Wintering in Poulsbo

The Port of Poulsbo has become the winter home for M/V Cloud Nine.  Poulsbo offers a more active marina, an accessible downtown with major shopping district within walking distance, and a lower moorage price during the winter months than what we were paying at the John Wayne Marina in Sequim.

With the sale of Jerry's house in November, we no longer needed to stay around Sequim and decided a different choice for winter sounded good.   All of the boats mooring for winter are docked on the F Dock, leaving the E Dock for guest moorage.  Poulsbo does limit liveaboards for winter, but we do have a few others here on F Dock.  

I can't say enough about how much we are loving being here in Poulsbo for the winter. We've enjoyed watching groups from nearby yacht clubs come in for a weekend, as well as the occasional large yacht arriving for a day or two.

We arrived on a Saturday and were greeted by a large group of boats from a yacht club in the Southern Puget Sound area.  All of their boats were decorated with Christmas lights, and it was quite a festive welcome to Poulsbo.  Downtown Poulsbo has many activities during the holiday season and we've been treated to carolers walking the streets, a horse-drawn carriage on the weekends offering rides to the shoppers, Santa and Mrs. Claus walking the downtown area, and a display of lights to put any Scrooge into the festive spirit.  The Poulsbo Yacht Club put on a Christmas Lighted Boat parade that was quite impressive with the number of boats participating, the elaborate decorating done by the boat owners, and the number of viewers on the walkway overlooking the marina.

One special night the Argosy ships from Seattle arrived for their annual Christmas Ship Festival.  Three ships, all decked out with Christmas Lights, arrived at the marina, one with Christmas music playing through its outside speakers.  Guests arrived at the marina and were directed to their ship for their cruise.  As the ships left the marina, carolers on the biggest ship performed a short concert for all of us in the marina to enjoy.  The music could be heard into the downtown area, too.  The boats took off for their two hours of cruising, returning later in the evening, and once again we were treated to Christmas music until the boats left at about 10:00 p.m., returning to the home base in Seattle.

December 19th we woke to snow here in Poulsbo.  Quite a beautiful sight.  We were happy to be on the boat and not having to be in a car driving anywhere.  





Christmas found us over in Edmonds to visit with Jerry's son, Sean.  The crossing was a bit of a bumpy ride from swells, along with a rather large wake from one of the passing cargo ships that had some wine glasses flying out of their "secure" spot.  We have since switched to stainless steel wine goblets after the 12 wine glasses we bought for $10 from Costco all broke over a period of a few months. We love the new goblets as they hold 10 oz. to the top, so you can give a nice 8 oz. pour of wine.  We have not noticed any difference drinking out of stainless steel.  However, you may have to be the judge on whether or not we have a wine palate.

The sun came out for a short period while in Edmonds and we enjoyed the view of some of the  Olympic mountains from our moorage.  Dinner at Anthonys, always a treat, added to the festive feeling, as the entire restaurant was decorated with lights, and the Edmonds Yacht Club had their boats lit up directly below the restaurant windows. 

 




We are looking forward to 2013 and would like to wish everyone the best for the New Year.  We hope to see many of you out cruising during the coming year. 

Power Management 101

With our Indian summer behind us, temperatures are rapidly dropping, and I am getting a quick study on how to stay warm in the boat.  As stated earlier in the blog, Jerry has the experience of living on a boat for four years, so he knew what was coming.  Me?  This is a whole new experience, and it's not just turning a dial on the furnace to a higher temperature.  Running ceramic heaters all over the boat doesn't work either because the dreaded "30 amps maximum" on our boat is used up very quickly with a couple of electric heaters going.  

For those of you never living on a boat before in the Pacific Northwest, one must become a power-use watcher, vigilantly checking the electric panel to make sure you are staying under the 30 amps available.  Having the water heater on uses 10 amps while it's heating water, so do you want hot water available all the time?  Probably not, if the other option is being cold.  So, we turn the water heater on 30 minutes before we want to wash dishes or shower, otherwise it is in the off position.  The lovely ceramic heaters mentioned above?  They use at least 10 amps if at the 1500 watt position. Running the electric drip coffee maker? Check the panel so you don't throw the breaker.  Do you need to re-heat your cup of coffee in the microwave?  You'd better turn off one of your heaters. 

I could go on and on, but you probably are getting the drift.  Power Management 101 is the class I'm currently taking on this boat. But that's not all.  We're deciding to be assertive and try to improve the boat's ability to maintain the heat inside by adding insulation.  Waking up in the morning and having the boat's inside temperature just one degree warmer than the outside temperature is unacceptable (so says the woman used to a warm house)!

