You may have noticed that Down at the Port was missing last month. I hope you noticed, otherwise, why do I do this?  It’s for you, you know.  So, after the 4th of July I needed a little time to decompress. I took some time away and cruised up into the San Juan Islands and a few of the southern Canadian Gulf Islands. Up at the Port of Victoria, B.C., I attended an event called “Victoria Splash,” which is the city’s birthday party.

Each year on the first Sunday in August, the Victoria Symphony performs a free public concert onboard a barge in the inner harbor. This year was the city’s 150th. I recommend everyone try to make this event at least once in your lifetime. It was estimated that 40,000 people lined the harbor and that several hundred boats and other floating things assembled to enjoy the event. I was fortunate to park my boat closer to the barge than any other craft there.

Victoria is a wonderful city to visit.

Our summer has come to an end at the Port of Kingston. A few more Farmers Market days are still ahead, so we will be able to head down there and pick up great fresh produce for a while yet. The tent will be coming down soon and then the staff will begin assembling our wonderful holiday light display. If you want to get involved in this ever-expanding project, give Kori or Jessica a call down at the port office 297-3545. You can come down and learn how to make LED light sculptures.

I was talking with someone the other day about our lights and we were thinking how fun it would be if some of the businesses got involved too. We could set up with a display that would spread all over town from Lindvog Road to the Port. Anyone want to help with that?

You have probably heard that we terminated the SoundRunner passenger ferry service between Kingston and Seattle at the end of September. I can say that we gave it our best try and ran an efficient and frugal service. If we had gotten help from other governments and transit systems, we would still be in business. Our little service has provided a fare box return that was double most transit agencies in the world. We simply did not get the support that we had hoped for from riders and other governments. There are lots of reasons for this, but I am proud to have given this project everything I had.

Moving on, you have probably also heard that we are working on a dredging project to keep the waterway between our boat launch ramp and the breakwater open for marine traffic. All of the agencies that need to be involved with this project are onboard and the permit process is moving along.

We hope to get the permit by the first of next year and do the work by the end of February. The time from March 1 to July is closed for construction on or beneath the water. That’s when the young salmon fry are heading out to sea and we don’t want to cause a lot of mucky stuff for them to swim through.

The next administrative event for the commission and staff is to prepare our 2013 budget. We will be working on that most of October. After several years of building new things, I think that most of the next year will be dedicated to maintaining our current plant and repairing some of the older structures in the marina.

Nautical term
On the side of merchant ships that carry cargo, there are some markings in lines and numbers. The vertically spaced numbers indicate the “draft” of the ship, or just how much of the ship is underwater. They are marked on the bow and stern of the ships. These numbers represent a measurement in feet.

Plimsoll, or international convention loadlines, marks are painted on the sides of a merchant ship to indicate the safe draught to which she may be loaded. Ships may be loaded to different draughts depending on where they will operate: F, fresh water; TF, tropical fresh water; S, summer; T, tropical sea water; WNA, winter north Atlantic.

What does all that mean?  It means that Plimsoll is the nautical term of the month for October.

So there you have it. I sure have been enjoying this great late summer weather and I hope you have too.  Thanks for taking a few minutes to read this stuff. I enjoy writing it for you.

Go, Bucs!

— Pete DeBoer is a Port of Kingston commissioner. Contact him at pete@petedeboer.com