So here I am! I skidded over to the laptop at the sunny hour of 11 pm, but then that’s about par for me these hectic days. My plan was to pop over to the barn after leaving work at a civilized hour. That did happen, but when I got to …
Thursday, October 16, 2014 LaConner Washington
Friday, September 5, 2014 – underway from Anacortes to Vancouver BC
It feels good to be back on Serenity again. She has spent the last two months in covered moorage with little company. Earl found someone to wash her while she sat there. It was a job to rival Fito’s in Mexico, for not quite twice as much, which is still not at all bad considering the work involved.
We are having a beautiful trip to Vancouver. We plan on overnighting in Coal Harbor. Depending on what we need to dispose of at customs, we will need to add to our stores, before leaving the dock with our dear friends John and Maria Luisa who are in Vancouver visiting John’s son Peter. We are looking to showing off the Coast of British Columbia to these friends from Mexico.
The US gillnet fleet is out in force. “Pushing the line” here means the international border. They have apparently not had a good season with most of the salmon entering Puget Sound from the north. The BC fleet is not fishing today. We are seeing lots of salmon jumping and I can’t help thinking of the thrill of setting out the net and seeing it light up with splashing fish. Those were some of the most memorable times of our gillnetting in Cook Inlet and I feel quite nostalgic!
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| Vancouver is a beautiful city |
Thursday, September 11, 2014 – Returning from Vancouver BC to Anacortes
After a lovely trip up the coast, we pulled into Coal Harbor Marina about 7 pm on Friday. This is a beautifully located marina, right in a downtown area near some big hotels and the cruise ship marina. My only complaint was the absence of WiFi at the docks. It was available at the office, but that is not the same.
The next morning we went to look at a new boat, a 38 foot Sabre Express. Knowing that our long range cruising is now behind us, we are looking for something that might be better suited to shorter trips around Puget Sound. Earl loved it.
Around noon, our friends John and Maria Luisa togerther with John’s son Peter and his wife Miriam and children Kevin and Kerstin arrived for a luncheon cruise. Kevin and Kerstin are delightful children. They moved up from Mexico two years ago and are thoroughly acclimated and doing beautifully in school. Kevin was the number 1 student in his class.
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| Kevin, Miriam, Peter and Kerstin |
We cruised inland, up Indian Arm and found a place to anchor. Being a Saturday and very much in the Vancouver area, it was relatively crowded, but Peter and family loved being out on the boat and we had a pleasant hamburger lunch. We returned to Coal Harbor in late afternoon and said goodbye to Peter and his family.
The next morning, we made an early start to head north to Princess Louisa Inlet. We were anxious to show John and Maria Luisa some of this beautiful country and have them experience our Trac stabilizers. Maria Luisa who is not an adventurous boater was thrilled with the stabilized ride and they are looking forward to installing stabilizers on the Viking Spirit when they return to Mexico.
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| Beautiful BC |
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| It doesn’t get much better than this |
There are few things as fulfilling as showing off an area you love to someone who has not seen it before. It makes you realize how very special something you have started to take for granted is. We could not have had lovelier day and made good time to our anchorage at McMurray Bay in Prince of Wales Inlet. It is a marginal anchorage with only a small shelf on which to put your anchor. It took us a couple a tries to get a secure hold.
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| Everyone was enjoying the warm weather |
The next morning we were up early to be sure to get to the inlet to Princess Louisa in time for the tide at Malibu rapids. John had never been through tidal rapids before and was very apprehensive. It is quite something to see a boiling stretch of water come to a halt. It was for us an uneventful passage into Princess Louisa. Although it was late summer and there had been little rain, there were still water falls. We motored up to Chatterbox Falls where we found two other Nordhavns and a couple of other boats and spent a wonderful day enjoy the peace of the special place. For the entire cruise we were blessed unseasonably warm weather – over 80 – and we loved it.
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| Slack water at Malibu Rapids |
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| chatterbox Falls |
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| Making use of Earl’s ‘Pavillion” – lunch on the boat deck |
Dawn on Tuesday we were up and waiting for the tide at the Malibu Rapids. Once again, John was anxious, but, once again, it was needless. We cruised pleasantly down to Smuggler Cove, a delightful hidden anchorage where we spent a lazy afternoon and pleasant evening.
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| Smugglers Cove afternoon |
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| Smuggler Cove sunset |
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| Northwest Light House |
From Smuggler it was a short trip back to Coal Harbor and another look at the Sabre Express. I don’t know how happy I would be to trade Serenity’s fuel consumption of less than 1.5 gallons per hour for something that takes 4 or 5 times as much.
