Grand Banks Eastybay 39, “Yes Please” at Tugboat Annie’s for lunch.
It was a chilly 25° out this morning, but the sun was shining with lots of blue skies, so we headed down to the boathouse to get some quality time out on the water. With a freshly painted, clean hull and propellers, Yes Please idles at just shy of 6 knots. It makes me laugh sometimes that a fast idle will hit 7 knots, which used to be full cruising speed in our old trawler. My how times have changed.
The tide was high and winds were mild, so we decided to brave West Bay Marina in order to have lunch at Tugboat Annie’s on the water. The narrow main fairway is built for the small boats that the marina caters to, with random pilings and boats extending well past the finger piers that line the sides. Idling into the marina feels like you are entering a narrowing tunnel, with no way to escape, followed by a hard right turn with a pump-out dock projecting dead center into the turn.
Fortunately, Yes Please is highly maneuverable, making the turn possible without tagging the pump-out dock and after spinning the boat around, we were safely secured on the guest dock. The big signs warning that the docks are “dry” at low tides reminds me why we don’t venture here often.
Lunch was good and leaving the marina was a little easier than entering, but still required a bit of finesse to keep from tagging the pump out dock as you made the turn. All in all, a great way to spend a rare, sunny, February day on the water.
