Day 31 - Port Angeles

It has been a rainy day - the first totally rainy day that we have experienced in the Northwest. We have taken it as a harbinger of what is to come and are planning our exit from the area before the end of the month.

The weather forecast on the VHF radio advised to stay away from the Olympic National Park, which blew away our plan to rent a car for a day and visit the park. We then went ashore during a lull at mid-morning with a plan to take a bus to Wal-Mart so that I could purchase a badly needed new pair of shoes. The first bad news was that the buses do not run on Sundays. The second bad news was that Wal-Mart is beyond walking distance.

We returned to the boat and spent the day reading and laying about. I did some rummaging in the port quarter berth and dug out some fresh books to read. Then I got really productive and drew plans for a stainless steel boarding ladder that we can put over the side. The ladder follows the highly successful design of Angie's ladder, which specifies square tubing that greatly simplifies the fabrication and provides flat surfaces for the rungs. I'll present the plan to a stainless steel man in Port Townsend and see if it can be built within two weeks for a less than shocking price. The boarding ladder will be important in warmer waters because although use of the Monitor wind vane frame is OK for boarding and disembarking from the Zodiac it is impractical for climbing out of the water.

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