With promises to see them in early 2015 in Mexico, we said goodbye to Maria Luisa and John and left early on Thursday September 11th for the return trip to Anacortes. This time the Canadian commercial fleet was out in front of the Frazer and we watched as they hauled in the salmon as we made our way south. It was a speedy trip as we had the tide with us and we were all tied up in by mid afternoon.
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| Catching salmon |
It has been quite a month since our cruise to Princess Louisa. We spent the next few days watching in horror as hurricane Odile slammed into Baja and devastated our beloved La Paz. The boats anchored out were heavily hit and three cruisers drowned. We are in sorrow for the lovely people that we lived among for five winters.
We also made the big decision to sell our beloved Serenity. We have spent the last month emptying her. I have come to realize that it is always low tide when I have a cartload of stuff to take up to the car. As we unloaded her, I was reminded by how much storage there is on a Nordhavn 43 and horrified at just how much we had accumulated in the time we had used her as a second home. Our garage is now stuffed and we have a job ahead of us to sort through all of it.
We will be trying to sell her ourselves using NordhavnFSBO. We are waiting for a sunny day to take some photos of her interior and I have the task of putting together the list of her equipment etc to list her. It will be a bittersweet day when we turn the keys over to someone else.
Thursday, October 16, 2014 LaConner Washington
Friday, September 5, 2014 – underway from Anacortes to Vancouver BC
It feels good to be back on Serenity again. She has spent the last two months in covered moorage with little company. Earl found someone to wash her while she sat there. It was a job to rival Fito’s in Mexico, for not quite twice as much, which is still not at all bad considering the work involved.
We are having a beautiful trip to Vancouver. We plan on overnighting in Coal Harbor. Depending on what we need to dispose of at customs, we will need to add to our stores, before leaving the dock with our dear friends John and Maria Luisa who are in Vancouver visiting John’s son Peter. We are looking to showing off the Coast of British Columbia to these friends from Mexico.
The US gillnet fleet is out in force. “Pushing the line” here means the international border. They have apparently not had a good season with most of the salmon entering Puget Sound from the north. The BC fleet is not fishing today. We are seeing lots of salmon jumping and I can’t help thinking of the thrill of setting out the net and seeing it light up with splashing fish. Those were some of the most memorable times of our gillnetting in Cook Inlet and I feel quite nostalgic!
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| Vancouver is a beautiful city |
Thursday, September 11, 2014 – Returning from Vancouver BC to Anacortes
After a lovely trip up the coast, we pulled into Coal Harbor Marina about 7 pm on Friday. This is a beautifully located marina, right in a downtown area near some big hotels and the cruise ship marina. My only complaint was the absence of WiFi at the docks. It was available at the office, but that is not the same.
The next morning we went to look at a new boat, a 38 foot Sabre Express. Knowing that our long range cruising is now behind us, we are looking for something that might be better suited to shorter trips around Puget Sound. Earl loved it.
Around noon, our friends John and Maria Luisa togerther with John’s son Peter and his wife Miriam and children Kevin and Kerstin arrived for a luncheon cruise. Kevin and Kerstin are delightful children. They moved up from Mexico two years ago and are thoroughly acclimated and doing beautifully in school. Kevin was the number 1 student in his class.
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| Kevin, Miriam, Peter and Kerstin |
We cruised inland, up Indian Arm and found a place to anchor. Being a Saturday and very much in the Vancouver area, it was relatively crowded, but Peter and family loved being out on the boat and we had a pleasant hamburger lunch. We returned to Coal Harbor in late afternoon and said goodbye to Peter and his family.
The next morning, we made an early start to head north to Princess Louisa Inlet. We were anxious to show John and Maria Luisa some of this beautiful country and have them experience our Trac stabilizers. Maria Luisa who is not an adventurous boater was thrilled with the stabilized ride and they are looking forward to installing stabilizers on the Viking Spirit when they return to Mexico.
|
| Beautiful BC |
|
| It doesn’t get much better than this |
There are few things as fulfilling as showing off an area you love to someone who has not seen it before. It makes you realize how very special something you have started to take for granted is. We could not have had lovelier day and made good time to our anchorage at McMurray Bay in Prince of Wales Inlet. It is a marginal anchorage with only a small shelf on which to put your anchor. It took us a couple a tries to get a secure hold.
