Labor Day Cruise

Last weekend, we went out Saturday through Monday.

We wanted to leave early Saturday, but by the time we got all the food and things we needed it was 10 am before we got to the wall (The wall is where you tie up to wait your turn to go through the Locks out to the Puget Sound). On nice Summer weekends, the wait can be several hours. This was not a nice weekend weatherwise - it rained most of the time, so we got through fairly quickly.

After we got out of the locks we cruised across the Sound to Bainbridge Island, and then along the coast of Bainbridge to Blake Island. Blake Island is a State Park in the Sound. We can see it from our house. We decided to tie up to one of the mooring buoys that the Park provides - we wanted to improve our mooring skills and use the dinghy. We picked a buoy on the sound side and then we rowed into the Park marina. It was a long row. We went ashore and had lunch and a nice hike. Blake Island is great - there are deer and lots of birds, and not a lot of people. The Argosy Cruise boat comes out twice a day to deliver tourists for a salmon dinner and Native American show and folks camp in the park, but otherwise it is quiet.

While we were hiking, we saw that quite a few boats were moored on the west side of the island, but only we were moored on the North side. That night when we went to bed, we discovered why - we spent the night rocking and rolling from a combination of wind, waves and wakes. We were on the side of the open Sound, and got a lot more movement then the other folks who were in a narrower passage.

It rained most of the night. The sound of the rain on the boat was great, but the constant rocking and rolling was not. It wasn't the most restful night, so we got up early, emptied the rainwater out of the dinghy, and headed down to Gig Harbor, a small port town on the Olympic Peninsula across from Tacoma.

It was pouring when we got there. We found a spot on the community dock, put on our foul weather gear and sloshed to the Tides Tavern for breakfast. It rained on and off for most of the day. When we got home the next day, we learned there had been a tornado on the mainland!Late in the afternoon, several boats came in and docked just in front of us (one rafted to the other). They played guitar (admittedly very well) and carried on into the night. It made us pine for the secluded rocking and rolling on the buoy!

The next morning we got up, and motored back to Seattle. We had a strong current behind us, so we made the entire trip in just under 3 hours. We spent an hour or so waiting at the locks, and got home around 5:00 pm.

It was a blast.