Dauntless

Tuesday morning our friend Gerry called to ask Kent if he’d like to drive to Blaine, board a 63 foot boat and accompany him on a power boating repositioning cruise. When? Well, be here ASAP.

Of course, Kent said yes immediately then asked me if I’d like to join them. I thought about it for 30 seconds and said, “Of course!” It was a lovely sunny day with no wind and what could be more fun than spending a day on the ocean in a 63 foot boat?

We grabbed our passports, floater coats and crossed the border, stopping briefly for lunch ‘to go’ from Subway, a dozen Corona and a bottle of red, and were at the Blaine Civic Marina by 11:30 am.

Gerry and the owner of the boat were just outside the harbor, with a couple of radar technicians aboard, repairing and testing the radar which hadn’t worked the day before. They unloaded the boat from a freighter in Seattle and brought it to Blaine - in the fog - with no radar.

The owner, Ed, had to return to Seattle unexpectedly and couldn’t complete the rest of the trip but needed the boat in Whonnock BC that afternoon. It’s always good to have a couple of deckhands along, although Gerry is a fully qualified Captain and would have no trouble alone, so he invited us to join him.

We left the marina around noon and headed toward White Rock Pier to clear customs, by phone. Kent was at the helm as Gerry phoned Canada Customs in Victoria and we stood off the pier until cleared. Gerry had a lot of explaining as the boat is so new, it isn’t even documented in the USA yet, and the owner was not aboard, but he had the HIN, ‘Hull Identification Number’, the owners name, address, phone number, the make and model of the boat.

Okay - at 63 feet this isn’t just a boat. It’s a 63.4 foot Queenship, ‘Passage Maker’, built in China.

The interior of the ship is a satin finish teak. Everything, except the ceilings, is finished in beautiful fine grain teak, with not a knot to be found. There are three staterooms. The master is amidships with a queen size bed, a settee, an ensuite bathroom, closets with aromatic cedar lining, plenty of cupboards and drawers, and my favourite - 4 port holes with inside stainless hinged covers. The master also has a door to the engine room, which would make most Captain’s very happy!

Speaking of engine room - it was pristine and glistening! The ship is powered by a John Deere 6 cylinder diesel engine, marinized by Lugger. The hull is soft chined with gyro controlled stabilizers and the cruising speed is 10 knots.

The middle stateroom has bunk beds and a door to the guest bathroom which is shared by the forward stateroom. The forward stateroom has a queen bed, the walls are artistically finished - in teak of course. The floors and stairs throughout are teak.

The pilot house is large, with a door on each side to allow easy access to the decks. A corner settee with table is at the back of the pilot house and behind the settee is a ‘daybed’ for the Captain to nap while the helmsman takes over.

The electronics include 2 Furuno radars, 4 VHF radios, a GPS plotter, a colour depth sounder, Simrad autopilot. A hydraulic bow and stern thruster make docking a piece of cake.

A staircase in the pilothouse takes you to the huge command bridge. There are 3 exit doors from the decks, making the deckhand’s job as easy as possible, although it is quite a step down from the deck to the dock, unless you are on the swimgrid.

The galley had a full size fridge, dishwasher, 4 burner stove, oven, garbage compactor, double sinks and plenty of storage. A bar area separates the galley from the large salon. My favourite feature of the salon was the flat screen TV which is hidden inside a cabinet and lifts by remote control. I want one! Imagine your TV not even in sight when not in use.

I enjoyed the day, taking tons of photos as we ventured up the Fraser River, passing Steveston, New Westminster, many tugboats, booms of logs, commercial traffic, fishing boats and a few other pleasure boats. We went over the Deas Island Tunnel, under the Alex Fraser Bridge, under the Sky Train Bridge, under the Patullo Bridge, through the opened New Westminster Railroad Bridge then under the Port Mann Bridge. Before transitting the Fort Langley/Albion Ferry Lanes we saw the construction in progress for the Golden Ears Bridge, with the Golden Ears Mountain in the distance - the snow glistening in the afternoon sun.

As the sun disappeared, we were still an hour from our destination. It was very difficult to see logs and chunks of wood in the river so Gerry went to the bow to keep watch - luckily - he pointed out a few hazards. I was going to go out with him to help (and to commisserate as it was brutally cold) but I knew he was really, really cold and it wouldn’t have helped much for us both to be so cold…

We were very glad to see the see the dock at Whonnock. While the guys were tieing up and shutting down the boat, I gave the interior a quick wipe down. It was a pleasure to clean the counters and tables, polish the stainless door handles and sill plates, wipe our fingerprints from the doors, and get down on my knees to wash the beautifully joined teak floors after our day of living aboard this beautiful Queenship, “Dauntless”.

We then took time to enjoy a couple of drinks and relaxed - not that I hadn’t relaxed all day, but it felt good to be at our destination. Gerry’s van was there and we hopped in and headed toward home. Kent’s truck was in Blaine so we decided to go there to get it and ate a late dinner at the wonderful Mexican restaurant in Blaine.

It was a perfect end to a wonderful day spent winter boating on the waters of beautiful British Columbia.