|
| Everyone was enjoying the warm weather |
The next morning we were up early to be sure to get to the inlet to Princess Louisa in time for the tide at Malibu rapids. John had never been through tidal rapids before and was very apprehensive. It is quite something to see a boiling stretch of water come to a halt. It was for us an uneventful passage into Princess Louisa. Although it was late summer and there had been little rain, there were still water falls. We motored up to Chatterbox Falls where we found two other Nordhavns and a couple of other boats and spent a wonderful day enjoy the peace of the special place. For the entire cruise we were blessed unseasonably warm weather – over 80 – and we loved it.
|
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| Slack water at Malibu Rapids |
|
|||
| chatterbox Falls |
|
|
| Making use of Earl’s ‘Pavillion” – lunch on the boat deck |
Dawn on Tuesday we were up and waiting for the tide at the Malibu Rapids. Once again, John was anxious, but, once again, it was needless. We cruised pleasantly down to Smuggler Cove, a delightful hidden anchorage where we spent a lazy afternoon and pleasant evening.
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| Smugglers Cove afternoon |
|
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| Smuggler Cove sunset |
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| Northwest Light House |
From Smuggler it was a short trip back to Coal Harbor and another look at the Sabre Express. I don’t know how happy I would be to trade Serenity’s fuel consumption of less than 1.5 gallons per hour for something that takes 4 or 5 times as much.
With promises to see them in early 2015 in Mexico, we said goodbye to Maria Luisa and John and left early on Thursday September 11th for the return trip to Anacortes. This time the Canadian commercial fleet was out in front of the Frazer and we watched as they hauled in the salmon as we made our way south. It was a speedy trip as we had the tide with us and we were all tied up in by mid afternoon.
|
| Catching salmon |
It has been quite a month since our cruise to Princess Louisa. We spent the next few days watching in horror as hurricane Odile slammed into Baja and devastated our beloved La Paz. The boats anchored out were heavily hit and three cruisers drowned. We are in sorrow for the lovely people that we lived among for five winters.
We also made the big decision to sell our beloved Serenity. We have spent the last month emptying her. I have come to realize that it is always low tide when I have a cartload of stuff to take up to the car. As we unloaded her, I was reminded by how much storage there is on a Nordhavn 43 and horrified at just how much we had accumulated in the time we had used her as a second home. Our garage is now stuffed and we have a job ahead of us to sort through all of it.
We will be trying to sell her ourselves using NordhavnFSBO. We are waiting for a sunny day to take some photos of her interior and I have the task of putting together the list of her equipment etc to list her. It will be a bittersweet day when we turn the keys over to someone else.
TN River Fall 2014
It has been a busy summer for Idyll Time and the crew. Since being back at home on the Tennessee River, several small trips to downtown Chattanooga were taken. Staying on the city docks downtown is certainly enjoyable and makes it easy to visit our city. With only one lock, Chickamauga to transverse and less […]
Oct. 15 – Cape Coral, FL
Glove Bight – Anchorage
“What great thing would you attempt if you knew you could not fail?” —Robert H. Schuller
The eastern half of the Okeechobee seems prettier to us, a little less remote, but still very rural. The first part of the day we saw lots of farms and ranches, but the closer we got to Fort Myers the more we saw large beautiful homes on the water. Our last two locks went smoothly and before we knew it we were in Fort Myers and back to familiar cursing grounds. We stopped for fuel at the yacht basin but decided it was too earlier to stop for the day…we’re on a mission to get this boat home. We usually enjoy having a few hours or most of the afternoon to explore an area, but this is a delivery cruise not a sighting cruise. We spent almost a month on the east coast of Florida in 2011 and thoroughly enjoyed it. There are lots of places we’d love to see again and even more we missed, so we’ll need to come back again one day and spend more time in the area.
CRUISING UP THE “BOOT” OF ITALY TO THE GREEK ISLAND OF OTHONI
After our very early morning visit from Coastguard at anchor, we weren’t long back in bed before needing to get up to make an 0500 hours departure for a 12 hour cruise to Gallipoli (yes the Italians have one too), on the north-east side of the Gulfo di Taranto. We enjoy these early departures, drinking copious cups of tea while watching the sky gradually lighten and the sun rise, and when you’re cruising at under 6 knots it makes a big difference to cover 20 miles or so before breakfast.
By 1300 hours the wind had increased to over 20 knots and beam seas had built up to about two metres with breaking tops, the inevitable larger wave’s power causing Envoy to shudder as her stabilisers fought to keep her on an even keel. Sharon became seasick, but there was nothing we could do except grind on for another three hours until we reached the shelter of Gallipoli. As generally happens with sea sickness Sharon was fine again within about half an hour as we joked that it wasn’t the greatest way to spend her 70th birthday!
