Quick Read

Just finished True Spirit, by Jessica Watson. It’s an interesting record of and commentary on her solo circumnavigation. Quite a kid.

Port Townsend to Olympia

Off Johnson Point, approaching Budd Inlet

A couple of weeks ago Julie & I moved the boat from her slip in Port Townsend to one at Swantown Marina in Olympia. The Port of Port Townsend is upgrading the group of slips we’d been in, so everyone had to move out. I think we’ll be back in PT sometime in March.

Swantown is a beautiful facility and the folks there are great. A lot of family members live in Oly, so I should have plenty of crew for fall and winter racing.

The trip down was trying, with 18-22 kt winds on the nose most of the way. We spent two days tacking down the sound in poor weather. We stayed at the Port of Edmonds on the first night, where the good folks there went out of their way to get us a guest spot when they were already full of fishing derby entrants.  The second night we stayed at Arabella’s Landing in Gig Harbor. Highly recommend this place.  The people there are helpful, and the facility is squeaky clean.  The third day’s weather was nice, but the winds died near McNeil Island.  We took Balch Passage between McNeil and Anderson Islands, then Drayton Passage to Johnson Point and on west to Budd Inlet.

The approach to Swantown was a little confusing. It was dark, and if you’ve never done this at night, the channel markers and ranges can be a little confusing. We arrived safely, and all those lights will never be a mystery again.  Sailing at night may have its plusses, but being in the narrow south sound with no moon at all made it nerve-wracking.

Julie seemed genuinely to enjoy the trip.  Almost all of my sailing adventures are solo, but I’ll look forward to taking her whenever I can convince her to skip work and join me.  She’s a first-rate first mate!

More later . . .