crew. Delivery of boats like this and offshore hands-on training are different things. One is done with a crew of vetted and experienced sailors like John Palmer and at a pace that could traumatize the fledgling would-be mariner and one is done at a slowed pace with plenty of stops and time to discuss learning opportunities as they arise. It can take a week with a strong crew to get to SF from the northwest and with more inclement weather. But even a good window of a week in calm weather the window may close or mechanical issues may present themselves and may jeopardize the chances of reaching the destination. What I have learned from doing both of these types of passages is that people looking to learn while underway, should take their plans of a destination off the table and focus on absorbing as much as they can from the experience that way they can continue safely on their own. When I speak about this to boat owners I describe these two types of passages and my role aboard as the difference between me wearing the captain’s hat and the teacher’s hat.

The captain and teacher have similar roles, but their differences are the most important. A captain gives orders to a known crew on a need-to-know basis, while a teacher gets to know their students to impart knowledge and create learning experiences. The captain and crew are more immediately capable, but this power dynamic can slow down the crew's development and progress. The teacher and students take more time but can eventually help the students become independent.

We left a day later than planned to accommodate John’s schedule after his return from another delivery helping a fellow GBA alumni he met on an Island Packet 350 delivery move his boat down the Washington Coast. This was a welcome delay as it allowed the current-opposing winds to settle in the Strait and for the owners to do some troubleshooting on one of the engines. 

On the way out of the strait, we noticed the running light on the bow wasn’t working. We managed to remove it underway and clean it with a wire brush but it was going to be a temporary fix as the LED bulb was distorted from corrosion. It was hard to remove the bulb cover because there was a docking light installed above. Poor design here and a red flag for the readiness of the vessel for the trip.

Motoring out to sea in calm water on the infamous Straits of Juan De Fuca

Multihull boaters do it different

Best fueling opportunity. A calm exit of the sound is great but it costs the go juice.

 The weather did settle, so much so that it required that we motor more than usual this time of year to keep up with the time allotted for the passage. 

This motoring necessitated going into Westport to fuel up. This was done very quickly as the safe time to cross the Greys Harbor Bar lined up with the fuel dock hours with little time to spare. Once underway the engines ran smoothly but by the third day, diesel fuel fumes were coming up from the fuel tanks under the aft bunks because the inspection plates had been leaking from the pressure caused by the sloshing fuel. This is the sort of thing that would have been discovered if the boat had been used or “shaken down”. This required ventilating the aft cabins to make them more tolerable to get the rest necessary to crew the boat safely.

The next incident came when we tried to tack through the wind with the help of the engines. The port engine did not start and required bleeding which should be avoided in the future because the tiller of the Port rudder comes dangerously close to the spot that allows access to the lift pump and could hurt someone in that position. There was quite a bit of air in the line and it is not clear to me whether it was because that engine had a squeeze bulb installed in the line and was leaking or that the squeeze bulb was installed by the prior owner because the engine needed to be bled in the past for some other reason. There was not a bulb on the other motor’s fuel line. This installation of a squeeze bulb is unusual and not recommended. Another reason that it could have been installed is that it was used to prime the Racor water separator after replacing the filter. Either way, I advised that it be removed and all the fuel connections and hose clamps be tightened once out of harm’s way. Another thing that began to happen at this point was the autopilot kept disengaging with the moderate following sea that was beginning to run and required that the helm be watched closely to prevent the boat from rounding up. This was mostly a concern because steering by hand and by compass requires the experience only half of the crew possessed. This is not the first time I’ve experienced this with multihull sailboats. Without going into too much depth this is because catamarans often have large roached mainsails with fractional rigs (smaller headsails) and little shallow rudders. They can sail fast upwind and across the wind and navigate the shallow waters of the Caribbean but off the wind in following seas this rudder sail combination tends to make the boat want to round up. Which, if I’m honest is a little scary because, in conjunction with swept-back spreaders (another thing that goes with large roach sail plans), you can’t luff the main like you can on other boats with the wind on the beam. So you have to reef the main often either by turning around into the wind and luffing it or by pulling the main down while sailing downwind which is hard without high-end batten cars. In addition to these challenges jibing these big mains can be scary so in moderate wind I opt to tack the boat around so I can let the load come off and back on the rigging more gently. In more than moderate winds this method (often called a “chicken jibe”) is aided with the use of the engines. The downside is heading into the wind and the waves while you do it.

Cnav practice offshore

This is a new and improved specialty of Jon’s: The Seattle Dog in a tortilla. Very good and less messy that the original version. Jon has made a name for himself on past passages making food when no one else has the stomach to go bellow.

We also went from a three-hour watch to a four-hour watch system to allow for more downtime to rest but stuck with the doubled-up supervised watch system. One watch when I came up with my watchmate to relieve the crew I noticed my watchmate nodding off and after only a little while on watch, I offered to take the remaining watch myself so he could get some sleep. 

“..Not long later a wave came in through the forward port hatch to drench the port bunk along with John, his bedding, and gear.”

— Quote Source

Once we were passing Cape Blanco a wave came down the deck and the aft port cabin’s hatch was open and drenched the owner’s cabin and bedding. I didn’t know this hatch was open to introduce fresh air due to the build-up of fumes. Not long later a wave came in through the forward port hatch to drench the port bunk along with John, his bedding, and gear. This was due to old hatch seals. The waves were primarily on that side of the boat so it is not clear that the same wouldn’t have happened to the other side’s deck hatches. The seas were not big at this point and the wind was below ten knots so I was trying to imagine what would happen when things got rougher at the next cape.

I caught two of these beautiful Albacore Tuna. One by accident and one when the lure slipped back overboard and I had to jump into the engine room to bleed the fuel line when one of the engines stalled.

Look out!

Later in the passage, there was lightning on and off the coast. When we discussed making regular handwritten notes of our latitude and longitude in the event that we were struck and the GPS lost reception. I was told then that there were no paper charts on board to use to plot our position and navigate to safe harbor if we were struck and lost our electronics during what was turning out to be a foggy trip. 

Once the bunks and gear were wet in conjunction with the other factors: crew fatigue, rigging concerns, fumes, leaks, autopilot, and fuel levels the decision was made to head in. By the time the bunks would be dry and the laundry and inspection plates done the weather window was going to be closed. 9-foot seas at 8 seconds with 30+ knots forecast would be beyond the boat and crew's ability to safely transit the dangerous coast off Cape Mendocino. The options were to wait for the weather to abate and repairs to be made and charge lay days or curtail the delivery in Eureka. 

It would have taken five lay days until the next weather window opened up which would have required recrewing. 

Unfortunately, I had a contracted commitment starting the 1st of September that was scheduled to last 7 to 9 days (another cat delivery to SF). I offered to come back and move the boat with them from Eureka to SF after it was completed. If this didn’t seem like a good option I offered to contact a local fisherman friend with experience on the coast to join them. They refused deciding to go on alone when the next window presented itself. After an uncomfortable time, they paid the travel expenses for John and me to get home. I suspect they were upset that we didn’t just go regardless of the weather and the boat’s condition. It's tough because when you help someone avoid a scary situation at sea, they don't realize what you are saving them from.

The following are screenshots of the forecast on Wednesday the 23rd for planning the cape roundings. It shows we just had enough time to get around before the 20+ knot conditions.

These are the forecasts taken on the 26th showing that sometimes a little delay can be significant.

I only received half the payment I expected for this job because of the setbacks the poor prep caused. On top of that, the time I set aside for this job clashed with a 30-day delivery on a 2018 Amel 55 that I could have taken instead.

This story shows the ugly side of things but this is a seasonal business and the reason I now expect full payment prior to the departure.

Takeaways

-Shakedown your boat prior to a trip like this. The Strait of Juan De Fuca is a great proving ground for crew and vessels alike. We offer shake-down opportunities every year on the easter straight.

-Discuss contingency plans early. These passages are about learning and moving a boat. Sometimes trying to get the boat moved gets in the way of learning. Motoring to make time gets in the way of learning how to sail. Learning how to drive the boat in moderate conditions in the daytime is the only way to prepare a sailor to do it at night.

-Don’t rush. Buying a boat, taking a crash course in sailing, and leaving the first year is not a safe way to approach the ocean. These folks would have been better off hiring an instructor to help them learn their boat rather than joining a multi-hull “cruise and learn” with 3 other couples. Cruise and learn classes cater to bareboat charter prospects. This way they could have sailed their own boat down the coast at their own safe pace.

-Spare fuel. Extra fuel helps with deliveries. If you have a window and need to go far, reduce the number of stops you need to make. This reduces risks at the bars and time wasted coordinating bar crossings with fuel dock hours.

Some hard lessons for all on this one but good conversation and food were had as well.

Cutwater 28 RPBA class

I was contacted by the new owners of a C-288 Coupe to get some training to meet the requirements of their insurance provider. It may be a little-known fact that at GBA we teach powerboating as well as sailing. The American Sailing Association has created an offshoot organization called the Recreational Powerboating Association. Designed with the express purpose of providing the same quality training materials and standardized testing that they have for years with ASA accreditation.

My training as an RPBA instructor meant that although their insurance company provided a checklist of things to cover I had an outline and textbook already to help them learn the material.

I joined them at the brokerage in Bellingham and was hugely impressed by the knowledge of the gentleman in charge of commissioning the vessel. Now I guess that one would expect this to come with a boat that goes for as much as $339,937.00 (according to the website). The only thing that the boat was missing was its dinghy davit and dinghy. These boats and their pocket cruising cohorts the Ranger Tugs have an innovative dinghy launching system that stores the dink over the engines. Aperantly the parts were delayed due to COVID.

First, we went through everything on the boat and when we were in the chart plotter (This boat has two huge displays) we set a course for Friday Harbor and noted all the hazards on the way. A boat like this that has two 250 hp outboards and will do 45 knots so you had better know where you are going.

