Thursday: Sidney to Cadboro Bay – OOPS, I mean Bellingham, Washington

Happy Birthday to Kristine!

Another sunny start to the day boded well for the celebration. Kristine decided she wanted to spend the afternoon and night in Cadboro Bay, a nice spot we’ve been to before that’s near Victoria and home to the University of Victoria. We pulled away from the dock and as we were exiting the marina we again saw Loren and Erin, also leaving. We radioed an “adios” and turned south toward Cadboro Bay as they headed east.

Alas, the good luck we’ve been having was about to change. After 45 minutes or so, I noticed one of the gauges not registering properly and, from experience, surmised that our alternator must not be working properly. I’m not much of a mechanic, but I do know that if the alternator doesn’t work then the batteries won’t get charged when the engine is running. Since the batteries power everything on our boat, from the refrigerator to the water faucets and lights, to the ignition switch, we like to keep them well charged at all times. We have an electric charger that does the job when we are plugged into power at a dock, like last night, otherwise we rely on the alternator during each day of cruising. If we didn’t get the batteries charged back up in about two days, we would be stuck wherever we were.

This was not a good situation. We cruised along for a bit, discussing options and hoping that the situation would fix itself. Of course, it didn’t. We finally decided our best bet would be to detour back to the US a day early and see if we could get the alternator repaired in the San Juans, probably at Friday Harbor (the biggest city).

We made a left turn and headed for Roche Harbor, on the westernmost part San Juan Island, where we needed to clear customs before we could do anything else. Unlike previous visits, the customs agent was friendly and efficient and we were through in less than ten minutes. We pulled the boat ahead to a visitor dock, and I walked up to the resort to find a phone book.

To make a long story short, I found the following:

1. Nobody in the San Juans repairs alternators, they send them out to either Bellingham or Seattle (each a six-day turnaround)
2. Loren and Erin walking the dock.
   

We thought we’d seen the last of each other for this trip, but they had cleared customs here too and decided to stay the night. Upon hearing my plight, Loren said “I have a spare alternator aboard that you’re welcome to use.” What are the odds of that happening? To make another long story short:

1. By 4:30 we gave up trying to make his alternator fit on our engine
2. I called the repair place in Bellingham to see if they could fix ours in one day (Friday) if I got it to them in the morning, and they said yes
3. We cast off and headed for Bellingham

Bellingham is a medium sized town in northern Washington, on the mainland, home to Western Washington University and just a little south of the Canadian border. We’ve never been there by boat, but from the charts we estimated it would be about a five hour cruise – all the way through the San Juans, out the other side, across the Rosario Strait, and up Bellingham Bay. Nevertheless, it seemed like our best option.

We tried to make the most of our situation, even though this wasn’t the birthday Kristine had anticipated. The cruise was very scenic, and we tried to enjoy that part of it. By 8:30, when we were about an hour away from Bellingham, we realized that the sun would be going down soon and we also noticed a rather large rain cloud right over our destination. Neither of these was a particulary good sign. To make one more long story short:

1. The sun went down and it started raining just as we arrived at the marina
2. There was exactly one space left that we could fit into, but we had to dock in another part of the marina first and move a small boat by hand that was right in the middle of that one space before we could fit in (there was no one outside to help, probably because of the rain, and the boat's owner was nowhere to be seen)
3. We tied off, had a bite to eat, and went to bed.

Kristine decided that she would celebrate her birthday a little differently this year. The morning had been lovely, with a long shower, sunshine, a walk through Sidney, etc., so that counted. She would celebrate the second part of the day, from noon on, sometime in the next few days when our status became a little more settled.