The Adventure

April 2005 - the Going Away Party

   08/16/06

April 1-10th 2005 - Party & first shake down cruise

Organizing all the bills and receipts that had daunted me earlier in the year.

The installation of our dream arch

The beginning of our party with many fabulous people that helped make our dream a reality. And also became our friends.

Sandy, always generous and fun. And Thank you for letting us use your car to pick up the beer for the party!

John and Heidi of the Java Gypsy, the best traveling coffee joint ever. And lovely, creative people

and a dear friend.

Simon, a fellow sail boater we had met the month earlier had pulled into the harbor the day of our party. Most of these pictures are taken by Simon's wife Siri- thankyou! Hope to see you south!

Eliza, an apprentice rigger with plenty of creativity and fun, and Rich, a musician & boat yard man who is quick with a smile and is a sunshine of happiness

New Dawn, at the long dock with a rainbow

The boys drinking beer with Ross

Our other and final going away party aboard the MV Lotus with many dear friends. We played games and traded books and laughter.

My best friend Kate with her husband, Sascha, aboard New Dawn for a three day adventure in the San Juans. Great food, greeat weather and wonderful friends.

Our anchorage/mooring off James Island, a beautiful park

we just love taking pictures of our boat

Kate & I seated for a mexican style dinner

Back in Port Townsend, Ross, laura & Sascha on the deck of New Dawn

Taking a time out while Ross napped. I was sewing and watching Xena. yiyiyiyiyiyiiiiii

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Organizing all the bills and receipts that had daunted me earlier in the year.

The Party

        After the holidays, we settled back into the routine of boat life: install something, repair something, splice something, cook something, clean something ...  We were busy wrapping up all those loose end projects and getting New Dawn ready for her around the world adventure.  A few last minute items were added to our replace/repair/new list.  A magnificent stainless steel arch was installed on our stern to provide a place for two solar panels and a wind generator.  We saw the sexiest arch on another boat that pulled into Point Hudson, we contacted the designer and now WE have the sexiest arch out there!  Thank you Alan!

        April 1st  began with a scurry of activity to clean the boat, install the arch and prepare for our going away party.   We thank Brion and Christian for letting us have our party in the riggers shop.  That warm fireplace hit the spot as well as kept the soup we bought from the Fresh Press warm and ready to eat.  So the potluck began around 5ish and we had just arrived with soup and beer.  We had a great time.  The party continued on into the evening as it evolved into a drumming music jam when Christian arrived around 8 with several drums and a bucket of percussion instruments.  We had a great time! thank you all. Thank you my friends.

Our first shake down

    Ross, myself, Kate and Sascha left Port Townsend on April 6th @ 11 am in great weather.  We ran down wind in 14-20 knots, calm seas.  Fast Eddy (our auto pilot) was at the helm for part of the way.  We arrived that evening in Friday Harbor for Thai food and visited a fun knitting store.  We went to a marina because our diesel heater was not yet rebuilt and I wanted to stay warm with our electric/shore powered one.  The next morning, the boys fixed something in the steering column and we were off to a mooring buoy at James Island. (we were not anchoring yet, since we had not rebuilt the windlass for the anchor and chain)  We got our dingy, named Speedy Z (Speedy Zoftig) down and in the water to row to shore for a hike around the island.  Everything was a beautiful spring green.  There were also large black slugs all over- neat to see.  We sailed home to Port Townsend the next day in a sunny cloudless day.

    We spent two more days in Port Townsend fixing things and visiting friends.  We had a card playing celebration on the Lotus and pizza on the Muse.  Thank you and we love you. 

April 10-30 2005

Meeting Ross' second cousin Jerry and his wife Suzanne in Point Roberts.

Watching an air show of 9 thunderbirds. amazing to see them fly so fast in formation.

Our first anchorage. We had just fixed the windlass at Campbell River Marina

my beautiful husband- the captian

the admiral

Alert Bay- fun color on the houses- we stayed for an afternoon to walk around

Alert Bay is home to the worlds tallest totem pole. Built in 1973. We never did find out how tall.

there was an eagle on top.

neat building

tipical alaskan ( even if we are in Canada here) Wreckage of an airplane on a dock that is only reachable by boat

our boat amoung the fishing fleet

My favorite anshorage- Miles Inlet. We were surrounded by fog until we ducked into this little inlet. The corridor entrance is only 75 feet wide. And the sun burst through like this place was our own oasis

Ross zoomed around on Speedy Z. The tide pools were amazing. Ther was also this flat worm that would swim to the surface- it was see through!

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Meeting Ross' second cousin Jerry and his wife Suzanne in Point Roberts.

Our Start North...

    After weathering out bad weather in Anacortes for a few days, we started north to Alaska via Point Roberts and Nanimo Canada.  Though the funny story to Anacortes is... I like to bake as we travel, to keep warm and feed.  I had set out, as I had done in the past on many occasions, two bowls of eggs and butter to make cookies.  We hit weather in the Strait of Juan de Fuca.  The eggs went EVERYWHERE.  We would find traces of egg yolk and shell for days after.   The other funny story happened as we were leaving Port Townsend.  The night before we left we were having beers with friends, another sailing couple, and the opportunity for a free, new mattress that fit our bunk came up.  it sounded too good to be true-  Brand new pillow top mattress.  The next morning, bright and early, we got up to  exchange our old one for this vastly superior one. And then we left. ( After staying long enough for one last Gypsy Soy Chai and Barista Special from the Java Gypsy)  When we went to bed in Anacortes that night, our limbs fell asleep with us.  The mattress was really uncomfortable- ahhh. And we were not going back for our old mattress in PT (Port Townsend is  a hard place to leave, we loved it there)  So we are not dreaming of a new mattress.