Over the following days, we covered everything the insurance company wanted and more. We removed the anchor and rode and marked it off as well as installed a swivel at the anchor. I have never seen the knot that the bitter end was held to the boat with before. Lots of practice docking was done and confidence slowly increased but there is something about something so shiny and pricey that will never quite allow total confidence.. and maybe that’s a good thing. I’ve wondered if the word confidence, which is used so much in the boating education world, is perhaps not that good of an idea. As some of us know tequila produces confidence and is cheaper than boating lessons but doesn’t improve competence. A word that I feel much better working toward with my clients.

There are a few boat builders that meet this design niche. I mentioned the Ranger Tug and there is also the Jeanneau NC series that offers a fast pocket cruising design that miraculously can accommodate two couples.

Going small makes a lot of sense and not just for those who can’t afford a 60-footer.

Tied up and the lovely Jones Island dock 10 minutes away from Friday Harbor and the boats new home.

I wish more insurance companies were doing this or better yet referring schools like GBA to help reduce claims. Not 20 boat lengths from where this boat is berthed there was a 29-foot two-year-old version of this brand up on the hard with a mangled prop and a recked bottom. Totaled. Two big chart plotters are sometimes not enough. Perhaps the best insurance is know-how.

Compass Rose passage North

Day 1-

Left Friday Harbor for Bedwell Harbor to clear Customs, then went on to Montague Bay for the night. Got in the skiff and headed to the Ferry terminal on Mayne Island in Village Bay to pick up my girlfriend Fallon. This works well for a rendezvous spot for anyone coming from mainland Canada or Vancouver Island.

Day 2-

Left for Dodd Narrows and Nanaimo to provision. Anchorage was full and we had to anchor twice as there was very little room. Forecast for more wind around the corner has the crew tempted to wait till calmer waters in the Strait of Georgia.

Testing the anchor buddy out. Cant believe a waited this long to buy one.

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Ten cruising guides paired with the Starlink, Navionics reviews, and hours a day are what it takes find the sweet spots in these cruising grounds. Even then may trailheads were overgrown but that makes it feel like a real adventure.

One of the young additions to the L pod checking us out. Seeing these two healthy Orca kids playing around makes us hopeful that this pescatarian subset of the species will not go extinct.

Day 3-

Provisioned and headed to Hornby Island. The rounding was nothing the Rose even hesitated at, 20+ knots on the nose, and towing the dinghy was no problem. Fallon and I kayaked and swam in the bay on the south shore of the island. I can see why this is a destination for Canadians in the area. Got back to the Rose and tied the Kayaks to the skiff which got loose later that evening and all were brought back to us by a friendly boater anchor downwind. Noted to keep paddles on the big boat and kayaks tied separately… as well as other things… knots are the foundation of seamanship skills but there is an argument for having painters with clips.

Parents providing scale for this deceptively large vessel

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Day 4-

Spent the night ashore camping in Desolation Sound’s Cochrane Bay. This is the end of a well-known hiking trail. The anchorage was the smallest we’ve been in yet. Quietest Fourth of July to date eh?

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Day 5-

Headed Beaver Inlet passing Shoal Bay and temporarily anchoring in Tallac Bay while waiting for the current to slow to transit Green Point. Took the skiff to Blind Bay on West Thurlow Island to walk to the big cedar. This was the best hike and we wished we had more time to do the full loop. We also bought an expensive cucumber. Having to do your perishable provisioning after crossing the border and in a place like Nanaimo is unfortunate. The grocery store in Nanamo is expensive and poorly stocked. Perhaps it’s worth getting a cab inland to a better store or doing all your produce shopping at the Saltspring Farmers Market.

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Day 6-

Headed for West Cracroft Island and Lagoon Cove. Decided not to head down the turbulent channel (Blow Hole) with the big boat and opted to anchor in Cutter Cove and take the dinghy in. There was a big table full of cruisers tucking into a prawn dinner when we got there and went for our short/not-so-short hike. The signs were a little misleading and there were a few new additions to the trail. Still worth it.

Lagoon Cove

The marina shop

There are not many spots to get ashore and hike so it is important to try and get ashore when you can and stretch your legs. Physical and mental health aboard is key as is diet and mindful communication. Even a 62 foot boat can feel small after a week. Get off the boat and explore and take time for yourself.

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Day 7-

Headed to the Broughton Archipelago and anchored in Village Islands Indian Cove because our first choice was full of rafted powerboats. Keen to check out the ruins of a native village Fallon and I set out in the Kayaks in what would be the longest paddle we have done and upwind. Fallon flagged a bit but we made it to a beautiful shell-midden beach and her favorite thing to do: beach comb. This beach has the feeling you get at all these ancient community sites of a safe place. A place where food is plentiful and landing your craft is easy. It was interesting to see the ruins of houses here spanning a thousand years. The remains of a long house’s plinth from 100 years ago represent a stark contrast so close to houses from the 80s abandoned so recently.

Day 8-

Not wanting to miss some of the sites in this beautiful archipelago we took off in the skiff after we agreed to rendezvous with the Rose in Cramer Passage. Having set times like this is important because the VHF and cell phones are useless here. First, we went south to Red Point where there were said to be Ammonites and when we got to the little beach and shut the outboard off we heard whales coming down the channel. It is quite an experience hearing these huge mammals exhale and inhale. You get a real sense of the size of these creatures you don’t when straining an eye through a camera viewfinder or phone. We did find the fossils, another reminder of the primordial nature of the land here. On the Way to Red Point, we noticed an active community on Harbledown Island. Fallon walked up the dock and was greeted by a pack of large and loud friendly canines and eventually a woman drove her golf cart to the fence that, as we learned later, was more to keep the dogs off the dock than the visitors out. She said she could give us a viewing of their museum later that day but we had a tide to catch.

Pictograph at Chief’s Bath Berry Island

After Red Point, we scoped out some kayaking campsites and caught up with the Rose for a few miles and a cup of tea before heading off again to check out the Burdwood Group in the skiff. This is a beautiful little group of islands and the best camping spot had just been landed by a nice couple in their tandem kayak. We asked about other sites and they shared what they knew and kindly offered to share their spot. We declined and headed after the Rose to find her tied up at a friend’s dock in the lovely Shawl Bay. After watering up we took the skiff to a recommended campsite around the corner at Moore Bay and left the folks to a dinner of freshly caught Prawns. We found a beautiful campsite and the water was by far the warmest I’ve swam in North of Mexico. We had a dinner of Prawns and potatoes on the fire and the morning after Fallon scared a black bear out of its den only 30 feet from our tent.

Just a couple strange ducks

Consulting with the people that know the best beaches and campsites…the kayakers. This is in a beautiful island group called the Burdwell Group and defiantly worth going back to.

We need more docks like these. The water here was by far the warmest salt water I’ve ever swam in in the Northwest

Unceded means that First Nations people never ceded or legally signed away their lands to the Crown or to Canada. A traditional territory is a geographic area identified by a First Nation as the land they and/or their ancestors traditionally occupied and used.

Black Bear in the campsite

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Saw a bunch of these guys. Sad to see how humans devastated their numbers so many years ago.

Solo Merganser in Skull Cove.

Day 9-

Headed to the (Knight Island) South Gate Islands and skiffed to the Murray Labyrinth and Skull Cove to see the ruins but couldn’t find them. Things get overgrown quickly up here. Very cool to check both these spots out though. Both would make good anchorages. Murry is an advanced skill required spot but a real motivator to get to the point where the boat’s crew can set stern or shorelines or just tie between trees. Beautiful spots.

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Day 10-

Left for Calvert Island around Cape Caution and had to anchor twice in the full bay. Windless is not running free even after I took it apart and did the above deck service. I think it’s because of the scales on the chain.

Walked to West Beach and out to Seventh Beach on the advice of some other hikers. All the beaches are amazing. Noted the big dog prints in the sand to learn later they were wolf prints.

Sea wolves and she wolves

…in good weather

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Day 11-

Decided to take a break from the push north and stay the day. Kayaked to a lagoon and walked to Wolf Beach after hours of trip planning.

Returning from Wolf Beach we realized that we couldn’t easily see where we had come out of the dense forest when we arrived. After looking for half an hour found the trailhead finally and took a little more time to tie a derelict fishing float to a tree branch for the next people to use as a reference. Coming out into this beautiful place one not only forgets about the path home but time too seems to pass so slowly. It was 8:30 pm when we headed back and it felt like early afternoon.

Rhinoceros Auk

Wolf Beach had a magical lagoon that would have been great to explore with Kayaks. Wolf tracks everywhere.

Wolf Beach Calvert Island

Sand Piper

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Day 12-

Went to Codville Lagoon and hiked to Sugar Lake a beautiful lake with red sand. Saw some other cruisers enjoying the water. These are always great opportunities to get beta from other adventurers. There was a Loon there making the most haunting song when we first arrived.

Day 13- Eucott Bay and hot springs with the Grizzly Bears! Horse flies were only out in the middle of the day. A shallow bay with a narrow entrance was a little intimidating at first and paired with the scant info about the spot made setting into this wonderful spot so worth the trip up the fjord. Bear watching from the boat. What a great way to see these awesome creatures.

Compass Rose anchored in Eucott Bay

Sushi is a good way to make a little fish look great on a plate.

The elastic anchor rode on our stern anchor (an Anchor Buddy) really was useful on this trip. Here it is seen holding the skiff pulled in for loading after it sat further away from the shore as the tide went out. This added piece of mind while we soaked and watched for the Grizzly to return to the Hotspring. It would be bad to let your dinghy dry out when you have to escape to the safety of the water. I would add that a skiff like this is really well suited to the waters. Tough and light for its capacity it increases the range of exploration.

Eucott Bay Hotsprings

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Day 14-

Bella Coola

I think this is a place we could have explored more and a better provision option than Bella Bella because of the farmland not far inland. Fallon and I went to the one bar on the reservation here and talked to some locals and they said that the wolves and bears are coming into the village these days because of food scarcity and people’s pets are being killed. Overfishing has effected this area significantly.

Always sad to leave or end an adventure but a great opportunity to explore new places and I’ll at least have some good resting spots in mind on the next delivery through these waters.

