Blakley Island, USA

Written by Eldor, Friday afternoon
As I write this I'm sitting in the shade of a 80 ft tall fir tree on a beautiful sun shiny day looking over the blue waters of the San Juan Islands. Did I mention its all of 65 degrees F? Someone has to do it.
Yesterday we sailed from Sidney, on Vancouver Island to Roche Harbor on San Juan Island, a distance of 11 nautical miles in 1 hour and 45 minutes. Our little boats are only supposed be capable of a little over 4 knots but we had a good wind and a very strong tidal current pushing us and once I saw 9 kts on my GPS.
Today we left Roche Harbor for Blakley Island and there was no wind and we had to motor all the way.
Tomorrow will be the last day of this wonderful cruise., the weather has been cool but there was some sunshine almost every day and all of the people sailing with have become very good friends. We will really miss them when we all go our separate ways.

Rain!

We have had limited wi-fi so we have kind of gotten behind. The above pictures were taken at Conover Cove.

This morning we are tied up to the dock at Bird's Eye Cove in Maple Bay on Vancouver Island. It lightly rained thru the night and it continues as we prepare to leave for Port Sidney still on Vancouver Island. Tomorrow night we will be at Roche Harbor USA and will have better connections.

Sad News

I received word just a little while ago that my niece passed away today. There is no way that we can get back to Salt Lake City for the service. We are with a group of nine sailboats and I can not ask them to return to Anacortes. We will not sail back by ourselves. Even if we were to try, there just isn't enough time.
I'd like to ask my friends to pray for my niece's family. She leaves behind a daughter, sister, brother and father.

Thank you, Dorothy

Poet's Cove

We had a great afternoon and night at Poet's Cove. It is a very nice resort. There was a rendezvous of BIG boats there also. One one side of us was a 45 ft boat and on the other was a 39 ft. They sure did make us look small! Our little boom tent has been a life saver. almost doubles our dry space at night.
Right now we are tied up to the dock at Ganges. It is a great little town. We arrived about noon after motoring over (NO wind). We did have a VERY brief shower on the way over. And yesterday while we were at the bristro there was a brief shower. Other than that the weather has been good.
Since it it Saturday, they have a great farmer's market. It reminded me very much of the one in Salt Lake City. We walked around and sampled some great cheeses and did finally buy some. We also bought a few things at the market. So far our supplies have been about right.
Tomorrow we hope to sail to Monteque Harbor. I think it is about 8 miles. I'm not sure if we will tie up to a dock or anchor out. .

We're in Canada

We have cleared customs and are now tied up to the dock at Poet's Cove.The weather continues to be beautiful. We spend a very pleasant night at the dock on Stuart Island. That is was it after Eldor figured out that it was the tea pot on the burner at was making a noise every time the boat rolled. I thought it was the boat behind us. He had his anchor tied to his bow pulpit and I thought he had taken out his hearing aides and the noise wasn't bothering him. The trip from Roche Harbor was kind of rough and I went below for a while until the captain called me back up for winch duty. Our next stop is Ganges Island. So far we have not seen and whales or much other sea life.

This is the first real connection I have had in while and it is very slow. Everyone here at Poet's Cove is very helpful except the ATM. It wouldn't talk to our bank and give us any money. So we just went to the resort's front desk and exchanged money. We have both had nice hot showers and Eldor is doing some laundry while I slowly write this..
We will be in Canada until June 25. I have NO idea if I will get another connections until we get back to Roche Harbor.
If you are reading this, would you please add a comment We have no idea if anyone is reading this. .

Garrison Bay

No signal! We broke off from the group and went back to Roche Harbor this morning to get supplies. Group delayed start because of fog. We eill rejoin them in a short time and all head to Stuart Island.

Friday Harbor, part 2

We had a good day in Friday Harbor. Some good food and a little shopping. The night was very quite tied up in a slip. We had one more Monty join us from Canada. It is fun to see all the different boats and to see have each sailor has rigged his boat. There is a 1974, 1976, a couple of 2005 and then ours is a 1992.
Today we sail to Garrison bay on the northwest side of San Juan Island. We will anchor out again so I'm not sure it we will have a signal or not.
The weather continues to hold good. The daytime highs are in the high 60' s and the nights are in the low 50's. The winds have been a variety, from light and variable to exhilarating.

