What the Guests See

As a rule we do not take guests or encourage visitors on the boat, but there is a small handful of long-time friends whom we enjoy cruising with.* I worked with Ken in commercial television when we were wee lads in Hawaii in the 1970s.* He and his wife have recently moved to Washington and they have gone on a couple of cruises with us into the northern San Juan and Gulf Islands in BC.

I'm always curious to learn what others find interesting about the places we cruise to.* Last week Ken gave me a DVD of the photos they've taken on the last two cruises.* While Ken is one of the country's leading directors of videography, his wife shot almost all the still photos on the trips.* Here is a small selection of what intrigued her in the islands.


-- Edited by Marin on Saturday 7th of January 2012 03:36:42 AM

The lady has a good eye for interesting subjects.

Marin wrote:*Here is a small selection of what intrigued her in the islands.

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******* Great pictures, Marin!

I can't help but notice that you wear an inflatable suspender life vest all the time. Even when piloting from the wheelhouse. Do you also use a seatpack parachute when flying the Beaver?

SeaHorse II wrote:
I can't help but notice that you wear an inflatable suspender life vest all the time. Even when piloting from the wheelhouse. Do you also use a seatpack parachute when flying the Beaver?

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*I'm left wondering how often the helmsman bumps his head, intentionally and non-intententially,*against that post.

As we say where I come from " cool snaps " Marin. We love looking at all the pictures that are posted, one can learn lots from them.

Elwin*

Great pics Marin. Interesting people take interesting pictures so I'd love to meet her. I especially like the trees, the sand spit, the cow and field and she even likes my kind of boat as in the last picture.

Eric

SeaHorse II wrote:I can't help but notice that you wear an inflatable suspender life vest all the time. Even when piloting from the wheelhouse. Do you also use a seatpack parachute when flying the Beaver?

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*No. The Beaver is on floats and we are almost always over water.* No need to jump out, we'd just glide down and land.* Anyway, a Beaver is so slow that even if you're forced down on land you can simply step out and walk just before the plane hits.

We wear our life vests all the time on the boat when we're underway.* Once they're on we totally forget about them as they do not restrict movment at all.

Also, according to the USCG folks who have boarded us, these life vests only count toward meeting the PFD requirement if you're actually wearing them.* Unlike Type 1s, and IIs which simply have to be on the boat to count.* You don't have to wear the inflatables inside the boat but if you go outside without having it on, you are in violation of the PFD requirement.* So say the USCG people, anyway.* So since we go outside for various things from time to time while we're underway we simply put them on and and leave them on most of the time when we're inside the boat.

Most of the people we know who use this type of inflatable vest do the same.* Our first ones were Sospenders, one of which Ken is wearing.* A few years ago my wife and I upgraded to Mustangs.


-- Edited by Marin on Sunday 8th of January 2012 04:13:31 AM

markpierce wrote:

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*I'm left wondering how often the helmsman bumps his head, intentionally and non-intententially,*against that post.

That photo is somewhat decieving.* The raceway is actually farther in front of the helmsman that it looks.* It carries the steering cables beween the lower and upper helms and also carries antenna cables and other electronics cables.

Ken happened to be standing when this photo was taken.* Usually the person at the helm is sitting in a seat so is even farther back then Ken is. And standing or sitting, the helmsperson is generally off to the left of the raceway anyway. Older GBs like ours have the helm position just to the right of the centerline of the boat.* Later GBs have the helm even farther right, closer to the door.*

But even standing in very rough water and swaying around a lot with the movement of the boat neither I nor my wife has ever even gotten close to bumping into the raceway.* It is a standard fixture on all GBs.* And we are so used to the sight picture with it being there that we don't even see it anymore.* Like the diagonal torque tubes across the windshield of many floatplanes.* After awhile they become invisible to the pilot.


-- Edited by Marin on Sunday 8th of January 2012 03:23:47 AM

nomadwilly wrote:
...she even likes my kind of boat as in the last picture.

*

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*We happened to be in Ganges at the time of the annual workboat gathering.* There were all sorts of really neat boats there.

Of the boats that were there that year this was my favorite.* It was built by--- you guessed it---- Boeing (of Canada).* I believe it was originally a forestry or fisheries boat but I could be misremembering that.

Marin wrote:You don't have to wear the inflatables inside the boat but if you go outside without having it on, you are in violation of the PFD requirement.* So say the USCG people, anyway.* So since we go outside for various things from time to time while we're underway we simply put them on and and leave them on most of the time when we're inside the boat.


-- Edited by Marin on Sunday 8th of January 2012 04:13:31 AM

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*That would be true if you do not have other Type I or Type II PFDs for each person onboard.* I always carry a dozen Type II PFDs in addition to my inflatables.*

Are these inflatables all you carry onboard?

No, we have four Type IIs on board.* They are stowed in a relatively accessible place but are out of the way nevertheless. So you are correct in that we are in compliance even if we aren't wearing our inflatables. But since we don't keep the Type IIs in a place where we can put them on instantly we operate the boat as if we didn't have them on board. So we and any friends we might have on board wear the inflatables pretty much all the time when we're underway.

We also have a Lifesling on the aft railing.


-- Edited by Marin on Sunday 8th of January 2012 02:09:51 PM

Marin wrote:Of the boats that were there that year this was my favorite.* It was built by--- you guessed it---- Boeing (of Canada).* I believe it was originally a forestry or fisheries boat but I could be misremembering that.

