Tuesday, August 2, 2016

There’s a great little bakery in Friday Harbor called Cafe Demeter where I picked up some yummy goodies for breakfast and we were underway by 10

dodging seaplanes on our way out of Friday Harbor.

It was a lazy cruising day

so lazy in fact that the Berry finally had to take over.

Fairly uneventful two hour passage up the east side of San Juan Island passing several small islands to starboard.

We arrived in Reid Harbor on Stuart Island by noon and tied up to a linear mooring system out in the bay.  Something different but easy.

Stuart Island is a special place for us with fond memories of a family vacation we took years ago when Justin was about four years old.  We sailed up here with the Templeton’s and their four year old daughter, Andrea.  I remember after being cooped up on the boat for hours we arrived at Stuart and went for the most wonderful hike – which we recreated today.

One of the highlights of the hike was coming upon this one room schoolhouse. 

 The other highlight of the first visit was the old water pump that little Justin pumped and out came a swarm of bees – something not soon forgotten.  The pump seems to be capped off and completely overgrown with bushes.  Another cool thing about this spot is one of the ways they raise money for the school.  There are treasure chests scattered about the island with tee shirts for sale on the honor system. 

Each tee shirt comes with an envelope that you can use to mail your payment when you get home.  At these spots there’s always a cooler of water and a dog dish under the spigot to catch the extra water for doggies.

From here we continued our hike

out to the Turn Point Light Station built in 1893.

I love this picture.

We even got to take a tour of the keeper’s quarters.

Here are some sights along our hike

Then it was back to our seaworthy home.

Just as the sun was setting it popped out below the clouds for a lovely end to our day

and one last trip to shore with the pooch.