Friday Harbor

We had a good sail to Friday Harbor. We were one of the last ones to leave our anchorage this morning and it looked like we would be left behind. The boats in front of us lost wind and we caught up. Then we all struggled along. More wind and off we go! We were the first ones into Friday Harbor because we tacked less with our fixed keel that allows us to point higher.
The weather is overcast this afternoon but we have had NO rain. Couldn't ask for better weather. We had a good night in our anchorage last night. We got out the Magna grill and had grilled fresh Washington state asparagus, sweet potatoes and hamburgers. IT'S A TOUGH LIFE BUT SOMEONE HAS TO DO IT!!
Sometimes it feels rather chilly to us Texas, but we are manageing because we have some good sweatshirts. Inmagine, Sweatshirts in late June. We stay nice and cozy at night with our new boomtent and our wool blanket.
Eldor has spent a lot of time playing with his GPS. He is trying so hard to learn how to set the waypoints. Then he get frustrated!! So far we have not gotten lost because we stay in sight of the other boats.
We are all meeting in a little while to go eat together.

Day 2

Beautiful weather, GREAT sailing, now anchored in Blind Bay on Shaw Island.
Friday Harbor tonight and a better signal!

Dubious Awards night

On Saturday things didn't get much better. Sometime while we were traveling someone let down the swim ladder on the boat and climbed in.
There wasn't anything in the cockpit to get so they broke off our VHF antenna.That needed to be replaced. Of course, there is a West Marine handy. Some dollars more we had the parts to replace it. Not an easy job but with some southern engineering and dropping his favorite little ratchet and socket set over board, Eldor did get the VHF working again.
The above picture is of Eldor receiving the "light at the end of the tunnel" award. I sure hope that all the bad things are over!!
We sailed out of Anacortes this morning at about 10:00 am. We had a great day of sailing and I'm sitting here on Blakey Island writing this. I will leave the sailing detailing to Eldor, but we did have a good day sailing and ended up where we were supposed to be. It was foggy this morning but as I sit here now the sun is shining. I'm so glad we didn't use up all the sunshine. We will all be join in a cookout tonight.

In the Water!!

Friday morning found us ready t0 launch. Dorothy drove the motorhome with the boat to the sling while Eldor went to the office to make arrangements for launch. Things went well and Dorothy had the boat backed in the sling before Eldor was finished in the office. It's little scary when they lift the boat and you hear all the creaking and groaning. All was well when the boat went in the water but then they began to fall apart!

Eldor started the motor to move to our slip and the motor poured out fuel and was making quite a slick. An outboard motor mechanic was called to come and get our motor. It was surprising how quickly he came. Just a little over a $100 and a little time and we had it back.(We weren't leaving without a motor!) While we were waiting, Eldor decided to flush our internal water tank. Again all was going well until he got distracted and overfilled the tank. We had to take everything to out and dry it off.

We enjoyed visiting with old friends and making new ones.

Hello All
I suppose some of you are wondering why 2 updates in 1 day. Well I thought that some of you sailors might be interested in another blog about our cruise. There is another blog on the Monty San Juan Cruise being done by our good friend, Sean. It can be found at http;//smallcraftadvisor.com/our-blog
It is not dedicated to our cruise, you will have to wade thru other blog entries to Dauntless Log or Montgomery San Juan Cruise.
A couple from the Tucson area with a M23 just pulled into the parking lot and are parked beside us. Fred and Lilly seem like a real nice couple and have done this cruise before but not 2 years ago when we did it.
Another couple from California, Tom and Delta Jenkins have arrived. We met them last year at the Havasu Porker Run sail on Lake Havasu.

Many of the buildings along main street have murals painted on them. Its very interesting to walk down the street and see all the pictures.

Getting ready!

This is the interior of our boat where we will live for two weeks. It doesn't look too tight right now but there are so many items that need to be stowed. Things like clothes, food, sails, maps etc. We are making progress.
The weather has continued to be good, but I'm sure that will change when we get on the water. There should be at least one other boat arriving today. Most will come in tomorrow and Saturday. I'm not sure if we will put the boat in today or wait until early tomorrow morning. We are trying to get everything stowed before we get on the water because it is quite a walk to our slip.
We received an email this morning telling us that Orcas have been spotted near San Juan Island. I hope they are still there when we get there. We are so excited about this cruise.
On a sad note, yesterday I heard from my brother-in-law that my 45 year old niece is in ICU with liver and kidney failure. At this time they have no idea what to expect. I would like to ask everyone to add Susie and her family to your prayer list. Thank you, Dorothy

Anacortes! We have arrived!

