Happy holidays from our family to yours!

This is our first ever "real" family portrait, taken at Sunset Beach a few weeks ago when the Seattle contingent was visiting. From left to right: Jackson, Lauren, Zach (from Seattle), us, Shea, Jess, Sue and Tyler (from St. Pete Beach). Wishing everyone a joyous and peaceful holiday!

This made for an interesting night's sleep

We had visitors for Thanksgiving (the Seattle kid, girlfriend and new grandson) so gave them the house, while we slept on the boat. Ah, just like old times, except we don't remember leaning quite this much while we slept ever before. Here at the new dock in Madeira Beach a low tide means we're bumping the bottom, but this particular phase of the moon gave us a super low tide, and we hit the sweet spot a few nights ago. Walking through the boat was like walking through a fun house. And sleeping was pretty weird. We're happy to report that Capt. Bivalve did a pre-emptive tie to the dock that kept us upright the rest of the nights and many good nights of sleep were had by all.

Why can't all marinas be like this?

We must say, seeing these notices from our old marina in DC, the Gangplank Marina, certainly makes us nostalgic. When was the last time you were served steak by your dockmaster?

Bye, Running Free

See ya next year. Bob said goodbye to the boat yesterday after popping a lot of blisters and winterizing everything. Nothing like cheap vodka in the water tanks to keep them from freezing, although it's usually not that cold in Seattle. Still, you have to prepare for the craziest weather possible. We've been warned to keep boat heaters (very low heat) running below lest we come back to moss hanging from the ceiling in the cabin, so we did, although it makes us mighty nervous. Bob's on a flight back to Florida today. Won't he be stunned at the scorching heat after Seattle, where fall is setting in already?

A fabulous last day . . .

Sheesh, Seattle, did you really have to give us the best weather of the year for Kitty's last day? We had a fabulous day of sailing the day before Kitty left. One last look at gorgeous Rainier on a nearly deserted Puget Sound. Bob took Kitty to the airport and the next day departed for Running Free's winter home and a first look at the bottom. Unfortunately, our little vessel has zits, aka blisters. Bob has popped them all so they can drain over the winter, is in the process of winterizing the boat, and will fly home on Tuesday. He'll likely have to strip the old ablative paint off next year, which will just suck, patch the blisters and put new bottom paint on. We hope this will take care of it for about the next five years. As cold as the water is here, not a lot grows on bottoms.

Tasting wine in Woodinville

Since Kitty will be in the air all day on our anniversary tomorrow, we decided to celebrate yesterday with a little road trip to Woodinville, where there are wine tasting rooms ranging from the gorgeous and spectacular, like Chateau Ste. Michelle, to the mundane, like little storefronts in strip malls. In keeping with our fairly low-brow taste, we thought the best we tried was Alexandria Nicole's Bohemian Blend, which had a bunch of Malbec in it, which Kitty adores, and was only $20. Bob, as most of you know, is no wine drinker, but put up with several tastings before we headed over to the Red Hook Brewery for a sausage sampler and some Copper Hook, which he has fallen in love with. While we suppose the nine-course dinner (with six matching wines!) at The Herbfarm would've been lovely, at $200 each, we decided that was just a bit beyond our means and went instead to a very cute, yummy and reasonably priced Italian place for dinner. We had a fabulous time, and Kitty is already depressed at the idea of leaving Seattle, although she is getting out of here just in time to avoid the trip to the boatyard, the haulout and whatever awaits Capt. B when he gets a look at the bottom.

Summer weather update

We didn't want you to think that summer has been a complete bust. We're now up to 351 minutes of summer -- up from 78 a few weeks ago. We haven't let that stop us from having fun. If you waited for decent weather here you'd never do anything. Zach, Lauren and Jackson came over for a quick trip out in the Sound and dinner yesterday. Those crazy Seattleites think it's sunbathing weather, evidently. Meanwhile, we've been bustling around to the Space Needle gift shop (a must if you want Space Needle pepper grinders, banks, T-shirts, corkscrews . . . ) and other places for a few gifts to take home. This is Bob -- at the foot of the real thing -- showing off the Space Needle Lego set for the little boys back home.

Knock knock.

Who's there? A big fat salmon, that's who. Just a few minutes ago, our neighbor knocked on the boat and delivered one he'd caught out in Puget Sound today. Bob had given him some buffing pads that we'd unearthed from a locker while cleaning out the boat, and he promised he'd bring us a salmon someday in return. Today he delivered. We have no idea what to do with it, but that's what Google and the Food Network's for, so we'll figure it out. Very exciting to have a real, whole, fresh, locally caught, gorgeous salmon on ice in the ice box. Such a cool Seattle moment.

Going, going, gone

We watched Jackson last night so Lauren and Zach could have some adult time. At about 6, he started getting a little fussy so Bob picked him up and started walking around with him. Pretty soon he'd conked out, way too early for bed, actually. Imagine Lauren and Zach's delight when they got home at 8:30, only to find Jackson in the bathtub, having just woken up from his "nap" and into full-on party time mode. At times like this, we must say, it is just awesome to be grandparents, say bye-bye for the evening and give our best wishes to the parents for surviving the night.