A marina friend, David Cooper, who is also a captain on a ship near Cook's Inlet, happened to be back in Sequim on a break from his regular job and stopped by to share with us some new insulation he found.  It's called Prodex and is approximately 3/8" thick with foil on either side and comes in either 24" or 48" width rolls.  

Prodex insulation in the 24" wide roll

It has an 'R' value of 15.6.  It's installed with a double-stick tape, and let me tell you, this sticky tape sticks to anything and everything.  [Click the word 'Prodex" above to go to the website; they sell the tape there, too.]

So, installation of the insulation has begun on Cloud Nine, starting in the salon, followed by the v-berth, and finally the pilot house.  Of course, this means having to replace all of the header fabric and not just the salon's, but we didn't have anything to do at the moment, so why not.  [Wish I had smiley faces to insert here, as I'd insert the winking "you've-got-to-be-kidding" face.]

Salon ceiling with Prodex insulation installed

The good news is that after the salon ceiling was insulated, our temperature the next morning was 10 degrees warmer than the outside temperature and that was still running only a small 750 watt heater during the night.  Obviously, as the night temperatures drop lower, we'll need to run the heater at 1500 watts (if not add the Dickinson diesel furnace into the mix, too).

Next up for keeping the heat in the boat?  Insulated curtains!  Get to sewing woman!

Until next time,

Nancy

To Bremerton & Back

Warm weather was sticking around and we had a full 8-10 days available before Nancy's next work commitment, so we decided to head out for another cruise and take advantage of this extended summer in Sequim.  The last few summers have been anything BUT a summer.  So maybe we've finally returned to "normal" here in the Pacific NW.  In any case, with no plans, no "have to's" (other than being back by a certain date), we take off heading south this time to explore more of Puget Sound. 

Approaching Point Wilson near Port Townsend.

 First stop was Pt. Hudson Marina in Port Townsend.  We love Port Townsend and the marina is so close to town.  The day was really hot, but we still walked through town, stopping at a few stores to browse, stopping at our favorite wine store for a bottle of port, and then on the Sirens, a local pub, on the 3rd floor of an old downtown building, with a deck on the south side looking over the water.  It's a great place to relax on a hot day and have a drink.  The deck is normally packed, but we were lucky this day, getting a table.  Later we returned to the boat and cooked up some King Salmon that was given to Nancy by one of her clients.  Fresh!  Yummy!  How better can life get?!

Channel markers lined up for entering Mats Mats Bay.

 Next day we continued our journey south, stopping at Mats Mats Bay for a lunch break.  Mats Mats Bay has a very narrow entrance, and you have to turn into the entrance once the two markers are lined up.  Then once in the channel, stay in the center as you make a dog leg towards the entrance of the bay.  We dropped anchor near the fishery, made lunch, and enjoyed the quiet and charm of this small bay.  

Part of Mats Mats Bay; quite a secluded little bay!

We continued on south after lunch towards our next stop, Kingston.  Kingston is a very popular stop in Puget Sound, directly west of Edmonds, and on a ferry route.  Kingston is normally filled up during the summer, especially on weekends when there is a Farmers Market on Saturday mornings and concerts in the park adjacent to the marina on Saturday nights.  We got lucky this day, getting a slip for the night.  Next morning, we walked into town to mail our voter ballots and get some groceries at the local IGA.

Heading down Agate Pass towards Poulsbo.

We were in no hurry to continue south as we knew our next stop would be Poulsbo.  We have always loved driving to Poulsbo, walking the quaint Scandinavian village, and walking the docks.  This time, however, would be our first time visiting with our boat, so we knew we'd need a couple of nights to fully enjoy our stay. 

The Scandanavian welcome sign coming into Poulsbo

We met a lovely couple, Jay & Barb, in Poulsbo, who moor their boat in Everett.  We enjoyed spending our evenings visiting with them, and Barb and Nancy even headed into town together the last morning for one more shopping trip (Nancy making out well at their second hand store).

The local Indian Casino with fancy totem pole.

