Love from Portland

Wow. It seems like a long time since I have written. It really is amazing how much can happen in a two week period. It seems like there is so much to tell.

Friday harbor was really a great little town. It was every bit as amazing as Cuba made it out to be. The amount of wild life hanging around the marina for the kids to see on a daily basis was phenomenal! They were constantly entertained and intrigued. The floating planes flying in and out right in front of our boat all day long never got old either.

I took the kids to the Whale Museum which was small, but pretty cool. The entire entrance to the museum is a staircase that has been painted in such a way that you ascend from the ocean floor to the sky above the waters’ surface. From the bull kelp and the crabs to the orcas jumping and the birds flying overhead. It was really well done and has made me consider doing something similar to Asher’s room since he was especially impressed with it.

When you walked into the main room there were skeletal systems from several large marine mammals. They had sound waves, pictures, charts, teeth, sculls and brains. It was a little sad though because of how many whales and other mammals have been hunted and put in danger. After we left Asher was in tears over the extinction of a particular species of gray whale. Luckily he didn’t stay heartbroken for too long. I do love how sensitive and thoughtful he is. He is so easily moved with compassion it blesses me, but I really hate to see my children cry.

On the third of July the town was having a little function down at the water front where the kids’ beloved stone seal is. We had gone up there because there are some public outlets and picnic tables where Cuba could finish up a little work and the kids could play. We had no idea there was going to be a gathering there. We found a table off to the side and sat down. At first it was pleasant Native singing, but at some point this woman started up an open mic and during the slots where no one was singing proceeded to sing herself. It was a train wreck if I have ever heard one and it went on and on. She even sang some songs more than once. It was absolutely redonkulous!

It was so bad that I paid Liberty $1.00 to go and sing a song just to get her off the stage. Well I got what I paid for. She went to go sing all right, but what came out was “um… Hi my name is Liberty and I’m going to sing you a song…. You’re a grand old flag. You’re a high flying flag…um” hands on mouth.

Next thing I know the woman who is running this open mic looks around and says,” Who’s your mother?” With a point and a smile I was compelled to help her out. I couldn’t just abandon her. So I sat in the only chair on stage with her on my lap and sang a song that I barely knew all the words to since she had learned it in her Kindergarten class (thanks Miss Ann). But at least I didn’t have to hear The Saints Go Marching In one more time.

That night we were fiddling around with our sewage holding tank system trying to fix something and a component that we suspected would break sometime finally did. Really bad timing. We were expecting our first visitors the next morning. This was going to require an early morning trip to town to buy a connector to splice our hose together with, then to come rushing back to fix it in time to get our friends from the ferry.

We were awoken the next morning at 6am, too early, by the sound of fireworks being tested on the water. The noise echoed back in such a way that we thought something had hit us, not to mention the boat doing the testing was no more than 300 feet away from us. It was a completely shocking and terrifying way to wake up.

On to the toilet repair, lets talk about gross!!! This was one of the grosses jobs I think I’ve ever done. There is nothing more real than the smell of raw stagnant sewage that has been sitting in the pipes for god knows how long. Our need for a proper holding tank and sewage grade hosing just got bumped to the top of the list of priorities. And I’m talking immediately!!!

Nevertheless we managed to temporarily fix the leak and splice the two hoses together in a very short amount of time. And rush back over to the ferry terminal and have a little time to spare. And as much of a hassle as these little problems and inconveniences have been they have bonded us closer and inspired us in our amazing capabilities to accomplish, problem solve and work together to do anything. We really make an awesome team.

After that whole debacle was over the day was great! We picked up our good friends Cate and Earl for the weekend. Our first visitors!!! They could not have come at a better time. Fourth of July weekend spent on a boat hanging out and watching the fireworks. We got ourselves stocked with groceries for dinner, ice cream and beer. We were blessed with the first really warm day we’d had since arriving in the Islands and great company. It was phenomenal.

After a delicious meal of grilled hamburgers and corn with salad followed by ice cream, we were ready and excited to watch the fireworks, not to mention very full. We were a little distracted however by the 165ft Westport yacht, named Katya, which had pulled in earlier that morning to block our view with her magnificent and tantalizing ways. She was like the devil incarnate, gleaming with brilliance and taunting us with a bad case of boat envy. Not to mention reminding us of all the egregious amounts of wealth that we were surrounded by. Ahhhh Katya, with your underwater glowing lights illuminating the way between me and you, and your streamlined hull with your shiny million dollar glossy coat that I could almost see my reflection in… Anyway the fireworks were awesome. They lasted a really long time and the sounds of thunder that accompanied them from the water were incredible. I think I could honestly say that they were the best display we had seen yet.

The next morning we wanted to take them to a state park and go explore so we pulled anchor and headed out. We ended up at the world's smallest state park. Although the entire island was indeed a park it was only about 500 feet across. We sat on top of the hill for 20-30 minutes and decided we should probably keep searching. So back into the dinghy, onto our boat, and off to find a place to explore.

We found our way up to Jones Island which was great. We tied to a mooring buoy and ventured out. The kids, Cate and I went swimming and ran on the beach. We hiked to the other side of the island and saw deer, built a campfire cooking stew and toasted bread for dinner. Then we rowed back to the boat for the night and slept. We saw them off on the ferry the next morning to everyone’s dismay and spent the next day getting ready for Bob and Lynn (Cuba’s parents) to come in the morning.

