About Galen – The Ocean – Small Boats & Photography

Galen & The Ocean

I grew up in and currently live in Port Townsend, WA. Went to high school here. Met my wife here. My family is still here. My wife’s family is here. You get the idea. Deep roots. I have lived in a handful of other places, and traveled a good bit of the world. But I never truly felt comfortable elsewhere; was reluctant to even own furniture. This town made me, and continuous to. So it is no wonder I feel as imperfectly whole here as a person can.

And yet, what has most defined the arc of my 55 years, and my future plans, more than this town and its people, is the ocean that nearly surrounds our home.

It started young I suppose, hanging out on the beaches and bluffs above, gazing out to distant islands, watching the waves, sunrises and sunsets, listening to the gulls and eagles, smelling the salt and kelp. Riding ferries here and there to neighboring shores. Almost unbeknownst to me, the ocean seeped in from the shoreline, salting my blood. I had a deep affection for the natural world from a young age. But the ocean somehow became my center of gravity.

Growing up, my family where not boaters. But around my senior year of high school someone invited me sailing, and I took to it very naturally, and instantly loved it. I was a late bloomer. Shortly thereafter, I joined a trip with some friends on two small motorless sailboats up into the San Juan Islands. We sailed from Port Townsend, against my parents wishes, and spent around a week exploring the islands. What a bunch of young naked hippies we were, with all the associated harmless debaucheries and adventures. We very nearly died sailing back, darkness set in with heavy rain, and we almost crossed right behind a tug boat towing a barge in the middle of Admiralty Inlet.

That trip changed me. After, boating adventures became the definition of freedom and fun. Whenever I have lived by the water I have had boats, thought about boats, drawn boats, built boats, and gone adventuring in them, and even lived on them. All because of this almost nebulous love of getting out on the ocean. Well, and I find boats endlessly interesting. You can see the state of my fleet here.

Port Townsend is a wonderful spot to venture out from by boat. From the north shore, through a wispy blouse of fog hanging over the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the alluring shapes of the San Juan Islands can just be glimpsed. Once you have crossed that daunting strait, and have experienced those demure islands, then Port Townsend whispers about the the nearly mythical Inside Passage, a marine trail that winds all the way to Alaska through narrow channels of islands covered in huge evergreen Fir and Cedar trees, and snow capped mountain faces that fall straight into the sea. If you brave some of the strongest tidal currents in the world, whirlpools and deadheads, you are treated to an experience of nature like no other: life altering encounters with whales and seals, fjords whipping with winds that always seem to be on the nose, daring open ocean crossings, and misty emerald islands dripping with sad wolf howls, while bears crunch down shoreline mussels like noisy potato chips. Of course, the waters of Puget Sound south of Port Townsend also offer fun explorations.

I have sailed, rowed and motored all over the San Juan Islands, Puget Sound, and up much of the Inside Passage of British Columbia Canada, exploring deep into many of its fjords, to just south of Alaska. Fortunately cruising grounds are endless up here, and I have so many places still to explore. You can read stories of my adventures here.

Several of the most transformative moments in my life have been through interactions with ocean creatures. When very young, and visiting the Vancouver Aquarium in Canada, we were underground looking through the giant windows of the Beluga whale tank. A Beluga swam right up to the window, and was obviously looking at me, which in itself was a marvel. But then it ducked behind the wide concrete partition between the windows, and I naturally moved to the other side to see it again. It was waiting for that, and ducked back the other way again. Soon we were playing a game of this, hide and seek with a Beluga whale and little kid. Talk about making an impact on a young mind. I was simply awestruck by the fact of this creatures intelligence and playfulness. The experience never left me.

Another time a friend and I, in our early twenties, had been sailing one of my boats in the San Juan Islands for around a week. We were both very tired from an extremely windy and rough anchorage the night prior. My friend was asleep up in the v-berth. There was a light rain sizzling on the surface. And the boat was just barely drifting along in the lightest zephyr of a breeze. My mind was off. Primed. A black harbor seal popped its head up just off the starboard bow, very close to the boat. We slowly passed by each other, locked eye to eye. As though woven into the fibers of the moment, a sudden tacit awareness infused me; the mind behind those eyes, looking at me, was the same as the mind looking at the seal. It was an extraordinary awakening.