Saying good-bye to hopefully new friends, we continued our journey south, briefly passing Bremerton and the US Destroyer Turner Joy.  We headed north under two bridges connecting Bremerton to the Olympic Peninsula and then made a left into Oyster Bay.  Waggoner's Cruising Guide recommended this bay, anchoring on the west side along a "dense forest".  Well, shall we say dense forest is a touch over-exaggeration, as it was a treed area, but had a parking lot at the end of the road and then a walking path through the treed area.  We saw and heard voices all afternoon, barking dogs for hours that evening, and we lost the sun at about 6:00 p.m. because of the trees.  If we choose to anchor in this bay again, we'll consider the east side nearer the houses.  At least we'd have the sun for a few more hours.

The morning greeted us with hundreds of jellyfish

Jerry did put the fishing pole to use that afternoon, catching a couple of dog fishes about 3 feet long.  Both were cut free and he realized this bay wasn't the best place for fishing.

Next morning we headed out, heading to the unknown, when we again approached Bremerton.  We weren't sure where to go next, the day was quite warm (hot actually) and the idea of a tour of the destroyer Turner Joy and dinner at Anthony's called us into the Bremerton marina.  The marina is brand new and beautiful.  The town has worked hard at rebuilding this area, and has a collection of fountains in the area where children can play in the water.  The one negative about the marina, however, is that the breakwater is open to ferry wake and the first two docks just inside the south entrance are subject to the wakes.  We moved our boat after realizing we didn't want to bounce around all night.  The marina staff is quite warm and welcoming, one boater mentioning that they drove him to the store a few miles away and would not take a tip for the service.

Dinner at Anthony's was fabulous and we had a window seat and got to look down on Cloud Nine while we dined and ate.

The next morning we began our slow trip back home checking out Manzanita Bay east of Poulsbo along the way.  Waggoner's Cruising Guide wrote that it was good, overnight shelter with excellent holding ground.  

Being that it was a Saturday, Agate Pass was full of boaters, and added to that were swimmers at the north end of Agate Pass.  Boaters coming from the north were unaware and a traffic jam occurred as too many boaters from the south, along with the swimmers and their flotilla, met up with very fast boats wanting to enter from the north.  The US Coast Guard Auxillary, who were present for the swimming event, should have been on Channel 16 warning boaters in the area.

We continued northward and stopped briefly at Kingston to see if there were any available slips, but the dreaded "Reserved" signs were on all of the empty slips.  That meant a longer day at the wheel continuing northward around Point No Point and into Port Ludlow.  We anchored out at the southwest corner of the bay, enjoying our stay immensely and hoping to return again soon.  The next morning, we watched an otter family of four frolicking in the water nearby.  We got the kayaks down and went kayaking into the inner harbor, where we were treated to an enormous star fish, as well as other smaller versions of various colors and even an orange sea cucumber.

Seals near Fort Flagler

We eventually left for the day, heading toward Port Townsend, but this time we ventured down to Mystery Bay on Marrowstone Island to see what this area was like.  We didn't like the meandering approach into the area around Fort Flagler as it twisted and had some narrow and shallow areas.  Being a weekend day, there were a lot of boaters and families around the beaches at Fort Flagler as well as further down in Mystery Bay.  None of these places looked relaxing for the night, so we called Point Hudson and got a slip again with them.  We celebrated our last night out on our voyage with drinks and dinner at Sirens.  The heat spell was continuing, and so on our way back to the boat, we swung into the ice cream shop to get some ice cream to enjoy.

Our final morning found us once again returning to Sequim.  We both wished we had more time out and look forward to the day when we can leave Sequim forever and go wherever we want every day!

Baby Seal Tries Out His New Surroundings

Our typical morning here at the marina includes a walk up the dock to use the restrooms.  This morning, we came across a mess of blood and hair on the dock--signs that a new seal pup was born during the night.

 

As we continued down the dock, the sound of splashing was quite evident, and as we followed the sound, the sight of a new born seal pup swimming vigorously through the water, his back tail fins were propelling him across the top of the water like a little motor boat.

We giggled at the sight of this new life exploring the surroundings of the marina.  He certainly got around to every place and wasn't afraid of people as he approached us on the dock.  His mom, on the other hand, was not happy with us being that close and tried in vain to direct him to where she wanted the little fellow to go.

We weren't sure whether he was scared or just wanting to check out everything, but this little guy kept on swimming around boat after boat, coming right up to people, all the time his back fins pumping as fast as they could move him.



 

He eventually settled down and later that evening we watched him and mom leisurely floating around the marina.

As the weeks went by, we had other seal pups born, but none gave us the excitement this little one did on this special morning!

