The Return of the Travel Lift

 We made it to Port Townsend for our haul-out with a whopping 20 minutes to spare. For those of you who made good choices in your life and don't spend an inordinate amount of time in and around boats, a "haul-out" means your boat is lifted out of the water and placed precariously on land so that you or (if you're rich) someone else can do repairs on the boat that are impossible in the water. This isn't the first time we've hauled a boat out, and it probably won't be the last. Our previous two boats lived in freshwater, which freezes in the winter, so a seasonal haul-out was a requirement. Here in saltwater Puget Sound, however, you can go years without a haul-out. 

But eventually, the travel lift comes for us all. 

The travel lift is an enormous remote-controlled cube that lifts boats out of the water and drives them and deposits them on land. It's fascinating to watch, unless of course you're three or four years old. If you're three, it's boring. If you're four, it's devastatingly traumatic to watch your home drive away without you. So I left Justin to take pictures and the youngest crew members and I went to play on the nearby beach. 

The kids got to ride bikes for a few minutes while Justin worked with the boatyard bros to bring our boat to its new home on land. 

After a few hours of Justin getting the boat situated and me worrying about getting the boat situated, we all met up for a very deserved brunch. I had some pretty great food in Port Townsend, and The Blue Moose Cafe was our first delicious stop. I had a breakfast burrito of the gods.

Mischief Managed is designed to support our entire family without relying on a marina. That means showering, cooking, laundry and using the toilet are all simple and easy. (Or as it easy as it can be when you've only been using a toilet for a year and a half, as is the case for our smaller crew members.) But when we're on land, some of those abilities are limited. We can use water, but we can't let it go down the drain. We can flush the toilet, but not as often as we normally do. Laundry and showers had to happen at the marina facility. 

This was dangerously close to camping, and I do not like camping. 

We considered staying at a hotel for the week, but hotels in the area were either crazy expensive or really far away, and none of the hotels had all of the younger crew members' toys. The idea of endless tantrums because "X" toy was at that boat was enough to suck it up and use the marina showers. Unfortunately, this meant I was not washing my hands constantly, as I've learned to do with crew members who have a habit of licking anything that comes within reach. By the end of the week I had picked up a pretty nasty sinus infection. 

It was bizarre looking out the window at this enormous sea of boats. We've been in boatyards before, but never one this big or this populated. 

One strange thing to get used to was climbing up and down a ladder to reach the side decks to get onboard. Luckily, our youngest crew members are part mountain goat and had no trouble with it. 

Almost as elegant as the staircase on the Titanic.

Justin had a lot of work to do that week. The biggest project, at least in terms of surface area, was painting the bottom of the boat. It could have been a lot worse, but it didn't look great right after coming out of the water.

There were a lot of sea creatures who were evicted from down here. 

Another project for Justin was officially setting up our depth finder. Our very old boat had a depth finder when we bought it, but it hadn't worked in decades. Unsurprisingly, a depth finder is usually placed on the bottom of the boat, which is difficult to reach when the boat is in the water. 

Now, hold on, I can hear all of your experienced boater-brains record scratching right now. "How did you manage to drive all the way from Port Orchard to Port Townsend without a depth finder?!" You ask. "That would be reckless, dangerous, and insane." For those of you nodding in agreement but actually thinking, "What the heck is a depth finder? Does that have anything to do with a depth charge? Isn't that for attacking submarines?" A depth finder is a piece of equipment that uses sound waves to determine how deep the water is beneath the boat. Just like a dolphin with echolocation, it makes a clicking noise and listens for the echo and can determine how far away the bottom is. 

A depth finder is a pretty crucial instrument in for modern boats. Technically, there have been depth finders since Christopher Columbus's time, but theirs didn't use sound waves. Back then, a depth finder was just something heavy tied to a string you threw overboard. (Plus Christopher Columbus was a jerk and he didn't deserve nice things anyway. Knowing him, the "something heavy" was probably an Indiginous person he threw overboard and he would listen for the yell when they hit the bottom.) My recommendation was to kidnap a dolphin and tie it to the bottom of the boat, but Justin pointed out there were several problems with that plan. Mostly, dolphins are a lot bigger and stronger than me and there's no way I could kidnap it. Plus, most dolphins are unfamiliar with English, including English units of measure. If I had to translate dolphin squeaks and metric distances, it would be way too much work. 

