And they're off....maybe!

The text of this posting was sent by email via our ham radio...the wonders of technology. We later added some photos at an internet cafe.

We pushed hard to leave Vancouver under the blue skies and sunny weather. A few brave souls showed up at 7 am on Feb 23 to see us off. Our first stop was Bellingham, which took us 13 hours (67 nautical miles) at top speed (yah, yah, we know you can drive there in an hour!!!). US Customs welcomed us with a space at the dock and an efficient entry. We visited our friends Peter and Brita and took off for Victoria at 2 am on Friday morning.

After a beautiful night passage (full moon and some good wind) we arrived around noon to Edie and Don (Lo's parents) waving on shore. They treated us to a wonderful dinner and provided us with frozen gourmet meals for our trip (thanks Momma Ross).

Given the time of year, our departure strategy will be somewhat conservative. We plan to wait here (or at Neah Bay, Wa) for good weather, then zip (okay plod, zip just sounds better) around Cape Flattery and down to Gray's Harbour (sorry, that's harbor in the US).

We hope that the blog starts to get more interactive (i.e., we update, you comment, other people read your comments and provide their own ideas, we read all the comments when we're far from home and missing you all, we get inspired to write more updates...give and take, ebb and flow, yin and yang). Please, this is a family site, so keep it clean and fun. Just click the "post a comment" link (not the send us an email link, although those are welcome too). You don't have to register unless you want to start your own blog, just leave your name. We look forward to hearing your comments.

That's it for now, Gary and Lo