Replacing Windows

With weather warming in Sequim and dry days upon us for awhile, Jerry took to replacing the rest of the windows on Cloud Nine.  As noted in earlier post, the explosion the end of January caused damage to our boat and we couldn't replace just the two windows that were damaged, as the boat wouldn't look the same.  Insurance luckily says that you have to put the boat back to the way it looked before the explosion, i.e. all windows looking the same, so they gave us the funds to replace all four.  So Jerry has been working on getting the damaged ones out and new ones in their place.  

 


Taking out the old windows and fitting the new ones in takes some preparation time.  Once the old windows are out, filling strips were needed to build up the framework for the new windows.










He used 3/8" thick oak strips to fill in to fit the new window frame, epoxying in each piece into place.












Once framing was set, he painted a layer of West Systems epoxy over the entire area.

 




A layer of 3M epoxy filler was then smoothed on to fill the cracks and indentations.














Sanding was the final preparation before the new window was installed.  Most days, a second layer of epoxy filler was laid down and sanded once dried.





 
The window goes in place, the side painted, and the boat begins to take on its new look with its new color:  sandstone.

Don't you love the fishing rod!  It's always available!

Back Home in Sequim

We returned home to Sequim and Nancy was sick within a day with one of the nastiest colds/flus she's every had.  A call to their friendly nurse practitioner brought much-needed antibiotics and 48 hours later Nancy's friends of 40+ years, Martha & Nancy, arrived in Seattle for a week-long visit.  Luckily, they were very understanding, giving her the rest she needed, and as she improved, they were able to take day trips to the Hoh Rain Forest and Butchart Gardens in Victoria.


Jerry came down with the same nasty bug, and as of this date, they both are still hacking and coughing and looking forward to the day they are both finally over this bug.


Warm days in Sequim finally, so we're planning on replacing some windows during this warm and dry weather.

Friday Harbor and Homeward Bound

Leaving Deer Harbor

Having the storm pass by and the waters calm, we left Deer Harbor headed for Friday Harbor, a short cruise south.  

Small island off SE corner of Orcas Island

The morning was beautiful, the skies clearing, and we really enjoyed maneuvering through and around the tiny islands that are south of Orcas Island.



 


We entered Friday Harbor and saw a flurry of activity.  A large marina, with permanent moorings and enough dock space to handle more than 150 transient boaters, we found our slip and got checked in.  Friday Harbor sees a lot of ferries coming from Anacortes, Sydney B.C., and smaller ones from other islands in the San Juans.  The town is close and easy to walk to and get around.


We ran into Sequim boaters, Bob & Linda on Pound Foolish, who were at Friday Harbor celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary.  They moor at the end of our dock at the John Wayne Marina, so it was nice to see friends.  We brought our leftovers and, along with their leftovers, enjoyed the evening eating and sharing stories.  

We were surprised the next day when the friends we met at Deer Harbor came into the marina and moored across the dock from us.  We spent another evening visiting with them.

We know that Friday Harbor will see us again.  With plenty to do and see while visiting there, we'll return when Nancy's knee has improved so that we can do more walking around the area.  The marina has two prices for mooring, one if you call in to reserve a space, and one lower price if you just show up and get lucky to find an opening.  Being that we were there before the July 4th weekend, we were happy to see plenty of empty slips and were very pleased to pay less than $1/foot for moorage.

Lighthouse at Cattle Pass with Olympics in background

Listening to weather forecasts, we decided to take an opening in the weather to head back to Sequim and continue the work needed on Cloud Nine.   We had hoped for a day or two at Fisherman's Bay, but knew we wanted a smoother crossing than our northward crossing. The morning was clear and the water calm as glass as we headed south.  Current was pushing our 6 knot speed up over 10 knots that morning through Cattle Pass.  Fun! 

Didn't want to play chicken with this big guy!

There was plenty of ship traffic in the lanes this day so getting across the shipping lanes this morning turned into a bit of a challenge.  Not wanting to be stuck in the middle of the traffic lane with a 300+ ship bearing down on us, we hung out in the separation zone waiting for an eastbound ship to go past us.  We had a westbound ship coming up fast behind us, but the separation zone gives you plenty of room for safety.  We snuck in behind the eastbound ship and continued our crossing, pulling into Sequim safe and sound and glad our first long outing was mostly successful.

We know that we have to resolve an issue with our batteries, and will schedule a visit with the marine electrician before we plan our next night off grid.  Lots of work still to do on Cloud Nine, but she's so much fun to be on each and every day.  We're looking forward to the projects still to come!


