Passage To The Mexican Riviera

11/29/11 in Los Muertos: We left La Paz at about 7:30 am morning, clear skies, winds about 12 knots. I’ve probably said this a few times already, but I’m always so excited to leave someplace and then so excited to come into someplace. We had an uneventful trip making the 45 miles from La Paz to Los Muertos, the place where Terry tangled with the mystery sea creature. We had sundowners on Endeavor and met Sherry, Bob, Sydney (another one!) and Annie aboard s/v Pearl, who joined us on Endeavor. They are from Olympia, have lived aboard there for years, which is how the Phillips family met them. What a nice family. They had hoped to cruise for a year or two, but the cruising kitty isn’t quite big enough, so they will be in Mexico for only six or seven months and then bash back north so Bob can go back to work at United Airlines. Sherry and Gina talked a lot about homeschooling, Sherry has been doing it for years, so Gina is always glad to talk to other homeschooling moms. I think doing something like this with your kids is fantastic for their education. Sydney and James are doing well, although Sydney misses her ballet a lot. Gina has arranged for a good ballet buddy to fly down here for a visit in January, and Sydney is really looking forward to that. James is such a bookworm that he loves all the free time he has to read. He loves his Kindle, he does!
It’s so nice to be back on the hook. The only reason I like marinas is for the chance to get online.We’ll be leaving around noon or so tomorrow to begin the passage across the Sea of Cortez to Isla Isabel, about 250 miles. 
The water temp here in Muertos is 74 degrees, considerably cooler than it has been over the last several weeks, when it was in the 80’s. The nights are also cooler, but we still sleep with all the ports open even in the ‘winter’ here.
11/30/11 – 12/1/11 Crossing the Sea of Cortez: We left  Los Muertos at about 11:00 this morning ahead of Endeavor bound across the Sea of Cortez to the Mexican mainland. They were going to give us a head start since they can go faster than we can. We aren’t sure yet exactly where we’ll land. Possibilities are Isla Isabel, Mazatlan or Matanchen – all around 250 miles away, so it will be two nights offshore. It will depend on the sea state and what kind of time we can make. We left under calm winds and sun, put the sails up and sailed for a couple of hours and then the wind died. I had first watch at 8pm, which was pleasant and uneventful. The moon was a crescent turned up like a cup. It was high in the sky, then in what seemed like only a few minutes, it turned bright red and sank into the Pacific.
The next day was very warm and the sea was glassy and no wind again. We saw sea turtles and lots of flying fish. The sky and sea blended into one blue canvas above and all around us. Again I had first watch and it was so surreal. There was kind of a haze that smudged the line between the sky and the mirror-like water, the stars were brilliant. It was sort of like drifting in space—I can’t really describe it. I kept thinking about that song I used to sing and play guitar to--Winken Blinken and Nod…’they sailed on a river of crystal light into a sea of dew’. As we motored along in the dark, there were some kind of critters in the water about the size of an small dinner plate that kept firing off an iridescent glow as we went by – hundreds of them. It was the most mesmerizing watch I’ve ever done. It was like a dream really. I don’t know what they were, but what a show with the glassy sea, the stars, the smudged horizon and the big fireworks going off in the water all around us.
It was decided to bypass Isla Isabel this time around and head for Ensenada de Matanchen because we had made very good time on the crossing and would have had to go into Isla Isabel before dawn—not a fun thing to do.
12/2/11 Matanchen: We saw humpback whales this morning just before we reached Matanchen. It’s a roadstead anchorage and had only a few boats in it when we got anchored and settled at about 9am. Just as we were coming in we heard a man on the VHF from the vessel Jama who was warning all of us about some serious theft problems in the San Blas and Matanchen anchorages. He advised us not to leave our boats unattended because very recently a boat had been boarded while the owners were ashore and the thieves had broken through their companionway and cleaned them out. Apparently the thieves had someone onshore who was signaling when the owners were on the way back to the boat, allowing them to get away. None of their stuff was recovered Terry recognized the name of the guy on the VHHF giving the warning and said he had read in Latitude 38 that this guy was kind of a troublemaker. We had a little meeting with Endeavor and decided that whether the guy was a troublemaker or not, we would be wise to follow his advice.We all (six of us) jumped into our dinghy and went ashore after arranging with Twyla and Ken on SV Sail Time to keep an eye on our boats and call us on our portable VHF if anything suspicious was going on.
The long beach is lined with many palapas and ramshackle buildings, dusty and hot, with the ever-present stray dogs. Apparently the town is a short walk down the dirt road running along the beach. From our vantage point on the boat it looks quite deserted, with hundreds of plastic chairs at empty tables in all the palapas—a bit unnerving. I guess the economy is suffering quite a bit.On the beach we met Baro who directed us to his palapa restaurant where we had all kinds of tasty dishes. Finally, we are in a palapa eating and visiting with the locals. Baro was so kind to us. He practiced his English, and we practiced our Spanish, and we learned all about his life. His house was behind the palapa, with a neat little yard in front. He’s lived here all his life, and he truly feels he lives in paradise. He used to be a professional surfer and has travelled all over competing. He has four grown children, a couple of whom live in Denmark, one in New Mexico and one someplace else I can’t remember (LA?). He cut some lemon grass out of his yard and gave it to us so we could make tea. All the while we’re visiting with him, an older woman is in the little cocina cooking away while the Mexican soap operas blared on the TV above her head. After eating lunch at the beach we went over to Endeavor and had the marinated FRESH dorado they had caught this morning. OH WOW! I guess the menu name for this fish is Mahi Mahi, which I’ve had before, but what a difference FRESH makes. Even Terry, my die-hard beef man is starting to order seafood and ceviche in restaurants!
12/3/11 Matanchen: We watched their boat while the Phillips’ took the panga tour up into the mangroves to see the birds and crocs. Then we spent all afternoon at another palapa eating and drinking and battling jejenes and mosquitoes.
12/4/11 Matanchen: This time Endeavor watched our boat while we took the panga tour. Eduardo was our excellent guide pointing out the crocs, iguanas, storks, herons, falcons, lilies and turtles. Then another afternoon at another palapa eating and drinking, the kids swimming. Tomorrow we leave – next stop Chacala.
12/5/11 Matanchen: We have been eaten alive by the jejenes and mosquitoes, and are out of OFF. We don’t have mosquitoes or bitey things in Anacortes and I had forgotten what it’s like to itch 24/7. To continue my little whine, we also had a very rolly night and didn’t get much sleep. Anyway, we finally said uncle and pulled up anchor to head the 54 miles to Punta Mita. We decided that Chacala was going to be just as rolly as Matanchen, so we changed our float plan and headed to Punta Mita. We do that a lot—make a plan of some sort and then change it on the fly. Endeavor fished all the way and we always knew when they had a fish on because they’d start going around in circles to chase the line. Punta Mita is small, mostly condos and a few nice palapas on the beach. The next morning we went ashore for breakfast, which was quite tasty. We spent the night at anchor in Punta Mita, then headed out early the next day for Banderas Bay. It was only about a 2 hour putt along the coast and the weather was nice and balmy.

