Our galley sink wasn’t terrible but it sure wasn’t great. It was a standard issue, 1975 faucet for cold water only. I tried to make it a little more versatile by adding a sprayer but even that was pretty cheap.

The Old Galley Sink

I had a thought that a proper kitchen faucet with a built in sprayer would be handy. I scoped out the faucets at our hardware store but such a set up would be around a hundred dollars. That seemed kind of high for what is really just a convenience item. As luck would would have it, Melissa and I were shopping at a second hand marine store   (Second Wave Marine Consignment) Where I found just such a faucet for fifty dollars. To make the deal even sweeter, the guy at checkout marked it down to thirty dollars because I have nice eyes.

Our shiny new faucet from Second Wave Marine Supply. Did I mention it cost me thirty bucks?

So, after three or four trips to the hardware store for plumbing bits and pieces, we have a nice new faucet. It is much higher than the old faucet which makes washing and filling pots easier. This little project also allowed me to cover a hole in the countertop that looked like it been hewn by a disgruntled marmot. If we ever decided to add a salt water faucet, that hole is covered up but still available.

Fill a pot with water at the stove? Don’t mind if I do.

Call me easily amused, now I smile every time use our new faucet.

Go toward the light and turn left and you can go to Hawaii.

Another stunning trip into the hinterlands of wild British Columbia. We’re sitting at a Starbucks with their lovely wifi having paid for a night in the Port of Sydney Marina. We made it to Oak Harbor on Vancouver Island in record time. We left Tacoma Saturday around 10:00am and by Sunday afternoon we were in Port Townsend. With fair weather it seemed a shame to waste the moment so we headed across the strait. We’d had great wind all the way from Port Madison, so naturally once we were in the strait the wind died on us. We knew it was too good to be true.  Through a combination of motoring and motor-sailing, we arrived in Canada around midnight. Entering a new port at night is always a thrill. I don’t recommend it, but it happens.

We’ll do more thorough posts later when we have better internet, but for now we can report that we were waved out of the U.S. by finback whales, the first time we’ve seen those. Then I can report that there is nothing more thrilling than orcas breaching in the distance, then surfacing by the boat in the light of the moon, even if the boat is under motorsail at the time. I like sailing at night. There is something remarkably peaceful about it.

Mike rediscovered his interest in leper colonies and he’ll post more about that later. We had a great anchorage off D’arcy Island until the wind kicked up. So we sailed up to Sydney Spit. It was just too cold and windy to stay long so today finds us at the Sydney Marina. Time for showers and to stock up on groceries. Nothing too exciting to report but I can say for sure that I’ve never slept this much in my life. Sleep. Read. Eat. Sleep. Then sleep some more.

Downloading photos takes too long by wifi, so we’ll wait for those. But stay tuned because we’ll be adding a Product Reviews section (no one asked what we think of these things but that never stopped us before) and adding to the Cheap Tricks section in the future.

Meanwhile, we need to see more whales!  And could the sun please make an appearance?

Melissa’s birthday was subdued this year by the fact that our son, Andrew, had his tonsils scooped out on Thursday. The surgery was a success and Andrew is recovering nicely, but as you might imagine, our attention was elsewhere.

Andrew, pre-surgery, modeling the latest in hospital couture. Ellen approves.

By Saturday we were all ready to relax and celebrate by making Melissa wear an amusing hat while listening to our dirge-like rendition of Happy Birthday.

Melissa, wearing the traditional birthday sombrero of our people. Note how most photos of this woman seem to include a hammock.

My gift to Melissa this year was a watercolor of our Cal 34, Moonrise,  painted by Alex Kimball. We met Alex at a Puget Sound Cruising Club event a few months back and a mutual friend suggested that he might have time for this project. As you can see, Alex captured Moonrise beautifully.

Watercolor of Moonrise by Alex Kimball

Perhaps one of the reasons Alex was able to so faithfully render the Cal 34 is because as a young man he actually worked the at Cal/Jensen factory building these boats.  Spooky, huh?

In addition to the watercolor, Melissa got Jimmy Cornell’s World Voyage Planner [amazon_link id=”1408140292″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ][/amazon_link]

And one of our local favorites, the Waggoner Cruising Guide [amazon_link id=”1932310452″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ][/amazon_link]

The World Voyage Planner is Jimmy Cornell’s latest work and looks to be a terrific addition to our sailing library. With just the one copy, I can see conflict brewing already.