Passage to Newport, OR

Just sharing an update from Newport, OR. We are on Eventide and have a whole TRU crew moving her south to San Francisco. We had a great first run from Seattle to Newport, only stopping in Port Angeles for one night. We arrived in Newport on Tuesday and are looking at the coming weather window on Sunday as a possible departure point.

The Ballard Locks opening up for our departure - friends and family came to wish us off despite the early hour

Some stats. It was 12.5 hours to Port Angeles and 67 nautical miles. From Port Angeles to Newport, OR was 300 nautical miles and 48.5 hours.

Generally, we motored quite a bit - from Seattle till just outside of Port Angeles and then most of the Newport leg, except for wonderful respites off the Columbia River entrance and in our final hours into Newport. Between currents, weather, crew, and family commitments when it was safe to move we needed to move.

Sailing just off of Port Angeles

Port Angeles was a quick stop and we didn’t explore at all. It has been a long day of getting to know the boat and we saw a weather window the following day. We had planned to stop in Port Townsend and Neah Bay, but fair currents and good weather meant we took the chance to move. I was glad we had serviced the engine recently and felt good about the state of all the vitals given we ended up putting on a good number of engine hours.

The stretch outside of the Strait of Juan de Fuca was grey in the morning but opened up to a gorgeous day with great weather for taking the “big left” at Cape Flattery.

Cape Flattery as we took our “big left”, just before sunset

The night was calm so we motored on till morning, but by mid-day we were making good time and shut down the iron genie in favor of some downwind sailing with the Code 0. We saw lots of whales while we drifted slowly south.

Flying the Code 0 off the Columbia River entrance

We had fair currents for most of the trip with the odd north current now and again - but these generally passed after an hour or so, giving way to favorable south currents.

It’s hard to beat a sunset at sea

In our final stretch we were able to do a nice broad reach into Newport. Great sunrise, good weather, easy navigation right after sunrise into Newport.

Sailing on a broad reach into Newport, OR

Of note, the transient dock in Newport is shallow. We draw 7' and have had to adjust to a specific position on the dock (moving it feet at a time) to find a spot deep enough on the -0.3' tide this morning.

Transient deck at Newport Marina in Newport, OR