August 31, 2004
Neah Bay, Washington USA (N 48o 22' W 124o 36')
We left the Pinkerton Islands and made the short trip to Bamfield, a little town on the south side of Barkley Sound where we would make our way to Neah Bay and the USA. Bamfield is something of a 'split town', one side is serviced by a dirt road that goes into the interior of Vancouver Island, the other side has no roads. The two sides are separated by a narrow strip of water. We tied up to the public dock on the roadless side and took care of our few remaining Canadian dollars by going to the general store and stocking up for the trip to San Francisco.
We departed Bamfield for Neah Bay at oh-dark-thirty, well before sunrise, and headed out onto the mostly calm Pacific Ocean. It was a motor trip all the way and we arrived at around 4pm. I gathered up our passports and boat registration and headed up the dock to call US Customs to check in. A sign on shore gave me the 800 number and in a few moments I was talking to a young man who's first question was 'When was the last time you checked into the US?' I had to think for a minute, it had been a long time, and I wasn't really sure what the last time I checked in has to do with this time. Finally I arrived at the answer, September 1997, when we finished our last trip to Canada in San Francisco. 'Oh,' he says, 'You have to go to Port Angeles.' Now I wasn't really sure how far away Port Angeles was, but I knew I was in Neah Bay, a Customs Port of Entry, and I didn't want to have to go anywhere else to check in. We discussed this, and finally arrived at the reason for going to Port Angeles. Due to Sept. 11, Customs required a physical inspection of any small boat entering the US unless you had been inspected within the last 12 months. More discussion ensued, including a call to the Port Angeles Customs office, and everyone's answer was the same: You have to go to Port Angeles.
You could say I was a little miffed, but I finally resigned myself to the change of plan and went back to the boat to deliver the bad news to Linda. Then I checked and found that Port Angeles is 50 nm from Neah Bay, all the way down the Strait of Juan de Fuca! A 100 nm detour? No way! Back to the phones I went, and more discussion ensued. An alternative was struck, we could go to Grays Harbor, 100nm down the coast. This seemed better to us, at least it was in the right direction. However, an examination of our charts showed that don't have a detailed harbor chart for Grays Harbor. We had no choice, we had to go to Port Angeles.
September 1, 2004
Port Angeles (N 48o 07' W 123o 27')
The trip from Neah Bay was uneventful. The westerlies that the Strait of Juan de Fuca is famous for didn't materialize until we were within 5 miles of Port Angeles, so we didn't do any sailing. We found a convenient spot at the guest dock around 6:30 pm and once again I went ashore to call Customs. This time the man said someone would be right down to inspect us. Now here's the thing. When an officer of the Federal government says he's sending someone to 'inspect' your boat, you get a little nervous. What are they going to do, look through every nook and cranny searching for contraband? Will we be forced to stand on the dock at gun point lest we interfere with them finding our stash of illegal fruit?
In the end, it was quick and painless. The two officers were more interested in the layout and craftsmanship of NAKIA then they were our Canadian purchased meat and produce. Why we couldn't take care of that over the phone is beyond me. Done it was however, 'Welcome to the United States.' We celebrated by mailing our quarterly estimated tax payment for 2004 to the Internal Revenue Service.
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