The Canadian Indian residential school system was a network of boarding schools for Indigenous peoples. The network was funded by the Canadian government's Department of Indian Affairs and administered by Christian churches. The school system was created to isolate Indigenous children from the influence of their own culture and religion in order to assimilate them into the dominant Canadian culture. Over the course of the system's more than hundred-year existence, around 150,000 children were placed in residential schools nationally.  By the 1930s, about 30 percent of Indigenous children were attending residential schools. The number of school-related deaths remains unknown due to incomplete records. Estimates range from 3,200 to over 30,000, mostly from disease.

This is a beautiful and tasteful example of how graffiti can offer a critique of the establishment. One person’s pioneer hero is another person’s usurper. It is a complicated tangle of issues but mostly a sad tale of the destructiveness of colonialism in the not-so-distant past. I really hope there is healing and regrowth in these communities.

57 Tollycraft Olympia to Bremerton (Why to avoid buying as is where is)

Unfortunately, if you are making a living delivering boats you need to be ready to go with little notice. On top of that, you have to be ready to go when the weather is not ideal and head in the direction that is the least comfortable. It is no mystery then that some brokerages only refer captains to the deliveries that their staff would never touch. I don’t think I’ve had an uneventful delivery referral from (a certain brokerage that will be unnamed) in the past 15 years they’ve been passing on my number. This delivery at least was a short one and I’m less nieve than I used to be so I hired a very skilled hand to help. Rick of the Salty Boys to the rescue again.

We arrive at the boat to find the house bank and start bank was dead. After turning on the generator and charging the batteries we ran into members of the yacht club that were familiar with the charging issue on the dock that the “as is where is” boat had been left. Big boats like this require big power and the little marina was just not equipped to accommodate it. Once the batteries charged we had to figure out why the starboard engine wouldn’t start. After jiggling wires to see if we had a loose terminal we became acquainted with a concerning amount of both deferred maintenance and hack job wiring. Cut wires were hanging down from the engine room ceiling and auto part store battery chargers and jumper cables were strung about with tools and parts everywhere. The owner who was joining had mobility issues so he had never been in the engine room. He was also technologically challenged so he had only sent the last and first pages of the survey to me with his camera phone prior so this and the fact that the boat “cant stay here” all presented frustrating pressure to get the boat that we were now seeing was barely seaworthy off the dock ASAP. After an hour of wire chasing we jumped the relay on the starter and the big Cummins came to life.

Unfortunately, this was not soon enough to allow us to dock the boat in its new berth in Bremerton in the daylight and the owner who was joining us did not remember where the slip he had been assigned was.

After some jockeying in a very tight marina and talking with Rick with my headphones as comms, we squeezed the boat in between two very rickety wood fingers in Suldan Marina.

Fortunately for the owner, the boat is close to the Salty Boys headquarters and the boat is already being cleaned up and fixed as I write this 4 days later.

ASA 106 (Advanced Coastal Cruising) on a new Dufour 530

I’m just returning from a wonderful and sporty, private Advanced Coastal Cruising class aboard a beautiful brand-new Dufour 530. This weekend brought gale-force winds and a wonderful opportunity to see what the boat and crew could do. This class is the fifth in American Sailing Association’s instructional series and covers what a sailor needs to know to make coastal passages in exposed waters where retreat to the protection of shelter is often not possible when the weather deteriorates. The forecast called for winds from the south exceeding 20 knots in the San Juan Islands into the Canadian waters north over a 72-hour period. The forecast on the Pacific Ocean was the same but combined with seas exceeding 10 feet. When the owner reached out originally he told me that he was planning on sailing the boat to Mexico where he and his partner planned to winter aboard. He went on to say that he and his crew wanted to get some ocean experience and to learn about heavy-weather sailing. After looking at the forecast together we decided to head West to the ocean instead of North to the Strait of Georgia. This decision was based on the reluctance to have to sail back south at the end of the weekend into the 20-plus knot winds and choppy seas that wind over current produces. Instead, our decision to head West allowed us to head out into the ocean and strong winds on a more forgiving point of sail. The concept of apparent wind is an important subject in the material. In short, it is a fact that sailing into the wind adds the speed of the boat to the “true wind” speed. So, for example, a 50-foot boat sailing 8 knots into 30 knots produced the effect of 38 knots on the sails. This, paired with the fact that wind force grows exponentially while adding to the discomfort of sailing into the waves that are created by the wind, makes deciding to pick a heading where the wind is on the side of the boat or “beam” and easy one. 

M.O.P. : Mom overboard pole

What’s wrong with this picture?

Our departure from Friday Harbor where the crew of three picked me up was slowed slightly by the strong flood at Cattle Pass and our entrance into the waters on the East end of the Straits of Juan De Fuca. Once in the Straits, there was enough wind from the Southwest to shake out the crisp folds of the French boat’s band new sails and to begin to find the optimal sail settings before dark. After a tack off Ediz Hook and Port Angeles, I threw the “Man/woman/cat overboard” pole in the water and each sailor did several figure-of-eight drills as a review of the manoeuver and as a test of the boat’s maneuverability. I was gladly surprised at the 53-foot long 15-foot wide boat’s maneuverability and ease of sail-handling. After that, the dinner of spring asparagus and pasta began but was interrupted by the cook getting seasick. I dived into the galley and finished what would be four servings of a wonderful dinner that was unfortunately only enjoyed by two. The crew mostly made up of R2AK veterans and old friends had forgotten to bring sea sickness medication. As an instructor and captain, I am not legally allowed to require crew or students to take medication so as uncomfortable as these experiences are they are valuable lessons about the dangers of the very uncomfortable but common occurrence of seasickness and the necessity of bolstering your system until you get acclimatized to the motion. With fifty miles to go, we decided to turn the engine on as the wind tapered so we could reach the conditions and sea we were looking for at sunrise and I went down for a three-hour nap before my 12 to 3 am watch. I came on deck and took the watch alone deciding to let the sick cook rest. At the end of my watch, my standing orders were to vary the speed to arrive at Cape Flattery at dawn. While I was off-watch, the wind increased from the South, and the engine was turned off. Unfortunately, too much sail was up, and when I came on deck at 6 am we were leaving the strait and entering the ocean in the dark. Which is what I had planned to avoid. We put in two reefs and rolled the jib in two feet and continued west into the dark sea. We went out for an hour- and- a half until there was enough light to see the waves and turn around. At this point, we were surrounded by ships entering the strait and with less maneuverability than I like to have due to being overpowered. We planned to head into Neah Bay 10 miles from Cape Flattery and get some rest and recuperate. At this point, everyone but myself was sick and eager to get back into sheltered waters. Just outside of the bay and out of the swell and chop we saw a gust of 41 knots on the wind gauge. At that point, we only had the double-reefed main and the engine on. Thirty minutes later we were tied up to a very inhospitable dock with broken cleats and rusty bolts protruding from the dock. The bright white hull of the new sailboat was in stark contrast to the rusting hulks of the dying native fishing fleet. The only real cause for alarm was one of the crew falling after jumping to the dock as we landed in a 25-knot gust. The freeboard of this boat was about four and a half feet making those fender-step things a real necessity. Everyone’s spirits were very high as we all went to sleep for a three-hour nap. After a nap, we had an amazing omelet breakfast with dill, chives, smoked salmon, and chevre. 

Kitted out!

Conditions and wind direction allowing for a nice dip of the toe into rough ocean weather.

Type 2 fun

Sailing in the flat water of San Juan Chanel under headsail alone.

After discussing the experience and the concepts of apparent wind and the development of bailout plans we looked at the forecast ahead. At this point, the wind was dying but the next wave of weather was going to be hitting the San Jauns as we would be returning, so we created a plan based on what we had learned about the boat’s sailing characteristics and the wind. Our trip back was mostly uneventful and the only challenge was maneuvering around the commercial traffic in the Victoria area. Instead of returning the way we came through Cattle Pass, we chose a more conservative route over the top of San Juan Island. After enjoying some fun sailing in the flat protected waters of the islands we anchored in Parks Bay for a three-hour nap followed by another take on the now-famous omelet. We did some talk about emergency procedures and discussed the boat’s return to “A” town they dropped me off in Friday Harbor at 3 pm. Some lessons can be learned through reading and study but some lessons require getting your feet wet. Hopefully, when tackling dreams as big as this we can do the due diligence necessary to be prepared for the new scary world of big water sailing and hopefully, we can take the time to organize shakedown sails like this one where we can practice before we put ourselves and boats into situations that we can not retreat from. This was a hugely valuable experience because we learned about what the boat likes and doesn’t like, what modifications need to be made before the big trip south, and most importantly where everyone’s comfort and resilience levels are. Getting seasick sucks and I would say that in weather like we were in not taking medication is not an option. There are no passengers on a boat like this. Everyone aboard represents a liability to one degree and they need to work to counter to whatever degree they are a liability with their different respective abilities to help. Coastal cruising and blue water cruising can all be done without sailing in “bad weather” but extreme patience that we moderns are not practiced in is necessary to avoid putting the boat and crew into the rough stuff. Unfortunately, the harsh realities of work schedules and life tempt us into these inclement weather situations and we have to be prepared to deal with them. 

Anchor alarms apps are one of the coolest new tools we have at our disposal.

“After enjoying some fun sailing in the flat protected waters of the islands we anchored in Parks Bay for a three-hour nap followed by another take on the now-famous omelet.”

Takeaways

Boat design - flat bottom light boats are great downwind but upwind in waves need to be slowed down and cracked off the wind due to hull slamming.

Gear - Hard to be too warm in these conditions. reports of some crew getting cold showed a need for either a backup dry set of gear or more layering. This would have been worse without a dodger and awning.

Sea sickness meds are a must in your kit and on the boat.

Boat Prep - A boarding ladder is essential for these high freeboard boats.

I would have liked to see another set of reef points in this light a boat’s sail plan. This is a light displacement mainsail-driven boat with swept spreaders. It’s all about controlling that power and keeping the boat balanced.

Island Packet 370 (Can winter passages be fun?)

