I was walking around down at the port with Ray, our head gardener, last week noticing all the little iris, daffodil, tulip and dahlia sprouts starting to poke out of the earth.
Each year, it gets more and more exciting to watch our port property begin to bloom as spring approaches. Of course, the official prognosticator of spring’s arrival, Punxsutawney Phil, officially predicted — by not casting a shadow on Feb. 2 — that spring would arrive early.
Speaking of spring approaching, don’t forget that on March 10 we will all spring ahead an hour when Daylight Savings Time returns. The port staff did a wonderful job representing the port and the town at the Great Seattle International Boat Show. I know that a lot of you stopped by to say hello. Harbormaster Kevin spent a lot of time working with our local businesses to put together a super “Treasure Chest” of coupons, goodies and gift certificates. The chest was raffled off on the last day of the show and the lucky winner, a Mr. Alan Turnidge, will visit Kingston more than a few times this coming summer to take advantage of all he won.
It was interesting to visit with people attending the boat show. Many had been to Kingston in the past and love the place. Some hadn’t stopped here for more than a dozen years and were surprised to see our video display about the town. It seemed to me that many Canadians know a lot about Kingston and make sure that when they are cruising south that a stop here is always on their agenda.
The first big event of the year will take place in Mike Wallace Park, March 30. In cooperation with the Chamber of Commerce Events Committee, Windermere Real Estate will welcome spring to Kingston with the sixth annual “Kites over Kingston” festival. Bring your own flying contraptions down and let’s get them airborne. The event is 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Speaking of the events committee, the slate is being formulated for the 2013 Concerts on the Cove series. Yes, our favorite Elvis tribute singer Danny Vernon will be back!
An update to our passenger ferry inventory: the Spirit of Kingston will be leaving for about a week to go up to Port Townsend for a pre-transfer survey. Once that is finished, she will come back to Kingston for a week or so before departing for Seattle where she will go into service with the King County Water Taxi service between West Seattle and downtown.
The Kingston Express is still for sale. Regarding the passenger ferry dock, we are looking at several ways to utilize that for mooring a larger boat and also providing some services to large yachts that can’t maneuver into the marina.
Nautical term
I love to read stories of the old days of sailing ships and “The War for All the Oceans” by Roy and Leslie Adkins is always a great one to pick up and review. That is where I learned this month’s Nautical Term. This month it is “Impressment.”
Impressment happened quite often when crews on ships were hard to recruit. From about 1650 until the defeat of Napoleon in the early 1800s, the British relied on “pressed” men to fill out the rosters of their naval vessels. Ships officers often would go into towns and entertain young men with rum. When the lads woke up from their night of revelry, they found themselves underway on a ship.
— Pete DeBoer is a Port of Kingston commissioner. Contact him at pete@petedeboer.com.