One can never have enough boats . . .

. . . at least that's the theory we appear to be operating on. We acquired our fourth today, a dinghy for Running Free. It was a good deal, and all we had to do was row it from one dock to another in our marina. In Washington state you don't even have to register them, as long as the outboard's less than 10 hp and you put the mother ship's registration numbers on the bow. We finally get why we see a lot of people tooling around here in dinghies with 9.9 hp motors.

An overnight to Blake Island

A day with sun is a day to sail, so off we went to Blake Island, south from us in Puget Sound. We wanted to go to the Ultimate Northwest Experience (that would be in capital letters, mind you), but, alas, there was no room at the marina. We were very likely saved from a tacky tourist extravaganza, but were kinda bummed anyway. We went back out into the mooring field, but have no dinghy, so there we sat, consoling ourselves with the most unimaginably spectacular view of Mt. Rainier at sunset. Oh, and we ran out of CNG gas for the stove, so no dinner either (and no coffee the next morning -- see pic of Kitty being cranky). We ate cheese, crackers, hummus and cookies. And drank a lot. And rolled a lot to the ferry wakes, but managed to sleep just fine. We even took showers for the first time on the boat, thanks to our oh-so-modern hot water heater, which heats water when the engine runs. Mighty cool. We mean hot, of course.

We're not in Florida anymore, part 242

Back where we come from, the tides are about two to three feet, but here in Seattle it's quite another story. On the full and new moons, the range is 14 feet. These pics are from yesterday, one day off the most extreme range of the month. Because of the crazy range, all marinas here have floating docks and ramps, but you still have to think twice before taking a fully loaded dock cart either up or down one at low tide, lest it get away from you and go off the dock and into the drink. It's pretty impressive to think about that amount of water flowing into and out of Puget Sound every six hours. The smart sailors time their trips up and down the Sound accordingly, and we're trying to be smart by waiting for the tide to turn before we head down the Sound for an overnight at Blake Island. We have sun, therefore we sail!

Look - up in the sky . . .

It's a sun. It came and went very quickly last night, when a hoard of people gathered on the hill above our marina to watch that thing in the sky that no one around here has seen in so long set over Puget Sound. Gorgeous. Please come back, sun.

Standing on the boom redux

One of our favorite pictures was taken in 2006 in Buzzards Bay when Capt. B thought it would be fun to see what the view was like from the boom. Turns out it was pretty awesome. So, it was no great surprise that he wanted to repeat the experience Sunday on the Seattle boat. Kitty believes there were definitely elements of needing to prove he still had what it takes, and he clearly does.

We know all of you are sweltering, and we truly sympathize . . .

. . . but here in Seattle we've had exactly 78 minutes of acceptable summer weather since June 1.

According to the Seattle Times:

It's only happened twice, he found. First, on July 2, for all of 12 minutes. And then again on July 6, for 66 minutes. Sistek decided to look back to June 1 to see how much of our summer has actually been summery. Using a minute by minute temperature station at the UW's Atmospheric Sciences Department, he looked for "truly warm summer" moments — which he defined as any time the temperature reached at least 80 degrees. That's it, Seattle. We've had a grand total of 78 minutes of summer. As Sistek put it, if you went to a movie you could miss it.

Lucky for us, we took advantage of the first week of July by sailing a bit. This weekend? Maybe? So they say. Meanwhile, we start everyday below in the cabin with the heater running and the boat closed up.

Sails (both of them) up!

Took an overnight trip to Bainbridge Island and were treated to this lovely view of Seattle on another gorgeous sunny day. We unfurled the jib and were pleased that the roller furling didn't come crashing down on our heads, so so far so good. It works just fine, and for that we're grateful, but realize this won't last forever. But for right now, we can sail with two sails, which improves our speed considerably. Bainbridge was beautiful, especially at sunset when you can look over at Seattle across the sound.

Mount Rainier to the left of us . . .

Mount Olympus to the right of us, and a cruise ship on top of us. Drop-dead gorgeous sailing everywhere this past Saturday, when we headed out into Puget Sound for a new adventure -- hoisting the sails. Well, hoisting a sail. We got the main up and down, but weenied out on unfurling the jib in the fairly stiff breezes. Figured that might better be tried in the slip when the airs were light. We discovered how wide the shipping channel is when three cruise ships barreled out of the port of Seattle and aimed right for us. Okay, okay, we get it now. The middle is yours -- it's a deal. We once again broke out in a sweat when the depth sounder stopped working, which only meant it was in 500+ feet of water and freaking out. The depths continuing to astound us, as do the beautiful surroundings. We've had one gorgeous, sunny day after another lately with temps in the mid 70s. Eating salmon and Rainier cherries and just generally having a fabulous time. Seems like everybody in our marina has crab traps, which they take out into the Sound, drop, and then return a few hours later to pull them, having caught their daily limit of five big, fat Dungeness crabs. We are panting after those crabs, but the salmon's just gonna have to do for now. As we keep saying, poor us.

Hey, there they are!

