passage to Astoria

Took the boat downriver to Astoria over Labor Day weekend. The Columbia was so high that we had to request the I-5 bridge be lifted, for the first time in our 7 years on the river. We spent Friday night tied up to the inside of the north dock at Sand Island, which was well protected by a debris barrier. Across the channel, St. Helens marina had its hands full pulling debris jams away from the docks. We spent Saturday in the marina at Cathlamet, after a lot of good sailing, especially downriver from Longview. We pulled into Astoria early on Sunday and headed home after visiting the Astoria Farmer's Market.

Will sailing season ever begin?

The bigger question: when will "repair season" be over? In preparation for what we had hoped would be an extended cruise to Mexico, we replaced our standing rigging and mast wiring last year. Afterwards, our masthead wind instrument was DOA, and we had a nasty leak at the partners. The first problem is still being worked on, and I finally fixed the leak by re-bedding all the screws in the deck plate surrounding the mast. We also replaced our 2-blade MaxProp with a reconditioned 3-blade prop, to reduce vibration. While hauled, we had a minor blister repaired, and a void near the rudder post filled. The exhaust thru-hull was found to be cracked and was also replaced at this time.
After a great cruising season, we had a stainless rail welded on both sides of the cockpit, in order to attach solar panels and bimini. We had a new bimini built and replaced our dodger canvas and windows.
The coup de grace to our cruising plans was the discovery that the engine problems we had long suffered with turned out to be more serious than we had thought. After long deliberation, we opted to re-power with a new engine, transmission, and panel. The new exhaust thru-hull had to be replaced with a slightly larger diameter, per the new engine specs. But there was another surprise in store! Now it turns out we are overpropped, and we are having our "new" 3-blade MaxProp cut down by PYI. This was a real puzzler, as the transmission ratios and torque curves for the old and new engines were supposedly nearly identical.
So Mexico is off for this year. With any luck we'll at least get to cruise BC again this summer.

Up the river without a paddle

We finally had a few days of Indian summer, coinciding with a school holiday, so decided to head upriver for a long weekend. On Friday we got a late start leaving Portland, so we motored for 6 hours to reach Beacon Rock State Park before dark. Only one other boat at the dock, which is one big advantage of a late season trip. This place is packed on a typical summer weekend. The park has been extensively developed in the 5 years since our last visit, and we enjoyed a long walk along the trails before night fell.
On Saturday morning, we radioed ahead to the Bonneville lockmaster, and were told we could get locked through in about an hour. It took us nearly that long to get there, as we were fighting current of up to 4 knots in places, and weaving our way through hog lines of salmon fishing boats. Here's an aerial view of the dam, with the lock to the right.
This was our first time through, and we were impressed with how easy it was. It's a bit spooky coming into the lock from downriver, and seeing that your masthead doesn't even reach the top of the sidewall! We were glad we weren't sharing the lock with any tugs or barges. It took nearly a half hour to fill the lock, after which we emerged onto a placid lake. We motored another half hour to reach the small marina at Cascade Locks. The entrance is quite shallow, but we didn't touch bottom. This is a nice facility, especially for the price (free). Since there was no wind, we decided to go for a hike on the nearby Pacific Crest Trail. When we got back to the boat, the wind had come up, so we had a nice afternoon sail over to Stevenson and back. I don't think I've ever seen such mild conditions in the Gorge.
A strong east wind came up overnight, so we had a nice trip downriver. After clearing the lock, we partially unfurled the genoa, and flew down the Gorge. When we reached Government Island, the sun gave way to fog, and the wind switched to the west. End of the season for this year. Time to start getting the boat ready for a possible departure to Mexico next year.

home!

We had an uneventful passage from Westport to the Columbia River bar, a smooth bar crossing, and a reasonably good trip upriver. As darkness approached, I decided to take the Cathlamet Channel in hopes that we could find a good spot to anchor for the night. We did, but the next morning it was low tide and we couldn't get the rest of the way up the channel - we had to backtrack 7 miles. We still managed to get to Portland by 6:30PM today, and are spending one last night on the boat before we clean up, pack up, and head down I-5 for home. It has been a great summer on the boat, and we're feeling enthused about sailing south to Mexico next year. We are very thankful to all the friends who made this trip possible, by caring for our house, our dog, and our car while we were gone.

Westport

Well, we got up on Sunday and it was raining, and the weather observations made it sound pretty tame out at sea, so we bagged our plan to hang out in the San Juans and scooted out the Strait of Juan de Fuca. We had a surprisingly smooth passage right past Race Rocks and along the central strait. When we got to Neah Bay, instead of spending the night like we usually do, we decided to push on overnight, in hopes of reaching the Columbia River bar in time for the late afternoon flood tide. Alas, we hit a northgoing current which slowed us down by a knot, so we decided to detour into Westport and spend the night. We had never been across the Gray's Harbor bar before, and it seems like it could be more challenging than the Columbia bar in bad conditions. But conditions were light today and we had no problems. No sooner had we put a line around a cleat than the US Coast Guard arrived for a safety inspection of our boat. We were asked to produce boat papers, drivers licenses, and all of the required equipment such as life jackets, flares, horns, etc. We passed with flying colors!
It was kind of a dreary day in Westport, but we entertained ourselves watching the sports fishermen (we didn't see any women!) unloading king salmon and tuna from the charter boats. We also watched the launching of a huge mega-yacht from the Westport Shipyard, which produces about a dozen of these resource-guzzling behemoths per year.
The New Hope Cafe seemed to be closed, but we had a memorable dinner at Takohachi's Restaurant - salmon with kumquat ginger sauce, seafood hot pot, and a unique flourless chocolate cake. As Waggoner's Cruising Guide would say: "recommended."
Tomorrow bright and early, if the weather gods are with us, we will make it the rest of the way to the Columbia, and start up the river towards Portland. We should be home by Thursday.

Back in the USA

We cleared Customs at Roche Harbor and are anchored for the night in Garrison Bay. Tomorrow we will head over to Fisherman's Harbor on Lopez to rendezvous with a few Oregon friends. Tuesday we will start heading out the Strait in hopes that the weather will have improved enough for the outside passage back to Portland.

Cow Bay

Cowichan Bay is a lovely place to stop, even with the weather deteriorating. We spent last night in Nanaimo, and headed on south through Dodd Narrows and Sansum Narrows to get here. There is a wooden boatbuilding center, a great bakery, and a lot of groovy thrift stores for the Admiral to browse. The couple on the next boat, Bob and Susan, are on their way to Mexico on their CS33 My Wind Song. We didn't catch any fish today, but we still get to eat salmon for dinner (good fish store here too).