To Fisherman Bay, Lopez Island

Laura Domela — Sun, 11 Dec 2016 23:25:27 +0000

We left Jones Island this morning and cruised back over to Friday Harbor for some grocery-getting and some lunch.

Airship, middle of the below photo:

The forecast for tomorrow looks a little rough, so we chose to head across to Fisherman Bay on Lopez Island and stay put until Tuesday.

Tonight
E wind 5 to 15 kt…becoming NE 25 to 35 kt after midnight. Wind waves 2 ft or less…building to 4 to 6 ft after midnight. Rain or snow showers likely.
Mon
N wind 25 to 35 kt…easing to 20 to 30 kt in the afternoon. Wind waves 4 to 6 ft. A chance of snow showers in the morning…then a slight chance of snow showers in the afternoon.
Mon Night
NE wind 15 to 25 kt. Wind waves 2 to 4 ft.

Gorgeous winter day for a cruise. Fisherman Bay is only 3-4nm from Friday Harbor. We were wishing we had further to go, so we slowed down a bit to make it last a little longer.

The sandbar at the entrance to Fisherman Bay is littered with boat bones:

Entering Fisherman Bay is shallow and winding but not difficult as long as you pay attention to the markers, your chart, your depths, and the plethora of crab traps as you wind your way in.

Safe Harbour and Airship are tucked in and anchored in the bay now, and we’ll probably have dinner together again and then make an early night of it, and with less wine (unlike last night). Tomorrow we’ll get some more Slowboat work done here with Sam and Anna before heading back to Anacortes on Tuesday.

Fisherman Bay to Spencer Spit

Laura Domela — Sun, 28 Sep 2014 21:15:22 +0000

This morning it was quite foggy in Fisherman Bay, so we decided to walk up the road 10 minutes or so to grab some breakfast at the Galley Restaurant while we waited for the fog to burn off. We finished breakfast and walked the ten minutes back to Airship and the fog was even thicker!

We cleaned up some stuff on the boat and Kevin did some fine tuning on the dinghy's outboard motor while we waited and listened to the radio and weather. Pretty soon quite a few boats began readying to head out and we figured we'd join 'em! See you later, Fisherman Bay!

We cruised around the north end of Lopez Island and decided we'd check out the mooring buoys at Spencer Spit.

Spencer Spit is a Washington State Park just south of Swift Bay on the east side of Lopez. There are 10 mooring buoys, 7 on the north side of the spit, and 3 on the south side. Apparently the south side is preferable (probably a tiny bit more protected) but all three of those buoys were occupied, so we headed back around and grabbed ourselves the far one on the north side. We nailed it on the first try, too…we've got this mooring buoy thing down. (You take a line back to the stern, where it's low to the water, and whoever's driving the boat comes up alongside or backs toward the buoy. There's a ring on top you need to get the line through, and once you have it, you walk the line back up to the bow of the boat and tie it onto the cleat on either side of the bow. Done.)

We put the chairs up on the top deck and had some lunch before launching the dinghy and heading to shore.

The fee to stay overnight here is $12 (not to exceed 72 hours) and you pay at the pay station on the beach, pretty much like in a campground. They have trash and recycling and water up there, as well as some campsites and hiking trails (but out here in the bay, there's just a buoy of course).

Looking back at Airship, from the far end of the spit. (See it, we're the tiny white dot on the far right of the image):

The south side of Spencer Spit:

Before heading back to the boat we took the dinghy out for a spin around Flower Island. There's a little outcropping of rocks just past the island where a bunch of harbor seals were enjoying the sun:

Here's today's route, if you want to follow along:

Tonight's dinner will be leftover burgers (made from grass fed beef and chorizo, which probably cancels each other out, I know) on lettuce buns with tomato, avocado, and Sriracha mayo, and some sauteed zucchini. We'll do some work in the morning before heading back into Anacortes so that the service department (back in town after a motorcycle trip in Eastern Oregon) can start on the couple of upgrades we're doing.

LOVE the boat. LOVE.

Fisherman Bay – Riveted

To Fisherman Bay, Lopez Island

Fisherman Bay to Spencer Spit