With Friends Like These
I understand that we are VERY lucky to live where we do and sail as much as we do. I almost equate it to those who live in ski towns and get to ski every day: its just our daily life and we enjoy it as much as we can, when we can.
We are also lucky that we live in a community and have friends who share these same values and passions. So a typical weekday evening is normally spent either racing in local series, sailing around, or just hanging out on our, a friend’s, or a family member’s boat.
Brandon and I sail Tuesday nights on a Swan 42 called The Cat Came Back based in Jamestown, and Thursday nights I sail on a J/24 called Bearlymuven with friends as well. We could race Mondays and Wednesdays, too, but honestly, it gets exhausting. Especially since we live about a half hour away and by the time we get home on these evenings, it’s normally past 10 pm and then we have to get up to work the next day. Brandon at 5:45 am and I really try to wake up then too…
I like to take Mondays and Wednesday as nights to just relax and sail. Last Tuesday, our friends Ben and Kelley finally launched their new Melges32. They have been spending most of the summer working on fixing her up and are now keeping her just a few moorings away at JBY. So Wednesday night, we headed over there to check it out and relax with a few beers.
Madeline, Ben, Paul and Brandon on the Melges just a few moorings over
Since they just had a newly painted boat, Madeline (who was over on our boat as well) and I left our dogs on Persistence. They were not happy about it, so we had to put them down below to prevent them from jumping in to join us.
Not happy to be left down below
The other nice part of living where we do is that we don’t have to sail far to get away. Just on the other side of Jamestown, about 1 mile as the crow flies and 7 miles by water sail, is Dutch Harbor. We made a plan with our good friends, Morgan and Jay, to meet up there with our dogs and yachts for a Saturday night mini vacation.
Saturday there was no wind in the morning and the weather was crummy. We did housework most of the day before heading over to Jamestown to sail. The “sail” took us about an hour and a half but we had to wear rain jackets because the fog was so thick, you were getting soaked just sitting in the cockpit.
We rafted up with the mighty Hypatia, the Everson’s Chesapeake 32, so we could have dinner and cocktails. While Brandon cleaned the bottom, Morgan and I loaded her 2 dogs, Gussie and Baelin, and my little Scruffy in the little tender for a beach walk. Needless to say, 3 wet dogs and 2 humans in a small boat is very entertaining. We are lucky they are all so well behaved…
Sidenote: Brandon made himself a compressor with a hose and mouth piece that he can plug into the boat using the Inverter so that he can stay down and clean the bottom. (will post photos next time of this contraption)
For dinner, my latest issue of FineCooking recommended a marinade of lime, white wine, miso (I didn’t have it so I substituted White Balsamic), Cilantro, Olive Oil, Honey, Scallion, and Salt. I chopped the veggies of zucchini, red onion, green pepper, and mushrooms at home and marinated them all day along with steak tips. We grilled them up and served them with Red Wine and Bread. I never really drink Red Wine in the summer but it was a night to sit down below and get cozy so it fit.
Boys and their boats and dogs
At night, we separated from the raft up to anchor on our own with the promise to reunite in the morning for breakfast and to explore Dutch Island. We awoke to a fight between fog and sun and luckily the sun won out.
After some delicous thick cut bacon, and last night’s veggies mixed with scrambled eggs, we mixed up some Bloodies and headed to explore Dutch Island.
According to Wikipedia, “The island was fortified from the American Civil War through World War II, and was known as Fort Greble 1898-1947.” It is about 100 acres and just sits off Jamestown. All over the island are structures that have been left in disrepair and the island used to be off limits yet not really enforced. Last summer, we visited the island and there was clearly an effort being made by the State to clean up the structures. Now we can see that they were making paths and adding hand rails to the Forts so visitors can explore.
Fort Getty Forts with new handrails
We hiked the distance of the island to the light house. The dogs loved it despite the smallest one needing to be carried eventually.
Almost to the light house but needs to be carried
Gussie leaping through the tall grass (don’t worry we got all the ticks off later)
15 lbs gets heavy eventually…
Baelin at the lighthouse
After exploring, we retired to our individual boats to sail home. Our friend, Danielle, came to Dutch Harbor to join us on the returning sail and we couldn’t have asked for better conditions. The wind did eventually die to fill from the north (also a weird thing for a summer day) but we were not in a hurry.
Scruffy on the way into Dtuch Island
Dogs cooling off halfway through our hike
Approaching Dutch Island
Persistence in Dutch Harbor
We wrapped the weekend with a lovely dinner back on Nai’a our friend’s Swan 60 for a reunion of friends to celebrate Bob’s birthday (which is actually today: Happy Birthday, Bob!)
To kick off this week, we relaxed at home on Monday night and my grandfather and great uncle (they are identical twins) came over for dinner for a nice backyard BBQ. We grilled chicken sausage and accompanied with a tomato, feta and cucumber salad.
Drone footage from backyard family gathering. Check out Scruffy going crazy being locked inside via the back slider (he doesn’t like drones).
Until the next adventure…