I’m Thankful For La Paz And All My Blessings

11/20/11 – 11/28/11 La Paz: Well, Gina and I never made it to Wal-mart. We found a store called Chedraui that is something like a Fred Meyer. We thought we had died and gone to heaven.  They had a fabulous bakery department, but we couldn’t figure out how to ‘do’ the bakery department. Gina finally noticed that people we getting a big round tray from under a counter and some tongs and going around loading up their tray with various baked goods. So we did that, then you take your tray to this counter and a lady bags and prices your baked goods. We also found some small fake Christmas trees and garlands-yay! The only thing we couldn’t find was a real ham—only pressed cubes of pork, and some grey looking ham slices. I had decided that I would make an authentic Mexican dish for my contribution to Thanksgiving instead of ham, but the next day Gina found a ham in her travels, so we had a turkey breast, mashed potatoes and gravy, roasted veggies and pumpkin pie for the Phillips parts of the meal. I brought the ham, (fresh!) fried pineapple, stuffing, and Pioneer Woman’s Dreamy Apple Pie. It was a great feast, but boy was it hot outside (mid 80’s) and even hotter inside our boats with all that cooking going on. It was a nice day though. I was missing my family, but the Phillips’ are a surrogate family for us, and we can’t think of anyone we enjoy more.

Gina, Sydney and I have been keeping up with our early morning walks into town and along the Malecon. Sydney has befriended a dog that has been following us every day-even showing up right on time at the head of the dock. She named her Lexy, because Sydney feels she’s a fancy dog and needed a fancy name.

We’ve been anxious to attend the local farmer’s market that happens each Saturday and Tuesday so we could stock up on some local produce. There was also an arts and crafts market at one of the marinas, so Gina and went to both on Saturday (the 26th). The farmers market in town was a modest affair-only about 7 or 8 tables, and not much produce, but I did buy a blouse. The arts and crafts was also pretty small, but I found some earrings and a ring

Watching the weather has been a top priority this week. We want to cross the Sea of Cortez and head over to Puerto Vallarta because both boats have people to meet, and there’s supposed to be another norther this week. Well, it didn’t actually show up until Saturday, so we decided to leave on Tuesday (the 29th) after the wave action has a chance to flatten. We’ll probably stop in Los Muertos for one night (where Terry was injured in his encounter with the mystery sea creature a few weeks ago), and then head on across to Isla Isabel or San Blas and PV. Mazatlan will probably have to wait until we back come back up to the Sea of Cortez next Spring to wait out hurricane season.

Terry and went out to dinner last night (27th) to celebrate our 36th anniversary. We’ll be in the middle of the Sea of Cortez on our actual anniversary, so off we went to Rancho Viejo for food, then a nice walk downtown, and finally a cab home. Today (28th) Gina went and got produce and eggs and other goodies so we’re ready to leave La Paz tomorrow morning at about 7am. I’m ready to get away from the marina and get back in an anchorage again. I really do like La Paz though, and will look forward to coming back.

