Marco Flamingo
Active member
This probably isn't on anyone else's bucket list, but it was on mine. I grew up on Grays Harbor and messed around there a lot in the sloughs and backwaters, so I was always curious about Willapa Bay, Long Island, and the North river. I'll probably still do Grays Harbor even though I explored the Hoquiam and the Humptulips rivers as a kid.
I put in at Toke Point at the Port of Willipa Bay marina. It's run by the Shoalwater Tribe and on their reservation. I immediately learned how the tribe got its name and why everything is called the something or other spit, shoal, sands, bar, bank, reef, shelf, slough, etc. I didn't have the official NOAA chart, just the Navionics card on the Lorance and a cruising atlas, both of which are facsimiles of the NOAA chart. Rather poor facsimiles, unless the NOAA chart itself is inaccurate (or the sand bars move around, which is likely).
I had to laugh at the Navionics chart. It's bathymetric lines ran in figure eights and curlicues in some places. Lines that randomly started and ended. Not a single actual sounding on the entire bay. The colors for dry land and what exposed at low tide were seemingly reversed in some areas. I assume that the data is from some computer scan of a NOAA chart and Willapa Bay is just too complex for that computer program.
The bar of the bay was interesting. First, there are commercial crab pots everywhere. That was generally an indication of deep water, i.e., 10 or more feet at low tide. But if the buoy had slime on it, it may have drifted into shallow water. Each crab pot was marked by two buoys about 4 feet apart and in a straight line with the ebb and flow. That makes it a lot easier for the crabber to retrieve them under any current conditions and helped me by 1) marking the channel and 2) showing the the direction and strength of the current and 3) missing them as the two buoys basically pointed towards the next if there was any current. At one point, the pot buoys were only making Vs on the surface, having been pulled under by the current. Time to get away from the bar, having peeked at the mostly sand islands that dot the southern opening of the bay.
I headed towards Long Island, at the southern end of the bay. I knew that there had been a land swap in the 80's between the State of Washington and Weyerhaeuser in order to preserve some of the last lowland old growth timber in the State. Some had told me that the State didn't get there fast enough. Weyerhauser had build a boat ramp on the island, which can be seen from Highway 101, and was barging logging trucks onto the island, loading the trucks, and then barging the loaded trucks back. Must have been some good wood.
There is no dock on the island side, so I had to "beach" my boat. I say beach, but the island is mostly surrounded by huge mud flats. Having recently lost my phone, which I use for tide charts and as a watch, I guesstimated the tide and ran the boat "aground." Again, there wasn't really any ground. I crawled through 10 feet of mud, having to reach to the bottom of each "post hole" in the mud an pull my shoe out, as the mud had sucked it off.
Once ashore, I hiked to the "Ancient Cedar Grove," about a 6 mile round trip. My impression is also that the State didn't get there soon enough. The marketable timber had been cut, leaving only trees of lesser value. Still, those snaggled cedars, some reportedly 1,000 years old, were impressive, as were the stumps left behind. A stump 10 feet in diameter and 12 feet high is impressive. Kind of like looking at a Woolly Mammoth tusk and imaging what the whole thing must have looked like.
Because I gauged the tide wrong, I spent an extra 1 1/2 hours waiting for the boat to float. I couldn't get to my intended anchorage before dark and just threw the anchor out in what I again guesstimated to be the appropriate depth. The entire bay is suitable bottom for anchoring. The only problem is that the bay is about 1/2 the size at low tide. There are tidal mud flats that are exposed three miles out from the high tide vegetation. That leaves small channels of deep water that the oystermen have marked with long skinny sticks.
The larger channels would be used by anybody travelling at night, the bays were all mud flats, so there were surprisingly few anchorages. I anchored at the edge of a channel, heard the bottom skritching in the night, pulled anchor and drifted into deeper water, and dropped anchor again. Worst case scenario I would have spent a few hours on a mud flat in the morning. Amazing how fast I can get up when I hear that skritch. I need an alarm clock that does that.
In the morning I went off to explore the North River. I had heard that there was a houseboat community there. Entering the river channel required a medium to high tide and following the ratty rotten remains of some old day markers. The markers carved an arch that I would have never suspected as being the river channel. Even following them was a little dicey. My lowest reading was under 2 feet. Once in the actual river, depths dropped to 18 feet.
The houseboat community was interesting. The shoreline of the North River, like many coastal rivers, is littered with old pilings left over from when the logs were floated down the rivers and towed to the sawmills. It was also common to drive pilings down the center of the river, so that the log rafts could be accessed even if the tide was low. It was also important to keep the logs "clean" as the sticky sandy mud was tough on the buzz saw blade.
The majority of the North River houseboats were on these old center-river pilings. That meant that you needed a boat to access your houseboat. The nearest dock was a mile away at the Highway 105 bridge and it was full of kicker boats, as the residents seemed to mostly be away, it being a work day. It was easy to tell who was home, because there would be smoke coming from the chimneys. Some houseboats had a special woodshed barge along side.