Winter deliveries can be a wonderful challenge and on the right boat and with the right crew the variable wind directions and weather windows can make for wonderful passages. I saw an Easterly in the forecast and scrambled to get a crew capable of moving this solid sailing craft from Portland to Orcas Island. As it turned out two former Advance Coastal Cruising alumni of GBA classes from years ago would be able to join as well as a new sailing friend from a neighboring island. A crew of four is a fine number for a delivery like this and even in a worst-case scenario (failing autopilot. rough weather etc). The only concern was that these hearty sailors who signed up for a suffer fest were in for a beam reach in a fully enclosed heated cockpit on a boat with as much luxury as you can fit into a 37 foot sailboat.

Things always come up though. The first thing to challenge the mission was that the LPG tank was expired and the filling station wouldn’t fill it. The tank was a rare and an odd size so buying a replacement would be impossible. We headed to West Marine to see if we could buy an adapter hose that would allow us to buy a cheap refillable steel tank that we could mount outside the tiny propane locker but no luck. The next idea and best idea was to buy a few green BBQ-style cans of LPG and an adapter that would allow us to run the stove off them. West Marine didn’t have them but “Sextants” a small chandlery and the last remaining place to buy used boat gear in PDX did have the adapter and was open for 30 more minutes. Crisis averted.

River navigation should be taken seriously

The day after the crew are aboard, my liferaft was lashed to the deck, provisions were stowed, and we were on our way down the Mighty Columbia toward the Graveyard of the Pacific. A quote from Commander Wilkes, US Navy (ca. 1860) describes this bar on a bad day: “Mere description can give but little idea of the terrors of the bar of the Columbia; all who have seen it have spoken of the wilderness of the ocean and the incessant roar of the waters, representing it as one of the most fearsome sites that can possibly meet the eye of a sailor.”

“The Columbia River Bar has swallowed more ships, about 2,100 at last count, than any other location on the Pacific north of Mexico.”

Sounds awesome right? Well it’s not that bad if you cross it at the right time.

The other thing I noticed before leaving was that the threads holding the headsail’s UV cover on the sail were barely holding together. When I notified the owner he said he had taken the sails into the North Sails Loft in Portland to have them inspected and had been told they would be fine.

Once underway at 7 am we found the tachometer to work intermittently and when we turned on the radar it crashed the plotter. We arrived in Astoria at 18:30 and found that the plotter boots up to full brightness at the worst time destroying your night vision which is already badly effected by the 360 plastic enclosed.

The next day we fueled up and found the fuel gauge to not be accurate and the fuel levels to be off from what the owner had told us. At 845 we were out to sea and it was gusting 25 on the bar. By 11:00 the UV cover was coming off the staysail. We turned on the engine when the charge was low on the house bank but had to slow the boat down first because the big nonfolding prop stuck the transmission in reverse. We made Cape Flattery by 7 am with wind waves of 3 feet against a flood. Around noon the head stopped working and I decided to continue into the wind and current and head for PA to pump out and troubleshoot. Found that the wire nuts on the pump were loose and the cabin lights flickered when bumped. Hot wired the pump to test and the pump worked but there was no pressure. Found that contrary to the owner briefing the head was not discharging overboard. Assumed that the duck valves are prolapsed. With no tools aboard capable of doing this job. Sunday morning I rent Max a car in PA and he heads back to Portland.

Before we met I asked the crew to come up with one meal each cook for dinner one of the four days we would be out. This is a good way to do it because if you only have to cook once in four days you can go all out. This paired with the fact that the cook never does the dishes on my passages makes for quite a smooth cruise all things considered. The seas are seldom smooth though so everyone quickly learns that simple is best. You don’t want to lose your lunch making dinner. Past opportunities to pre slice veggies come easily to mind when one is chasing the onion slice as it is caught by the roll of a wave. I’ve often thought that a Mandoline (a hand-powered slicing kitchen tool) would be a great way to allow someone in the cockpit to slice a bunch of veggies into a bowl while keeping an eye on the horizon. The first lunch was Seattle dogs but in tortillas that I cooked under John’s supervision as it is a specialty of his. (Sausage, onions, sauerkraut and creamcheese. The next dinner was underway off the Washington coast and conducted by Max H who had done some preprep and the meal after this was a Chicken soup made almost from scratch by Barry who regretted somewhat not pre slicing some of the veggies as it was pretty bumpy at that time.

I would say that the best meal of all came from our retired fire captain John Palmer. When we were provisioning together we saw some Thai curry simmer sauce and ingredients that would make a rough weather meal easily. Frozen peas and carrots, minute rice, a yellow onion, and precooked grilled chicken in a bag. This meal came together in 15 minutes for a lunch in the San Juans on the final stretch to Deer Harbor and was amazing. This is a great idea for a seagoing meal. It’s very easy to make things more complicated than necessary and find yourself spending too long in the galley and getting sick. Once sick it is very hard to get well again and so not worth it. Anything that is canned or precooked or in a bag that can be added to something cooked from scratch easily is invaluable offshore. Our plan for the meals was to have hearty cold-weather food that would warm everyone up from the inside and provide the fuel to stay warm on a cold night watch.

Other than the boat’s lack of lee cloths and real sea births we fared very well. Being that we were on a perfect beam reach for the whole Washington Coast and got to sail quite a bit it made up for it.

Test thread life on UV covers using your thumbnail.

Didn’t make it. These are much harder to restitch once they have come off.

Max Heckscher GBA alumni turned indispensable shipmate offshore.

Once across the bar and into the beautiful stiff Easterly we were on a beam reach heading north quite happy in the boat’s full cockpit enclosure.

So glad to have Max Heckscher, John Palmer, and Barry Crist aboard. Great work gents.

A three blade prop at this speed can not be taken out of gear in reverse

on the button

65 Pacific Mariner Anacortes WA to Vancouver WA (Is bigger better?)

Detroit powered spaceship. (busy fuel dock in the background)

When I was contacted by the new owner of this incredible 65-foot yacht I was excited that we had such a good weather window on the Washington Coast otherwise I would have been a little concerned. The more I move boats in big water the less concerned I am about the size of the boat and the more I’m concerned about the complexity of their systems. This boat was a good example of a complicated boat but I was comforted by the fact that Rick from the Salty Boys Boat Works was keen to come along. I’ve worked with Rick quite a bit this year having him and his business partner Jake help prepare boats before deliveries. I thought this would be a fun one and a chance to share a trouble-free delivery as Rick had previously experienced a very dramatic delivery with another captain his first time on the coast years that ended in a Coast Guard rescue. 

After he said he would join he mentioned the only conflict was his dad was visiting and if he could come. I said yes and just like that, we had a crew and a great weather window. Now, this boat was quite different from the last powerboat I took south around the corner. The last boat had been a Nordhavn and a very seaworthy boat in contrast. This Pacific Mariner 65 was a very large and fast boat and not what I would call a very sea-worthy craft. The potted plants were fake but the crystalware was not. But there was a bath tub and bidet to make up for it.

If you have to ask how much…

Whats for lunch?

Our first challenge was fueling. During the summer in any busy port with a fuel dock, there is a line for the fuel. The boat was moored right across from the fuel dock but that wasn’t the same as being in line and if we wanted to be “in line” we were going to have to hover. So when the line got down to one last Bayliner filling up we cast off and turned around to orient the boat so as to best communicate our intention to any barging other boats. The bow thruster on the boat was hydraulic and needed the generator running or, I should say, one of the generators running to operate. It blowing about 20 knots so it was going to be a challenge holding this large and new to me vessel on station in what now felt like a small marina. I was glad at least that it wasn’t an electric thruster as those can overheat… The best steering station is on the flybridge and unfortunately, the alarm for the hydraulic temp is not at that helm.. the engines on a powerboat with two screws make a boat more maneuverable when they are further apart because they can twist the boat more easily that way and despite the fact that this boat had an 18-foot beam they did not twist the boat well and the thruster was key to its maneuverability. Im not sure why it took that Bayliner so long to fill but it did and we eventually got our chance to buy a lot of fuel. Now, putting over a thousand gallons of fuel into a boat is a job in itself. Many fuel pumps don’t have trigger locks to prevent spills so you have to hold the trigger for the entire time. We jockeyed the boat to allow the high-flow pumps to reach the two fuel fills and the pump nozzles had locks so eventually we were fueled up and on our way but later than we had hoped after provisioning and getting spare oil. I usually like to do a short run out the strait and top off to calculate the fuel burn because even if I know what the brochure or specs on the boat should burn dinghies on davits causing the stern to drag or dirty bottoms or props will affect the economy and range and with the remoteness of the coast its not something to mess with. All that said we were going to miss Port Angeles fuel Dock given our later departure and may as well run out to Neah Bay and wait for the morning to fuel up there.

We got to Neah Bay just as it was getting dark and at 20 knots SOG no less. Even in a place you know well like I do Neah Bay once it’s dark and there are a few boats you have a very poor sense of where you are in the anchorage. We set the hook and turned on the other generator, with a little guilt I will add. I’m not used to being THAT guy in the anchorage and I have more experience as the “blowboater” enjoying the quiet. What I didn’t know when I was just an innocent sailor is that some powerboats have so many systems that they require the generator to be on ALL the time.

I’m glad to say in retrospect other than throwing a little more wake that I should have later in the adventure the biggest mistake I made on the delivery was over-salting the steaks that night. Ill get over it one day. After dinner, I downloaded the weather and it looked like, what was supposed to be a little southerly in our future, was going to be a bit more substantial and if we waited for the fuel dock to open we would arrive at the Columbia River bar at max ebb (the worst time). I’m sure we would have been fine but my job is all about risk analysis..and a bit of docking…and cooking. And with the new info, it was looking like it would be better for us to head to Westport for fuel and not wait for the Neah Bay fuel dock to open. So at first light, we were off and down the coast of Washington heading to the home waters of Kurt Cobain. Not the best place to spend the night as there was still some crab gear out. We would have to make good time the next day to cross the Columbia bar and get all the way to Vancouver 100 river miles up from the infamous bar. The next day’s southerly wasn’t looking too bad and if we timed the beginning of the flood in Westport it would be the end of the flood on the Columbia fifty miles south… if we went fast.

