“Man, this is a lot of work for a little fun.”

Natalie remarked as we drifted in the middle of Lake Union in almost no wind. I thought yep, that’s a pretty good description of sailing! Sometimes it’s a lot of work and only a little fun.

But it was a good reminder that it’s about the journey, not the destination. The “work” of getting there has fun parts too. And sometimes there’s more fun than other times.

We had left dock at 5:55pm to catch the 6pm Ballard bridge opening, and then opened the Fremont bridge to get to Lake Union, raised sails, and did a little 1-2 knot drifting in 0-3 knots wind. After about 20 minutes it was time to turn around and go back through the two bridges to make it back to our marina by 7:20 sunset.

We had decided to go for a short sail because we needed to turn the boat around in its slip in order to remove the name decals on the stern. I felt it a shame to turn on the engine just to turn around, so I suggested why not go for a sail? Plus it was our first time taking the boat out since getting it back to Seattle 3 1/2 weeks ago (we were busy doing projects, and had a week in Hawaii).

Renaming Ceremony

Removing decals after heating with a hair dryer for 5-10 seconds per letter

After removing the old name and port, we did a denaming and renaming ceremony with a bunch of friends invited over. The script I followed was John Vigor’s denaming / renaming ceremony.

Natalie found the idea for the name from an old 1950’s cocktail book. The violet hour is the time of day when your work is done and it’s time to relax and have a drink. That’s often our favorite time of day, especially when boating and arriving to an anchorage with the sun just about to set.

We bought the new decals from BoatUS.com (about $80 for the name+port and $20 for the registration decals) and they were a piece of cake to put on.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=o2jZ2H8NCwc%3Fhd%3D1%26vq%3Dhd720