Running for Cover

There are a handful of notoriously bad places in the Northwest for a cruising sailor. The Columbia Bar, Cape Flattery, the Strait of Georgia, and Johnstone Strait all come to mind. Each of these places has a well deserved reputation as a place that can get nasty quickly. We've been to and sailed through each of those places during some pretty nasty weather, and in each instance thought to ourselves “Holy Crap! That was rough!”

Not only have we conquered some of the Northwest's worst areas, we've also crossed a good portion of the Pacific Ocean. We've hunkered down in nasty squalls, we've sailed in waves the size of 2 story houses, and seen our wind speed indicator ripped off of the top of our mast at somewhere around 55 knots of breeze. I guess what I'm saying is that we have a pretty good frame of reference for when things get nasty.

Even with all of that, we've just had one of our worst moments at sea ever...yes ever.

Before we head down the coast to Mexico, we need to make one last stop in Sequim, Washington. We're stopping there to see my Mom and also because she will be delivering our brand spanking new life raft. It's an important piece of equipment that we hope to never have to use. For us to get to Sequim from the San Juan islands, it's a pretty routine trip that takes us South out another infamous place, Cattle Pass, and across yet another notorious stretch of water, the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Before I go any further, I should tell you that we have done this trip more times that I can remember. It's been our typical route from Seattle into the San Juan islands and back home again. I could do it with my eyes closed.

Even though we've made this crossing about a million times, we still pay close attention to the weather, the tides, and the currents. Some of the worst conditions we've ever seen have been in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and we really have no desire to get beat up. The weather forecast was calling for 10 to 20 knots of breeze out of the West which would give us a great sail straight into Sequim. 10 knots of wind would be a little light, 20 knots would be a little heavy, but somewhere in the middle would be just about perfect to have us racing across the Strait in no time.

Cattle Pass has a huge amount of water that runs through it during the tidal exchanges. I'm talking a massive amount of water. Currents of 5 knots can run out of the pass during big exchanges. This morning was going to be one of those days. But if we left our anchorage by 5 am, we should be able to time it to go through the pass with a minimal amount of current. I know what you are thinking, “5 am is a terrible time to get up.” You are right. We should have stayed in bed.

Everything was going according to plan this morning. We got up before the sun, put on the coffee, hauled up the anchor, and were motoring out of our peaceful anchorage by 5 am. The water was glassy calm. Not an ounce of wind in sight. I was thinking, “great, we're going to have to run the motor all the way across the Strait today. Bummer! Why can't the weatherman ever get it right?”

As we got closer to Cattle Pass, the breeze started to pick up slightly. Pretty soon we had 8 knots of breeze, then 10, then 12. Perfect. This was looking good. So we put up the mainsail and motor sailed the rest of the way to the Pass.

Just as we were about to enter the Pass, you could see whitecaps starting to form on the other side, the breeze jumped from 12 knots to 25, and it was coming right on our nose. We quickly put in our second reef on the mainsail just as the wind increased to the low 30's.

Since I know most of you reading this are not sailors, I'm going to tell you a little bit about wind, waves, and currents. First of all, wind in the low 30's is a lot. It's what you see in the movies when there is a storm scene. It's blowing like crazy, it feels like your face may get ripped off, and anything that wasn't tied down on the boat is most likely flying through the air, never to be seen again.

Wind makes waves. The more wind you have, the bigger the waves get. You can trust me on that one, it's science. When you have waves that are running in the opposite direction of the current, that current makes the waves steeper and stacks the waves closer together.

Big waves aren't really a problem. We've been in 20+ foot seas that didn't bother us in the slightest because they were far apart and the boat just rolls up and over them (I should clarify “didn't bother us in the slightest”...they were huge and I swear they were monsters that were trying to eat us alive...but it was still relatively gentle considering the conditions). But big, steep waves that are close together are a major problem. They make the boat a violent place to be. They will throw you around like a rag doll.

Since we got up at the butt crack of dawn and made it to the pass at our intended time, you would think that we would just cruise on through the Pass with no issues at all. Well, here is where the problem starts.

There are current “predictions” that tell you when the current should be at the least, and in theory, when you would want to go through the Pass. Well, predictions are just that. They are predictions. They don't call them exact times, or precisely, or get here on the dot or else, they call them predictions. Loosey-goosey if you will (although they are generally pretty close).

We got to the pass when we intended, which was just after “slack” current. We wanted to get there with a slight push of current to send us into the Strait of Juan de Fuca with a running head start. We had calculated that we'd get roughly ½ of a knot of current in our favor based on the current “predictions”. Well, my math was good (I double checked after we went through), but the prediction was a little off. We entered the pass with 2 knots of current which quickly jumped up to 3.5 knots half way through pass.

3.5 knots of current may not seem like much if you are sitting on your couch or in your office. You may be thinking “What's the big deal? It's just some water running through a pass. Don't be a weenie.” Well, the big deal is this. 30+ knots of wind makes big waves and when you put 3.5 knots of current in the opposite direction of those waves, it makes a 6 foot wave turn into a 10 foot wave that is a vertical wall.

As we were going through the pass, standing waves were forming all around us. And in no time at all, they were breaking waves that were crashing down on the front of the boat and sending a wall of water, spray, and foam washing over the entire deck. They were so steep and close together that bow and the stern were at times both under water. Straight up and straight down we went, crashing through walls of water. And since there was so much current running out of the pass, whirlpools and back eddys were forming in the breaking waves that made it hard to keep us pointing in the right direction. It was crazy!

While we were in the thick of the chaos, I did point out a dolphin that was surfing down one of the big waves to Brenda. After we made it through the pass and were sailing on the Strait, Brenda commented on how calm and relaxed I seemed when I pointed out that dolphin. Almost like it was just a normal everyday event, to be pounding through massive waves, right next to a surfing dolphin.

It took us roughly an hour to punch through the current and waves and make it into the Strait. It was an hour that seemed to go on forever. And even though we've seen much bigger wind and waves, and been through squalls and storms that lasted much longer, these were the worst conditions we have ever seen...ever. We are definitely not looking to do that again.

When we finally made it onto the Strait, the wind piped down to a mere 25 knots. I'm always amazed at how 25 knots of breeze feels like a lot of wind, but after you spend a little time in 30 knots of breeze and then go back down to 25 knots, that 25 all of the sudden feels almost calm.

The Strait was pretty lumpy, bumpy, and rough, and it looked like the wind was building so we ducked and ran for cover. We turned down wind, rounded the south eastern portion of Lopez Island, and have anchored for the night in Watmough Bay. It's a beautiful spot to be, and even better, it's relatively calm compared to where we have just been.

Tomorrow, the weather forecast is looking much better, so we'll get up early and make another attempt at the Strait.   

Brenda is harnessed in as we run for cover.

Almost to Cattle Pass just as the sun is coming up.

It doesn't show up very well, but there is a lone ray of sunshine far off in the distance.  It was quite beautiful, especially after we just had the ride of our lives.