Learning In La Paz

11/14/11 – 11/19/11 In La Paz: This week has been very much a learning experience. It’s a simple fact that everything you want to do is more complicated in Mexico, but it’s vastly more so when you are in a new place in Mexico and trying to do things you haven’t done in Mexico yet. Case in point – getting Mexican cell phones up and running. After we bought sim cards for our phones, we needed to recharge them with money/minutes because the cards don’t come with much value. I went online and opened an account at Telcel, our Mexican cell service provider. That was easy enough. Then I recharged my sim card online using my ING debit card, again, not too difficult. I noticed however, that my phone didn’t immediately recharge with minutes, but thought, well this is Mexico. The charge on my ING account, however, went through immediately. A couple of hours later my cell phone rings and I notice the area code is 503 – Oregon. I answer and someone named Leslie starts asking me info in order to ‘verify my online Telcel purchase’. She says she’s from a company named Vesta and wants to know my SS# and some info about my ING account. I refused to give her any info because I didn’t know her from Adam. Then she says she will get an ING rep on the phone, and after a couple of moments someone calling himself Mohamed comes on and says he’s from the LA offices of ING (our bank). He then asks me the same questions and I again refused to answer, so my online Telcel transaction was cancelled. I wasn’t about to give sensitive bank info to someone I couldn’t positively identify. I emailed ING with the story and they said I had done the right thing. I did a little research and found out there is a company called Vesta that does verify online purchases for cell providers, and the Oregon # that called me pointed to Vesta when I googled it, so the whole thing was probably legit. Anyway, instead of doing it online, we found a local Telcel place, went in, paid in pesos and got more minutes, and it took about 5 minutes,so now all is good.

Then Gina and I want to a bank (a long hike) to change dollars to pesos, but didn’t bring our passports, so we couldn’t do it. I don’t remember having to have your passport to change money in Spain? Anyway, we got the job done eventually—the next day. After no joy at the bank, Gina and I went to the grocery store, Aramburo, which went well, except we wanted to pay in dollars since we hadn’t been able to get pesos. They would accept dollars, but not a hundred dollar bill, which was all I had, so I had to use my debit card, which they had to verify was not fraudulent, so that took a bit of effort, but we left the store with good groceries, and took a cab home. We had some trouble interpreting the meat labels, but I got a lot of produce and meat, including some chorizos which turned out to be very good! On a side note, they had a whole bin/case of frozen turkeys at that store—just like you would expect to see at a Safeway around Thanksgiving! This cute little Mexican woman stopped me to ask me about what size turkey she should buy.
She had her foil roasting pan and other holiday prep stuff in her cart. She was a crackup, and it was nice for me to be able to help a local here in La Paz for once.

We’ve had a couple of boat issues to deal with this week. After the storm last Sunday, we realized our battery charger had fried – probably a power surge, as we are hooked up to power at the dock. It’s a $300 – $400 item. Our friend Brian Wade is coming to Mexico on Nov 29th, so he’s bringing us another one. We have some gremlins in some of our lights – sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t. Then today (the 19th) Terry spent most of the morning changing the joker valves in both heads (toilets) and unplugging the vent line. It was not fun, as you might guess! They had needed it for some time, so we can check that off the list.

We’ve enjoyed walking around La Paz a lot. I really like this place. The weather is beautiful, the nights cool down a bit, which is nice, and it’s not nearly as touristy as Cabo. There are a lot of other cruisers who are always willing to give you the scoop on what you need to know. We’ve found some good places to eat, some interesting neighborhoods. The local people have been unfailingly kind and helpful. Gina and Sydney and I are taking long morning walks along the Malecon for exercise too. Life really is very very pleasant.

Gina and I are going shopping for Thanksgiving tomorrow after mass. I’m having trouble finding a ham, so we’re going to taxi to a Wal-Mart and see what they have. I have always hated Wal-Mart, so I’m hoping the Mexican ones are better? The Phillips family have spent many Thanksgivings with us, so it’s a bit of a tradition that I bring ham and fried pineapple and a pie, and Gina does a small turkey and pie too. We’re not sure exactly where we will be on Thanksgiving. Both boats need to get to Puerto Vallarta soon to meet various people who are flying in. The weather is always a bit iffy this time of year, and we have to cross the Sea of Cortez, which is a 200 mile passage. So the weather will dictate where we’ll be on turkey day! I will miss all my family then, and will be thinking of you ALL DAY. Have a good one!!!!

Life In The Sea of Cortez

11/13/11 in  La Paz: Yesterday (Saturday) was kind of a work day on the boat, but we only work for half the day because it just gets too hot! I defrosted my portable Engel freezer. It was easier than I expected; Terry gave me the dinghy pump (Kathy-remember Terry using that as a water cannon?) to suck the melted ice out of the bottom, but all I did was get water all over the settee. I couldn’t get the darn thing to hit the bucket I was using. Finally just used my turkey baster—much better. I also scrubbed the teak floors, and cleaned one of the heads. Terry washed the boat on the outside. It was caked with salt from our ‘norther’ adventure. So now all that’s left to clean is the other head, and to straighten up the disaster in our V-berth from everything stored in there tumbling down into one big heap—also a result of the aforementioned ‘norther’. I’ll do that ‘manana’, maybe. Then I was going to haul my 4 loads of laundry up the dock to the marina laundromat, but I couldn’t summon the energy. Besides, we had to move the boat to another slip in the afternoon because we found out we could pay half price if we rented the slip by the week, and the slip we were in was already spoken for. For half price and great internet, we’re staying in the marina for one more week. Love those marina showers too (except for that one dead cockroach I found in one)!

So after we got all settled in our slip, The Phillips family picked us up in a cab and we rolled into town to go have an early dinner. We went to a great place called Rancho Viejo. Terry and I had Mocajetes Arrachera. It’s flank steak cooked in a wonderful sauce and served in a Mocajete which is a sort of mortar and pestle made of lava rock, used in Mexico for centuries to grind their corn, etc. It was very very good. Later we stopped in a bar on the waterfront that had a trampoline which James and Sydney enjoyed while we had a nightcap.

