Outfitting - A Boat Out of Water - Part One

So, we chose the Port of Port Townsend over many boatyards closer to home for our pre-trip inspection and painting. Partly this was a matter of cost; the rates are cheaper the further you get from the city. In the case of Port Townsend, however, this doesn't imply any lower level of service or competence; on the contrary, PT is a major boating center for the Pacific Northwest and has many experts and facilities. That's a winning combination for us.

Besides that, my parents live nearby and have a buoy available where we can moor when we're not physically in the yard. Having the house available for accommodations is also a plus (and a must, if we're to have any hope of attracting friends and family to help us with painting the hull! Transit time for our work force is the downside of the location). Although my folks are traveling and will be away from town while we're there, they have a lot of friends in the area, and as my stepfather is an alumnus of the highly respected Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding and a member of the local Coast Guard Auxiliary, he has good contacts in the marine community there and invaluable knowledge of reputable local tradesmen. We're hoping to do everything required ourselves, but it's nice to have a good fallback.

The location also gives us a jump start on the trip and gets some of the potentially icky bits out of the way early. Although some might say that there are far greater threats further north, Admiralty Inlet is no place to get caught on a bad day, and if we can avoid having to deal with it on Day One so much the better... once you are into it there are few places to duck out for cover, and the funnel effect for wind and waves can make for very nasty seas.

So we'll depart Lake Union mid-day on the 22nd to clear the bridges and locks before they stop opening during rush hour, and either hole up at Shilshole overnight or cruise across and moor at the marine park on the north end of Bainbridge Island. That's a pretty exposed mooring and if there is any weather at all it can be too bouncy to sleep much, so we'll have to play it by ear. Either way, we need to head out around 6AM the 23rd to catch the ebb tide, which should make for a pretty quick trip up to Hadlock.

I was pretty nervous about scheduling the haul-out; we've never done it before and it seemed like another great opportunity to either spend a lot of extra money or break something or both. But the yard was great when I talked with them and it eased my mind considerably. Of course, we could still find all sorts of problems once she's out, but I'm not going to sweat that until we actually see it.