george’s blog

I brought the boat home, today. I had it hauled out at the yard in the travel-lift and set down on the trailer. I pulled it up the hill with the ‘63 ford, which went fine, and in the coming days I’ll take her off the trailer here, so I can work under the boat. The main thing will be to remove the unused centerboard trunk and extend the main cabin forward to the mast partners. My goal is both to expand the living space belowdecks and also eliminate as much weight, wetted surface, and turbulence as possible. Of course, after 5 years in the water, I have a long punch-list of other things that need to be done. There is woodwork on deck that needs to be glassed in and hardware and winches installed for stiffer running backstays, and I want to cut the bow sprit down and glass it. So that should keep me busy for a while.

Bella Darya was my home for the summer of ‘08, mostly anchored out in downtown Olympia. I did make several trips to the Seattle area and to Pt. Townsend and San Juan Island. The boat is faster and more responsive as a cutter, but it’s still a work in progress. My plan is to haul her out this winter and fill in the unused centerboard trunk. I also intend to extend the main cabin area forward up to the maststep.

I removed the forward mast and made the boat a cutter. I took several hundred pounds off the bow (which sits 3″ higher out of the water) without losing sail area. I’m also adding shrouds, which is stiffening the rig substantially. I have a genoa, which I won’t use until I have the spreaders and upper shrouds installed, but I have been sailing with the staysail. I’m pleased to discover the helm still balances nicely, and the stiffer rig makes the boat more responsive. The forward bunk is also much more comfortable without the mast sticking through it. I’m looking forward to installing the spreaders and uppers and then doing some more trips.

I participated in this year’s Olympia Artists’ Studio Tour. I had a couple visitors, possibly a couple sales.

I took an overnight trip to Penrose State Park, on the Key Peninsula, for a raft-up with my friends from Tacoma. I’m glad I snuck through Pitt Passage before sunset, so I could get the lay of the land, because coming back, I had to thread my way back in the fog. It was a nice trip, with good weather, good food, good visiting.

This has been a busy month for my art career. I participated in the Olympia Artswalk, at a restaurant called Darby’s. This year I displayed 8 new paintings, all of them on recycled materials. Then this week, I delivered those pieces to a gallery/shop called “Frank and Dunya”, in the Freemont District in Seattle. I’m also in a show in Seattle sponsored by the “Re-Store” at the “New York Fashion Acadamy” in Ballard.

Just thought I’d post this latest picture, which was taken at the Port Townsend Wooden Boat Festival in September, by a friend, Mike.

As is my custom, the week following my return home was devoted to the flu. Now that I’m recovering from that, I’m returning to work on Trudes’ and my new house, which is a 1934 cabin in NW Olympia. Since last April we have completely gutted and updated it, with new insulation, a foundation repair, new wiring, new windows, etc… I’m now working on baseboards and window trim, which leaves only the acid-staining of the concrete floor in the kitchen, new kitchen cabinets, and then a lot of little details. I’m also preparing for Artwalk, which is Friday evening. I have a few new paintings which need to be framed this week, and I want to create a more professional mobile display, with its own lighting, because the lighting at Darby’s, the restaurant where Trudes and I will be showing, is poorly lit.

Having returned from the wooden-boat festival, I’m now getting back into the swing of remodelling Trudes’ and my new home. I will post photos of that and of my latest paintings soon. I received a disk with pictures of the boat taken in Pt. Townsend by a friend, Hans Littooy.

I departed Friday Harbor soon after my last posting and sailed in light wind up Upright Channel, between Shaw and Lopez Island. The wind completely died on the East side of Lopez, so I motored down Lopez Sound and anchored just opposite Lopez Pass. The next morning I motored across Rosario Straight and tried, unsuccessfully, to buck some current through Deception Pass, between Whitbey Island and Anacortez. So I doubled back to nearby Bowman Bay, where I picked up a mooring pin and waited for the tide to turn. My tide guide called for slack at 2:20, but when I got there, there was still some ebb current, which I was able to buck. I proceeded under power past the beautiful Skagit Valley and anchored for the night by the mouth of Penn Cove, Whitbey. The next day I motored past Seattle and down Colvos Passage, anchoring for the night in Gig Harbor. Friday I returned to Olympia, arriving around 2:30pm. I come home wanting to add shrouds to the lower masts to further stiffen the sail rig, but otherwise the boat performed just fine. 

Here I’m facing aft inside Bella Darya, and you can see my laptop on the binnacle behind me, with my GPS position on the chart for Puget Sound. My hand-held GPS is on the rooftop, where it gets better reception, and it’s connected to the computer by cable.

Here you can see the 18′ boat in tow behind me. The red line is a secondary painter for it, but I’m also using the other end of that line to tie down the tiller, so that the boat is steering itself while I’m goofing around with the camera.

Here I’m approaching the old and new Tacoma Narrows bridges.

Here I am under the new bridge cables, with the old bridge behind.

Here I’m visiting with a seal pup near Eagle Island. Several of them approached me and swam around the boat.

I took the four previous images outside Gig Harbor Thursday evening, facing West, then North, up Colvos Passage, East at the Tacoma skyline, and South, down the Narrows, with the bridges in the distance.

My arrival in Olympia.