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*Apparently the owner is unaware of that since USCG Documentation records lists the builder as "unknown."* The record shows the 44.4-by-12-foot wooden boat was built in 1930.

I have no idea why the documentation lists the builder as unknown.* The Boeing of Canada builder's plate is right there for everyone to read.* Boeing of Canada in Vancouver built a large number of boats in the 1930s, from boats like this one to some very pretty sailing sloops. Some of the boats built by Boeing were quite fast express cruisers and it is said they were in high demand by the rum-runners during Prohibition to move liquor from ships to rendezvous points in the San Juans and Gulf Islands.

Years ago my wife and I encountered a Boeing boat on Lake Mahood way up in the BC interior. It was kept in a boathouse and was launched from a cradle that ran on tracks down into the lake. Its design was very similar to the famous Lake Union Dreamboat although it was only about 25' long and did not have the glass-enclosed cabin of a Dreamboat.* The after section of the boat was open.. The owner told us it had been brought to the lake by wagon.

For years a Boeing sloop of about 36-40 feet sat on a trailer next to the derelict "Red Barn" that had been moved from its original location to the current site of the Museum of Flight on Boeing Field. Back then that corner of the airport property was nothing but weeds, a few trees, the sagging, rotting Red Barn (which by then was dull gray), a dilapidated B-47 (later restored and currently parked at the entrance to the Museum), and this Boeing sloop. I have no idea what happened to the sloop. From the outside it looked pretty decent. Perhaps it had been donated to the Pacific Northwest Aviation Society (or Museum), the forerunner of the Museum of Flight, and they eventually sold it off or something.

The current owners of the boat I pictured knew just about everything there was to know about the boat including who built it and where. They were very proud of the fact it had been built by Boeing of Canada.






-- Edited by Marin on Sunday 8th of January 2012 06:55:09 PM

uh oh Marin you'd better post about how awful the weather up there is as those pictures are pretty inticing.* Looks a lot more interesting than anything around here.*

As I've said before, all the photos showing nice weather were actually shot on the south island of New Zealand. The foreground of us, our boat, etc. is all Photoshopped in. Here's is an example--- this is a shot straight out the camera taken on a typical PNW day-- in fact during one of the same cruises our friend was taking her photos.* But I can take the boat and the dock and key it into a shot of a beautiful sunny day in New Zealand with green mountains and waterfalls and whatnot in the background.

You can't believe anything you see anymore. Go see the movie "Hugo" for proof of this. Excellent movie, but the settings of most of the scene is all CGI (Computer Generated Imagery). As was Avatar, of course.

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What kind of trees are those some sort of birch?

SD

skipperdude wrote:
What kind of trees are those some sort of birch?

SD

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*They look like crepe myrtles to me.

Ah. Never seen one. Pretty neat looking tree.

Up here we have Spruce,( several species)*Pine, Birch and Cottonwood.

Thats about it.* In the city a few non native that people have planted.

Sd

Moonstruck wrote:skipperdude wrote:
What kind of trees are those some sort of birch?

SD

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*They look like crepe myrtles to me.

The trees in question are Arbutus, also going by the name Madrone or Madrona. They grow only very close to the salt water coastline in the NW. I have tried transplanting them, but with no success. They insist on crappy, rocky soil and salt air.*


-- Edited by Carey on Thursday 12th of January 2012 12:49:14 PM

skipperdude wrote:
Ah. Never seen one. Pretty neat looking tree.

Up here we have Spruce,( several species)*Pine, Birch and Cottonwood.

Thats about it.* In the city a few non native that people have planted.

Sd

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*Dude, these are crepe myrtles. *They have varieties that bloom different colors. *One of the longest blooming perinnials. *See what you think.

The trees are arbutus. They are found in some areas of Europe and in the Pacific Northwest. Their scientific name is arbutus manziesii. In BC they call them arbutus, in Washington most people call them madrones (pronounced ma-DRON-as.) They are pretty much my favorite tree. They grow close to the water although they can be found somewhat farther inland. Very common in the islands. Their bark peels year round and they have leaves year round. I'd love to have some in our yard but we live just outside and above their "comfort zone." Plus they are messy trees--- they drop leaves year round. So they would be great in a natural yard, something of a chore in a landscaped yard. In the spring they develop really nice little flower clusters.

The photos are of a typical "grove" of them. The second photo is Carey (of this forum) taking a picture during one of the times we took our boats to Westsound on Orcas Island.* These trees are typical in size, although they can get much larger in terms of spread and density of their branches.

PS* I should add that I read recently that the arbutus is in trouble in this area.* Air polution has a negative effect on them, and there is (IIRC) a disease that is threatening them.* Something really important for boaters in this area to know is not to use an arbutus to secure a shore tie to.* It's typical to take the stern tie line to shore, run it through a ring (if there is one) or around a tree or rock and then back to the boat.* That way when you leave you can retrieve the line without having to go to shore.* Many of us carry 300 to 500 feet of poly line for this.*

Very important not to put the line around a live tree, particularly an arbutus.* Tension and movement of the line from the boat and then pulling the line in when you leave can cause it to cut into the trunk and expose the tree to disease.* Given the apparently shaky future the arbutus has in this area, the less damage we can do to them, the better.





-- Edited by Marin on Thursday 12th of January 2012 01:03:10 PM