The three amigos arose with no planned destination, beyond eventually reaching Roche Harbor to check through US Customs in the next three days. Surfbirdhad mentioned than they were going to remain in nearby waters, but we realized that if we did so as well we would have to rush to finally make it back to Bellingham by Thursday night.

[caption id="attachment_4260" align="alignright" width="300"] Inception[/caption]

Instead, we decided to go back to Vancouver. We had all had a good time there but really had not seen much of the city. So we set our course and got underway, and after five hours of pleasant cruising, arrived at the port.

Our dockage was at Coal Harbor Marina, right up against the downtown waterfront. After our traditional arrival beer, I checked us in the marina office, and then the three of us went for a circumambulation of the nearby city blocks. Our excuse for a place to go was a nearby Starbuck's. Once again, we were all very impressed with the modern architecture, cleanliness, and youthful vitality of the city.

[caption id="attachment_4259" align="alignleft" width="150"] Vancouver houseboats[/caption]

As we returned closer to the waterfront, we were all very struck by the vast amount of water activity in the harbor: not only boats, kayakers, and single and multiman crew hulls, but a seaplane port right in the middle of things, with pontooned planes arriving and taking off every five minutes. It has to be the most vibrant, remarkable city harbor in North America.

It occurred to us that none of us had a clue about where to go for dinner, and almost simultaneously, all three of us thought about calling Sarah Howard of the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club to ask for recommendations. Instead we emailed her,

and she immediately emailed back, offering to join us for drinks and providing her choices for a couple of good places to eat. Since one of them was right near the waterfront, that's where we ended up, and she met us along with TK to spend several hours joking and talking about the cruise. We all agreed we'd meet again at the Lauderdale Boat Show in November. Yet another bridge built with the Royal Van.[gallery include="4258,4257" size="medium" link="file" columns="2"]

With that, we stumbled out of the restaurant and down the dock to our awaiting vessel, and sleep.