First trip to the San Juans

[Cheechako]

Spencer spit is one of the easy spots to spend the night for sure. Good sand holding, and a real beach! I usually do the north side of the spit in case the wind is roaring in from the straight, but have seen boats on the south side. It's a good spot if you have a dog or small kids, room to run. The rabbits are thick about sundown.
just south east of Spencer is James Island park. A small island you can hike around in an hour or so. It has some mooring bouys and a dock. I wouldn't spend the night there without being on the dock or bouys though. Rocky bottom and currents.. you will swirl around all the time and hear your chain dragging across the rock sea bed.. Had to abandon a rode there once in the middle of the night and head for Spencer in the dark. Terrible night! Got the rode back next day.

[IdoraKeeper]

All good suggestions. I was at Sucia three days ago. All was normal except there was a burn ban. No beach barbeque. Ditto on the channel into fisherman's bay. If you want to continue north think about clearing into BC at Bedwell and easing on up to Ganges. Fabulous oysters at the Oyster Catcher there. Its a great sail. Just up around the corner is Montague harbor also very nice. I will be back up in a couple weeks. Its great.

[wristwister]

Whoa, slow dow Idora! The OP has yet to even experience the charm of the San Juans, and already you want to throw the Canadian Gulf Islands at him? Man, cruising itinerary overload!

I was at Sucia 5 days ago, the tail end of a week long trip through the Gulf islands. Ganges and Montague are indeed great, and that bus ride to the Hummingbird Pub ... well, hard to find the words to describe that.

[Nikolina]

Ditto on all of the above, make sure you have a "current atlas" the one that shows the direction of the currents around and through the islands. They're very helpful

[Glenn.Brooks]

Southern part of the gulf islands are closer to Lopez than Seattle!


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[cwyckham]

Originally Posted by Nikolina

Ditto on all of the above, make sure you have a "current atlas" the one that shows the direction of the currents around and through the islands. They're very helpful

And pick up one of the annual guides to the atlas that tells you what page to look at. Much easier and faster than working it out yourself from the tide tables.