August 4 -9 Quartermaster Harbor to Garrison Bay, San Juan Island

 Next morning we head out prior to the low tide mud at our slip and hope to sail Colvos Passage north.  While the north running current gives us a nice speed boost alas the wind is on the nose so we motor up that passage and through Rich Passage and head into Port Orchard marina for 1-2 nights of reciprocal moorage.  The Port gives us a ride into Safeway and we are happy to finally do a ‘large’ grocery order.  Back at the marina we do laundry and showers and now are sitting peacefully in the cockpit catching up on the blog and our reading.  We have also traded off some of our books for new ones and are well stocked for the rest of the trip.  The photos are all downloading on wifi and I can get all caught up by tomorrow.

In lieu of replacing that missing “o” ring we opt to go to the local boat works and buy a new in-line strainer which means we have a wonderful early morning 5 mile round trip hike.  Once we return to the dock we walk right onto the Bremerton-Port Orchard foot ferry and head for Bremerton.  We enjoy a couple hours of walking the port, the town and taking in the (free!) Puget Sound Navy Museum.  It is quite well done and discusses the history of the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility which takes up a large portion of the Bremerton waterline.  It also has a section that portrays life onboard one of the U.S. Navy’s nuclear aircraft carriers and a good display regarding the nuclear submarine program.  The museum is housed in one of the original buildings, historic Building 50, constructed in 1896 as headquarters for the Shipyard Commandants.

It gives me pause as I contemplate our little sailing vessel moored just across the way from the USS Nimitz #68, “the Navy’s oldest and finest aircraft carrier.”  My photos do not do justice to the sheer massive size of her and the many other navy ships and subs that sit across the harbor.  The amount of history and stories each vessel could tell would fill volumes!

Lunch is a shared plate of wonderful Hawaiian bbq at a tiny hole-in-the-wall café called Aloha.  The chicken, brisket and kalua pork are very tasty.  A small cone at Cold Stone Creamery tops off today’s dining out and we head back to the boat.  This evening is salami, cheese, rolls, wine and free local music in the park. A talented female vocalist belts out Aretha and Nancy Wilson and the male lead does a great Frank Sinatra venue. “I've lived a life that's full, I've traveled each and every highway but more, much more than this I did it my way.”

A lazy day we are anchors up at 1140 and move from Port Orchard Marina further up Port Orchard (the water body) to Brownsville Marina, another nice small reciprocal moorage.  We take one of their roomy 40’ slips and settle in for the afternoon.  On our short hike we notice great smells coming from the marina’s pavilion where a wedding reception will be held this evening.  We complement the chef who is actually just baking a variety of pizzas on the bbqs.  He says to stop by later for pizza, “The bride just turned 21. She will never notice.”  Well I have been wondering why I brought a skirt this year, now I know.  We don our finest clothes and go crash the wedding.  After toasting the bride and groom is done we slip out the back way.  Her Nana and (we think an Uncle, about our age) have been eyeing us.  We walk back by later while they are cleaning up and one of the bridesmaids asks “are you the couple who crashed the wedding?  We all got a chuckle out of that,” We fess up and tell them we came back to tip the photographer since it was mentioned that they were doing the photos for free.  We snag some more great pizza and a piece of cheese cake and depart.   We wonder when they reminisce if they will mention the handsomely dressed couple or the cute older couple who crashed their wedding.

The next day we ride a nice ebb tide through Agate Passage.  Our destination is Kingston Harbor for another reciprocal moorage.  We are all the way into the marina and round the corner to find the reciprocal slips and decide to abort our mission.  There is a long line of power boats buzzing around the fuel dock and the only way to get to the two slips is to squeeze in and around all of them.  We take Kingston off our list.  Instead we head on up and anchor again in Port Townsend.  We experience some of the rip tide that is prevalent along Admiralty Inlet as we make the turn into Port Townsend.  Dinner is our pirate’s plundered pizza that has warmed up on the hot water tank while underway.  Near our anchorage is a small float with nothing but couches on it.  Reminds me of the Max stop in Gresham.  We observe a diver, kayaker, and a couple of folks in a dinghy ride over to use it while are there.

The next morning we are underway by 0600 so that we miss the worst of the potential Pt. Wilson rip, destination Aleck Bay and our entry into the San Juan Islands.  We have enjoyed our trip through parts of the Puget Sound and will most likely venture there again.

We anchored in Aleck Bay three years ago with our good friends Walt and Odile.  They joined us on ExTerra for our maiden voyage up the coast and it was wonderful to have their expertise and camaraderie on that trip.  Aleck Bay has changed little since then.  There are a couple more houses, and many more people actually staying at and enjoying the houses than last time.  We do a little fishing and putter around in our trusty dinghy, ET.  Carl rides his first ever float plane wakes as the small float plane takes off from one of the new houses.  Other than that it is a pretty quiet, calm anchorage.

Unlike Aleck Bay, our next anchorage just off Barlow Bay, which is a very roly poly anchorage.  We get to see a great little steam boat; the Captain exclaims that he stole it from Humphrey Bogart as he toots his whistle while passing within 10 feet of us.  Shades of the African Queen for sure.  Do I have the correct movie Loren?  Carl is happy to catch a limit of Greenling and release a few as well.  More treasure as we pull up the anchor.  We have a starfish clinging tightly to the large seaweed that is wrapped around our anchor.  Funny what passes for entertainment out here!

We hope to sail today but alas the winds do not cooperate.  We do have both sails up briefly but are making only about 2 knots so we motor again.  We do get to see numerous Orca whales as we move along the west side of San Juan Island.  Some actually turn and come quite close to our boat.  We move slowly, even at hull speed, which is what they recommend if you suddenly come upon whales close up.  They put on quite a show.  

We are very close to shore and also get close up views of the kilns and lighthouse at Limestone Kiln park.  We poke our nose into Mosquito and Mitchell Bay but they look to be too shallow and exposed so we put down anchor in Garrison Bay instead.  We have travelled this area on land years ago with Barb and Craig.  We stayed at Deer Harbor resort but took the ferry over to take in the history of San Juan Island.  We are anchored very close to where the English Camp (famous for the Pig War) sits.  Crab are cleaned and cooked and chilling for tomorrow.