Interestingly along this whole stretch of coast we only spotted a handful of boats in five days – mostly local fishermen.
Gallipoli is a stunning medieval fortified town, much like Syracuse, with a well-preserved Byzantine castle last used to drive off a British fleet in 1809. The old town and its castle are built on what was once an island, but now connected with a causeway. It’s much more interesting than nearby Santa Maria di Leuca although more expensive at 90 Euros (NZ$141 per night). Here we “cleared-out” of Italy in preparation for arriving back in Greece.
.JPG)
By 1300 hours the wind had increased to over 20 knots and beam seas had built up to about two metres with breaking tops, the inevitable larger wave’s power causing Envoy to shudder as her stabilisers fought to keep her on an even keel. Sharon became seasick, but there was nothing we could do except grind on for another three hours until we reached the shelter of Gallipoli. As generally happens with sea sickness Sharon was fine again within about half an hour as we joked that it wasn’t the greatest way to spend her 70th birthday!
Interestingly along this whole stretch of coast we only spotted a handful of boats in five days – mostly local fishermen.
Gallipoli is a stunning medieval fortified town, much like Syracuse, with a well-preserved Byzantine castle last used to drive off a British fleet in 1809. The old town and its castle are built on what was once an island, but now connected with a causeway. It’s much more interesting than nearby Santa Maria di Leuca although more expensive at 90 Euros (NZ$141 per night). Here we “cleared-out” of Italy in preparation for arriving back in Greece.
Gallipoli street scene
Overview of Gallipoli old town (a photo of a picture)
We had one more long cruise of about 13 hours ahead of us to reach Othoni Island off Corfu’s north-west coast, so made an 0600 departure. Soon our towed fishing lure scored several strikes and we landed a small tuna which later made excellent sushimi after cutting off its tail to bleed it.
Doug and Laurie landing small tuna. In New Zealand I’d be embarrassed with a picture like this, but this is the first fish kept in two years and hundreds of miles of trolling
We also caught several other bright-coloured fish of edible size, but not knowing their species didn’t risk eating them.
By early afternoon the wind picked up to 15 knots on our starboard bow kicking up a 1.5 metre short chop. As if a still-healing broken kneecap wasn’t enough poor Sharon became seasick again for a few hours until we reached the shelter of Othoni Island to be greeted by a pod of dolphins leaping about. The main bay on Othoni’s north side is very isolated but offers superb shelter from all southerly winds, and we anchored hoping for a restful night after our long day – but it was not to be.
About 1900 we noticed a display of lightning in the distance, and this seemed to gradually increase in intensity and move towards us. After dark the sheet lightning lit up the whole sky like daylight, while the bolts of forked lightning looked like giant flaming spears thrust into the sea, leaving us imagining the consequences of being hit by one of them. About an hour after we went to bed the wind turned north and a medium chop quickly set in, causing quite a bit of pitching. Diane and I knew from experience this was the storm front approaching and immediately got up to investigate. The wind had suddenly increased to nearly 20 knots and the chop was already nearly a metre. Then torrential rain hit is and the thunder and lightning increased in intensity as the front passed over. The real problem in these Med storms is that the wind can increase to over 50 knots very quickly, and there was no alternate anchorage nearby. But the wind stayed around 20 knots for just a few minutes and then just as suddenly dropped completely, and soon the sea was calm again. “Panic” over – the storm front had passed and all was well.
Next day we went ashore at nearby Erikoussa Island and the effects of the storm were quite visible with lost electrical power and damage caused by flash floods.
TECHNICAL – Nothing to report. I do enjoy typing these words!
ENVOY LOG – as at 14/9/14 we’d spent 159 days aboard and cruised 1,692 miles for 300 engine hours.
What a week…
And it’s not over.Nordhavn Exumas Abacos Bahamas trawler Caribbean Pickwick Boat dogs
Memphis Downtown
Day 278…Sharks!
Welcome to day 278 of 365 photos…Today’s photos of sharks was taken yesterday. We had a VERY rainy day today and it didn’t stop until around dinner time so I didn’t get out to take a photo. The sharks were taken at the pier yesterday. It is not usual to see sharks at the pier […]
The post Day 278…Sharks! appeared first on Moosetique Musing.
The Grand Re-opening of the Roanoke Public Library
Roanoke, VA 24012 USA
Hi All,
First let me thank everyone for the B’Day wishes. I would never remember a birthday if my sister didn’t remind me so I’m impressed that anyone thought of mine. Of course Facebook helps.
Tuesday Jane and I attended the re-opening of the main branch of the Roanoke Public Library. She and […]