And so Justin invented the "Depthfinder-On-A-Stick" (Patent pending.) The "Depthfinder-On-A-Stick" is a depthfinder sensor clamped to a pipe hanging down the side of the boat. It worked surprisingly well, and Justin only had to reattach it to the boat after falling off a few times. 

 The yellow circle is not a part of the Depthfinder-On-A-Stick. Or reality.

After hauling the boat out, Justin was able to actually install a more traditional depthfinder. 

It's much less visually appealing than Justin's invention, in my opinion.

While Justin was hard at work (I assume...he could have gotten the work done early and spent the rest of his time doing crimes for all I know) the kids and I got a chance to explore Port Townsend. There was a small park with a pond across the street where the kids got to run around while I frantically followed behind them checking for ticks. 

Climbing the tree was easy after the ladder. 

We did have access to our stove and microwave, so technically, we could cook onboard. But we couldn't wash dishes easily without having a place to drain the water, so it was much easier to eat out. One of my delicious Port Townsend meals was some excellent Thai food. This was from 1-2-3 Thai, recommended by a fellow boater, Carrie! 

The kids and Justin were not interested in trying exciting new restaurants. Conveniently, there was a McDonalds across the street from the boat yard. Morgan was very excited about it.

Why waste time using hands when you can suck up fries like a vacuum?

There are a lot of pros and cons to embarking on an adventure like this, especially as the kids get older. They are a lot more capable when it comes to climbing in and out of dinghies and up and down ladders. But with independence comes different needs. It's not enough for them to just hang out with me and Justin all the time. They want to play and interact with kids their own age. Unfortunately, there aren't too many families with preschool-aged kids who choose this lifestyle, so finding other cruising families is a rare occurrence. 

So when we discovered another four-year-old girl in the boatyard, our kids pounced. Her parents were happy (read: relieved) to have another family for their daughter to play with while they worked on their own boat and we were excited to bring her along on our weekend adventures. 

Justin took a break and came with us exploring Fort Worden and nearby beaches, while all three kids ran around and tired themselves out. 

They decided this is their room now. 

Who needs a weighted vest when you have kids?

Some of the sand even stayed on the beach.

We took Little Boat into town and ate more delicious food. I stocked up on books at a local bookstore, and somehow the kids managed to convince Justin into a toy store. And since we had company, we couldn't leave the toy store without treating out guest....

Devious little con artists. 

Finally, only one day behind schedule, Justin finished his work and it was time to put Mischief Managed back in the water. 

Daaaang, that's one fine aft. 

By this point, the kids had thoroughly charmed the boatyard employees. They probably would have let Abigail and Morgan drive the travel lift, but I didn't want to tempt fate so I took the kids back to the beach to run around. Abigail got to test out the kite she had picked out at the toy store that weekend. 

After an hour on the beach, the boat was back in the water and looking seaworthy. We spent a night at the marina in Port Townsend to fill up on water and electricity, and I laundered everything I could get my hands on. I almost laundered the furry crew members, but they managed to escape in time. 

Now that's a boat someone would pay money for. 

Once we were back at anchor, we could finally relax. It was peaceful and quiet and Mischief Managed was where it should be. Justin was finishing up some last-minute touches now that we were at anchor, which included moving Little Boat (our tender/dinghy in case you haven't already figured that out) into a more secure position. It was a pretty routine procedure Justin had done a bunch of times. 

Which made it that much more surprising when he dropped the line attached to Little Boat and Little Boat drifted off into the harbor. 

Justin ran inside, grabbed a boat hook, and swung desperately towards the receding line, but just missed it. He launched himself back inside, grabbed the inflatable swim platform we use for getting in and out of Little Boat, and paddled. Justin had just finished a pretty taxing weekend, but I don't think I've seen anyone exert as much physical energy as he did rowing with his arms on the swim platform. And to Justin's dismay, I recorded him doing it. 

Thanks to Justin's physical prowess and absolutely no thanks to Morgan and me laughing from the poop deck, Justin managed to drive Little Boat back. From then on, Little Boat has been tied to us with at least two lines. (I recommended 17 lines, but Justin talked me down.)

At least the universe decided to reward Justin for his hard work with an early bedtime for the kids and an incredible rainbow over the sound. I hoped that rainbow would mean an easy crossing to the San Juan Islands that upcoming weekend. [SPOILER ALERT] It did not. 

Tl;dr: We hauled out the boat in Port Townsend for a week.