Today (Sunday) was kind of a lazy day. I spent a good portion of it trying to find out what time the masses were at the Catedral Nuestra Senora de La Paz. Finally I found a Yahoo group for gringos in La Paz, joined it, asked for the info and got it! It was too late for any of the morning masses so I decided to go to the one at 5pm. Terry said he would dinghy me into town and then I could walk to the church. Well, it’s long dinghy ride to town, and then a long walk to the church, but we finally got there. We noticed a few drops of rain as we walked, but hey, this is La Paz, it almost never rains! Terry ended up going to mass with me and by the time it was over it was really raining! The wind had also picked up so we had a long, wet, windy and dark ride home in the dinghy. It was a bit scary too. We should have taken a cab--it would have been much safer and drier. Sometimes we aren’t very smart.

Cabo San Lucas To La Paz

11/06/11 in Cabo San Lucas: Finally we get to leave Cabo San Lucas! We headed to the fuel dock at 6:30am, got filled up with diesel and some gasoline for our generator. We were out of there by 7 and on our way to La Paz. Cabo is on the very tip of Baja California, the long peninsula that runs down the west side of Mexico. La Paz is around and up into the inside of the peninsula in the Sea of Cortez, sometimes called the Gulf of California. We plan, for now, to go to La Paz and stay for awhile and then figure out our next step from there. I am so glad we now get to go where we want, when we want. Now our actual cruising life begins. We have heard the weather reports of a ‘norther’ with high winds and steep seas beginning Monday or Tuesday, so we will only go part way to La Paz and pull in somewhere that is protected. We motored for 45 miles or so and pulled into a nice sized bay called Los Freiles—The Friars. I love this place. There’s no town, only a beach and some fishermen’s shacks. Since we have no prop for our dinghy, we went to the beach with the Phillips’ and poked around for awhile. We found some rocks and tide pools where there were hundreds of dark brown small crabs jumping from rock to rock. I’ve never seen a crab jump before—very cool. The best thing about this place though is the isolation and the quiet. Such peace here. It’s very soothing and wonderful to just sit and look around. We had looked forward to doing some snorkeling and taking a hike here and exploring. But we’ll have to wait because of the weather. We plan to leave tomorrow morning.

11/07/11 in Los Freiles: We left this little spot at about 7am. I was sad to go because it was so beautiful and I don’t think we finished doing all we could do there, but the weather is supposed to get worse before it gets better and we want to get to La Paz. The seas were a bit choppy, wind on the nose about 15-20 knots, but lots of sun, so we got naked and soaked up the rays as we travelled. We tried sailing, but with the wind on the nose we weren’t too successful. So then we experimented with a sailing concept called “velocity made good”, which is a bit complicated but has to do with trying to make the most distance with the wind on the nose by tacking back and forth and keeping the wind more off the beam so as to make forward progress. At some point the extra distance you go by always tacking chews up any additional benefit you get by sailing more off the wind. We need to understand it more, but it was a start. We travelled about 47 miles and pulled into a place called Ensenada Los Muertos (Ensenada of the dead!). There’s no town here, only a very small luxury hotel and golf course on the west side of the bay, a small church on the hill, a cantina on the east side of the bay and a huge empty white beach with a bunch of fishing pangas in between (a panga is a Mexican boat-there must be millions of them in Mexico) . The mountains off to the west are spectacular—high desolate and intimidating. We got anchored and settled in by about 3 pm, had sundowners (cocktails on boats—the happy hour!) bbq’d the fresh tuna the fisherman in Cabo gave us, and settled in for the night. I’m a happy camper to be somewhere tucked in behind a bluff with the wind supposed to get pretty nasty tonight and all of tomorrow.

11/08/11 in Ensenada Los Muertos: Today was a mixed bag. After doing a few chores on the boat in the morning, Rick invited us to go ashore with the family for some beach time and lunch at the cantina. The cantina is named 1535 (don’t ask me why) and is a nice large airy place with tile floors, tables for dining, a few grouping of couches and chairs for lounging, a bar, and they serve nice meals. You can also hook into their wifi which we had planned on doing and brought both computers. Terry got online right away, but it took me forever, and the connection was very slow. I finally got on Facebook and posted a quick update. Then Lisa came on and we chatted for a bit! Then we had lunch there—not cheap. I keep looking for all this fabulous and cheap food in Mexico, but so far no luck. After lunch we went to the beach, and after some confusion, Terry, Rick and I decided to move the dinghy further down the beach to be closer to where the kids were going to snorkel. As we were pushing the dinghy into the water, Terry got stung by some sea creature of some kind on his foot and was in a lot of pain, and it was bleeding quite a bit. So Rick took us back to our boat and I started reading our medical guide about what to do. It was difficult because we don’t really know what got him. The first thing we did was soak his foot in vinegar to sanitize and mitigate the venom somewhat. Then we soaked his foot in as hot of water as he could stand. That really helped his pain. After doing a lot of reading we are guessing he stepped on a sea urchin. I noticed that Sydney had found a dead one on the beach earlier, and the symptoms and description of the wound fit the best of anything I could find. There is no town of any kind here, and if his wound started looking worse I was prepared to hire a local person to drive us to La Paz or the closest doctor. He did the hot water thing for 90 minutes and the pain had lessoned and he had no other symptoms of any kind. So the only thing to watch for now is infection. And we also can’t tell if there is maybe part of a spine from what got him still in his foot. Poor Terry, first he pulled his hamstring very badly in Avalon and now this. He was pretty bummed. By the end of the day his foot was looking much better, so I think the worst is over. No more going barefoot in the rocky shallows on the beaches!

