Gunkholing Inati Bay

Our first full week living at sea was spent only a few miles from our launch point. Inati Bay was an ideal location to shakedown the whole living on a boat in the wild thing. It was small, surrounded by nature, offered good protection, and most importantly only an hour’s sail (or motor) from a major marina if we found some big issues, which we did not.

As I mentioned before, it is a well known location and by Saturday evening the small cove had filled with other boaters. Some of the motoring variety, and some of the sailing type. Some with kids – who played in the frigid waters, good on them – and others out for a chartered adventure. Other than initial waves of hello across the spans of water between boats, not much socializing took place (by us). We stayed to ourselves, enjoying our first quiet and relaxing days at sea, even learning how to craft our very own anchor bridal in the first days.

By Sunday evening, the cove was all our own. Other than a single boat (or possibly two) pulling in each night for an overnight stop – leaving first thing in the morning – Inati Bay was all our own for the week. We had the beach to play on only a few dozen feet away which got use multiple times each day to keep Moose happy. Much of the island is private so we did not venture too far, exploring only a few yards off the shore at most. We did take our dinghy out for a sight seeing adventure a few miles along the coast line to an established campground overlooking the larger bay that we learned to sail Meriwether in. We nearly grabbed our tent for an immediate tent-camping trip, but we lacked an essential for camping – stove fuel.

The week passed with no further drama after our day-1 anchoring issues. We quickly got back into a routine of living as nomads. I even got to get back to my own work, intentionally taking the entire week off any boat projects. The only big issue we found was that we had supplied as we were accustomed too in the van – for a single week. By the weekend, we needed all the essential foods and were forced to make our way back to civilization. WE hope to stay out at sea for two to three weeks before returning to a grocery store (and black tank pumpout). Kerri and I both agreed that returning to Bellingham would feel like a failure of some degree, so we chose not to return. Now that we are full-time-sailors, we can’t go back just because it is the easy place. We must move forward – into the wide open waters ahead.