Dress for the job you want

We did not go fast. I think we were down to 7 knots at one point but as I suspected the outflow north would lay the chop down north off the bar and we would be able to speed up. By the time we were at buoy 14 we were doing 20 knots again. Our fellow powerboats and wake makers were there too. Doing their best to catch the last of the salmon the season allowed and strewn on every heading across the channel no less, forcing us to thread the needle while throwing a wake that only teenagers on jets skis can really appreciate. Starting our way up the familiar and nostalgic waters for me with the leaves just starting to turn and the days starting to shorten I knew the river summer I had just missed.

The convergence of the Willamette and the Columbia can be a busy place for commercial traffic. Tugs pushing four barges at a time and tankers anchored and underway all make transiting this area at night unadvisable even for one familiar with the area. A little further and we were in my old haunting grounds and an area of major silting and depth changes. One has to be sure to have updated charts here and even then deep drafted boats need to use extra caution. As we approached the boat’s new home on the Vancouver side I was glad that there was a little light left. It would be a tight one with an opposing current and wind. Some kind residents of the marina came to grab lines and our three-way call on headphones helped coordinate our efforts and we landed the big boat on the second stab. 

3 nuts

Alls well that ends well. 

Time to pop in a DVD and order a pizza

Nordhavn 40 from Roche Harbor WA to Napa CA

The crew arrived when I was having a soda water from Captain Ron’s built-in soda fountain aboard his mighty “Zephyr”. Ron and his first mate Ashley were kind enough to give my crew a tour of the 80-foot converted pilot boat they they charter for research work on the Washington Coast. After this, we went to provision, and though I was a little concerned about Rachel’s enthusiasm with filling our shopping cart im very happy she did. I am a frugal shopper and a single guy so despite my experience provisioning boats for trips like these it always seems like a lot of food when its all in one cart.

Sam spent the night with his wife who drove them out that evening in a hotel and who was going to enjoy a hike before driving back to Seattle the next day. 5:30 am was the decided dock time for light and a favorable tide.

Unfortunately, we didn’t get off the dock as quickly as hoped as the LPG was not working. A quick look and jiggle of wires showed that someone had replaced the solenoid and not used waterproof butt connectors and though the boat was unusually well equipped with tools I could find any butt connectors so I had to open and salvage an old one to boil water for some coffee for my brain. After a brief safety meeting, we went to the dock and topped off with 600 gallons of fuel.

Once underway and with the last of the Ebb still running we brought the engine up to 2100 RPM and were making over 9 knots. The water was flat and the sun was out.  I decided to leave Tatoosh Island to port which is unusual as I usually take “hole in the wall” in powerboats in calm water but it was past lunchtime and in addition to needing to make something to eat I was not confident with the maneuverability of the boat at slow speeds and with following current to take the narrow and scenic short cut. There was a small westerly swell running and maybe 5 knots of wind from the South when we hung a left downhill. 

The Nordhavn has a round bilge and high superstructure so is prone to roll. Some come with what are called active stabilizers which are articulated fins that protrude from the hull underwater and can automatically adjust to the roll of the boat to keep the boat flat. This boat didn’t have these but did have “passive stabilizers” or “paravanes” which are often found on fishing boats in the northwest and do the same job although not as efficiently. 

Paravaines are long poles that tilt down to the water to suspend “fish” or heavy-finned sinkers that are attached with chains to pivot points to allow them to sink easily but provide resistance to upward pull and counter the rolling of the boat respectively. The byproduct of this antagonism is that they produce drag so I chose to wait to deploy them when the conditions picked up. We did however lower the paravanes but just without launching the fish.

We did however decide to practice deploying and retrieving one after watching a video that was coincidently shot at the same dock in PA we had just spent the night at. This was a good idea as they are tricky and require crew coordination.

The NW swell picked up eventually and we launched the fish. This is a challenge as the upper deck of the N40 is quite high and the roll of the boat up there is substantial. With Rachel driving and Sam on the upper deck and clipped on operating the winch and crane while I pulled the fish from their holsters. There are short cables that are used to keep these 40-pound fish in place and work nicely as tethers to clip to your PFD and harness while you wrestle with these dangerous things. The only addition to the tips in the video is that you should pull a bunch of slack in the retrieval line prior to launching so that when you release the fish it quickly sinks down and out away from the boat when timed with the roll.

While we were doing this we saw a puffin with is rare this far south.

Paravane down and not enough line to secure it.

Once down the boat felt totally different. Unfortunately, the riggers who had been hired to refurbish the boat’s rigging didn’t make the topping lift line long enough to be secured when deployed. I also found that one of the shackles on the fish was very loose and the “mousing” (wire) employed to prevent them from backing out was at the end of its life. I managed to remove some of it without breaking it and retighten the shackle with a wrench and re-mouse it. This was a weak point we would not be able to deal with once in the seaway  

Once around the corner of Cape Flattery we usually lose all cell coverage and the ability to look at the forecast ahead but with the Starlink that Sam brought we were able to continue to monitor the weather we were heading for. Unfortunately, it was not looking good and I decided to delay the decision to proceed once I saw how the boat behaved in the bigger seas. We were about due west off Astoria when the seas picked up. And by that time turning the beam to them to retreat would have been a mistake as the rolling with the sea on the quarter was proving to be bad enough. This and the fact that the Columbia River Bar is a big commitment Astoria being 11 miles upriver and the bar being what it is. Newport would be the next option should we need to go in and this would mean an angle change and commitment made early to avoid the same beam seas with a right angle turn from parallel. The cost of this coarse change would make deciding to stay out hard because we would be beam to the NW swell mixed with the North swell and mean seas on the other beam to earn more water (get offshore) By noon the bar report from Yaquina Bay was deteriorating and was restricted to vessels under 16 feet and there was a chance it would be closed to vessels our size. The forecast for the rest of the coast wasn’t looking good either. We were looking at 8 to 10-foot swells and 20-plus knots all the way to SF. 

Cape Blanco is one of the first capes you have to contend with on this route and once a little south, we saw the biggest seas probably in the 12-foot range and with 30-knot wind occasionally blowing the tops off the occasional breaker. At one point the starboard fish got caught behind its holder on the transom and we had to slow down to clear it.  From here on our bail-out options were Cresent City or Eureka. The forecast was reviewed and it looked like we didn’t have a break from the weather for over a week and the logistics of getting people home began to come to the forefront of my mind. This was another instance where the Starlink proved to be very handy. Often the transportation to and from remote and semi-remote places is harder that the delivery itself. To add to this challange car rentals have become much less convenient post-COVID and what used to be as easy and booking a quite affordable oneway rental is no more. It turns out the Hertz in Eurika now again offers one-way rentals for only $300 to drop off in Seattle. It looked like we were going to get a chance to sample the burritos in Eurika.

Once the car was booked and the crew headed back north I reached out to the owner who had expressed an interest to join for some training underway and I proposed that he meet me with his first mate for some docking practice in Euika. The current here due to the tidal exchange is substantial so it looked like a bit of a silver lining to what was now going to be a few-day delay.

Safely tied up in beautiful Eurika California

Talking to the harbormaster I was told that there weren’t any gate keys available but to call a guy named Nate if i needed to get in or to just jump the fence. Later that day a scruffy man in extra tuffs and with a Budweiser in hand asked me if I fished the boat. I said it wasn’t mine and that I was waiting for weather to continue the delivery south to SF. He invited me over to his friend’s boat for a beer and I met his friend Nate. I explained my situation in some more detail and asked for dinner recommendations and when Forest heard that I didn’t get a key from the Harbormaster he offer his own off his key ring. Two days later and Eurika was warming up to me. Oldtown is cute and quaint and about as far from my first impression of the fishing town. Walking from the public marina where I was moored to town I had to pass one of the stinkiest fish processing plants I’ve ever had the displeasure of smelling. Incidentally, the bar across the street has amazing fish tacos.

Dock security

Forest

Once the owner and his first mate showed up for lessons I saw that we would need better weather to continue with them aboard as crew. One evening I shared my concern with my new fisherman friends Nate and Forest and as it turned out the day after the first weather window opened Nate was fishing out of SF so I asked if he would crew for me. Happy to get on a boat that didn’t stink Nate agreed to help.

We planned to meet the owner in SF and drop Nate off and continue up to Napa where he had secured moorage.

R2Ak June 24 miscellaneous

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The Flying Tiger we lost in the rough stuff outside the island and the repair they managed to get back on the course.

Dazed and confused (Finishing the Race to Alaska)

Sailboat racing is not a spectator sport for the most part. It is usually something that only the competitors care about or understand and the accolades seldom go far beyond the yacht club. But this event has proved that sailing(and paddling) can be a highly entertaining thing for many people both in the know with regard to water sports and not. R2aK proved to be a very well-oiled promotion machine and they did a great job serving up some sort of wacky vicarious experience through social media and made “tracker addicts” of many a grandfather and even the occasional ex. In stark contrast to this media storm they brewed; the race course we just covered was some of the most remote and inhospitable territory I’ve ever sailed through and once we re-entered the stratosphere and the cell signal the cruise ships emulate all our phones to litt up with excited encouragement from those following our wobbly way North…. This paired with the reception we got as we arrived at the finishing dock in Ketchikan barefooted, highly sleep-deprived from dropping our watch regiment in the final push..and in our pajamas was surprising, to say the least. Moments before we were in our skivvies and in our own little world virtually unaware of our standing in the race pounding coffee and expending copious calories to achieve 2 to 3 knots of boat speed. I can confidently speak for the crew saying we are highly grateful for the outflowing of support both before, during, and after the race. We will be picking up the best trophy the first to lose any race could ever dream of receiving this evening…if, that is, we can wake up from the naps that are inevitably happening very soon. 

From the bottom of our salty hearts 

Thank you, everyone.

https://r2ak.com/2022-race-feed/day-7-steak-knives-miller-lite-engineering-r2ak-media-loses-our-gd-minds/

June 21 r2ak

Going soft

Before the wind died

Brutal. .