11/09/11 in Ensenada Los Muertos: Woke up today feeling good after sleeping very hard, even though we had a rolley night onboard. Terry’s foot looks good, and he feels fine, so unless some sort of infection develops, he will live! We have cheated Los Muertos!

We didn’t go ashore today, we took care of boat chores instead. I did two bucket loads of laundry out on the poop deck. The winds are very strong (+20 knots) because of the ‘norther’ blowing down the Sea of Cortez. We are quite sheltered in Los Muertos, as it’s supposed to be blowing +30 knots outside of here. The sun’s still shining though, so there I was hanging laundry to dry, hoping it doesn’t blow off the boat. I also made bread today!!!! I bought a fantastic book called Artisan Bread in Five Minutes A Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking. Basically the strategy is that you make a very WET yeast bread dough, let it rise for two hours, then store in your fridge for up to two weeks. You never have to do any kneading. When you want fresh bread, you tear off a grapefruit sized chunk, ‘cloak’ it (1 minute), let it rest for 40 minutes, then bake at 450 for about half an hour. The bread comes out beautifully, with a nice crispy crust, and all chewy on the inside. The longer you keep it in your fridge, the better the flavor is—kind of like sourdough. The book has all kinds of variations on the basic recipe. I highly recommend it.

Because the winds in the Sea of Cortez are supposed to die down by tomorrow mid-morning, we are planning to leave tomorrow and see if we can get to La Paz, which is about 58 miles from here. If the seas are too rough, we’ll stop somewhere. There are several little places we can hole up in between here and La Paz.

 

11/10/11 in Ensenada Los Muertos: Up bright and early, pulled up the anchor and were on our way by 7am. As we left I went up to the cockpit to see what the sea state was. Winds seemed fairly light and the waves were manageable, so I went down below to cook breakfast. What a joke! I no sooner got in the middle of cooking up eggs and chorizos (our last ones from Boise ) when all of a sudden I felt like I was trying to cook in a washing machine. Confused lumpy seas, winds picking up, Harmony bashing through the mess, and I’m down below hanging on by my fingernails. I did manage to finish breakfast, but the dishes had to wait. The rest of the day was not any better. We had 20 knot winds on the nose the whole day and waves like boxcars. We got our butts kicked by those massive waves. It took us 10 hours to travel about 45 miles and we were exhausted by the time we reached Caleta Lobos, where we anchored up for the night. We should have waited one more day before leaving Muertos, but live and learn!

Caleta Lobos is small, empty and peaceful. The full moon rose in the stillness of the evening and once again all was good in our little world.

11/11/11 in Caleta Lobos: Up early, pulled the anchor and headed the12 miles to La Paz. Flat seas and sunshine have restored our humor. We got a slip for a couple of days at Marina Palmira. Internet!!! It’s slow and I get kicked off all the time, but it works. As soon as we got in, we took a cab to Lopez Marine to see if they had a propeller for our dinghy. No luck there, but the guy told us where the Yamaha shop was, so we hopped in another taxi. We had a great time there trying to talk to the three women at that place, but they had a prop for us, and $143.00 later we left, after smiles and laughter all around. Nice people. We decided to walk for a bit, and ended up walking clear back to the waterfront, which must have been 3 miles or so. On the way I spotted a Mextel store, so in we went to buy sim cards for our cell phones. They do things very differently in Mexico. The store was lined with bank teller-like windows, I’d say 15 of them. We had to get a ‘little paper’ they called it and then get in line. All these employees working, but no one actually getting anything done. It’s amazing. The red tape!! We waited in line for 30 minutes or so, and finally got our turn. We had everything but our passports with us, so now we have to go back so our sim cards can be activated. Who knew you need your passport to buy a sim card with cell phone minutes? That was all we got done today. Tomorrow laundry, back to the cell phone store, defrost the freezers, and maybe some grocery shopping. Or maybe not.

Farewell Avalon, On To San Diego

 

9/12/11: We left Avalon about 9am, very calm and nice out, no rougher than motoring through the San Juan Islands at home. We anchored in Newport at about 1:30pm. This is not at all like we were expecting. The guide book and chart indicate a lot of anchoring fields all through Newport Bay, especially around Lido Peninsula. But what we found was a very narrow fairway down one side and thousands of boats on mooring buoys filling up the rest of the space. We finally found a bit of open ground right at the stern of the Google boat (formerly Sony Playstation’s boat) and anchored in about 8’ of water. I feel like I’m in a motorhome parked in a Wal-Mart parking lot with dozens of other motorhomes all crammed together. We don’t really like it here, and probably won’t bother taking the dinghy off the davits for a little putt to look around. I couldn’t find any open wifi for an internet connection either. We are very disappointed. So I guess we’ll spend the afternoon reading. I might take a shower on the poop deck with the solar shower after dark so I won’t offend any prying eyes!

A couple of the guys from the Google boat dinghied by and told us the port might not let us anchor here because we are in the wrong spot—they just wanted to let us know. They showed us where to anchor, so we moved. I now have internet (poor signal, but still, it’s internet)!

Back To The Channel Islands-Will It Be Better This Time?