They arrived the next day at around noon and we showed them around town a bit before going back to the boat. While they were here we went on a tour around the island on a bus and saw some of the beautiful countryside, an alpaca farm, one of the other towns and a pod of whales off the coast at one of the state parks. It was pretty cool.

While they were here Bob helped me get our dinghy situation straightened out. Shortly after arriving in the San Juan’s we noticed that our dinghy was not holding air in the right side of the floor. We bought the dinghy a year ago and had only inflated it two or three times to mostly try it out. Then it landed itself on the top of our boat all folded up waiting for this summer to finally fly free.

I went to the West Marine in Friday Harbor earlier that week and talked to the guys down there about it and all four of them were more than obliged to help. The manager even had one of the employees drive me and the kids back down to the docks to check it out (every once in a while it really does pay off to be the woman).

They determined that it had to be sent away for repair and they were going to give us a loaner till it was fixed. Oh my god was I glad that Bob was with me that day. The manager brought down our loaner in a box and laughingly said, “Well have fun with that.” Only there was nothing fun about it. We sat on that dock for probably an hour in the rain trying to figure how that piece of crap was supposed to be constructed. Once we were done I still had the task of rowing in back to the boat in the rain. I really wouldn’t have minded this had the dinghy been really rowable. It tracks horribly and is way smaller than ours making any company require two trips now instead of one. In the long run we are a tiny bit glad this happened because ours is so big and hard to move that we were having a few second thoughts about whether we had outdone ourselves.


The last couple of days we took them to Jones Island as well. We liked it so much we really wanted to explore it more and show them how beautiful it was. We pulled up rocks and combed the beaches for hours. We turned over this one rock that must have had under it more than 300 crabs. It almost made my hair stand up to see them all scurry for safety after we disturbed their peace. The kids went crazy. They thought it was the coolest thing ever. Later while hunting for life on the beach Liberty found the smallest sea star I have ever seen in real life. It was so cute.

We built a fire and made sugar bears. If you don’t know what a sugar bear is you need to! They are the most delicious campfire treat I have ever had. You take a can of premade biscuit dough wrap it on the sticks and roast them. Then you roll them in butter and dip them in sugar. Yummmm are they good.

After we made the children crazy on sugar we made them burn it all off by playing hide and seek for a while. Once they were ready to crash Cuba rowed them all back to the boat and came back with some wine and a blanket and we cuddled up by the fire and hung out for hours. So beautiful. The night sky was perfect with the full moon, the stars and each other's company.

Saying goodbye to Bob and Lynn the next day was really hard. Having them here was loaded with fun.

We took the whole next day to get ready to go to Bainbridge Island where Cuba's company main office is (showers, shopping and laundry). I decided to try and save the $20 dollars it would take to do laundry at the mat and did it by hand. I used salt water for the wash and first rinse and fresh for the final. This worked out pretty well and I did about three loads in an hour and a half. But I failed to give the clothes enough time to dry before it was dark. They stopped dripping just in time for the rain and gale force winds to set in that night. We no sooner brought all the lines inside when we saw the lightning strike not terribly far from us.

I’m pretty sure I was told like a million times growing up as a child that the last place you ever want to be in the middle of a storm was either on the water or in the middle of a field. What the hell was I doing on a boat?! I had a flash panic thought to jump into the dinghy and row to shore. But after I realized just how ridiculous that was I calmed down. Paying out more scope with Cuba and adding a second snubber to the anchor chain was also a great deal more reassuring.

With very little sleep, from constantly waking to check on our holding, we woke up early and got ready for our 13 hour sail. The wind that morning was incredible, but unfortunately not usable. It was head on and only seeming to push us back, slowing us down and making us extremely cold. We spent the next 12 and a half hours taking turns motoring our way there. The kids did amazingly well. And just as I detected the first bit of boredom in them I let them watch two movies in a row. They loved that because our television watching all summer has been next to nothing.

At about 10 miles to go we finally got wind in a good enough position that we decided to raise both sails and turn the engine off. Finally, I was so excited. Ironically with not more than ten minutes worth of sailing it started to pour rain and we heard the huge crash of thunder. There was no way that either one of us were going to be up there straddling the mast when that come our way so without hesitation both sails were dropped. Total bummer. I am looking forward to sailing just for the fun of it while we are here. When you are trying to make any distance in the daylight it is really hard to always sail.

Since we have been in Bainbridge it has been really great. Cuba has been working in the office and getting to know the people he works with up here better. They are really great. The kids and I have been able to visit him at work for lunch and explore the surrounding areas. We walked down the main street and met a woman in a candle shop that was so impressed with the kids and their story that she gave them each a little sailboat candle. The kids thought that was really cool. Then we spent the next day roaming to Seattle on the ferry and exploring the science center. That was a day well spent. And we were all well spent at the end of it.

Being here has been really fun but we are getting excited to come back to Portland in a few weeks and see all of our beloved friends and family. To those of you who have been able to make it up here we greatly thank you, we really couldn’t have done this without a wave of love and familiarity being brought to us to help us with our home sickness. To those of you who were not able to make it up we are getting really excited to see you all soon.