 

Laying Low in Deer Harbor Marina

Summer has not yet arrived in Puget Sound, and by the looks of it, we may be having the same kind of summer as the previous two -- cold and windy.  With a storm coming in, we decided to take shelter in Deer Harbor Marina on the southwest corner of Orcas Island.

Deer Harbor Marina is a well-liked marina in all of the cruising guides.  Quite honestly, we're questioning why.  The marina has no breakwater and is open to the south getting rolling wakes from the ferry traffic on Lopez Island and during the storm, rolling seas from the south wind.  The cruising guides talk of an Orcas Shuttle that runs all over the island, but this shuttle officially starts the first day of summer, this year June 22nd.  The marina charged $1.55/foot to moor, which included electricity, water, and the pump out station, if we needed.   This is the most we've paid so far on this trip.  There is no town nearby, just a restaurant 1/2 mile up the road.  So, unless you want to rent a car for $60/day or take a taxi over to Eastsound, there is not much to do here.

In defense of the marina, there is a very well-stocked store at the head of the main dock.  The marina staff is accommodating and very polite.  The marina office has a large selection of t-shirts, sweatshirts, and wind breakers at a very reasonable price.  There is a resort up the hill from the marina and the swimming pool is accessible to marina guests.  Shower tokens are $2 and give you 7 minutes, which was the longest shower we've had so far on this trip, and we each used every single minute.

We got to share a few hours with a couple from Missouri, David and Nancy, who were chartering a Grand Banks 36.  We were impressed that they both took boating classes in order to be well-prepared for their charter trip.  We continue to be amazed at the friendliness of the boating community.  At almost every stop we meet wonderful people, learn about their lives, and share boating stories with them.  


The storm rolled in with wind gusts in excess of 40 mph and we were glad to be safe in harbor.  We watched a Kenmore Air plane come into the harbor for a landing, being blown about quite a bit, and he skirted the tops of the sailboats in the marina and landed just past.  Quite a thrill for us down here and I'm sure a little scary for those on the small plane.


We're heading to Friday Harbor on Monday.  Jerry is wanting to get to a store to buy glue to fix a stubborn hole in our dinghy.  I'm wanting to find a drugstore to buy an ace bandage to wrap my knee, which has been giving me fits on this trip.  My knee brace just isn't cutting it and getting around is getting harder each day.

To Bellingham and the San Juans

Up the Swinomish Channel, north towards Anacortes, is a long, slow trip.  This is a "no wake" zone, and the officials in this area mean no wake.  So at about 4 knots, we made the slow trip north up the channel, following a fishing vessel.  It's approximately an hour-and-a-half trip, again in a very narrow channel, and great attention must be paid to stay in the center of the channel, unless meeting a vessel coming the other direction.  Here's a photo nearing the north end of the channel, going under Highway 20 bridge and approaching the floating railroad bridge. 

 
 This bridge activates each day at 4:00 p.m. to allow a train across, but closes the channel to boat traffic, so boats must be past before this time or a long wait is in store.


Clearing the last buoy out of the channel, we headed north up to Bellingham.  After tying up at the guest dock in Bellingham, we showered and met up with friends, Ed & Lois, for dinner at Anthony's.  We did laundry and worked on the boat the next day, having dinner again with our friends.  Ed & Lois were the highlights of our Bellingham visit.  We enjoy their company so much and it was great to see them.  


We don't have much to say about the marina at Bellingham.  They don't seem that accommodating for guests.  They place their guest boats at the outer part of the marina that gets the most wave action from wind and boats going in and out of the marina.  There are pay stations at different gates, but no information about what is available in the immediate area.  But, on the other hand, our moorage was only $30/night and so you can't really complain.  We just thought we'd eventually see someone from the Marina Office, but not to be.  We hear from other boaters that each marina handles guests differently, and so when you do come across one that is gracious and welcoming with a bag of information as to what's in the area, and maybe even discount coupons, they tell us that is a marina you'll be happy you chose.  We had a wonderful experience at Edmonds last fall, greeted with a bag of goodies and discount coupons.  We'll have to see as we get more experience which we prefer.  

After two nights in Bellingham being blown around at the dock, we awakened to calmness and sunshine and headed for the San Juan Islands.  Before leaving Bellingham Bay, we were met with one of the Alaska State Ferries that runs between Bellingham and Alaska and can be taken by anyone, either as a walk-on, or with a car.  

We headed north between the mainland and Lummi Island.  A small ferry was running between the island and the mainland taking folks into work.  A lot of lovely homes lined the shore of Lummi Island.  As we turned westward toward the San Juan Islands of Matia and Sucia, we turned to see Mount Baker and the Cascades behind us.

