Day 10 (Purple).
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Unfortunately, neither of us took any pictures during this leg of the trip, so you'll just have to use your imagination.
Thursday we got up, had breakfast, and walked up to the marina office to get the WiFi password. While Deb took care of a couple things, I got ambitious and washed some gunk off the hull of the boat. Then we hiked into town to visit the PBY museum. I love military history, particularly when it involves airplanes. In addition, the airport where I have flown gliders has a PBY parked there, and I got to see it fly once. It's a big, lumbering, smoking, prehistoric beast of a plane with big, unmuffled radial engines. The museum had an actual plane on display, and I was hoping to be able to go inside it.
The museum is very nice, and is run by a dedicated group of volunteers, most of whom are retired military. They have exhibits not only of the PBY, but of the entire history of the Whidbey Island Naval Air Station from its inception as a seaplane base around the time of World War 2, up to the current configuration. We were too busy looking at the exhibits and talking to the volunteers to take any pictures. All of the volunteers had personal stories to tell, some as far back as WW2. The museum's own PBY was in the parking lot across the street with the wings removed. Unfortunately, it was not open for people to go inside, but we were able to walk around it and take a close look. We soon ran out of time and had to head out, due to the marina's 1pm checkout time. If you ever find yourself ignoring my earlier advice about being in Oak Harbor, and those sorts of things interests you, stop by the museum!
Back at the marina we prepped the boat for departure. We were at not only low tide for the day, but for the entire month. In fact, the exact time we needed to leave, the water would be a couple of feet below the datum used on the charts for depth. I studied my electronic large scale chart carefully, subtracting 2 feet from each of the already small depth numbers in the channel. There were definitely a couple of spots in the first part of the channel that were right around 5 feet deep. Renegade draws 4'9" according to the published specs. I had less confidence in the charted depths, as those numbers can change over time, and don't necessarily cover every rock or high spot on the bottom. To say I was apprehensive about this part of the journey would be a gross understatement.
Before we headed out the channel though, we had to make it over to the fuel dock, which was right at the end of the marina where it gets shallow. We slowly made our way there at idle speed, hugging the ends of the docks as much as possible to keep clear of the shore. The lowest number I saw on the depth sounder was about 7 feet, which is a little less than I am normally comfortable with. But we made it to the fuel dock, pumped out the holding tank, and filled up with diesel. Six and a half gallons. In nine days of cruising around, we had only burned 6.5 gallons of diesel, quite a bit less than I figured we would have used. With the fuel topped off, we eased our way over to the exit of the marina, and the dreaded channel.
With just enough speed to maintain steerage, and Deb up on the bow peering down into the water, I headed forward, eyes glued to the depth sounder. The height of my depth sounder below the water line is something I measured less than accurately by looking at a picture of the boat from the side during haulout. This offset is programmed into the depth sounder so that it reads actual water depth, or something close to it, depending on the accuracy of my photoshop measuring technique. The guidebook had mentioned staying to starboard on the way in, and indeed the chart confirmed that the deepest part of the channel was next to the red markers. On our way out, those markers were on the port side. Not an issue really, except that normal protocol is to stay to the right of the channel, just like on the road, and we were on the wrong side. If another boat came along, we'd have to move over. As we neared the area that was the most shallow on the chart, the depth sounding fluctuated: 7... 6.5... 7... 6.5... 6.0... 6.5... 5.5... 6.0... etc. And, of course, a large power boat was approaching, coming the other way. I eased over as much to the right as I dared, which wasn't much.
"Are we clear yet?" Deb hollered from the bow. At that exact moment I glanced at the depth sounder which read 4.75. Gadzooks!!! That's slightly less than the actual depth of the boat! Clearly there is a bit of error in my offset measurement, and maybe the accuracy of the depth sounder itself, but we couldn't have had more than a few inches of clearance. Way. Too. Close. Thankfully after that point, the numbers slowly increased until we were in safer water, and then out into the bay. Note to self (and others), extreme low tide is not the time to go in or out of Oak Harbor in anything with more draft than a canoe.
The water out in the bay was glassy smooth, so we motored southeast towards Langley. Further down Saratoga Passage I could see a line where the wind was visible on the water. After 20 minutes or so we reached the wind and put up the sails, resulting in a nice relaxing 4.5 knots downwind. Our goal was to cover the 15 or so nautical miles to Langley by 5pm. Deb had called earlier in the day to see if the marina had room, and was told they did, and to call back on the radio or phone when we were coming in for a slip assignment. However, the guy would only be there until 5:00. The GPS showed us being a little late, so Deb called back on the phone and we were told to just tie up anyplace on the guest dock, there was plenty of room. That sounded pretty reasonable, so we sailed on.
As we got closer to Langley, I noticed a phenomenon that has been consistent throughout all of my sailing in the Seattle area. The closer you get to your destination, the less wind there is. It's like the wind is proportional to the remaining distance. The wind gets less and less, and finally we start the motor. Every time I notice it, I am reminded of the joke about the mathematician and the engineer that goes like this:
A mathematician and an engineer are at a party. Standing against the wall across the room is a pretty girl. She tells the two that they can take turns walking towards her, each time covering half the remaining distance between themselves and her. When they get there, she will kiss them. The mathematician throws up his hands in defeat. "Impossible!" he says, "I'll never get there!" The engineer meanwhile walks half the distance, then half the distance again, and so forth. After about 20 rounds he is standing right in front of the girl, and kisses her.
"Hey, that's not fair, its mathematically impossible to make it all the way there!" says the mathematician.
"True enough, but we're within acceptable tolerance."
As the ETA on the GPS went from 5:15 to 5:30 to 5:45 to 6:15 and the knotmeter wound down depressingly towards 0.00, we fired the motor and packed away the sails. Deb and I switched rolls... she drove the boat while I put all the fenders out. We made a pass along the outside of the breakwall that functions as a guest dock. There was one bit of space that looked big enough to fit our boat. So much for "plenty of room!" Deb decided that it was time for me to take over again. I opted to back into the marina and into our dock spot. That would allow us to head out forwards the next day. It would also allow us to avoid a starboard side tieup, which is more challenging due to prop walk pulling the stern away from the dock when you put the boat in reverse to slow down. Fortunately Renegade backs up like a champ, and we squeaked into our spot with no issues.
After getting the boat tied up, Fredrika drove down and picked us up for dinner at our new favorite Langley restaurant, Village Pizzeria. We had pizza and beer, then went on a quest for dessert and/or coffee. Fred was kind enough to drive us to the grocery store when all the local places ended up being closed. We returned to the marina and chatted for a bit. When she tried to start the car to leave however, the battery was mostly dead. After a bit of discussion I realized, duh, my boat has not one, but two starter batteries! I'll just go get one and bring it out here, and we can jump start the car. After I unhooked one I carried it up to where there was a dock cart and pushed it the rest of the way. Those batteries are heavy, probably something to do with all that lead in there. The car started right up, Fred was on her way, and I dragged my battery back to the boat and reinstalled it. Mission accomplished!
With the eating of food, drinking of beer, and jumpstarting of cars out of the way, it was time for bed in preparation for an early start for the journey home on Friday.
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