Departing from Kingston, we back out of our slip, turn and
move slowly out of the harbor. We turn left
around the marina entrance buoy and move towards the ferry terminal, looking to
see if a ferry is at the dock or coming into the dock. On this cruise north to Port Townsend, a
ferry was indeed about a mile out from the terminal and coming in so we slowed
and waited for her to dock, then proceeded.
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| WSF Puyallup entering Kingston |
We then speeded up and left Appletree Cove, the large
wedge-shaped cove where Kingston is at the western point.
Hanging a left turn, we passed Apple Cove Point, and
proceeded northwest toward Point No Point, a Coast Guard station which has one
of the radar towers of the VTS (USCG Vessel Traffic service) system. Point No Point is also a good salmon fishing
spot and frequently when fish are running, there are a number of small boats
fishing in the area.
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| Fishermen on the beach at Point No Point |
We were told by radio to stop while this transit was made. We did!
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| M/V Argonaut |
On the way north, we passed many other vessels including a tug with a sand barge, the Argonaut, and Silver Bells, beautiful classic motor yachts headed for Port Townsend like us.
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| M/V Seven Bells |
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| Huge flocks of shore birds! |
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| Container ships are huge! |
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| Empty log ship with Mt. Baker on background |
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| Olympic Mountains -- No snow |
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| Mt. Baker |
We are now in Admiralty Inlet, and all marine traffic
heading to or from the Pacific Ocean will pass through these waters, usually in
the VTS lanes. From Foulweather Bluff,
we set a course on the GPS chartplotter for the Port Townsend Canal.
It is frequently rough in the area near Foulweather Bluff
due to wind and converging currents so we try to move out as fast as possible. We pass two small harbors on the way—Port
Ludlow and Mats Mats Bay.
When we arrive
near Port Townsend Canal, we’ll look for other traffic coming out of the Canal
or a boat overtaking us to move through the Canal ahead of us. There are several buoys and markers to keep
you off shoals but the shallow Canal passage is no problem. There can be as much as 3 knots of current
pushing you or opposing you in this narrow channel. When you pass under the highway bridge, you
have 58’ of vertical clearance, enough for most pleasure craft, even
sailboats. We’re not fond of meeting
other vessels in the canal due to wakes of bigger power boats so we’ve
sometimes waited. Once into Port Townsend
Bay, you see the tall smokestack from the Port Townsend Paper Company plant and
after moving out into the middle of the bay, we turn right and head for the
town of Port Townsend about 5 miles ahead.
There are two marinas in Port Townsend, both owned and
operated by the Port of Port Townsend.
The first one we’ll see is Boat Haven, a large marina with major
shipbuilding and repair facilities along with two large Travelifts to lift
boats into or out of the water. There
are many different repair facilities here with wooden boat repair being a
specialty of many of the shops. Every
conceivable marine trade is represented here so it’s a great place to do
repairs and annual maintenance work. We
go here regularly to have work done by the Port Townsend Shipwrights Coop, who
have many excellent shipwrights, electricians, metalworkers, painters plus many
other tradesmen. Boat Haven also has a
Coast Guard Station with a cutter and several smaller boats based here. The bus terminal for Port Townsend is across
the street along with a large Safeway grocery store, a terrific hardware store
and many restaurants and even a brew pub.
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| Boat Haven Yard and Marina |
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| Car transport carrier and both PT Ferries in Admiralty Inlet |
Port Townsend calls itself a “Victorian Seaport” probably
because of its many downtown buildings being from the picturesque Victorian
era. The town also has a number of well
preserved Victorian residences. The ferry docks are close to downtown as well
as a small cruise ship dock. On this
trip the American Spirit, a small
cruise ship was docked here.
The
downtown is very interesting with many eclectic businesses and lots of very
good restaurants. Port Townsend is well known for its many
writers, artists and craftspeople of all types.
The biggest annual event though is the Wooden Boat Festival (WBF) on the
weekend after Labor Day. WBF began in 1978 and this year’s Festival was
the 38th Annual Festival! And
that’s why we’re here now too! The
Wooden Boat Festival is based at the Northwest Maritime Center, a new complex
of beautiful wood buildings opened at the 2009 Wooden Boat Festival with much
celebration! There are a number of
classrooms used for seminars during WBF and also ongoing classes in marine
subjects as well as many community meetings and events during the rest of the
year. Inside there is a café, a
nautical library and a small boat rental facility. There is also a large ground
floor boat shop where skilled professional woodworkers teach boatbuilding
skills and create new vessels. There is a marine training center with a view of the harbor and the Strait of Juan
de Fuca with a full size “ship’s bridge” with all relevant instruments,
controls and simulators for training future ship crew. And of course there is a very interesting
ship’s store that carries many hard to find wooden boat and sailing vessel
parts. These buildings adjoin Point
Hudson Marina where all the Festival boats moor for the weekend.
This is probably a good place to explain how we happened to
be selected as a Festival exhibitor boat again this year. Each year, the festival issues a call for
exhibitor boats and then reviews applications to select boats with interesting
builders or designers, interesting histories or designs to appear at the
festival. So we submitted our
application again with a picture and after a month or so, we got an email that
we were selected! So that means as we
get closer, we apply a little more varnish to our exterior brightwork, clean up
the decks and touch up deckhouse paint and any dings in the hull!
On this September 2014 trip we are describing here, we pass
down the waterfront and find many wood vessels orbiting around the harbor
waiting to be called into Point Hudson by the Festival Harbormaster. Last year, the longtime Festival Harbormaster
(called the Harbor "Masher" for his skills in shoehorning boats into tiny spaces)
died sometime after the 2013 Festival and his successors tried their best this
year but were very slow since they had set up a new mooring system. Turns out, that was very advantageous for us!
It actually took 4-1/2 hours of circling before we got into
our slip, so we had lunch in the pilothouse while watching the other boats
slide past us and about every hour, we called the Harbormaster on the VHF radio
to see if they were ready for us. But
it was all worthwhile since we got our very own slip rather than be turned at a
90 degree angle and pushed by festival
inflatable boat “tugs” into one wide space between 2 docks with 5 or 6 other
boats as happened in the 5 other years we’ve been here. So instead, we motored slowly through the
entrance to Point Hudson and were told to hold while they moved another vessel
out of our slip. Eventually we came in
without any assistance and docked easily port side to the dock headed in. We had a linehandler that grabbed our lines
and we were in and tied up!
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| Coming into Pt. Hudson Marina |
Wow—there
were literally hundreds of wood boats of all sizes and types surrounding
us! It’s always just amazing to be part
of this great spectacle! And our boat, at the ripe old age of 52, is
looking the best she has in many years and making us proud! In our next post, we’ll let our photographs
show you many of the Festival boats and the crowds of very appreciative
spectators that come to the Festival every year.
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