Port Townsend Sailing, Magic and Manifestation

The quest for a boat that felt right, should have taken a month maybe two in normal times. Covid times have created shortages in everything from toilet paper to cruising boats. From Mexico to Canada, decent used boats were in short supply and commanding a premium.

After 4 months of looking and a bit of sailing with friends around Admiralty Inlet, Jamila and I took a break. We took her daughter, Nuna, to Road’s End Farm Horsemanship camp. The greenery in New Hampshire was an amazing contrast to the drought stricken west coast.

Flying across the country the line of green began about the Great Lakes. Rivers and lakes were blue eye candy from the air.

When we returned to Seattle we called a broker who we had looked at several boats with. He said there was nothing new to see except one boat that he had not yet seen the listing on. A few hours later he called us with details.

We were curious. We were intrigued, we borrowed a car and headed for La Connor where the boat was.

We met the broker and we all toured the boat.

It is much easier to get a sense of a boat’s condition when it is out of the water. This one was. We were cautiously optimistic after the first hour aboard.

We were optimistic since we immediately knew we had manifested a boat with the features we wanted. We were cautious since the boat needed work but how much would not be known until it was afloat.

Around the Puget Sound especially in the popular sailing waters of Port Townsend, Port Ludlow, Whidbey Island, Sequim and north to Anacortes, Bellingham and the San Juan Islands, finding a dock to keep your boat at is arguably much harder than finding the boat.

Most marinas have 2-5 year waits for slips.

Our research included taking Nuna out on sailboats. We chartered one with Sail Port Townsend LLC to give her a sailing lesson. Another learning experience the following week put her at the helm of a carbon fibre 40' trimaran scooting along faster than the apparent wind. She loved it all including the navigational aspects. We were encouraged she would enjoy spending time on whatever craft we ended up with. Seeing porpoises, seals, a distant whale blow and multitudes of birds all enthralled her.

We had manifested a dock space in May when we first decided to look in earnest. A story unto itself. We located the exact kind of berth we described to ourselves and one friend. Twenty four hours after we put that intention out to the universe, we handed over a check for 2 months of rental. So far, a dock but no boat. Now we had located the first boat that we could imagine sitting at our dock.