Back in the US of A

The passage from Bamfield BC to Newport, Oregon, took 38 hours: two full days and one night. Coming in to Newport from offshore, we dodged a bazillion crab pots - including a set that some entrepreneur placed right in the middle of the fairway between two entrance buoys. Between the tuna boats and the crabbers, it became clear to me that the US, not wanting Canada to move ahead of them in the resource extraction race, enacted the No Fish Left Behind Act intending to clean out the ocean of all sea life as fast as it can.

They’re doing a good job of it - but we still saw some critters Out There. At 3am, we had a visit from some Pacific white sided dolphins; they showed just enough of themselves to reveal their black and white markings. Nothing lifts a girl’s spirits on a gloomy, foggy night spent dodging other boats, than a visit by a couple of exuberant dolphins taking a quick chuff of air and then zipping back and forth under the hull of her boat. Bonus: the dolphins and porpoise I’ve seen, always roll over slightly to look you in the eye - they seem to want to see you looking back at them and watching them bust their so-superior moves. So if you’re ever visited by a dolphin or porpoise, day or night, lean over the gunwales a bit so they know you’re paying attention to them.

Later, when it was daylight, we saw our first ocean sunfish. And yes; it does look like a giant fish head floating in the water, ineffectually flapping its wee fins, with a very surprised look on its face -- as if its head has just been severed by a shark or a boat propeller or something. Seriously - this fish is ALL HEAD and just bobs along on the surface of the water. According to my Field Guide to All Things Fishy, the ocean sunfish is a type of extremely large puffer fish (grows up to 11 feet; the one we saw was a mere 4 feet or so) with highly toxic flesh that kills you dead, but before you die you remain conscious throughout the whole ordeal so you get the full experience of neurotoxins shutting down your organs one by one. It would make the perfect weapon for a revenge killing. Hmmmm…..

We entered Newport, Oregon on August 6 at 2030, just as the last light of day disappeared. Docked without incident at the South Beach Marina, whose staff helped us with all kinds of things from the moment we landed. They even helped us arrange an appointment with the US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) to check back in to the US after having been gone for over 6 months. The next day we had a visit from Customs Inspector Jeff, the very nice man with the uniform and the semiautomatic sidearm. Because we had our $25 annual CBP sticker already affixed to the proper window of the boat and the rest of our papers were in order, we totally made Inspector Jeff’s day by having saved him a lot of extra paperwork. Thus our inspection and check-in went smoothly. Newport is one of the two best all-weather ports in Oregon; so if you’re an American arriving from Canada it makes sense to enter the US here. And if you do, please be kind to Inspector Jeff and have your CBP sticker in place to save him some paperwork. You won’t regret it.

Because we had to have our mail forwarded to us, clean the boat, and generally sort things out, we stayed in Newport about a week. Even had time for some tourism. I can heartily recommend a trip to the Oregon Coast Aquarium and the Yaquina Bay lighthouse; and there are many fine restaurants you will no doubt find for yourself if you ask around. Newport is also the first place I have seen more sea lions on one float, than I saw in all of BC since January:

Here are some pictures of birds we’ve seen on the water in our travels, that I was unable to get close enough to until I went to the Oregon Coast Aquarium: a black oystercatcher, a pigeon guillemot, and tufted puffins!

It’s funny, in a way - intellectually GB and I know we’re back in the US, but somehow, after having been on the boat in Canada for so long, Newport still seems to both of us like it’s a foreign country. Maybe it is. Heh.

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