The clouds have parted this morning, probably only for a short while, and there they are again -- those gorgeous Olympics. Pretty awesome view from our back door, aka the stern, and we don't mean the barbecue grill hanging off the guy's boat next to us.

Work proceeds, but we think most things are under control. Everything's organized below, which makes us feel ever so much saner. Bob spent an entire day going through the cockpit lockers and finding interesting things, like crab traps. Totally clean and organized now, which is an awesome feeling.

Trying to get out of here for a cruise next week, but we're mildly concerned about our forestay and the very old Profurl roller furling, apparently original to the boat in 1984 when it was built. A guy who was working on the furling gear of the boat next to us came over and took a look at ours, pronouncing it in need of replacement, for a mere $3,600. Pondering our options, but they don't include dropping multiple thousands right now. Sailing without a jib? Hanking it on? Who knows, but hoping we can get by til at least next year.

Liveaboard re-entry in full swing

Kitty arrived in Seattle Tuesday at noon with a six-page list and military level plans for the rest of the day to take full advantage of the rental car. Ikea is conveniently situated right near the airport, so that was the first stop. A shocking $450 later we emerged with most of the necessities to live aboard – linens, cookware, flatware, and beyond. Next stop Wal-Mart, where we dropped a couple more boat bucks. After a visit with Lauren, Zach and Jackson, who has no idea how much his grandparents are working to be near him, it was off to Target for something we forgot and then Kitty’s first look at the boat. She pronounced it cute, perfectly sized, a bit frayed around the edges and in need of cleaning and organization. We collapsed into the V-berth, but not before we had to clean all of that and get sheets, comforters and pillows all installed on a funky-shaped mattress.

Oh yeah, cleaning and organization. You cruisers know what we’re talking about: The cockpit is full of stuff and you have nowhere to put it. There’s nothing quite like the letdown that occurs on a small boat like ours when you gleefully notice a locker you hadn’t seen before, rush over to it anticipating stowing a pressure cooker or some other bulky item, and then realize it’s full of something else that can’t be rearranged – like an engine or hot water tank. We did a huge grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s Wednesday to take advantage of our last moments of having the car, which delighted Kitty to no end (ah, Two-Buck Chuck, we meet again), and now have a functioning galley, which was a priority. The functioning galley and functioning V-berth, however, are bookending a real mess in the middle, but we’ll be working to fix that this weekend. Some of us are actually trying to earn a living in the middle of this chaos, but we’ve managed to make room on the settee table for a laptop, cup of coffee, pen and small pad of paper, so that’s kinda ok.

Our first trip out of the marina was last night to pump out the holding tank, reminding us yet again of the glamorous life of cruisers. We went outside the breakwater and motored around Puget Sound for an hour. We were expecting a very special guest, our grandson, for his first visit to the boat so we didn’t have time to actually sail. We were stunned to see how deep the water was – 170-foot depths are not unusual here. We’ve got 30 feet under us in the marina. No, we’re not in Florida anymore. We also didn’t spend much time out there because the weather was really marginal, as you can see from the picture. We got rained on before we got back in the slip. It’s been like this since we got here. Seattle’s having some kind of unusually long spring. It’s been in the mid-50s at night and struggling to get to 70 during the day. We’ve run the kerosene cabin heater every day, at least in the mornings. The weather changes constantly: sun, clouds, lots of clouds, clearing, rainy – repeat. Still, when the clouds part and you can get those brief glimpses of the Olympics across Puget Sound, it’s pretty glorious.

All in all, a perfectly fine little boat that’s a completely different experience than maneuvering our full-keeled Equinox around. Running Free is super light, small, easy to get in and out of the slip and turns on a dime. That’s pretty fun. Kitty got her first real taste of wheel steering last night on our little trip. So different than a tiller and seems slightly ridiculous on a boat this size, but we’re sure we’ll get used to it. There seem to be no major problems so far, although we had a couple of minor wrinkles. When we realized we needed a pumpout, we discovered to our horror Thursday night that the deck plate to the holding tank was completely corroded and frozen. Bob beat on it for awhile, put PB Blaster on it, genuflected a few times to the cruising gods and then went to bed. The next morning he was able to get it open, thank God. The stuffing box also needed to be adjusted because way too much water was dripping into the boat, but that was a pretty easy fix.

We’re planning a two-week cruise right after Fourth of July, probably to the San Juans, so we can keep our marina convinced we’re not liveaboards. They continue to adjust their definition of what that means, from half of every calendar month to half the total time your boat is in the marina. We are definitely in asking for forgiveness and not permission mode on that front. Also making inquiries into another marina where there are liveaboard slips, so stay tuned.

Our new Seattle "home"

Ok, so maybe Capt. B isn't quite as charming as Kitty thinks he is. He was not able to convince the people in charge at the marina that we should be allowed to live aboard our new boat for two months. That's the bad news. The good news is that the definition of "living aboard" is sleeping on your boat for more than 15 days in a calendar month. So we're set in June in August because we'll just be there half of both months. In July, we guess we will be forced to go on a cruise of Puget Sound or the San Juans. The rest of the time we'll have to live here. Damn. Our life is just ruined.