Fisher 38 from Portland to Seattle (how often should you check the oil?) Words to come

Searay 42 Anacortes to Westport

I was first contacted by the new owner of a brokerage on Oregon to bring this boat down to Portland to be listed there. When I asked for recent survey I was given something from 2019. Truth is a lot can happen to a boat in two years.. In lieu of a recent survey I said I would go inspect the boat prior to agreeing to deliver it.

The murky backwater I first found the boat.

The rotting ribs of a broken relic from another time.

When I got to the boat for this inspection its was up a tiny shallow river called The Samish. The brown muddy water that floated this buff horse was barely as wide as the boat in question was long and nestled in with other apparently mothballed yachts.

“The bow thruster doesn’t work” the former owner said. Immediately i saw that it wasn’t the lack of bowthrust-ability that would be the problem but the fact that the water it was floating on was not marked and beyond any lateral navigational aids. Random pilings stuck up out of the Samish river’s slow moving muddy water, apparently complete with the universal signs for shallow or (relatively) deepwater ie spray painted thumbs up or thumbs down signs. This was not good news and my heart sank at the thought of having to tell the guy I couldn’t move the boat from where it was.

Memories of muddy banks like these from my youth on the Multnomah channel bubbled up in my nostalgic minds eye and made me smile. You can take the River Rat out of the river but you cant take the river out of the Rat.

“How do you get out of here,” I asked

“I haven’t taken the boat out recently,” said the prior owner. “it needs to be a 7-foot tide and you are fine”

After saying this he admitted he gave himself a 90% chance of getting it out of there and as it wasn’t his boat anymore he didn’t want to take the risk.

“How long have you lived here? “ I asked

“My whole life”..he responded “I learned how to sail out there” pointing as he did to the muddy delta

Going on he shared a few stories of drunkenly sailing in and out after dark running aground many times laughing about it.

I had seen what I needed to..or so I thought. I told the owner I wouldn’t move the boat from where it was but if he got it to Anacortes I could do it. Then I asked how the Ocean Alexander was coming along and that maybe could use the coming window to move it from Gig Harbor to Portland. (see previous log entry)

Two weeks later and he sold the boat and the new owner contacts me saying that the running light and the fogged windows had been addressed and the boat was ready to go in Anacortes. I saw a window coming up and called a recent student who hired me the weekend before to teach her some boat handling skills she would need as a yacht steward and said I had a learning opportunity and an adventure to share.

no sauce in the starboard V drive

I arrived at the boat the afternoon before our departure date to go over some things and found that the fluids were low everywhere. The V drives transmissions and oil needed to be topped or filled and I had 45 minutes before the stores closed before the weekend. First I went to West Marine and they didn’t have the oil so I went to North Harbor Marine and big pro service yard in A town and they set me up.

enough wingnuts to give a surveyor a conniption

After topping the fluids that night I thought I would test the electronics and found that the batteries were dead. Upon closer inspection I found that a switch with a sticker on it that said “turn off when engine running” was off. This I surmised was the battery charger breaker switch. I flipped it and went to the Brown Lantern to get some long overdue dinner and the last beer for a bit. The next morning the engine batteries were still dead. The bank that had charged was the “inverter bank” this is what you would call a house bank. What was labeled house bank was nested with the starting batteries was what was dead. These batteries were AGM gel batteries and hooked up the “smart” charger. Well, this charger like many other modern chargers isn’t smart enough to charge a fully discharged battery. It needs to see some voltage before it will turn on so using some automotive jumper cables I jumped from the “inverter” bank that was now fully charged and lead-acid type and the smart charger lit up and started charging at 30 amps.

It’s 9 am and we are supposed to be underway to make it to Neah Bay safely before dark. It’s looking like it’s going to be noon before we can get going.

Underway

Two 3208 caterpillar engines pumping out 375 seahorses of trustpower, stinky smoke, and NOISE. At 2400 RPM it must have been 80 decibels and unless that is 80 decibels of Motorhead I’m spending my irreplaceable hearing on I’m wearing ear protection. (and cranking some Motorhead at the same time) my Bose noise-canceling headphones have been a game-changer. I have a pair of shooters noise-canceling earmuffs that I have used with earbuds which are good but the Bose are sweet and will connect to your phone via bluetooth so you can call your shipmate who is on the bow and share information like distances, traffic, encouragement, and instructions.

Noon thirty and we were underway and making 15 knots. We had a heavy dinghy on the back which I knew would slow us down and on top of that, the bottom still had river slime on it so we weren’t going to be hitting the 20 knots these monsters were supposed to be able to make.

The forecast and our late departure meant that we were going to hit some turbulence in the afternoon. I was thinking that it may be a good thing to see what the boat could do before bombing the Washington Coast. If we were going to stir up some tank goo into our filters it would be better in the straight with more options to bail. It was right when we hit some chop and I was regaling my crew and my captive audience about the Swiftsure Regatta and my experiences in the bay off our beam that the port engine died.

I passed the helm over to my shipmate and dived into the engine room telling her to try and keep the bow into the waves. My first thought was that we had clogged a filter and I switched the valve on the parallel Racor filter. After a little time cranking it was apparent that it was going to take some more work to get it going and as it was the roughest bit of water we had been in yet it would be better to try and do any work in the relative shelter of Clallam Bay conveniently off or just forward of our beam and the subject of my recent yarn. I admit that the main thoughts in my mind at this time were what are we going to do if the port engine clogs a filter now and how many cranking amps do we have in these, so recently abused, batteries and can I jump them or should I switch them with the other bank and also how much of a wide berth I was gong to give the rocky point and our leeshore before I cut into the bay. Clamam Bay is small sportfishing town where many wife free weekend warriors flock to get a chance to catch a fish large enough to take a picture with. This is about all that is going on in the little “town” of Sekiu. The last time I went into the dock it was to get fuel in a 32-foot trimaran and even that ultralight boat had multiple people telling us we couldn’t tie up there. I knew it was going to be a problem but I didn’t want to risk anchoring as the windless was battery-powered and may draw the batteries down more. It’s easier to ask forgiveness than permission so I told my shipmate that I was going to be in the engine room and to be as sweet and charming as possible to whoever walked out to kick us off and to buy as much time as she could.

adventure number two

First I opened the top of the Rocor we had been running on before the engine died and I switched it to see how bad the fuel was. It was bad and more important it was half empty. Assuming the worse that it had sucked air through a seal after it clogged and introduced air into the system. After a little more cranking on the new filter, I decided to open it up and although nice and clean it was also half full. As many readers will know: air is bad in a diesel engine’s fuel line. It has to be removed by bleeding the line by opening an injector line and cranking the engine.

That’s when it hit me. Was the Port tank fuel gauge really broken? Did the owner really fill it up before we got to the boat as he said? Did that previous owner really dip the tank as he said? A moment later I was squeezing over the still quite warm Port engine to tap on the tank with a wrench. Empty.

At this point, it was looking like we needed to squeeze into the tiny fuel dock that was (thanks be to Neptune) still open and to do it on one engine. Now like anything there are tradeoffs in boat design. Boats with two engines are much more maneuverable than boats with only single engines but not all twin screws are created equal. The further that “wheels” props are apart the easier it is to maneuver in tight spaces that those with props closer to the centerline but they don’t track well when only one engine is available.

https://youtu.be/8hJ1HDcMowk

This was the case. On par with the maneuvering approach, I had to master when working as a Vessel Assist captain I turned the boat around and around as I was now not an “anbiturner” but unlike Zoolander I could only turn to Port. The trick to going straight with a boat like this is to get enough speed that both the rudders are working. Combined with the surge in the area and the tiny landing dock and the random piling to be woven through I was not happy about the situation the owner’s poor prep had put us in.

Now we see why the tank was empty. The fuel is not going into the tank at the speed it should and after an hour we had 37 gallons and enough to make it to Neah Bay. The vent is clogged no doubt and will require more time and boat yoga than we have daylight for dodging trees on the way to Neah Bay.

Another unfortunate aspect of this situation is that the delay and pit stop has confounded our ability to calculate the fuel economy (or lack thereof) I wanted to know before hopping to Astoria down the Washington Coast.

high tailing in to Neah before it gets to dark to see the trees floating by

The CAT 3208 proved to be a popular diesel engine for trucks through the early 1990s and boats through the late 1990s. Production ended by 1999 mostly due to the engine’s inability to meet global emissions standards established by clean air regulation at the time. The use of the engine was widespread and its performance was reliable. As a result, many vehicles equipped with the CAT 3208 remain in service long after production of the diesel engine ceased.

I can attest that at 2400 rpms two of these under your feet sounds like a diesel power jet airplane and reframes that brochure image in your mind with the bikinis and all as an experience far from relaxation. BUT I am a bit of a sailor snob so theres that. Thunder in paradise it will be.

Caterpillar also offered a marine version of the CAT 3208 diesel engine for yachts, leisure boats, and commercial trawlers. Larger vessels would be powered with twin-turbocharged diesel engines. The marine diesel engine version was modified with bigger heat exchangers, exhaust manifolds, turbochargers and seawater pumps to cool the engine oil. However, the engines were known as gas guzzlers, and consequently, they did not meet the criteria of internal combustion exhaust emissions regulation. Production of the marine CAT 3208 diesel engine ended in 1999 and outlasted production of the diesel engine version for heavy-duty trucks.

Between 15 and 17 knots we went Kate and me with our noise-canceling headphones

My co pilot Kate. Soon to be Captain Kate to you

We came into Neah Bay just as we were losing visibility and it was pitch black by the time we were approaching the dock. Not something I wanted to be doing. Even a harbor as familiar as Neah Bay is to me, risk increases exponentially once you lose visibility. There are two sides to the page. One side is risk or con (broken) and the other side is assets or pros. Things that may seem totally unrelated but the fact that they are on the con side of the page can have a huge effect on each other listed item of concern. It is a captain’s job to assess and reassess these risks constantly. We were going to have to have a serious conversation with the owner in the morning. We found. a spot with power to tie up which was key to a hot dinner as the generator wasn’t working and the inverter bank was not functioning right after finding a short where an outlet was missing on the aft deck.

