mooring buoy – Riveted

More Around Patos Island

Laura Domela — Tue, 02 Dec 2014 21:06:37 +0000

We took the quadcopter and hiked out to the lighthouse on Alden Point for some more fun aerial footage.

Oh hey seals!

In this photo, there's one seal looking straight up at the copter. You might have to click for an enlargement, but it's pretty cute.

Another cove-side campsite (Patos Island is a Washington State Park):

The remains of an old car or truck, beside the trail out to the lighthouse:

Kind of funny to have a car on a very small island where there are most definitely no roads.

Hey! The new mooring buoys match the boat's paint job:

Earlier today Kevin did his first from-the-boat launch and it went great! Can't wait to see the footage he got out here!

Taking off from Airship's top deck:

Smooth, successful top-deck landing:

Sunset looking out of the cove:

How to Replace a Mooring Buoy

Laura Domela — Tue, 02 Dec 2014 17:19:36 +0000

This morning as we were working and having coffee, I noticed out the back window what looked like a pretty big boat heading toward the cove. This is a pretty small cove (only two mooring buoys), and this boat seemed, um, large. It showed up on AIS as a vessel called Thunderbird, and it was designated a pleasure craft. I don't think so. Pretty soon the bow of the boat dropped, drawbridge-style, and we could see that it was filled with mooring buoys.

Ah! Time to replace the mooring buoys in Active Cove.

A couple of guys were soon suiting up in what looked like wetsuits and then drysuits (because, you know, it's like 30something degrees out there). They got in the water and went down and hooked the crane line onto the concrete block on the bottom.

Divers in the water:

Succesfully hooked the line, divers back on deck:

Pulling up the old buoy (and a bunch of kelp):

And here's the new (larger) concrete weight heading down to the bottom. They have some other corkscrew anchoring things, but they said they don't work in all this rock out here, so they use big concrete blocks to anchor the buoys:

And there ya go! Shiny new mooring buoy:

It was our turn next, so we moved over to the new buoy for a little bit while we watched them replace ours. Pretty cool to see the whole operation!

Thunderbird (not a pleasure craft, unless you REALLY like replacing mooring buoys):

See ya later guys. Thanks for the morning entertainment:

Patos Island (and Humpback Whales!)

Laura Domela — Sat, 01 Nov 2014 00:31:51 +0000

This morning (while it was still raining) we decided to head out for Patos Island, northwest of Sucia. The forecast said it was to be improving for the weekend. It looked like a cruise of about 3.5 hours from Anacortes to Patos Island, and our plan was to grab one of the two mooring buoys in Active Bay at Patos (figuring off season we'd have a pretty good shot).

As we approached the picturesque lighthouse on Alden Point, we saw something large in the water up ahead, with a bunch of birds flocking around and over it. Kevin said, "Orcas!" I said "I don't think so…I didn't see any tall straight dorsal fins, and this thing was HUGE!"

Turns it it was humpbacks! Two of them! And they were close.

We hung out with them for a little bit, snapping photos. (I can't believe I left my long lens at home, again…but I really thought we were just coming for the weekend, and not going out on the boat at all this time. It will not happen again.)

It was SO amazing to be this close to these HUGE animals. We floated around for about a half an hour and then said goodbye and headed back toward our cove.

See you later, awesome humpback whales!! (Nice view of the new solar panels, as I make sure we aren't missing any more whaleage behind us.)

Inside Active Cove, about to grab a mooring buoy (there are two, and they were both empty so we have the island to ourselves for the night):

Patos Island has a lot in common with Sucia and Matia islands: very cool sculpted sandstone landscape, and clear clear water:

We deployed the dinghy and took it to shore, registered for the night (this is a WA State Park) and did a little exploring, including a hike out to the lighthouse.

Looking back as we head toward shore:

One of the gorgeous campsites here (all with picnic tables and fire pits, as well as a fair amount of goose poop, but whatever…look at that view, don't look at goose poop!)

Paved sidewalk path from where the dock used to be out to the lighthouse:

There are a LOT of birds out here on this point.

We hiked back to the dinghy on the beach (with one more shot of Airship at its buoy…white speck in the distance is the dinghy on the beach):

Getting close to sunset:

Can you believe this place?

Different view of the boat from the shore (sorry, it hasn't gotten old yet):

Before heading back to the boat we did a little twirl in the dinghy out to the lighthouse (through a bunch more birds):

Lighthouse at golden hour:

Back at the boat, having a little rum and lime on the top deck as the sun goes down:

So far, this is our favorite spot in the San Juans.

Here's our track from today. The loop on the left (at the top/end of the track) is the humpback-watching loop, and the pale yellow-filled one on the right is Patos Island:

Oh, and guess what? We have internet here (on the new Moovbox Wi-Fi router, which Kevin will be reviewing here soon).

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.