Across the shipping lanes, watching a tug pulling a barge far behind him northward, we came across the small island east of Matia Island.  Our plan was to go to the west side of Sucia Island (west of Matia) where there were a couple of different bays to anchor in, but we explored the east side of the island first and entered Echo Bay.

Echo Bay had numerous empty anchoring buoys and was quite beautiful, but the kicker was when we turned eastward and looked at the view of Mount Baker and the Cascades from this Bay.  It was breathtaking.  So, we attempted our first mooring to a buoy.  We missed the first pass, but got it at the second pass.  We had thought that you had to catch the ring on top of the buoy at the water level, so tried to catch the ring from the swim step, but later in the evening had a good laugh when we watched a sailboat lift the ring upwards while the people slipped their line through the ring from midships!  What you can learn from folks by watching!!!  We put the dinghy in the water, took photos of Cloud Nine, and went to register for the night.  

Private Island off Sucia Island with house in trees!

This was our first use of the Washington State Marine Park system.  It was amazing to realize this entire island was a State Park, specifically for boaters.  Pit toilets, camp sites, picnic tables, and hiking trails throughout the island, along with the mooring buoys, linear mooring lines, and at another part of the island, a floating dock.  You can certainly see the benefit of tax dollars here in this beautiful area.  Our fee to use the buoy was $12/night, although we can get a yearly pass for about $160 for our boat.  (You can see a linear mooring line at the right side of photo.)   By nightfall, we counted 18 boats in Echo Bay, most of them sailboats.  We rocked quite a bit at this anchorage due to the wakes from large ships in the north/south shipping lanes.  We would choose to anchor elsewhere next time.


We awoke to rain and left Sucia Island heading south for Deer Harbor on the southwest part of Orcas Island.  With a storm coming, we wanted to head for shelter for a couple of days.

Charming Town of LaConner

Saying goodbye to good friends at Deception Pass Marina, we left for the short ride over to LaConner.  We've been to LaConner many times via car, always saying that "one day" we'd bring our boat here and moor for the night.  Of course, when we said that, the dream of having a boat was still that--just a dream.  But, here we were, motoring our boat to LaConner to spend the night, fulfilling a wish of ours.
 

  

The channel approach to the southern end of the Swinomish Channel is just off the eastern side of Whidbey Island.  The approach is very narrow and it is imperative to stay between the markers in this area.  We passed this eagle pretty close, but he didn't seem to be bothered until we were well passed.  

 



As you move down the channel, you realize that you are heading right for a rock wall, but then the channel turns and you maneuver around an "S" curve.  

The channel continues past a housing development and soon enough, the Rainbow Bridge comes into view with LaConner just beyond.  (Of course, the Rainbow Bridge is now painted orange, but you can guess what it used to look like.)






We chose to use one of the town's public docks (at $.50/ft for the night) and have our first night with no power.  The public docks are right along the water in the main part of town.  We were able to leave the boat and walk the main drag of town and visit the shops and restaurants.  We had to stop at our favorite, LaConner Brewery, so that Jerry could enjoy their brick-oven pizza (one of the best ever tasted), while I stayed gluten free and had the Brick Oven Nachos.  Both were very good.  We brought the leftover nachos back and finished those up later that night.  

 Just above the public dock where we moored was one of the town's many public plaza's where local art work was displayed and benches available for tourists to rest.  The "art" at this plaza rose high above the heads of the tourists and I'm still scratching my head by its meaning.  I guess this artist felt the local fish were being polluted by all the trash that was in the water.




We seem to attract Blue Heron, and here was another one coming close to the boat for a visit.














I went wandering with my camera, and Jerry was happy to see me returning. 

Our mooring place was directly across from the land belonging to the Swinomish Indian Tribe.  They had a celebration and put two canoes in the water, the younger folks going out first and the elders chasing in the next canoe.





 
Later in the evening when the canoes returned, there was dancing, singing, and drums beating up under one of the three pavilions (one seen above).  We checked the website of the tribe, but did not see what they were celebrating.  The tribe does participate in a canoe trip, along with other coastal Indian tribes, paddling to one location for all tribes to celebrate.  We can only assume this might have been a celebration of the canoes being readied for the trip.

Next morning, we said good-bye to LaConner and headed up the Swinomish Channel heading towards Bellingham and a couple of days visiting friends, Ed & Lois.