For the last few weeks since labor day, we have been eager to go sailing again. The weather has been pretty nice well into September (minus the chilly mornings) and the wind has returned that we have been missing for most of the summer. For this trip, we made the short excursion down to Blake island for an overnight.
2025-09-27
It’s about an hour and a half sail/motor from Eagle harbor to Blake island. We departed at around noon and, after a bit of puttering around to find the mooring we wanted, we were all set by about 2p. It had been a while since we have done a mooring ball and, with Sara at the helm, there was a misunderstanding on what reverse vs neutral meant and the end result was a dropped boat hook - thankfully after I got a line on the moorning ball.
So we rushed to drop the dinghy while Sara kept her eye on the floating boat hook - it was floating away fast. Bit of a hectic start to our overnight, but we made it.
I finished getting the lines setup on the mooring ball after that - all safe and secure for the evening. I took Oakley ashore for a quick potty and then back to the boat.
We slowed down a little after that, made a late lunch and headed ashore for some playtime/hiking. Our mooring was on the south end of the island - which used to be where the south side campsite was located.
The spot is about a 30 min hike from the marina and the main campground on Blake island - so I took Oakley on a hike in that direction to get some exercies in. While I was gone, Sara, Angela, and Jane stayed on the beach and did some exploring and fort building…
I ended up making it back to the beach just as Sara/Jane/Angela were making their way to the marina - so I turned around for round 2.
Unfortunately, after only about 15 min on the hike, Jane had had enough and I was recruited to take her back to the boat while Jane and Angela went on the same hike that I just did.
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After a very interesting dinghy ride back to the boat, Jane did not want to get out of the front pack and into her lifejacket, Jane had a bottle and got cozy for a much needed nap.
The origional plan was to get a fire going on the beach and do some dutch oven cooking - but we didn’t think to check the burn ban and with a level 3 burn ban in effect, our dutch oven plans were a bust. Instead, I spent the next hour or so trying to slow cook a stew on a propane stove…
Before too long, I got the message from Angela and Jane/I packed up to go pickup the intrepid explorers from the beach!
Jane was much happier on this dinghy ride, Angela proclaimed that I was a man of many talents - steering back to the boat with an infant on my lap.
We got back to the boat and Sara got deep into her new book. She managed to find a very technical woodworking how-to book at the free little library at the marina and she was into it. She wanted to share the book with Papa, but she had some research to do first.
Dinner was good, but not amazing. We really wanted to slow cook the stew over a 2-3 hour period, but it wasn’t really possible on ths stove. It was edible though, we will just have to save the actual slow cook stew recipe for another day. After dinner, it was board games and some hanging out before bed.
2025-09-27
The following morning, Sara and I headed ashore again for a hike while Angela and Jane spent some quality time on the boat (feeding is a long process with Jane still). Sara and I did a loop around the boat to get some pictures in the morning light of us on the mooring ball.
We headed back to the marina again, but taking a slightly different route - a loop route that took us over the middle of the island on the way back. When we were almost to the marina, we saw a little family of deer grazing. I think they probably come down to the marina (and nearby campsite) to scavange for any scraps that us humans leave behind.
I saw a very innovative man at the marina campsite. He was loading/unloading his boat with the dock carts, but he had a uniwheel thing and was zipping back and forth with it. Very efficient!
The trip back through the middle of the island was fun! This was not a route we had taken before, so we got a little lost - but none the worse for wear. My phone battery died right before we made it back to the boat, which was our map, but at that point we had a pretty good idea where to go to get back.
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Once we got back to the boat, we spent a bit getting the boat ready to go and then we casted off. The wind was blowing pretty well right at the mooring ball, so we decided to just sail off the mooring without starting the engine. There was a little bit of coordination required to make sure the sails went up as soon as I dropped the moorning, but all was successful!
We ended up having a really good sail back to Eagle Harbor. We weren’t really in a hurry, so I just kept the sail up the whole way - only really slowing down right as we made it into the harbor. There was a rowing competition going on as we were sailing in. We had been warned about this event in advance of the weekend - but seeing it in person you could tell that these were not the amateur crews. I don’t know what level/region the competition was covering, but I’m assuming this was not the junior leagues…
I only ended up starting the engine about 500 feet or so from our slip - which is a bit to tight/tricking to sail all the way into. Very exicing to get some sailing in after the all the calm wind days over the summer. Succesful trip - hopefully we get some rain over the next couple of weeks and we can go back and cook that stew soon!
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