If you were on the water in Puget Sound on Saturday, you may remember it being a light wind day. It certainly was when six boats “sailed” over to Port Blakely. There was an amazing view of downtown Seattle back lit by the Cascade mountains while the resident J-pod swam east from near Blakely rocks. Later that day a transient pod swam north out of Colvos Passage. While the sailing may not have been great, the whale watching was classic.

Six CYC member boats rafted up for the night: S/Vs Monte Solaro, Altair, Gusto, Sola, Caza Viento, and Whale Shadow. We were also joined by M/V Call Back, possible future CYC members. 

In standard cruising style, the afternoon and evening was spent relaxing and socializing. Gusto provided their sailing dinghy, Little Wing, for enjoyment and many people sailed around the bay in her. Everyone that sailed the dinghy seemed to return as their younger and perhaps best self. It's almost magical, what a small boat can do for a person.

All of the anchors held firm for the night. In the late morning, many people took a walk along the forested trails in Fort Ward park. The raft up started to split up around three with four boats returning to Shilshole after five.

(Only six boats obviously pictured … but if you zoom in through the shrouds of the blue hulled boat — Whale Shadow — you’ll see one more coming in to join the raft up. William Bonner took this photo with his drone. He also filmed this video — https://youtu.be/OYKI-3FckoY. I believe he said this was his favorite photo.)