Unfortunately one of my favorite breakfast places. The Warm House” had not survived the pandemic but a small homely galley was kicking out breakfast burritos and coffee in the Harbormasters office. We paid our night moorage and back at the boat I crawled in a pooka where the fuel vent hose lived and cut the hose off the barbed fitting to clear it out with a piece of wire I stripped from the spares box. After it was cleared we moved to the fuel dock and top off for the trip south. After so much delay fighting the poorly prepared boat, our weather window closed and did not allow us to get the boat further south than Westport.

Some boats are more ready to go than others.

always want to rinse off that saltwater after splashing around in it!

A well deserved brew for the crew

Advanced Coastal Cruising class aboard a Dufour 530

I’m just returning from a wonderful and sporty, private Advanced Coastal Cruising class aboard a beautiful brand-new Dufour 530. This weekend brought gale-force winds and a wonderful opportunity to see what the boat and crew could do. This class is the fifth in American Sailing Association’s instructional series and covers what a sailor needs to know to make coastal passages in exposed waters where retreat to the protection of shelter is often not possible when the weather deteriorates. The forecast called for winds from the south exceeding 20 knots in the San Juan Islands into the Canadian waters north over a 72-hour period. The forecast on the Pacific Ocean and the adjoining water of the Strait of Juan De Fuca was the same but combined with seas exceeding 10 feet. When the owner reached out originally he told me that he was planning on sailing the boat to Mexico where he and his partner planned to winter aboard. He went on to say that he and his crew wanted to get some ocean experience and to learn about heavy-weather sailing. After looking at the forecast together we decided to head West to the ocean instead of north to the Strait of Georgia. This decision was based on the reluctance to have to sail back south at the end of the weekend into the 20-plus knot winds and choppy seas that wind over current produces. Instead, our decision to head west allowed us to head out into the ocean and strong winds on a more forgiving point of sail while leaving the option to quickly return to the lee and protection of Cape Flattery.

(The concept of apparent wind is an important subject in the material. In short, it is a fact that sailing into the wind adds the speed of the boat to the “true wind” speed. So, for example, a 50-foot boat sailing 8 knots into 30 knots produced the effect of 38 knots on the sails. This paired with the fact that wind-force grows exponentially while adding to the discomfort of sailing into the waves that are created by the wind makes the decision to pick a heading where the wind is on the side of the boat or “beam” and easy one. )

Whats wrong with this picture?

Prepared!

Our departure from Friday Harbor where the crew picked me up was slowed slightly by the strong flood at Cattle Pass and our entrance into the waters on the East end of the Straits of Juan De Fuca. Once in the Straits, there was enough wind from the Southwest to shake out the crisp folds of the French boat’s band new sails and to begin to find the optimal sail settings before dark. After a tack off Ediz Hook and Port Angeles, I threw the “Man/woman/cat overboard” pole in the water and each sailor did several figure-of-eight drills as a review of the manoeuver and as a test of the boat’s maneuverability. I was happily surprised at the 53-foot long 15-foot wide boat’s maneuverability and ease of sail-handling. After that, the dinner of spring asparagus and pasta began but was interrupted by the cook getting seasick. I dived into the galley and finished what would be four servings of a wonderful dinner, unfortunately only two got to enjoy it. The crew, mostly made up of R2AK veterans and old friends, had forgotten to bring sea sickness medication. As an instructor and captain, I am not legally allowed to require crew or students to take medication so as uncomfortable as these experiences are they are valuable lessons about the dangers of seasickness and the necessity of bolstering your system until you get acclimatized to the motion. With fifty miles to go and as the wind tapered we decided to turn on the engine and motor sail. This would allow us to time our arrival to the ocean at sunrise. At this time I went down below for a three-hour nap before my 12 to 3 am shift. I came on deck and took the watch alone deciding to let the sick cook rest. At the end of my watch, my standing orders were to vary the speed to arrive at Cape Flattery at dawn. While I was off-watch, the wind increased from the South, and the engine was turned off. Unfortunately, too much sail was up, and when I came on deck at 6 am we were leaving the strait and entering the ocean in the dark. Which is what I had planned to avoid. We put in two reefs and rolled the jib in two feet and continued West into the dark ocean. We went out for an hour- and- a half until there was enough light to see the waves and turn around. At this point, we were surrounded by ships entering the strait and with less maneuverability than I like to have due to being overpowered. We then planned to head into Neah Bay 10 miles from Cape Flattery and get some rest and recuperate. At this point, everyone but myself was sick and eager to get back into sheltered waters. Just outside of the bay and out of the swell and chop we saw a gust of 41 knots on the wind gauge. At that point, we only had the double-reefed main and the engine on. Thirty minutes later we were tied up to a very inhospitable dock with broken cleats and rusty bolts protruding from the whaler boards. The bright white hull of the new sailboat was in stark contrast to the rusting hulks of the dying native fishing fleet. The only real cause for alarm was one of the crew falling after jumping to the dock as we landed in a 25-knot gust. The freeboard of this boat was about four and a half feet making those fender-step things a real necessity. Everyone’s spirits were very high as we all went to sleep for a three-hour nap. After a nap, we had an amazing omelet breakfast with dill, chives, smoked salmon, and chevre. 

Type 2 fun

After discussing the experience and the concepts of apparent wind and the development of bailout plans we looked at the forecast ahead. At this point, the wind was dying but the next wave of weather was going to be hitting the San Jauns just when we would be returning, so we created a plan based on what we had learned about the boat’s sailing characteristics and the wind. Our trip back was mostly uneventful and the only challenge was maneuvering around the commercial traffic in the Victoria area. Instead of returning the way we came through Cattle Pass, we chose a more conservative route over the top of San Juan Island. After enjoying some fun sailing in the flat protected waters of the islands we anchored in Parks Bay for a three-hour nap followed by another take on the now-famous omelet. We did some talk about emergency procedures and after we discussed the route the boat and owner would take back to Anacortes they dropped me off in Friday Harbor. 

Some lessons can be learned through reading and study but some lessons require getting your feet wet. Hopefully, when tackling dreams as big as this we can do the due diligence necessary to be prepared for the new scary world of big water sailing and hopefully, we can take the time to organize shakedown sails like this one where we can practice before we put ourselves and boats into situations that we can not retreat from. This was a hugely valuable experience because we learned about what the boat likes and doesn’t like, what modifications need to be made before the big trip south, and most importantly where everyone’s comfort and resilience levels are. Getting seasick sucks and I would say that in weather like we were in not taking medication is not an option. There are no passengers on a boat like this. Everyone aboard represents a liability to one degree and they need to work to counter to whatever degree they are a liability with their different respective abilities to help. Coastal cruising and blue water cruising can all be done without sailing in “bad weather” but extreme patience that we moderns are not practiced in is necessary to avoid putting the boat and crew into the rough stuff. Unfortunately, the harsh realities of work schedules and life tempt us into these inclement weather situations and we have to be prepared to deal with them.

“There are no passengers on a boat like this. Everyone aboard represents a liability to one degree and they need to work to counter to whatever degree they are a liability with their different respective abilities to help.”

Parks Bay for a nap before heading into Friday Harbor

All smiles and appetites back.

Ocean Alexander 40 Gig Harbor to Portland

Diesels love their oil like a sailor loves his rum..

I got a call from a customer who I’ve delivered two boats for in the past. Repeat customers are quite rare in this business, at least in the NW, not so much on the East Coast. This customer had just bought a brokerage in Portland and was looking to get some more inventory on the docks. The first boat he wanted moved was a 42 foot Express Cruiser moored 30 min drive North of Anacortes and as it didn’t have a recent survey prior to its purchase I said I would have to go look at it before I would agree to move it south. Im glad I did as I found it so far up the Samish River where there were no soundings on the charts for the area. The former owner said that he could probably get the boat out on a high tide but as it wasn’t his anymore he wouldn’t risk it. This was concerning as it was coming from a mariner that grew up on the body of water. I told the new owner I would deliver the boat if he got a local to get the boat to Anacortes. Also the running lights didn’t work and the plexiglass windows were too fogged to safety navigate though. I then asked if there was another boat ready to be moved south.

Also bought without a survey was an Ocean Alexander 40 in Gig Harbor. I said I would have to look at it first and drove down to meet the former owner who was unsure about the boat’s ability to do the passage. Saying that when he first bought the boat the engine made funny/not funny sounds that scared him and motivated him to have the boat trucked instead of moved on its own bottom.

The boat was a well maintained tri-cabin of a good pedigree with many electronic upgrades. I was told that there were $30,000 of upgrades aboard. The previous owner was less than enthused by the Raymarine Axiom series plotters he installed and the poor customer support that he encountered when the transducer didn’t match up forcing to buy a second display rather than hauling out to install a new ducer.

Everything looked doable but as it was a single screw boat and I planned to exercise extra caution.

I noted that the oil was low and that the strobe light that was meant to meet the requirement for flares was out of batteries. I’m not a fan of these. There are lots of flashing lights out on the water at night and its not something that attracts the attention you want when you need help.

I went to Fisheries Supply in Seattle and bought filters, oil, and flares. Then contacted a gentleman who had expressed an interest in joining me on a delivery at some point because he was getting his captain’s license and planned to become a delivery captain.

John met me at 6 am in Shilshol and we drove to Gig Harbor where after filling up the oil we got on the water to head to Port Townsend for fuel.

The fog was not too thick but enough to slow us down.

Fun fact: Did you know that with the advent of radar boating collisions and allusions* have gone up? Now you do. It seems to me that there is an imprudent reliance on tech in the marine world and a converse decline in situational awareness. I think tech is good and should be utilized but it should serve as an addition to the eyes and seats of the pants.

Radar overlay before being calibrated,

Fortunately, John has a tech background and quickly calibrated the radar overlay on the plotter.

The fog lifted as we passed Seattle but not much later we were pulled over by the Coast Guard while I was taking a nap.

