We left home at about 9:30. Headed to Whole Foods for cheese and olives. The car was packed to the gills. Not a square inch left, but Melissa couldn't stand the idea of leaving without good chesses so we put a cooler in the back seat between the seats and filled it with gourmet cheeses. We picked up John and Cindy at their house about 10:30 and headed for Anacortes. We got there at noon in time for lunch at Gere-a-Deli with Melissa's Dad, Chuck, who was to join us for a night in the San Juan Islands.
After lunch Dave, Chuck, and John headed for the marina to do the check out of the boat. The boat is a 46' Beneteau performance sail boat. The owner of the boat came down to do the check out himself because the charter outfit was too busy. The checkout was surprisingly uneventful (Dave typically finds multiple pieces of gear that need to be fixed when we are sailing). When the owner was going over the radios he indicated that he had no idea what the HF radio is for. Dave being a Hamm radio operator knew the equipment intimately. The owner said maybe Dave could teach him how to use them someday. (HF radios communicate over long distances and this one was even set up for data so you can send/receive email in the middle of the ocean.) The owner went out of his way to show Dave how the inverter works. He assured Dave that it would automatically shut off the hot waster tank when you go onto battery power. They then went on the training cruise. On the way back into the marina, someone backed another boat out of the slip and cut Dave off. He had to stop the boat and float waiting for the guy to get out. The owner started getting nervous when the boat started to drift. (Drifting in close quarters can be dangerous as you can find yourself bouncing off the other boats in the marina.) But Dave had it under control and pulled into the dock smoothly.
Meanwhile Melissa and Cindy headed into town to get the fresh groceries with Chuck's car, which still had room in it. Fortunately, Melissa had spotted what looked like a butcher on the way through town. They had steaks from the same heard of cattle that Ruth Cris gets their steaks from. We loaded up with hand cut rib eyes and New York steaks along with bacon, hamburger, and salami. Then on to the grocery store for all the fresh veggies.
By the time the shopping was done the guys had finished the training cruse and we were ready to load the boat. At 4pm sharp we were off! We weren't gone an hour when John went up on deck to move a line and sploosh - there went his cell phone! Dang!
We then pulled into spencer spit just as another boat was leaving. Hooray! An available mooring buoy. After we got tied up we went ashore in the skiff and wandered around looking at the herons and the bunny rabbits.
Dinner that night was the best rib eyes any of us had ever eaten. We discovered that the boat was not equipped with steak knives. But we didn't need them! We had grilled asparagus, and a wonderful cabernet. For dessert we had peaches with mint and whipped cream. Yum.
We stayed up way to late drinking wine and telling stories.