Interactions like those likely lead to another significant period of my ocean life. For the last 20 years I have made my livelihood on oceans all over the world. My wife and I are snorkeling travel authors and photographers with a focus on tropical reef exploration, which have taken us from the easily accessible beaches around Hawaii to traveling on many week liveaboard trips to some of the most remote islands in Indonesia. We have written many books, have a massive website, and generally done our very best to help build and support a huge community of world traveling, ocean loving snorkelers. It has been a great joy, but is at times very depressing, as we are witnessing the mass extinction of reef life around the world.

Partly in support of long range plans for continued ocean adventures, a few years ago my wife and I bought some forested raw land in Port Townsend, had a little cabin built on it, and we ourselves spent a few years building an even bigger boat barn/workshop that I designed. It’s currently stuffed with boats in different stages of construction.

Our home lies a short walk to a high bluff view across the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the San Juan Islands, and another short jaunt to a public beach along the same coastline. We (wife, dog, and I) make this walk daily, and it always lights my boating desire. Marine fog regularly rolls through the evergreen trees on our property, and fog horns from ships and our local lighthouse can be heard in the season (fogust we call it). Often in the middle of the night when taking the dog out I will hear the deep chug, chug, chug of the massive props of merchant ships coming in from the sea on their way to Seattle. I never tire of these sights and sounds.

Most recently I spent two years working full time for the Northwest Maritime Center in Port Townsend, a non-profit that gets lots of kids and adults out on the water. I helped maintain their fleet of boats, and assisted with a many different educational programs.

Yes, the ocean has had a profound impact on my life, and looks to continue to.

Why Small Boats & Inside Waters?

A theme of my photography explorations is that I travel in very small boats. Why? There is a known adage, commonly realized by folks with years of boating experience, that the smaller the boat the more you will use and enjoy it. That is true in my experience.

Small boats offer a much more intimate and tactile experience of the ocean, which can be a double edged sword when conditions get rough. But in most circumstances it is a trade I am willing to make. They are just more fun and easy to manage. They fit the human scale.

Small boats are also extraordinarily more affordable, both initially and in continued maintenance and labor; particularly trailerable or car-toppable boats. And that affordability makes it possible to own a diverse quiver of them, each suitable for different tasks.

Small boats are also much kinder to the environment in many ways.

Also, I am not drawn to the big open ocean in all its immense power and crashing splendor, upon which a larger craft would likely make sense. I like the smaller ocean, its temper tamed a bit behind islands and mountains, its voice singing a tune I can tap my foot to. I like coastal routes with cozy little anchorages or campsites on shore at night, offering shorelines and trails to stretch my legs along. It’s inside waters for me.

Galen & Photography

I starting taking pictures when I was about 15 years old with an old manual Nikon 35mm camera, a few lenses, slide film, and a very heavy tripod. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and never stopped. I ended up designing my own degree and curriculum in Nature Photography and Naturalist Writing at Fairhaven College of Western Washington University.

I intended to become a nature photographer and after graduating college started a business to that end. But the career path options available at that time quickly disillusioned me. The type of photography and business activities I was having to pursue did not suit my nature and artistic desires. And in retrospect, I lacked necessary business experience.

But I seem to have an entrepreneurial spirit, and over time started four more businesses, three of which were successful, which certainly rounded out my business skills. My photography and writing experience became very central to the success of our snorkeling travel author business, which has been very satisfying.

Small Boat Adventures Meet Photographic Art

In some ways I have come full circle, and am once again pursuing the type of art I desired as a young man. Although now I have a much more mature understanding of the art form, who I am, and what I wish to create. And the photography will be tightly focused on and happily married to my love of small boat expeditions and the ocean, and well supported by the business acumen gained over the last 30 years.

That is what InsideWaters.com is all about, going on small boat photographic explorations and sharing it with you. I still have a couple of boats I am building that are needed to flesh out the fleet, but I am now going on explorations trips, learning my craft anew, and will be publishing stories and images here fairly regularly.

Once my photography portfolio achieves the depth and desired excellence I have in mind, I will begin offering pieces for collections.

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