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Spencer Spit State Park

Also on the list of “must see” San Juan destinations is Spencer Spit State Park on Lopez Island, another “long ago haunt” from UW grad school days in Seattle. Our friends Jerry and Jeanne introduced us to bicycle camping and we spent a fair amount of time in the islands on our bikes. As usual, the “must see” billing did not disappoint. Spencer Spit was another anchorage, so we went “off the grid” for a couple days. This post’ll (like the new word?) get us caught up. It’s a long one, but today’s my birthday and I can do what I want.

Always Something

Nature, including the human component, never fails to provide unlimited and interesting viewing entertainment. This unique vessel was overnight shelter to six people, on anchor in the bay. Lacking any type of cabin or “below-decks”, they used a canvas cover. (And they did have an anchor light, by the way.) In the morning they went ashore for whatever biological issues needing attention, then manned the oars and navigated the pass between the sand spit and Frost Island. I guess not all boating has to be so freaking expensive.

This Heron was having a good time fishing in the marsh. He (she?) remains perfectly still except for a barely perceptible movement of one leg at a time as s/he moves forward. Watching this, I forgave all Herons for the massive bird poop they deposited on “Jackie B” in a slip at Anacortes marina.

Finally, why would seven people in an overloaded dingy be clinging to the bow of this smallish sailboat?

Because…they were all living on it. After awhile, they hauled on the halyards and SAILED out of the anchorage. Good on ‘em. There are at least as many sailboats as power boats in these waters, but rarely do we see them actually sailing, let alone getting underway on sail.

Crab Logistics

We had fair success crabbing at Spencer Spit. (BTW- crabbing is closed Tuesday and Wednesday. Gives the critters a break I guess. When I got up at 6:00 a.m. Thursday, crab pots were already out in the bay.) Perhaps we didn’t think this through before securing a mess of tasty legal size males. But you DO have to cook ‘em live, or within minutes of doing the “break-’em-in-half-butchering-thing” my friend Bud taught me. But who wants to stink up the “Jackie B” by boiling crab on the propane stove in the salon? Not us. So we cooked on the beach:

One dingy trip to get the pot, water, cooker and propane to the beach. Get the water boiling.

Second dingy trip to bring the crab from the crab condo (similar to my friend Mark’s live well for bass) hanging off the “Jackie B” stern to the beach. Throw ‘em in the boiling water. They didn’t scream, I’d already broken them in half a la the Bud technique.

Third trip going as fast as the dingy’s Yamaha 8 HP Four Stroke will tolerate to take the cooked crab back to “Jackie B” for a bath in cold fresh water.

Fourth round trip to fetch the cooled down burner from the beach.

Fisherman Bay

Yet ANOTHER must see destination is Fisherman Bay, also on Lopez Island. It has some unique navigation and piloting challenges.

I’m a big fan of “local knowledge” — actually talking live to someone who has “done it” (and am able to mysteriously undergo transformation from introvert to extrovert when the opportunity arises). But we also keep a wide variety of cruising resources on “Jackie B” for reference.

“Probably the most frequent site for groundings is the entry channel to Fisherman Bay on Lopez Island.” — Exploring the San Juan and Gulf Islands” by Don Douglass & Reanne Hemingway-Douglass

“Many boaters bypass Fisherman Bay, feigning disinterest: actually they are apprehensive about the shallow entrance channel.” — “The San Juan Islands, Afoot and Afloat” by Marge and Ted Mueller

The bay is the site of the Lopez Islander resort, a very nice place, and to overcome boater fears, the resort staff has a little map which come as close to “local knowledge” without actually talking to someone. It’s a “Catch-22″ thing however, because they give you the map when you get there. We got around that by getting a copy from John and Colleen, our friends in the yacht club:

We have two GPS units on “Jackie B”, but being an old school Annapolis type, we always have a chart laid out on the chart table.

(Side rant: Every time I buy charts at West Marine, they ask me if I want a tube to roll them up. Arrgh! Guaranteed: Rolled up charts do NOT get used. Fold ‘em if necessary but I challenge anyone to deal with a tightly rolled up piece of paper when the situation requires easy access to information. End of rant.)

Anyway back in the day, there was no such thing as GPS. The fanciest gizmo was Loran and it was funky. Navigation and piloting all boiled down to dead reckoning (from the term “deduced”), running fixes, radar, and celestial navigation. We try not to rely on one piece of information, integrating the paper chart, GPS, radar, depth sounder, and visual observation to keep a mind map of the situation as it unfolds. And in the words of my mentor Chris, “You have to look outside. Don’t stare at the GPS Chart Plotter, this is not a video game.” Now, having said all this, we’ll probably run aground (again). But I say a prayer every day for safe passage, so que sera, sera.

We tolerated some rolling around at Spencer Spit until about 2:00 pm before getting underway for Fisherman Bay. Tides have been mentioned in earlier posts, and this situation called for special diligence. When a couple feet one way or the other makes the difference between successful piloting or kissing the earth, it helps to have as much water underneath the keel as possible. “Cap’n Jacks” tide and current almanac is our guide. Fortunately the low tide was a positive number, but we wanted to enter during a rising tide situation just in case anything went wrong we could float off.

A gin and tonic was the reward for our successful entry into Fisherman Bay. Now all we have to do is get out of here tomorrow.

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