September was a whirlwind month for SV Unbelievable and her crew. We left Bellingham on August 28th and headed to Port Townsend after a star-filled night at anchor in Watmough Bay on Lopez Island. We needed to do a couple of modifications to our new Garmin autopilot to make sure it played nicely with our 30 year old hydraulic steering, and nowhere else in the Pacific NW are there as many knowledgeable marine professionals as in PT. We were there for a week finishing up some of our personal projects (including the autopilot), packing everything away, and provisioning for making the “big left turn” south to California. Then, on September 3rd we slipped the dock lines on a sunny calm evening and headed west into the Strait of Juan de Fuca. There was little wind so we motored most of the 80 nautical miles (nm) to Neah Bay, the last safe harbor available before a vessel rounds Cape Flattery and heads south into the open ocean. We timed the passage westbound to coincide with the ebbing tide for a nice push on our stern, and arrived at Neah Bay around 5am. Holding our collective breath that we weren’t on another boat’s anchor or on a crab pot line, we dropped the anchor and slept for a few hours, visions of dimly lit container ships transiting the strait slowly fading from our minds.
The next couple of days arrived with high winds and big swell, so we packed and re-packed the boat and did other small projects onboard and on shore in Neah Bay while we waited for a weather window. It eventually arrived on September 6, when we pointed the bow west and motored out past the Cape Flattery lighthouse, then stood out into the open Pacific Ocean for the first time. So much blue! We turned south and raised the sails, thrilled to finally be where we had been talking about going for so many days, months, and years.
The bubble of joy and freedom was not long lasting, however. Soleil was slightly seasick from the large swells the Pacific threw at our stern quarter, so we decided to put into La Push (the first harbor south of Cape Flattery) for the night to give her a chance to recover. La Push is a bar crossing, and the wind was creating large swell and breaking waves over the bar as we made our way through the narrow channel toward the harbor, where we encountered a dredge blocking the way into the marina. We navigated that obstacle while holding our breath we weren’t going to entangle ourselves on any of its anchors, and promptly wrapped one of our own jib sheets around our prop shaft just past the breakwater, as we were jockeying the boat around looking for the deepest slip at the mostly shallow-water docks. The wrapped line stopped the engine dead, which is a terrifying experience in a tight waterway, but we got it restarted and managed to get docked albeit with the knowledge that we were going to be spending a few more days than planned here while we figured out what damage had been done to the shaft and how to repair it. Fortunately, there are worse places to be than the outer coast of Washington in early fall…
After diving on the prop shaft numerous times to remove the entangled line and look for damage, and getting opinions from marine professionals and knowledgeable friends, Morgan decided we needed to haul out to replace our cutlass bearing, ensure the prop shaft hadn’t been bent by the torsion of the encircling line, and re-align the engine. In the meantime, we should minimize use of the engine since we didn’t really know the extent of the damage. Our options were not great for hauling out: sail downwind to Ilwaco on the Columbia River (which involves a big bar crossing and motoring upriver to the yard) OR sail back upwind into the Strait of Juan de Fuca and haul out in Port Angeles, which was by far the safer bet. So, we sucked in our pride and on Sep 10 sailed back to Neah Bay, dropped the hook for the night, then continued on to Port Angeles on the 11th for a haul-out on the 12th. We ended up being in Port Angeles for a week on the hard, but made the best of our time there by renting a car and doing some hiking in Olympic National Park (Hurricane Ridge and the now un-dammed Elwha River!) and driving back to the Skagit Valley to grab a few things from the ranch where we have all our household goods stored.
Finally, on Sep 20 the boat was back in the water and we were ready to depart once again. Without fanfare this time (because YOU JUST NEVER KNOW), we left Port Angeles Boat Haven on a glassy calm morning and sailed west down the strait, bypassing Neah Bay in good weather and continuing on south toward our first intended stop, Newport Oregon. Second time’s the charm!
Stay tuned for our next post: West Coast Wanderings…or maybe, West Coast Weather, since this time of year, forecasting and avoiding adverse weather is definitely the name of the game!
So excited to follow along! Glad to hear you’re on the move and doing well. Thanks for sharing photos!