Sailing from Friday Harbor to Seattle, WA

[wiseleyb]

Well - mostly motoring... but...

I've done a few posts on Sailnet but, since I didn't see a Westsail forum in Boat Builders row figured I'd post this here if anyone was interested.

Recently bought a Westsail 28 (pretty rare boat) and, for my inaugural trip got to bring this completely unknown-to-me boat down from Friday Harbor (WA) over Thanksgiving to Seattle's Elliot Bay Marina.

The boat's blog has pics and day by day descriptions if anyone is interested. http://westsail28.com. And more pics on flickr.

[sailingdog]

Nicely done... looks like a solid boat... but then again the Westsails have always been pretty solid boats.

[CharlieCobra]

At least ya had a good weather window. Today would not be a good day for that trip.

[wiseleyb]

@CharlieCobra - no doubt - I don't believe how lucky I got with the weather - that trip, this time of year, is (from what I see down here in Seattle) 98% complete misery

[TAREUA]

Congratulations on a good delivery! Those were some nice photos. Last year I delivered my new (only to me) boat the other direction from Poulsbo up to Semiahmoo. We rode a huge ebb North, and then hit a brisk Northerly which made the area south of Cattle Pass really sloppy. That's where we coined our phrase a 'bellringer' for any wave violent enough to cause the boat's bell to clang on it's own. Good luck with your boat, and hope you find good crew. Real sailors don't mind a little frost on the deck eh?

[Moonfish]

Wise-one - nice boat! Here's a link to a friend's website who is circumnavigating on a Westsail 28.

http://www.projectbluesphere.com/

His name is Alex Dorsey, and he's made a DVD and on-line videos of his travels to date, which include some of the refit of s/v NAMASTE. His stuff is really well done, as he was once in the Hollywood film industry. He also gave us some excerpts that we used in the Lats & Atts TV show, of which we received a lot of good feedback.

Too bad you had to leave Friday Harbor, though...

[Moonfish]

Tareua - Good one!! A "bellringer". We'll use that from now on, too. Our second Juan de Fuca crossing was with some gnarly wind vs. wave vs. tide action - rang the bell quite a few times!

I'll second the motion on going with the tide up here - if possible. Last summer we went from our slip in Snug Harbor (next to Roche Harbor) to Poulsbo for the Lats & Atts NW Cruiser Party in one 10-hour day. Not too bad, and lot's of fun. Coming home - against the tides - it took two days and 17.5 hours. Still was fun, though...

[tenuki]

Nice blog, great sailing here in PNW eh? I sail out of Edmonds, that ferry and the VTS traffic always make that area interesting.

[wiseleyb]

@tenuki: I'm hoping to find great sailing here but, after living in this calm+sunny or rainy+windy land for 7 years now I'm not sure how optimistic I am I really want to go cruising up to Alaska and that's why I got the boat. I mean - water/island wise you couldn't find a better place on earth (well, maybe Thailand, Southern Chile, Caribbean, New Zealand, New England, Greece or Croatia [ok - so there are tons of great sailing spots ]) but the wind here (at least in the convergence zone of south Sound, is ridiculously light.

I couldn't buy a motor boat. I "work" from home - so hopefully I can bail when it's windy and work when it's calm. Optimistically naming the boat "Windig" - which is German for Windy.

[tenuki]

I used to sail out of shilshoal and my experience here in edmonds has been better, partially because my boat is 10 minutes from my house and I can go when the wind is on so there is merit in your plan.

Rainy sailing is still great sailing right? :P

Long live sailflow.