Here we are at our road destination! We arrived today and checked in at the marina office. We are the first to arrive but there will soon be more Montys here. While we were parked in the lot at the marina a car stopped and a couple got out and with awe said" Is that a Montgomery?" They were from the Denver area have been looking for a small sailboat. They seems to know quite a bit about the Montys but had never seen one. We told them to come back at the end of the week and they would see all three sizes and probably one of the biggest assemblies of Monty. I think they will try.
We unloaded our scooters and took off to find the post office. We retrieved our mail and then went to "the Brown Lantern" for lunch. Great different items than we see in other areas. Eldor had a sandwich call a Santa Anna tuna. I'm not sure what it had in it but it bit back. It was good though.
We have the motorhome settled in the lot and have been making piles of things that need to be transferred to the boat. We did buy some supplies this morning but I'm sure there are other things that we will think of. Tomorrow we will be arranging things in the boat. We have made arrangements to have the boat launched by sling on Thursday so that we will be out of the way of the other 15 Montys.

We're over the mountains!

We are currently in camp Walmart in Marysville, WA. Just a couple of miles north of Everett and only a few miles short of our destination.
We came across Stevens Pass. That was an "interesting" drive. Thanks, Gayle, for the brakes on the boat trailer. We felt MUCH safer! (Believe me, there were places I was Really glad we had trailer brakes.)
We woke to sunshine but when we stopped in Lavenworth we had our rain shower. Nothing much, just a cloud over the mountain.
This area and time of year is known for it's cherries. We HAD to stop to get some. They weren't cheap but they sure are good. The picture above is the floral display at the market. It was just too spectacular not to take a picture. We also stopped later for fresh asparagus.
We had planned to see Dorothy's brother, but it didn't fit in his plans. We'll try to catch up with him on the return trip.
Today we will be shopping for supplies for the trip and then try to figure out where we are going to stow supplies for two weeks on a 17 ft boat.

Pioneer Museum and Wall Drug

Any of you who have ever crossed S.D. on I- 90 probably remember seeing about 200 miles of billboards about the Pioneer Antique Auto museum and Wall Drug. The Pioneer Museum has not only cars but also tractors, motorcycles, all types of farm plows, tools and hundreds of other things. It would take several days to see everything but since it was cold and raining we only spent about 3 hrs. One of the highlights was finally seeing a Whippit. On many occasions I ( Eldor ) have heard my Dad talking about the car he had when he and Mom got married, a Whippit, and we have stopped at MANY antique auto museums all across the country and this is the first one we have found.
Anyone who enjoys unrestored antiques of all kinds should stop there when in that part of the country.
Wall Drug in Wall, S.D.
In a town of maybe 2000 people has this drug store that covers at least a good sized city block and their claim to fame is all you can drink coffee for a nickel a cup on the honor system. They carry as much variety as Walmart except groceries and at 2:00 pm Wed. the store was so full of people from all over the U.S. you couldn't stir them with a stick. Dorothy had a cheeseburger and I had a Buffalo burger. The buffalo burger was very good but I couldn't tell the difference between it and hamburger. After fighting the crowd for about 30 minutes we left and found a campground to spend the night.

Rain, Rain go away!!

The rain has been following us all along our way. The above picture was taken between Butte and Missoula, MT this morning. We are hearing that the weather has been good in the area we are heading to. We can only hope. Nothing special to report today, just driving and listening to an audio book. Audio books certainly help the time go by when the scenery doesn't change and we are just making miles.
Saturday night we are in a VERY small park in Davenport, WA. It's in eastern Washington state on Highway 2. We still have to go over the Washington mountains.

Saturday morning, when we woke up the tempature was 42 degrees. It is warmer here.

Hello Relatives, friends,Calvary, and AYC members
After completing Family business in the K.C. area we crossed a corner of Iowa into the rolling prairie of South Dakota where our 1st stop was at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD. A very unusual building, Most of the interior decor is murals made of 12 varieties and colors of corn. It also has a gym where several colleges and high schools play basketball, and has a stage for concerts and plays.
They have an artist on staff who creates murals for 2 of the exterior walls made entirely of corn and other grain products grown in the area. Since corn on the cob and corn stalks only lasts so long outdoors they completely recover those 2 walls every year with new murals.
For all of you sailors out there, don't despair, we will have our boat in the water about June 12.
Stand by for periodic updates. Eldor

We're on our way to the Northwest!

Well, we left home after enjoying a great crawfish boil put on at the yacht club by our good friend, Paul. Sure were good mudpuppies! Thanks, Paul.
We traveled on to Dorothy's son's in Richmond, MO where we have our own personal hook-ups. Eldor stayed in Richmond while Dorothy went to St Louis to spend time with her aunt. Back to Richmond and then to Sedalia, MO for the Escapees club Escapade, their weeklong national rally. We had a great time meeting up with friends that we only see once a year and other that we see a little more often. Good ol Missouri weather was as unpredicable as ever. It rained several days and since there were over 800 RV parked in a grassy field, when it came time to leave about half had to have a wrecker to pull them out. Including us.
We were able to spend a little time in K.C. with Dorothy's sister and her family.