I saw lots of bird wildlife. Elk tracks but no elk. WX2 said small craft advisory in the afternoon, so I headed for Tokeland. I can't say that I would recommend this as a C-Brat cruise destination, but it's now off my bucket list.
Mark
I put in at Toke Point at the Port of Willipa Bay marina. It's run by the Shoalwater Tribe and on their reservation. I immediately learned how the tribe got its name and why everything is called the something or other spit, shoal, sands, bar, bank, reef, shelf, slough, etc. I didn't have the official NOAA chart, just the Navionics card on the Lorance and a cruising atlas, both of which are facsimiles of the NOAA chart. Rather poor facsimiles, unless the NOAA chart itself is inaccurate (or the sand bars move around, which is likely).
I had to laugh at the Navionics chart. It's bathymetric lines ran in figure eights and curlicues in some places. Lines that randomly started and ended. Not a single actual sounding on the entire bay. The colors for dry land and what exposed at low tide were seemingly reversed in some areas. I assume that the data is from some computer scan of a NOAA chart and Willapa Bay is just too complex for that computer program.
The bar of the bay was interesting. First, there are commercial crab pots everywhere. That was generally an indication of deep water, i.e., 10 or more feet at low tide. But if the buoy had slime on it, it may have drifted into shallow water. Each crab pot was marked by two buoys about 4 feet apart and in a straight line with the ebb and flow. That makes it a lot easier for the crabber to retrieve them under any current conditions and helped me by 1) marking the channel and 2) showing the the direction and strength of the current and 3) missing them as the two buoys basically pointed towards the next if there was any current. At one point, the pot buoys were only making Vs on the surface, having been pulled under by the current. Time to get away from the bar, having peeked at the mostly sand islands that dot the southern opening of the bay.
I headed towards Long Island, at the southern end of the bay. I knew that there had been a land swap in the 80's between the State of Washington and Weyerhaeuser in order to preserve some of the last lowland old growth timber in the State. Some had told me that the State didn't get there fast enough. Weyerhauser had build a boat ramp on the island, which can be seen from Highway 101, and was barging logging trucks onto the island, loading the trucks, and then barging the loaded trucks back. Must have been some good wood.
There is no dock on the island side, so I had to "beach" my boat. I say beach, but the island is mostly surrounded by huge mud flats. Having recently lost my phone, which I use for tide charts and as a watch, I guesstimated the tide and ran the boat "aground." Again, there wasn't really any ground. I crawled through 10 feet of mud, having to reach to the bottom of each "post hole" in the mud an pull my shoe out, as the mud had sucked it off.
Once ashore, I hiked to the "Ancient Cedar Grove," about a 6 mile round trip. My impression is also that the State didn't get there soon enough. The marketable timber had been cut, leaving only trees of lesser value. Still, those snaggled cedars, some reportedly 1,000 years old, were impressive, as were the stumps left behind. A stump 10 feet in diameter and 12 feet high is impressive. Kind of like looking at a Woolly Mammoth tusk and imaging what the whole thing must have looked like.
Because I gauged the tide wrong, I spent an extra 1 1/2 hours waiting for the boat to float. I couldn't get to my intended anchorage before dark and just threw the anchor out in what I again guesstimated to be the appropriate depth. The entire bay is suitable bottom for anchoring. The only problem is that the bay is about 1/2 the size at low tide. There are tidal mud flats that are exposed three miles out from the high tide vegetation. That leaves small channels of deep water that the oystermen have marked with long skinny sticks.
The larger channels would be used by anybody travelling at night, the bays were all mud flats, so there were surprisingly few anchorages. I anchored at the edge of a channel, heard the bottom skritching in the night, pulled anchor and drifted into deeper water, and dropped anchor again. Worst case scenario I would have spent a few hours on a mud flat in the morning. Amazing how fast I can get up when I hear that skritch. I need an alarm clock that does that.
In the morning I went off to explore the North River. I had heard that there was a houseboat community there. Entering the river channel required a medium to high tide and following the ratty rotten remains of some old day markers. The markers carved an arch that I would have never suspected as being the river channel. Even following them was a little dicey. My lowest reading was under 2 feet. Once in the actual river, depths dropped to 18 feet.
The houseboat community was interesting. The shoreline of the North River, like many coastal rivers, is littered with old pilings left over from when the logs were floated down the rivers and towed to the sawmills. It was also common to drive pilings down the center of the river, so that the log rafts could be accessed even if the tide was low. It was also important to keep the logs "clean" as the sticky sandy mud was tough on the buzz saw blade.
The majority of the North River houseboats were on these old center-river pilings. That meant that you needed a boat to access your houseboat. The nearest dock was a mile away at the Highway 105 bridge and it was full of kicker boats, as the residents seemed to mostly be away, it being a work day. It was easy to tell who was home, because there would be smoke coming from the chimneys. Some houseboats had a special woodshed barge along side.
I saw lots of bird wildlife. Elk tracks but no elk. WX2 said small craft advisory in the afternoon, so I headed for Tokeland. I can't say that I would recommend this as a C-Brat cruise destination, but it's now off my bucket list.
Mark