9/5/11: Left Santa Barbara at 10:00am, sunny skies, calm out, not much wind. Motored 26 miles over to Prisoner”s Bay on Santa Cruz Island (one of the Channel Islands). We really hated to say goodbye to Santa Barbara.
We had grilled marinated flank steak, corn on the cob, and tomato/avocado salad.  It was so good. Up to now I haven’t been inspired to cook anything but the same old stuff, but after going to Trader Joe’s yesterday and stocking up, I’ve made a menu for the next several days and will be trying a couple of new recipes. It also helps that I’ve set up my iphone with the inventory from my freezer and the lower shelf of my fridge. I also put my grocery list on the phone, so now I can shop more efficiently, cuz I could never remember what I have in stock.
We went to bed pretty early. The air coming into our open hatch in the aft cabin smelled SO good—there are  eucalyptus tress growing right here. We had a roly night, this anchorage is not that protected from the swell, so we didn’t sleep all that well.

9/6/11: Left the roly anchorage and motored for two hours over to Little Scorpion, which is really nice. Gina had invited us over for potluck—she was making risotto. We took pork chops and sesame/garlic green beans. I had taught the kids Nertz several years ago, so they got me involved in a game of that. The dinner was so good, we all ate too much. I really liked the lemon bars she bought at Trader Joe’s. It’s too bad Terry doesn’t really like lemon stuff. We plan to leave here at 5am tomorrow morning and head for Catalina Island. I can’t believe how close we are to LA and San Diego. The weather is great and the water temp is 69! I finished reading The Girl Who Played With Fire and have just started The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest. Terry’s reading the ‘played with fire’ one. It’s been fun to read the same book at the same time.

9/7/11: Got up at 4:30 am. We were already awake because it got a little roly towards daybreak. We all left the anchorage at 5am sharp as planned. We have about a 10hr trip to Catalina. We dumped the holding tank. We also ran the watermaker and charged all of our devices like phones, kindles, computers and cameras while we motored. I also am trying to get caught up on the blogging while we motor, so we don’t have to use battery power when we are at anchor. Now that we’ve left the marina, our power consumption is important to monitor. We are so glad we put in those four new solar panels. They really help keep us charged up pretty well. We are considering unplugging the Engle freezer at night to see what difference that makes. The key will be remembering to plug it back in in the morning! So now we are learning to be 12 volt power experts!
Our first port on Catalina Island was at Two Harbors, or more specifically, Isthmus. It’s this way-laid-back sandy, dusty small little place that has a 50’s kind of feel to it. We had a bit of a hard time picking up a mooring buoy because they have this special system where you go to the bow and grab this long flexible pole that’s on top of the buoy, you pull it aboard and keep pulling till you come to a loop in the line, attach to a cleat on the bow, then keep pulling the line till you come to another loop and attach to a cleat on the stern. Of course, we have to try this is a strong headwind. I’m at the bow wrestling the damn thing, but the wind kept blowing us back. Finally Terry and traded places, I took the helm, and he did the wrestling. Anyway, we love this place, it’s so quiet, not very touristy at all. We took a walk over the isthmus to Cat Harbor, then had dinner at the local restaurant (calamari piccata). The meal was tasty, but so big I had to get a ‘go box”—which I promptly smashed flatter than a pancake trying to board Harmony from the dinghy. Will I ever be graceful????? Maybe when I grow up.

9/8/11: We left the Phillips family behind in Isthmus. They wanted to start school this morning, then maybe snorkel. We decided to head to Avalon to see if we could get a mooring. The Phillips’ will come tomorrow. There are two, count them, two, fishing derbies, an outrigger event and an art show in Avalon this weekend which means it will be packed, and there are only 250 mooring buoys-first come, first served. We will get a mooring and the Phillips’ will raft up to us if there’s nothing available tomorrow. Avalon was only 11 miles away, so Terry and left around 9am this morning for the quick trip down. When we saw Avalon and the casino and the inner harbor we remembered how Terry’s parents told us about getting on a charter boat from LA and coming over to Avalon, and how much they enjoyed it. It made Terry miss his dad a bit, but we laughed to think of Sally being wild and crazy enough to take a boat all the way from LA to Catalina Island—she has since decided she doesn’t really like boats, but she always talked fondly of their trips to Catalina Is.
Avalon is a major resort spot, with a casino, hotels, busy busy harbor and lots of exclusive and spendy shops. We just spotted a Google catamaran, don’t what that’s all about yet. I preferred dusty little Isthmus, but it’s nice to have internet again (not free ) and get caught up! More later, after we venture out for a walk.

We dinghied out to the Google boat. It was formerly the PlayStation boat, has been renamed. We talked to one of the crew and Terry told him about the Americas Cup winner Oracle being built in Anacortes. He said the Goggle boat has one of Oracle's old masts on it. I'll post pics of it in the picasa web album tomorrow.

9/9/11: I’m ashamed to say I have not yet been ashore! BUT, I have finished the last of the three books, (the girl who kicked the hornets nest), and can now move on with my life! Those books are unputdownable. Endeavor just got here a bit ago and got the mooring right next to ours. We’re going ashore soon.

So we all went ashore and had pizza for lunch on the waterfront. We were laughing because there we were in an Italian restaurant staffed entirely by Mexicans--who didn't speak English too well! After lunch we went walking along the walkway past the casino and on over to the last beach where they had lots of cabanas set up. Terry found out if you wanted to rent one of the beach lounge chairs you had to part with $50! We have no idea what a whole cabana cost, but Gina said probably around $500--she had been places like that before and that was the going rate. The guys returned to the boats while we girls hit the shops. I thought the shops would be very upscale, but we were surprised to find that much of the merchandise was of mediocre quality. I did buy a pair of really cute flip flops, Gina got a couple of tops/coverups and Sydney got some leopard sunglasses that are very cute on her. Happy Hour was on Endeavor. Gina and I have observed that Happy Hour causes the "I don't feel like cooking" syndrome, because we get all happy and before we know it, it's 7pm and too late to start cooking. So we went ashore and had Mexican food--HUGE margaritas. By now, we were all exceedingly happy.

