My backyard this morning: Appletree Cove Marina.



We headed out of Appletree Cove at about 8 AM, turned north and headed for Anacortes. The wind was light from the north to northeast; not enough for sailing, so we motored on the glassy water past a harbor seal and a small pod of harbor porpoises, out into the open water of Puget Sound.



Once we were out in the middle of the Sound, the wind came up, the sails went up, and the engine went off. We had all kinds of sailing today: glassy-water, no-wind sailing (when the engine was on); little-wave, little-bit-of-wind sailing; slight-chop, ten-knot wind sailing; and couple-foot waves, more wind sailing.

We had a rambunctious sail up Admiralty Inlet and into the Strait of Juan de Fuca. We got to experiment with lots of different sail configurations--the jib, the staysail, and the main; the jib and the main; the Code 0, the staysail, and the main; we even got to practice reefing the main. Scoots screamed along at 10 knots--upwind! It was fabulous fun!



At one point, when we were in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Eric mused that in not too many months, we'd be heading up the Strait--instead of across it--then making the Big Left Turn and heading south to San Francisco. So true, I can't wait!



When we turned the corner at the northwest end of Fidalgo Island, we dropped the sails and motored up Guemes Channel. The sky loomed gray and stormy in the distance, and we were convinced that we would be rained on before we reached our destination; we weren't, but the wind got really gusty and cold.

Our destination was Fidalgo Marina, home of Cap Sante Marine, the people who sold us our dinghy at the Seattle Boat Show, way back in February. At that time, we told them that we would pick up the dinghy at their shop with our boat, which was the incentive for our current adventure.

Fidalgo Marina is reached by navigating a diagonal channel marked (after the initial matched pair of red and green buoys) by only red daymarks, followed by a slight nudge to port at the last daymark, and a leap of faith to the tall gray metal walls marking the entrance to Fidalgo Marina. Stray too far from these markers and you'll find yourself bogged down in Fidalgo Bay mud. I let Eric take the helm, since he has more experience there than I do. He got us there without incident.

After that, things got a little hairy. Dave at Cap Sante had generously provided some dock space for us near the Travel-lift, and the directions I'd written down called for us to turn to port after entering the marina, and look for the Travel-lift dock, so that's what we did. After entering between the tall metal walls, we motored slowly down the marina fairway, which was limited by a tall gray metal wall to port, and by a large covered shed of boat slips to starboard; it was about one and a half boat widths wide, and ended with a hard starboard turn after the end of the covered boat slips. It was kind of like being in a maze.

As we were heading along the fairway, I looked through the covered slips and noticed A BRIDGE on the other side, connecting the covered slips and the shore. It suddenly became clear that we couldn't get where we needed to be, by following this fairway. Then, when we turned the corner, we saw that the bridge wouldn't be an issue because the fairway ENDED up ahead. Eric was able to slow Scoots down, and after a series of backs and fills, turned her around in the end of the fairway. Whew!

After a trip back up the narrow fairway, and around the covered boat slips the other way, we found the Travel-lift dock we'd been looking for (we should have turned to starboard when we entered the marina). Eric pulled us alongside, I handled the fenders and dock lines this time, and we tied up at 5:30 PM after a long, fun day of sailing.