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Last night on Elliott Bay, sailing & crabbing

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delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Initially Posted - 08/31/2013 : 12:16:01

I took my best friend, his eldest son & his best friend out for some sailing & crabbing last night. The winds were right on our nose on the way out to Magnolia bluff to drop our crab pots, so we motored over there, which takes about an hour. About ten or fifteen minutes out, what wind there was started picking up in a dramatic way, and while I'd been letting my friend's son drive, I decided to take over since we not only had winds pushing us around, but a lot of small traffic. We got our pots dropped but not without a bit of trouble, one of them ended up in a hole with only the upper float just bobbing on the surface, so we had to go back & grab it (not so easy in the rising wind & waves), and then tow it into shallower water. It still ended up kinda deep so I'm hoping we can find it easily enough when we get back out there this afternoon.

Once we got the pots set, we hoisted sails and were off on a really nice broad reach, almost exactly opposite of where my marina is, so after running for 15 minutes or so (and getting the boys used to the heeling, the friend had never been sailing before, but was having a ball up in the starboard cat-bird seat), we gybed and headed almost straight back for the entrance to the Duwamish River.

Here's what the Duwamish Head Marker looked like as the sun was setting behind us. This is the place I always check into on FourSquare and tell you guys that "I'm still the mayor". I still am...

Here's another picture of one of the state run ferries coming out of the sun:

We had to play dodge with the water taxi and a couple of tugs with barges on our way to the river's mouth, and then idle in long circles waiting for another barge & tow to come down the river (it's very narrow, and the tugs can't see you in the slightest, best to give them an extremely wide berth). A couple of other boats were in the holding pattern with us, but everyone dropped nicely into a train for the leg upriver to our marinas, no jostling about as sometimes happens.

The approach to the marina I expected to be a bit hairy, the wind was blustery & contrary to the current, which always makes for an interesting landing. I expected for my bow to get blown into my upstream neighbor, so I had my friend on the foredeckk with a boat pole to fend off, and I was going to step down onto the dock with my mid-ships spring line. While I ended up making a great approach, my friend decided his best course of action was instead of fending off, to dive under the lifeline on his back and slide down onto the rapidly receding finger pier. Fortunately I got down onto the dock to prevent the boat from going further upstream (and depositing him into the water once he ran out of him between his toenails & fingernails), and then chastised him properly for abandoning the plan. Then we had a good laugh about it.

We're leaving shortly to go pick up the crab traps. Hopefully they're nice & full of fat Dungeness crab, and we'll get a nice sail in as well.

David
C-250 Mainsheet Editor

Sirius Lepak
1997 C-250 WK TR #271 --Seattle area Port Captain --

Edited by - delliottg on 09/01/2013 07:11:54

delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 09/01/2013 : 07:08:16

Well, we went back out yesterday to do some more sailing & pick up our traps. Had some really nice wind for a while. We were making 5+ knots with a reefed main. Rita was driving, and between chewing on her lower lip because of the heeling (slight), dodging ferries, and other sundry things, I think she actually had a good time in the end.

Crabbing was semi-successful, we took three Dungeness, one of which was a monster, another was a visual keeper, and we had to gauge (and keep) the third. However, that's the report for only 2/3 of our traps. We searched & searched for close to two hours for our last trap and couldn't find it.

Rita & I are headed out right now to get out there at low-low tide (8:56 AM) to see if we can find it with less water on top of it. Updates later. Hopefully we get a few more crab to make up for the extra effort.

Edited by - on

Stinkpotter
Master Marine Consultant

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Djibouti
9013 Posts

Response Posted - 09/01/2013 : 08:34:28

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by delliottg
 ...I had my friend on the foredeckk with a boat pole to fend off, and I was going to step down onto the dock with my mid-ships spring line. While I ended up making a great approach, my friend decided his best course of action was instead of fending off, to dive under the lifeline on his back and slide down onto the rapidly receding finger pier. Fortunately I got down onto the dock to prevent the boat from going further upstream (and depositing him into the water once he ran out of him between his toenails & fingernails),...<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">I hate when the crew ad libs at the last minute...

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delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 09/01/2013 : 18:51:22

Rita & I motored over to Magnolia this morning to look for the trap, no dice. We spent about an hour & a half looking, until the tide had started coming back up and it became pointless.

I've spent a while looking for a viable negative tide to go look again, and while there are a couple coming up in the next few months, they all occur when it's dark (actually the best one occurs in December, just around midnight, not helpful). Going forward several months there's a -2.6 tide (3.4' lower than this morning's) on May 17th at 13:30 in the afternoon. I'm not overly hopeful of finding it, but it won't hurt to go sailing that day & look.

My friend offered to buy us a couple of crab since we gave the three we got yesterday to him and his family. I told him to not bother, but it was nice of him to offer.

Edited by - on

ruachwrights
Captain

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USA
258 Posts

Response Posted - 11/18/2013 : 13:02:28

After seeing your post I must say that you sail on some beautiful water out there! Crabbing and sailing... I'll have to try it sometime. I do most of my crabbing dealing with nay sayers when I say "let's go sailing" ;)

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Notice: The advice given on this site is based upon individual or quoted experience, yours may differ.
The Officers, Staff and members of this site only provide information based upon the concept that anyone utilizing this information does so at their own risk and holds harmless all contributors to this site.