We pulled Calliope out of the water on October 15 for winter storage in Bellingham.

We moved into Harvey, the RV a few days prior. Currently we are at Larrabee State Park on Chuckanut Drive just south of Bellingham.

I’ve redone the blog a bit to separate the great adventures on the water in Calliope from the great adventures on land with Leroy (truck) and Harvey. If you’ve subscribed to our blog, I don’t know if you’ll get updates on Harvey. Go check him out!

Sunday, September 22. We dropped Kloe near the ferry dock on Lummi Island yesterday and then booked down to Smuggler’s Cove because the wind and rain were coming again. This is a nice little overlooked nook, protected from the south winds. As predicted, it rained and blew most of the day. We are hoping to catch a window in the morning to scoot across Bellingham Bay into Squalicum Harbor. It’s supposed to rain and blow the rest of the week so hope we can sneak through. Bellingham Bay can be nasty. Fall is here. Time to end this journey.

Saturday, September 21. We grabbed our granddaughter Kloe from Lummi Island and motored to Sucia to spend Friday night and most of the day Saturday. We tried to sail both coming and going across Rosario Strait but there just wasn’t enough wind. We had a great time on Sucia hiking trails, kayaking, watching the wildlife, eating pork chops and cake. We think we spotted a minke whale a few times but they don’t come out of the water much so it was hard to tell. Something big.

We hiked across to Shallow Bay on the other side of Sucia to the China Caves. One would think these caves were carved out of the sandstone by waves, except that they are about 40 feet above high tide. ???

Thursday, September 19. Saturday we left San Juan Island for Prevost Harbor on Stuart Island. This was where we had our walk-uphill-both-ways-to-lighthouse adventure last spring. We hooked up with Kate and Carl on SV MOM again and went for a long walk, but not to the lighthouse. They’ve been there and done that (and admired the outhouse) too.

From Stuart we went to Waldron again. We will always stop at Waldron as we have many dear friends there. We had to bug out on Monday afternoon because a big storm was predicted for Tuesday with winds from SE. So we booked across the street about 4 nm to the north nook of Jones Island to weather the storm. Jones is a small island, all State Park. We tied to one of the park buoys as there was no room at the dock. Our clever plan was not unique. Don’t these people have to work? It’s late September!

The storm was pretty intense and we were glad to be in the lee of Jones. Later that evening we walked across the island to find an old orchard with deer eating the apples. They were very tame. The bucks came right up to us and allowed us to scratch their horns but the does were more standoffish.

After the storm, we came back to Waldron to finish our visiting. We are heading for Lummi Island today. Going to daughter’s to do laundry, shower, turn on all lights, turn up heat and open all windows and doors! Bwahahaha!

Friday, September 13. We cleared US Customs at Roche Harbor yesterday and headed south a couple of miles into this well-protected bay. There is a small park with a 2 mile loop trail we hiked this morning. Not very long or steep. We are most definitely back in civilization with a lot of houses. Seems like not too many people around though. Wouldn’t want to be here in summer!

Wednesday, September 11. We are anchored off of Russell Island preparing to cross Haro Strait tomorrow morning at O Dark Thirty to check in with US Customs at Roche Harbor, San Juan Island. We stopped at Russell Island on our way north but didn’t take any photos, so here they are:

Monday, September 9. We left Princess Cove this morning, motored down to Prevost Island and anchored in James Bay. There is an old homestead here between James Bay and Selby Cove that is now a Provincial Park with trails and an old apple orchard. Right after we anchored this morning, a park service boat with three guys came in here. Two guys got off the boat and disappeared in the trees while the third stayed with the boat. We wondered what the heck they were doing. After about 15 minutes the two guys came back with fistfuls of apples!

It’s not a bad anchorage, but we get some rollers every time a gorilla goes by out in Captain Passage. We have come up with a boat classification system for easy communications while underway. Big power boats are gorillas. As in, “There’s a gorilla coming up on our port side.” They are alright but totally unaware of the havoc they wreak. They’re huge, move fast and have a monster wake. They’re also clueless. They wave as they go by while we are floundering in their wake. They wonder why people in sailboats don’t wave back. Then there are gorillas who deliberately come too close, cut you off, make you change course, know what they’re doing and don’t care. These are Silverbacks. Then there are considerate gorillas who slow down as they pass. We call these Bigfoot. Smaller power boats are baby gorillas. Really big power boats are floating hotels.

Small boats are mosquitoes. Mostly harmless but annoying as hell, cutting across your bow, stern, whatever, going really fast. The wakes aren’t usually bad but you have to keep from hitting them. I finally gave up and decided that it’s up to them to avoid me hitting them. Included in this class are sport fishermen and small tour boats. The tour boats are rubber, hold about a dozen people strapped in like a roller coaster ride while the captain zips around at breakneck speed looking for whales, grizzlies, waterfalls, rapids or something to entertain the paying customers. The really annoying ones, besides silverbacks, are wasps. These are mid-sized, usually aluminum, water taxis. They deliver goods and people all over. They are always in a hurry, put up large wakes, come really close (on purpose, I think) and don’t care. Then you have cruise ships, ferries, tugs and barges, fishing boats, crabbers and shrimpers. They’re kinda like semi trucks on the highway while you are a Volkswagen bug. You just try to stay out of their way and prepare for a nasty wake. They’re working and just don’t have time for you.

Monday September 9. We left Sergeant Bay last Wednesday, crossed the Strait of Georgia and anchored off of Newcastle Island across from Nanaimo. It was very busy. We only stayed one night, walked the trails next morning, then sailed downwind to Dodd Narrows. After crossing the Narrows, we motored down to Pirates Cove and parked in the south nook again. We stayed in both of these places on our way north last spring, so I didn’t add more blog entries for them. [Note how casually I now mention crossing the Strait of Georgia and Dodd Narrows. Ha ha. I’m still plenty nervous, just not Pee-my-pants panicked.]

On Saturday, September 7, we motored south to Princess Cove on Wallace Island. We also anchored at Wallace on our way north, but we were in Sunrise Cove on the south end because of the NW winds. Now the winds are coming primarily from the SE, so we get to stay in places that we had to bypass before. Princess Cove is a sweet, narrow little cove with access to the trails on Wallace. It is also very popular and had about a dozen boats over this weekend after Labor Day!

An added bonus in Princess Cove was that our friends Kate and Carl were there on Sailing Vessel MOM (Moonflower Of Moab). We first met Kate and Carl at Prevost Harbor on Stuart Island at the very beginning of our journey. They also live on their boat in summer and a camper in winter and have been doing for more than ten years now. They have been ever so helpful. We have run into them several times over the summer: Shoal Bay, Forward Harbor and Alert Bay. They helped us through Johnstone Strait the first time and have given us good advice and lots of encouragement.

SV MOM in Princess Cove with half moon.