Back in the US

Saturday, July 25, 2009. Day 21.
We left Montague at 0610 to continue our trip S. Weather was calm with a few clouds. We went down Navy Channel & Plumper Sound and crossed over into the US at approximately 0825.

As we were cruising we heard a fellow Olympia boater the "Velocity" on the radio. I hailed them and we had a short chat. It was nice to connect to somebody from home when you are out.

We continued on down San Juan Channel and into Friday Harbor at 1030. We stopped at the Customs dock and got our clearance number: 3014200907251333334. I don't know why but clearing customs is always a bit nerve wracking for me. This time, while I was talking on the shore phone to Customs a boat tide up in front of us and let a bunch of people off. The Customs area is very visibly marked CUSTOMS ONLY. Next thing the Customs agent is asking me who these people are and what are they doing. He then became interested in them and not so interested in me. He quickly processed us and sent us on our way. We then proceeded to slip G50.

Friday Harbor is a time to get showers, and reconnect with friends and family in the US - we did both. The the marina showers were quite busy and we had to wait for quite some time. We then did our customary trip to the Front Street Ale House. As always I had the "Bangers, Bubbles and Squeak" for dinner. Josef had Prime Rib. I was a little "freaked" because of all the people coming and going. After being weeks out in the wilderness and now you see all these people it takes some getting used to.

As the day turned into evening we were presented with a spectacular show of lightening and thunder as a storm passed just overhead. I watched and counted the seconds after seeing the lightning and figured it struck not more than 2 miles away.

Nm: 27.9 Avg. speed: 6.1 kts. Time: 4:33 Hours: 4.8 Ending hours: 5928.1