20260402 Thursday, April 2, 2026- Clamming Success

It rained on and off through the night, but it stopped after 3am.  When we left for the beach at 6:45am, there was more daylight, so driving onto the beach was a lot less stressful because we could see where the beach was compacted and where all the driftwood ended up.  It was also a lot easier to see any clam shows.  

There was just a sprinkle of rain with winds of about 20mph when we arrived, but the rain stopped shortly thereafter.  Unlike yesterday, visibility was much improved and with the sun occasionally breaking through the clouds, we could actually see some clam shows.  There were very few of the classic volcano shows, but enough to show Mark and Jan what they look like.  There were mostly quarter sized depressions for shows, but they were visible.

Janet managed to find her limit within a half hour, while it took Ben about 45 minutes.  Mark and Jan received tutoring on spotting clam shows and digging techniques.  Mark had spotted at least a dozen good shows, but didn’t manage to pull up any clams until Ben followed him and plunged his longer gun into Mark’s original holes, finding the clams just about 6” deeper than the maximum reach of Mark’s welded aluminum gun.  With that knowledge, Mark was able to find more clams, sometimes plunging a second time into the hole, and sometimes reaching into the hole to feel the clam at the bottom.  

Jan was using one of our vented PVC guns, but she couldn’t get them more than about 16” into the sand.  Janet helped her by going in a second time with her vented stainless steel gun and let Jan try using the fancier gun.  The stainless steel tube is thin walled so it is less resistance to plunge it into the sand.  We eventually managed to get everyone their limit of 15 clams each.  

Mark and Jan checked out of their hotel and rendezvoused back at the RV with a box of donuts to learn how to clean the clams.  They were quick studies, having experience with cleaning shrimp, and were able to get their catch bagged up to go home with them.  They had to leave by 10:30am to catch their ferry reservation.  They were going back via Port Townsend so as to avoid the I-5 University Bridge construction mess.  

We ran out of propane just as the last of Mark and Jan’s clams were de-shelled, so we let out clam catch soak while we ran into town to refill our propane tank.  It looks like we can run the generator about 5 hours on a 20# propane tank.  

We tried to refill our tank at the closest RV park, but their pump wasn’t working properly.  After about 15 minutes of attempting to get it to work, we drove to a different RV park, close to the Westport airport, where they were able to fill the tank pretty quickly.  It helps that it is close to the library as well, so we could use the library’s Wifi to upload the blog.  Ben discovered that Oak Harbor residents can get reciprocal library privileges with the Timberland Regional Library system, so he got signed up and can now check out books, DVD’s, and even have expanded access to use the library 7am-8pm 7 days a week, even if the library is otherwise closedm so that is cool.