This was a wonderful weekend sailing trip to Blake Island organized by the Washington Yacht Club!
100 people on 11 keelboats, 2 catamarans, and 2 dinghies. Coolers full of ice-cream, steaks, and salmon. Definitely not a regular camping trip... not to forget that Cecilia, Chino and I made over 20 sanwiches for the 1st day of sailing just for the 3 of us ... ya know, just in case the winds did not blow.
7 am: First boat ready to go! Our crew: Andy the capt'n, Anne, Cecilia, Gerardo Chino Israel Fernandez Ramirez Miguel de Rivera, Sally, Stewart, Edward, Patrick, Natalia, and Matt.
Passing by our Oceanography building where we will all defend our Masters one day. Pretty sweet deal to study by the water, we know, we know.
My boat will be called the "Flying Gypsy". The movie
Gypsy Caravan: when the road bends is, by the way, excellent.
Seattle, the Emerald City, from the water.
It's Seattle. Polite driving is encouraged, even when you are on a boat. But is that a wake I see behind the motorboat!?
Our WYC fleet waiting for the bridge to open, and it does.
Waiting to transit through the Ballard Locks, from the fresh lake to the salty Puget Sound. Meanwhile, Cecilia is doing dishes in the galley. Then, the doors open and off we go...
"It is always sunny in Ballard...".
Sailing on the Sound: awesome heel, Cecilia, check out that angle! Is everyone still on board, or have we lost someone? Later that afternoon someone else was steering with a big angle and Cecilia almost rolled into the water from under the mainsail where she was peacefully taking a nap. She says she felt a hand grab her and save her from splashing in!
Quite the view, eh!?
Yes, captain! Alrite, captain! As you wish, captain!
And then we arrived at Blake Island.
Our campsite on the island.
Nothing to do but have fun! So we played a quick game of ultimate frisbee: Cecilia, Natalia, and Bhuvana face Bei, Colin, and Chino. Sally cheers for us and we win. There is no need to confirm this information, just trust me, okay.
Dinner time! Salmon, veggie burgers, or steak on the grill. For dessert, ice cream with all of these toppings! We transported the ice cream in dry ice: good idea but it was as hard as a rock after dinner and we had to put it on the grill(!) to unfreeze.
The moon was full and we all slept well. So well in fact that some of us missed the sausages for breakfast.
Various island treasures.
A salmon dinner and show at the Native American Cultural Center costs $80 to curious tourists arriving from Seattle on yucky Argosy Cruise diesel boats. We were so lucky to have sailed there and enjoyed it all way more for way less!
Bon apetit!
An awesome chil trip to Dungeness Spit with Bhuvana, Greg, and Cecilia. Something about that coffee shop we read in on the way back.
Flyin to New Mexico with Colin. That was one funny funny flight experience. Among other things, we discovered a ridiculous offer in the in-flight magazine: a portable hot tub which can be mounted on top of an SUV. Whoa!
A moment to remember at Mesa Verde, Colorado.
On the road ...
Sunset at Chaco Canyon.
Sailing with David's bible buddies from Montlake to Magnuson Park and back. Navigating in the dark was by far the coolest part.
Walking in Corvalis.
Wha, wha, whaaat!?
Surfbreak somewhere on the coast.
All that love!
Good morning America!
I had always wanted to see these haystacks and I had no idea they were in Oregon.
Gotta love The Astoria Tower: I met Brad Pitt on Astoria Square in Budapest, a security guard at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in Manhattan found my passport on Park Avenue, I spent the night of the New York blackout on a rooftop in Queens Astoria, and then I went running up and down this tower in Astoria, Oregon. Life's too awesome.