9/10/11: Just puttering around on the boat today, paying bills, getting caught up on emails and phone calls. We are planning to leave tomorrow and head for Newport, CA, where we can anchor out. Endeavor has to hurry on to San Diego, where they have rented a slip for a month. Then they will rent a car and go up to LA where they are meeting a few family people to do the Disneyland thing. Our trip to Newport is somewhere around 30 miles, so that will take us only (only!) a few hours. We'll catch back up with Endeavor in a week or so I think. I hope to be able to go to Mass before we leave. I'm trying a new recipe tonight, one of Pioneer Woman's called Grilled Chicken with Lemon Basil Pasta. We'll see how that goes. Has anyone watched her cooking segments on the Food Network? I wish I could see them. I probably could if I had a good internet connection, and figured out how to do that.

4:30pm: Terry just strained a muscle on the back of his thigh. Rick had used an ATM earlier this afternoon and had left his debit card in the ATM. So he and Terry dinghied over to retrieve it. Terry was trying to get out of the dinghy onto the dock and the dinghy backed away. Terry had one leg on the dock and  one on the dinghy, pulled his muscle and fell into the water. Rick had to lift him out of the water. Terry is in a lot of pain. I put ice on it right away. We'll keep that up every hour or so and see how he does, but he says he really felt it when his muscle went-twice. On top of that he had my cell phone (not my iphone) in his pocket, and Rick's ATM card was not in the machine when he got there to retrieve it. Not a good afternoon in our little world.

9/11/11: It's very strange to feel so isolated from the 9/11 anniversary. I really would liked to have seen the coverage on TV. My memory of that day was watching when the 2nd plane hit the tower and knowing for certain that we were now at war. I called Terry, who was working in Bellingham, and told him about it, and while I was on the phone with him, the first tower collapsed. I was crying and all upset and just wanted him to come home. It's one of those days that you never forget. So I have felt a little separated from what the rest of the country is doing today.

We decided to stay here another day, so Terry could rest and heal a bit. He's been trying to move around, but he's very sore. So I took the water taxi, which only had to move me 50 yrds, it cost $4.75--pretty much a ripoff, but we can't use the dinghy right now because Terry can't get it set up and I'm not that great at driving it. I'm going to have to work on that in the future. We had Rick put our dinghy up on our davit last night after Terry got hurt. As soon as Rick got it up there, it came crashing down in the water because a splice made by Northwest Rigging failed. Anyway, Rick got it back up there, so no more dinghy use until Terry is better.

So I went to Mass at St. Catherine of Alexandria Church. It was great. A visiting priest from Michigan who had performed the wedding for his niece yesterday was the celebrant. He was priest of a parish in lower Manhattan on 9/11, and he told us about that day. It was very interesting. After Mass, I went to the grocery store, and to the drug store to get Terry some kind of hot/cold compresses for his leg. Then another $4.75 for the water taxi to take me the 50 yards back to the boat!

We were then enjoying a quiet afternoon down below, when we felt our boat get bumped hard. Looked out and the sailboat next to us had drifted over and hit us. I'm trying to get fenders between the two boats, and Terry is trying to help and I'm yelling at him to go away, I could handle this and he's yelling back. It was funny. He's a difficult patient. One moment he's complaining about his pain and won't stop talking about his leg, the next minute he's trying to hurt himself worse! Honestly, he's nuts sometimes. Oh, and no damage to the boat!

 I'm going to be glad to leave Avalon. We have been cursed here, lol! Tomorrow, we'll go to Newport for a day or two, then meander our way down to San Diego.

PS: I forgot to mention that here they don't really have that many cars. They use golf carts to get around. They're everywhere!

PPS: I made Pioneer Woman's Grilled Chicken with Lemon Basil Pasta last night-yum! Leftovers tonight.

Santa Barbara, Wherein Wee Ducky Dawdles Some More

 

8/30/11: I’m a bit behind here, but I’m not going backwards! Terry and I fueled up the boat this morning. Since August 1st, we have paid anywhere from $3.68 gal for diesel to $4.08 here in Santa Barbara. We are still having problems with blocked fuel lines. A few days ago, Terry figured out that our sea strainer was blocked which caused steam to come from our exhaust on the way from Santa Rosa Island, to here, so that has been cleaned. It was plum full of mud and unidentifiable stuff. I remember Joe Barnes saying he sometimes found fish in his.  I think Terry and Rick will tackle the plugged fuel line tomorrow. We spent the afternoon on the beach sunning and watching Sydney and James play in the surf with their new boogey boards. They are such fun to watch, and they add a lot to the whole cruising thing. They are good kids and have terrific parents.

I asked Terry what he thought of cruising so far, since we’ve been at it for almost a month now. He says he’s enjoying it, but has been disappointed in all the boat problems, although he commented that he’d rather work on the boat here than in Anacortes, where Skyline is sometimes referred to as the ‘hell hole’. It’s been pretty frustrating for him because he is anything but a diesel mechanic. But he’s kept his cool so far, and is learning some things as well.

