through the curved windows

through the curved windows

of the ferry, two girls gaze

at the curving wake

In the morning we load up the cars for the next leg of our journey to Vancouver. I learned how to pack from travels with my father, so I jigsaw puzzle the luggage into the trunk (or "boot" as my English buddy says). At the Anacortes ferry dock we join a line (Nicki says "queue") of vehicles waiting to board. The buoys that corral the ferries near the dock look like scifi islands looming up out of the water.

The buoys are crowded with cormorants, graceful waterbirds with sinuous necks, blue-black feathers, orange neck patch and long hooked bill for catching fish. After diving for fish, the birds perch with wings outspread to dry. These fish eaters have painted the dark metal with abstract splotches and streaks of their white droppings, truly visceral art.

Entering from the stern, we park in a double line on one side of the garage, then get out and walk upstairs to the passenger area. The Chelan ferry cruises slowly for about two hours through the San Juan Islands, stopping only once at Friday Harbor before reaching Victoria on Vancouver Island. After reading about the dearth of lifeboats on the Titanic, I check out the location of the life rafts and life preservers, comfortingly colored orange.

Then I gravitate to the open stern deck, a bit cold and windy, to savor the scenery: the curving line of the wake, pine covered islands eclipsing blue islands sliding by under a mottled blue-gray sky, birds skimming the dark water, tiny boats far in the distance. 

Of course, there's people watching: a trio of boys leaning against the deck railing, an older man with a ballpoint pen in his right hand ready to take notes on a piece of paper while his left index finger taps an iPad, a father buttoning his daughters' jackets before a stroll outside.

And then there's the serendipitous discovery of beauty in unexpected places and forms: the undulating lines of oak benches, a sprinkling of blue and yellow rubber bands like bubbles floating on a river of rust.