How do you pick a Happy Place to visit? What is it that makes it Happy? Is it the sunsets or sunrises? Is it the people? Or maybe it is the activities that you do while you are there? Sometimes my happy place has been temporary because we are at some resort and having total down time…. I think a true happy place is someplace you have been before and want to go back, because it is so wonderful. That is what the San Juan Islands are for us. So we ARE in our HAPPY PLACE!!!
It is a mix of activities/quietness/small city stuff/ice cream and island hopping. And lets not forget about the crabbing!! We arrived with Ken and Cheryl Williams, just in time for the 4th of July in Roche Harbor. Great fireworks and very very crowed marina.
After the 4th, we headed for Friday Harbor for another couple nights and dropped off
the Ken & Cheryl at the ferry dock to head home. The seaplanes are amazing, I tried to get a video of the sea planes coming and going from Friday Harbor, never seemed to work. I got a good pic of a plane that was taking off close to us. It sure takes skill getting the plane landed and maneuvered between the boats anchored, cruising/sailing and the very large ferries.
We moved to DARA bay, which we just named ourselves, because it doesn’t have a name, so we named it. DARA = Dan, Angela, Ron, Ashley… we found this bay with Captain Ron and Ashley last year and had such a great time we had to go back. So the bay now has a name……. not officially…BUT MAYBE I can figure out how to do that???
Dara bay provided us time to do lots of projects, had some raining cold days and just had some down time. I also convinced Dan to do a bike ride on Orcas from West sound dock to Deer harbor. Hills and cars were crazy, but we made it and had ice cream and headed back to the dock and boat. I was proud that Dan stuck with it…. it isn’t his cup of tea.. ha ha ha. 
Our next adventure is our friends from San Francisco joining us for the weekend. Kurt, Wendy, Melissa and Alex. Which led us to opening day of Crab Season….We were in Blind Bay and really expected to have tons of crabs but it wasn’t the case. We crabbed all weekend long and nothing but small ones. We heard stories of folks getting lots, we had to buy ours.
Melissa, Alex and Angela hiked Mt Constitution on Orcas Island. It is one of the best views you will ever see. We did it the hard way, we hiked 24,000 Steps and 10 miles to the top straight up 2,398 feet, which is the highest point in the San Juan Islands. One of the hardest hikes I’ve done. Harder then some of the Columbia River Gorge hikes I’ve done. On top is a 53 foot sandstone observation tower with views of all the islands and Mt. Baker. We made it up and back down.
Every evening was engulfed with seafood and 500 card game. Yes, we taught more people to play our ENLOE Family card game. They are now addicted too. On Sunday we had a great trip to East Sound, walking the small town and eating lunch before everyone had to head home. Here is a video montage.
With all things in life, you have to take the good with the bad… it is no different with boat life. On Sunday I slipped and fell down a rock path and landed my knee on the only large rock in the path. It took 2 days to stop bleeding and 1 week to be able to bend it. I’m doing much better now, thanks. We also some how got a 2 inch hole in the dinghy. The dinghy has 4 tubes and the aft starboard side is the one impacted. Repair story in next blog….. we pulled up the dinghy and headed to La Conner to park the boat for a week, so we could head to Portland for an event.
We had fun in Portland, but we couldn’t wait to get back on the boat, which now feels more like home, verses Portland. More to come on our trip back to Portland.
Stay Happy and Healthy for now.
Cheers, Dan & Angela
Keep on cruising and so enjoy your adventure……JL