CYC - Poulsbo Winslow Fireworks Trip

©Lee Youngblood 2014

We joined the fleet of boats going over to Poulsbo for the fireworks on the third. It was great to see so many boats, out for a great weekend, on the water. By the time we got to Liberty Bay, the bay was littered with anchored boats and boats rafting up. Of course I had to get shots of friends, favorites, and interesting boats, like John Guzwwell's Endangered Species with the kids on the stern. We joined the CYC cruising group's raft-up, and with eight boats in the raft, plus visitors, it was quite a party on Joyce and Bret's big Catalina s/v Joy Ride. Might be a record hard to beat! The fireworks were better than usual, and it was great to see friends leaving the next morning.

You would think the great Pouslbo fireworks show was enough fireworks for a year, but no, just the warm-up for the Forth of July. So we joined the mass exodus, and headed over to Eagle Harbor. We were passed by Fred and Ann's Catalina 30, Anneke, our favorite Catlina 30 after a Desolation Sound trip back in 2004. We survived Agate pass with the nasty, obnoxious powerboat "Special F/X" slamming everyone around. Public shaming won't slow him down! Out of the pass, we took our time sailing, down to Winslow with Mt. Ranier in the background. As we sailed into Eagle Harbor, Paul and Suzette, on Altair showed off their years of sailing experience, and with sweet sails, blew right by us.

The Winslow raft-up will go down in our history as the best "Rafting Rodeo" yet! A raft-up was started as we arrived, the harbor packed, and the call was for us to put an anchor "over there". Ok, we can do that, but as we backed up, we were told the whole raft had to move somewhere else, as we were too close to the fireworks, or maybe someone's view. So we pulled up and moved to where we could anchor and wait for a friend to leave. If Dragons Toy left, there would be a hole we might all fit in. As they left, we scrambled to re-anchor and hold the space. The raft was forming, and bigger boats needed to be added. At one point, boats were backing in from both sides of the raft. Carmanah rafted to us, and we needed to reset. Then the Baba 30 Insolita needed to tie up on the outside, so they rafted up to us too. Kathleen ended up backing down to the raft-up, with both Carmanah and Insolita tied to Simplicity, and Chris helping! We all piled on Dorothy, Ronda and Jerry's Pilot House Valiant for dinner, and had friends over too. Nice to see Roy before he headed off to SF! There were lot's of laughs and stories! The Winslow fireworks tuned out to be a surprise, really good, but we had to head back to work early the next morning. Quite an interesting weekend. . .

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