BLAKELY ISLAND TO BELLEVUE (MEYDENBAUER BAY YACHT CLUB)

Sunday, August 24, 2025

Today’s agenda is to head for the barn. We were going to stay out one more night to avoid the weekend crowds going through the locks, but John decided we should just suffer through it and get home tonight. Our nemesis, Point Wilson, was in our path so we timed our arrival at PW to a tee to avoid an unpleasant encounter – something we’ve experienced more that we care to admit. Anyway, the straits of Juan de Fuca were glassy smooth the entire way, the sun was out, it was so enjoyable. The passage by Point Wilson was a nonevent, and we made our way to the locks arriving at 4PM. There was already a huge lineup at the locks and it was abundantly clear we weren’t going to make that cycle so made the decision to tie off to the wood pilings in the locks staging area and wait our turn. The locks are always a sh*t show because so many people don’t know the protocol, or there is the occasional idiot that crowds the line, and we had both today – I have three stories to tell. First off as we were motoring slowly (which you are required to do) down the Shilshole channel at the entrance, a huge Hatteras (brand of boat) behind us peeled off and went between the red buoy and the shore which is a very shallow shoal. You non-boaters may have heard the term “red right returning” and that means always keep the red buoy to your right when returning to port. The fact that this big boat took the chance of running aground was truly reckless, but he made it, and threw us a nice wave in a no-wake zone to boot. He ended up tying off to the same pilings in the staging area, but made sure he was ‘ahead’ of us again. My second story is there is a train trestle that spans across the waterway leading to the locks and some boats are too tall to transit and need to wait for the bridge to raise. We were the third boat to arrive at the locks for this round, and for the last 2 hours various boats have been arriving and hovering behind us waiting their turn, including one large sailboat, who was at least 10 boats behind in the order of arrival. A big commercial vessel arrived and they have priority boarding, so up went the bridge and in followed the sailboat who apparently thought he was next in line to go into the locks so positioned himself so. Now sailboats, no matter the size, don’t typically get the wall position because of their oval shape, they normally raft. So for this guy to think he was at the front of the line spelled another kind of idiot. My third lock story. As we waited for the next large lock opening we watched another idiot in a small boat decide to jump in the water in the lock entrance staging area! This is a HUGE safety issue and he should have been cited. Darwin awards are calling. FINALLY around 6:30PM the large locks opened for boarding. The rule is, if a boat is larger than you, let them in first because the large boats tie off on the wall, then the smaller boats raft off the larger boats, that’s how they load the locks. Two smaller boats that were tied up ahead of us on the pilings decided that it was time to cast off their lines only to be told by locks staff “if it’s bigger than you, let them through” so they became mere obstacles for us to dodge around. Mr. Hatteras idiot was slow casting off the pilings so we slipped right past him as payback for his earlier idiot move. Mr. huge sailboat also had to stand down as he was told to wait as well. Anyway, we got ourselves tied down in the locks and waited as the rest of the locks were loaded. It was high tide so a pretty quick trip up and out, and by now it was 7:30 and dusk was setting in. Being a Sunday on the lake, it is very crowded with small boats, kayaks, paddle boarders, and lots of boat traffic. The speed limit is 7 knots for about an hour as we weave our way through Lake Union, through the Montlake Cut, and finally under the 520 bridge where the slow speed limit ends. But by now it’s getting fairly dark so we don’t want to go fast either. We arrived at our home port, Meydenbauer Bay Yacht Club, only to find our subletter forgot to get his boat out in time, so after a couple of phone calls we were given permission by our neighbor to use his slip overnight. Using flashlights John was able to guide the boat to the dock with ease, and we were finally at our home port. We grabbed the essentials and took a Lyft home to our townhouse, collapsing into bed without dinner, a fact neither of us seemed to care about. Another trip in the books, and this 2025 Boat Trip Blog is now complete. Thanks for following along, hopefully I didn’t bore you to absolute tears. Love to All, Sincerely….Denise