Lummi Islander sets sail on San Juan tour
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Some opportunities arrive quietly and deserve to be taken. This was one of them — a chance to get my daughter and her 7-year-old twins off solid ground and onto the water, not aboard a tour boat full of strangers following a script, but on a working vessel doing its honest daily rounds through one of the most beautiful archipelagos in the world. The girls are twins, which doubles everything — the energy, the wonder and the noise. At 7, their eyes are still fully open to the world, and I wanted to put something real in front of them before that changes.
I live on one of these islands. That alone is a privilege I have never taken lightly. What moves me most is not only the landscape — though it earns every superlative ever written about it — but the quiet, capable people who make their lives here every day. I wanted my granddaughters to see both.
Three weeks ago, I posted a request on Next Door for suggestions on how to take my visiting granddaughters on a boat trip that wasn’t a tourist excursion but would offer them a homestyle view of one of the most beautiful regions in the world. An ocean’s perspective, condensed into two short, memorable hours.
A neighbor suggested a water taxi. Being of terrestrial origin, I pictured an Uber navigating the passage westward and southward — surely reliable and on time — though my mind quickly redesigned the vessel as something more fitting: a handsome boat combing surf in a brisk windchill.
There at the bow stood a grandmother, her daughter and the twins — rocking in heaven, holding hands, facing forward like miniature Statues of Liberty, defiant in the wind.
The ride was bliss.
I called Island Opportunity Charters in Bellingham and asked whether passengers without a specific destination could tag along on a delivery run through the San Juan Islands — and for a reasonable fare. The question was half serious, half hopeful. Whatever the per-person rate, it had to multiply by four.
To my genuine surprise, “Island Opportunity Charters does exactly that,” said Jenny. She gave us options for days and specific islands scheduled for stops. Specific destinations couldn’t be guaranteed weeks in advance, but with flexibility of a day or two, options would be available. The girls would ride at half fare. In perspective, our total cost came to roughly 60% of a Whatcom-Lummi Island ferry punch card — considerably less than owning a boat, maintaining a slip, or fueling one.
We arrived at the dock mid-February on a weekday, early enough to be there before the boat put in.
I came prepared with seasickness medication for the girls. As it turned out nobody would need it.
One granddaughter hesitated at boarding. Within minutes both were at the bow as self-appointed figureheads — mermaid queens, hair in the wind, meeting the sea head-on together.
Our captain delivered the island’s first gentleman passenger — property owner, mayor and mailman combined — along with feed for his chickens and ducks. Cargo offloaded, we lifted the bow ramp, came about and got underway to collect two other men finishing their respective workdays on separate islands. On time.
We were early for both pickups, so Captain Craig circled us around a pair of superbuoys occupied by California sea lions, tanning themselves with complete indifference to the cold. I attempted a bark — drawing on memories of years spent near California rookeries. The girls laughed. The sea lions offered one slow, heavy flipper wave that said, plainly, get lost.
With a half hour still in hand before the passengers would be ready for pick up, Craig took us on a slight detour to Pelican Beach on Cypress Island — what he called the finest stone beach in the archipelago. He hadn’t revealed what he had in mind.
We came ashore briefly at the Cypress Island Natural Resources Conservation Area, stepping onto a beach paved with a treasure of perfectly flat, smooth stones. Craig’s son, Seth, minded the boat while Craig spent the next half hour teaching my granddaughters to skip rocks. I stood back and watched — my daughter and both girls completely absorbed, genuinely captivated, the sea and islands working on them in a way no planned excursion could manufacture.
We then collected our final two passengers — workmen heading home to the mainland, easy and unhurried in their taxi seats — then turned back toward Bellingham.
Alongside a seasoned captain and his first mate, Seth, four flat-footed tagalongs completed the tour.
The entire journey ran two and a half hours. For the children, and honestly for me, duration was beside the point. What stays is the intensity, the harmony, and the particular kind of joy that arrives without being arranged and seeing two seven year olds press incessantly for more rides.
— By Christine Schonewald
Also read in Salish Current:
• “Good Time Girls to kick off 2026 tours,” March 16, 2026
• “Reliable ferry service, tourism and the question of balance,” March 27, 2024
• “Managing tourism at core of destination plan controversy,” Oct. 29, 2023
• “Virus versus visitors: San Juan residents weigh health risks of tourism amid pandemic,” March 26, 2020