We welcomed the kids onboard and prepared to present the required equipment. Unfortunately, this and the fog meant we would arrive in Port Townend after the fuel dock closed at 4.

The next day we were on the fuel dock before the attendant arrived. A nice fellow named Eric who fit the description of the laidback NW nautical townsperson. Eric offered his card saying that in the future he would make himself available to help us out after hours.

I always ask for these but after a lawsuit they are no longer making them. It attaches to the fuel tank vent to catch the splutter when filling. #giveahoot

The view from the Bar at Sirens.

I had been watching the forecast closely and knew that we were in for a bumpy ride in the straits as a strong westerly was forecast for the waters north of Port Angeles just as we would be passing through due to our later departure. I had hoped to make it to Neah Bay by sunset but this would not be the case.

The morning’s delay found us feeling out where the strongest ebb was north of Discovery Bay and south of the inbound shipping lanes.

The morning’s delay found us feeling out where the strongest ebb was North of Discovery Bay and just South of the inbound shipping lanes. The sun was out and the water flat and we wondered if the forecast was wrong and if we would be able to sneak through with our feathers and breakfast undisturbed. Nope

Popping wheelies in the Strait of Juan De Pukea

Not only did it pick up quickly, but once in the washing machine, I didn’t dare make the coarse adjustment necessary to get into the flatter water to the south in the back eddy. There was only one way and that was through. At some point, after asking if this is what ten-footers looked like, my shipmate asked to lie down as the Scopolamine patch wasn’t doing enough to mitigate the queez.

I put on some appropriate tunes and rode it out throttling up and down to maintain steerage without going too fast. I regretted my greediness riding the ebb longer than I should have. Noted. It was looking like we wouldn’t make it to Neah Bay and Clallam Bay would have to do for the night.

As the sun went down we set the anchor and the anchor alarms on the plotter and my phone.

As the sun went down we set the anchor and the anchor alarms on the plotter and my phone.

The sun rose and we were underway having added some oil. I was a little concerned about how much oil the old Perkins was burning.

Now for the jump. I had called my friend who was a Crabber in the area and asked about where to expect the pots and the floats that would be such a threat to our single prop and source of power. Out passed 40 fathoms for the commercial nonnative and inside of that for the native gear. AKA pots everywhere but way outside.

We cut through Hole In The Wall and headed for deep water. There were still pots over 300 feet and 15 miles offshore. further south the water got deeper and we stopped seeing the gear.

The next day as the sun came up we came in from the deep water and could see the floats all around and in the channel to the Columbia River. Even up river 4 miles from the bar there were floats in the channel.

Now it wasn’t the pots we had to dodge it was the trees.

Across the bar and heading up river

Slowly we made it upriver to Kalama before the sunset. We made our way up to the McMenamins for dinner and a beer. I recommend the “Rubyhead” which is a mix of Hammerhead and the Ruby and John doesn’t recommend the BBQ chicken pizza. Chinook salmon season opened a few days earlier and the charter boats swarmed the river the rest of the way to Hayden Island. We hugged the shore to find currant relief and to avoid pushing the engine. The engine was burning way too much oil and after finding a leak in a loose fuel line the old hose concerned me. We weren’t to the marina before another scare was had. 2 feet of water right at the entrance meant we had to approach the entrance in a counterintuitive way.

The boat was barely tied up before the old boat brokers were climbing board and poking around their new listing happy to have another slip full.

Winter Shaw 2022

Thanks for the Editing Joe

Outstanding crew work from my fellows. Hugely humbled to have this caliber of sailors aboard. 

Big shout out to El Barto (pictured) - Mast

Mike Powell - Drums

Tom Andrews - Tactics

Scott Galbraith - Bongos

Paul Andersson - Snackticks

Nick Andrews - Bow (pointy end)

Me - Cowbell and Didgeridont

Capt Rhys Balmer

https://48north.com/

Luhrs 36 Anacortes WA to Eureka Ca

On the 10th of October, I woke up in the worst hotel I’ve ever stayed in. Turns out that staying in a hotel rated 2.5 stars is like spending the night at a crime scene. Signs that the bathroom door had been kicked in at one point and repaired poorly at that, along with more than one person working on their car in the parking lot came as a stark contrast to the room I stayed in Hawaii on the 14th-floor complete with remote controlled blinds and a view of the marina. Maybe having contrast in your life is good.

I made it home for a few days between the Dragonfly delivery to SF to do the Benson Cup on my boat “Elsewhere” and had grabbed some stuff before the Baba 35 delivery but there wasn’t time after that to go home before heading off to PA to get on the Luhrs so I wasn’t as prepared as I like to be. Different deliveries require different prep. I caught a ride to Tacoma with the owners of the Baba and got the aforementioned room where I planned to wait for my crew coming up from the Gorge on the next day. For once I had a little time to kill so I caught a bus to the Goodwill where I found some mugs and a pot to cook with as the boat just sold and didn’t have any cookware. I also got a sweatshirt and shorts and a few DVDs. After that, I caught another bus into town and watched a French film I had been wanting to see at an art-house theater. I have to admit Tacoma’s old town has some charm. My crew arrived and we drove to Sequim where I got us a room. More like those seen in episodes of Xflies than Breaking Bad.

Something for everyone in Westport.

The next day we drove to PA where the Luhrs had been since the Canadian delivery crew brought it over a few weeks before. The boat was out of place in these waters, designed for southern climes and much more suited to a place like Florida with its open cockpit and exposed flybridge. Its three outriggers too did not make sense in the protected waters where downriggers helped catch salmon rather than pelagic fish like tuna and marlin. The only thing that was missing on this strange boat was one of those fighting chairs with the spot for the rods but to go between your legs. 

Pick a spot anywhere in Westport.

The fuel dock attendant mentioned this too but with more colorful language. Fuel dock attendants don’t have to mince their words. We put in 240 gallons in the single 400-gallon tank and were on our way. The boat had been repowered not long before the sale and the engines only had 750 hours. The engines were 500 horsepower Cummins turbo diesels and should be capable of pushing the boat at 30 knots. Far faster than most seas would allow and fuel tanks could supply for long.

The plan was to take it easy until we knew what the burn rate was and could figure the boat’s range. Westport fuel dock was going to be closed when we got there so we would have to fuel first thing and head to Newport the next day. We ran the engines at 1700 and the flow meters said we were burning 21 gph which worked out to a little over a gallon a mile. This was the most conservative rpm and should produce the furthest range 

If you are going to be late and need after hour fuel up the attendant will come down after hours for $75.

In Newport, we arrived just before they closed at 16:00 and the ride was rough. While we were fueling we chatted with the attendant about wishing there was more than Rogue Brewery to eat at on this side of the bridge he told us that his daughter used to work there but now managed a much better place called The Barge in Old Town and would drive us in and buy us the first round. He was a retired fisherman who had “delivered some boats in his time”. We would have been very glad for just the ride over the bridge but a free beer and exchange in sea stories was even better.

Above the door of The Barge reads in bright yellow western font “Home of the Wino’s, Dingbat’s & Riff Raff”. What the grilled cheese sandwich I had for dinner lacked, the service and company more than made up for. Rouge Brewery is great, don’t get me wrong, but the patina isn’t quite there like these ocean-side roadhouse dives have that I love. Not to mention the local knowledge that is invaluable to a mariner in a foreign port is less likely to be found at tourist places.

Once underway the next day we got a surprise. The integrated electronic system in the boat produced an alarm saying we had water in the fuel. Water in fuel is more common than most think and I have a few misadventures I’ve written about on here that go into detail but that’s why we have water separators. Often call Racors because of the popular brand these units separate the water from the fuel while filtering a specified size of particles. These filters have a clear bowl at the bottom where you can see the water if it’s in the fuel. Sometimes these bowls have terminals where an alarm can be wired and when there is water in the bowl it completes the circuit and sends the alarm. That’s not the kind of sensor these engines had. I honestly still don’t know where that sensor is but I did shut the engine in question down and jump into the engine room once I saw the alarm. Different boats have different access to their working parts. If you’ve read any of my other posts you’ve heard me complain about this before. It’s mostly on sailboats designed by Bob Perry so I was surprised to see how poorly this boat’s fuel filter system was designed. In order to see if there was water in the fuel, I had to put my camera phone on video and record a short clip as I held it at almost arm’s length down into the bilge of the boat. I couldn’t see much in this out-of-focus clip so I decided to take a sample of the fuel in the bottom of the bowl. With both hands and a yogurt container set to catch the fuel and possible water below the drain valve, I pulled up the sample and found only a little gunk and nothing to indicate a concerning amount of water in the fuel. The only concern was how hard it was to get the plastic valve open. I could imagine how breaking this would have been hard if impossible for us to fix.

I was actually concerned about the water that was setting off the alarm while we were in a precarious place on the Oregon Coast. Going in anywhere for anything was going to kill the precious little time we had with our weather window. I discussed the risks with my crew and we decided to stay the course. This is important to note because electric alarms are a relatively new part of the marine world. Everything from the annoying AIS alarms to the distressing accidental PLB activation. Even our VHF radios “cry wolf” whenever 20 minutes the USCG cadet must as quickly and inaudibly as possible transmit a “securitay” announcing to every boater in a 100 mile or more radius that an unmanned red kayak was reported adrift in the vicinity of bla bla. These warnings lower our guard just as we lower the volume on the radio. How we as prudent mariners remain attentive to the important information at hand while the din of the modern bridge is a tough question and challenge for today’s boater.

Just when things are sunny and going smoothly..

fuel sample

Other than some sea state that created what bordered on inhumane conditions on the bridge we made it in before the blow and after making friends with all the scallywags on the dock found a spot to tie up in the lee of a big fishing boat. Eureka has its share of patina but I think that with some basic security measures and friendliness to the marinas residents it is fairly safe. We gave our uneaten provision to one of these water folk.

The pretty color overlay here is the result of a poorly calibrated radar. Take your instruments with a grain of salt and be sure you know how to navigate without them.

The end of our weather window and the answering text when asked if we could bring it further south.

If you use Windy for weather on the coast be sure you use the wave prediction feature.