As for me, I doing just fine. I need to get myself into more of a routine, however. Some days I get a lot of walking in, and others hardly any at all. I really need to set my alarm (!), get up early and go for a walk before doing anything else. I can fritter away more dang time just puttering around and then wonder where the day has gone. I think Inertia is my middle name sometimes, but I can’t help it, I love being inert, lol. I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading. I’ve finished The Whistling Season and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. We also watched the movie version of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, which I don’t recommend at all. The book was great (if kind of disturbing), the movie was truly bad.

Living on the boat hasn’t been an adjustment at all. I think having done it for all those months in Seattle years ago helped. Meal planning has been harder because I don’t yet have a good stock of meat in my freezer-just some rather slim pickings from my freezer in Anacortes. That should improve tomorrow, because we’ll be hitting a real grocery store and stocking up. So far most of the grocery stores we’ve gone to around marinas have not been great at all. And I’m going to comb though some recipes and get some inspiration too. Sometimes I get into such a rut, making the same 3 or 4 things all the time. I do love our additional Engle freezer that we bought to supplement the tiny ice cream carton-sized one that cools our refrigerator! It doesn’t use much electricity, can be used as either frig or freezer space, and has about a milk-crate sized capacity.

I’m loving seeing different places. And everyone’s mood has been lifted up by the sunshine. We really really needed to get to a warmer, sunny place. But I am missing the ease of connecting with people and chatting with my sisters online. Internet is sometimes iffy, and we often forget to keep the cell phone charged.

That day on August 1st when we untied from the dock in Anacortes seems like a lifetime ago. Gina and I were both commenting on that. I think about the lumpy, foggy days and nights offshore, my night watches alone in the cockpit, the fun we had in San Francisco, Monterey, Half Moon Bay and Capitola, the  meals with the Phillips’, the cozy evenings reading or watching movies on the boat, the beauty in the landscapes as we passed by, the anxious moments trying to do things on the boat that we’ve never done before, the sometimes frustrating efforts to buy food, do laundry, and just get around in unfamiliar places, the simple bliss of a warm unlimited shower in a marina, and the peace of an evening watching a sunset at anchor. I am truly blessed.

8/31/11: Terry went up early this morning to shower and discovered the marina is without power. This doesn’t really affect us because we can run on our 12v batteries with no problem, and then just start the engine to recharge them after a day or so. But it is kind of odd! It’s also foggy here this morning.

Terry got the fuel line unplugged this morning, so knock on wood, all systems are ‘go’ onboard Harmony once again. I was chatting online with Lisa and Jan Liday this morning and lost my internet, even though it says I’m connected. I wanted to publish this post and some pics, but will have to wait till later I guess. I can’t even respond to my email.  At least I was clever enough to install Windows LiveWriter from Microsoft before we left. It allows me to compose all my blog posts offline, and then I can publish them anytime I want when online. It’s a great little free product.

Watched The Soloist with Robert Downey Junior-good! It’s the story of a musical prodigy (cello) who winds up homeless in LA. Downey comes along to try to rescue him. He’s one of my favorite actors. The black guy who played the prodigy (can’t remember his name) was wonderful also.

9/1/11: Today we’re off to the Old Mission Santa Barbara, which we can get to by bus and a short walk. I’m looking forward to that. Did a little ‘housecleaning’ this morning. It takes me less than 5 minutes to sweep, which is all I’m willing to commit! Most of the time I’m chasing down and eliminating clutter. I can’t stand having bits of this and that laying around in our small living space.

9/2/11: Well, I had two things I wanted to do today, and it’s 4:30pm and I haven’t done either one. I planned to put non-skid in the cabinet where we keep glasses so they don’t constantly clink and clatter when we are offshore, and to re-organize the v-berth. Right now it’s 4:30pm and I haven’t done either one. But I did sweep the boat and clean the two heads, dye my roots and find a good mojito recipe and assembled the ingredients and invited the Phillip’ for cocktails, as my guinea pigs. So all is not lost—is it?? I’ll do that other stuff tomorrow.

7:10pm: the mojitos were a success except that we needed straws because the mint kept sticking to our teeth. So we all had green things growing on our teeth, but don’t worry, it was all good. I might go with Gina and Sydney to watch an outdoor screening of the old movie Grease on Stearns Wharf. If I can walk there without falling into the water. I had a couple of kamis after the mojito, you know, so ambulatory skills are not what they usually are,

I am really going to hate leaving Santa Barbara, which we will probably do on Monday. It’s the best place on earth, if you like sun, warm weather, palm trees, beaches, etc. It’s not so good if you are cheap, but…..you can’t take it with you right?

9/3/11: Fog this morning, and even a little chilly after the fog burned off. Gina and I did our laundry. Terry delivered us by dinghy to the marina laundry facilities. It was a nice one, but you had to use a credit card to buy another ‘credit’ card from a machine, then use your credit card to load the ‘credit’ card with money for the washers and dryers. What a rip-off. You could only load the card in $10 increments, so if I was going to do two loads of laundry it would cost me a total of $15 ($5 for the card and $10 for the minimum amount to put on the card). Then the total amount used by the washers and dryers for two loads is $7.50, so now you have a card with a balance left unused of $2.50 that you will never get a chance to use up, and no way to get your money out of it. Gina and I shared a card, so it wasn’t quite that bad, but still ticks me off.

We went out for adult night to State St where all the nifty restaurants and bars are. Our favorite place was The James Joyce. They had this band playing there called Ulysses S. Jasz that was just terrific. They play classic New Orleans Jazz there every Saturday night. It’s a bunch of old geezer musicians and a campy older woman vocalist who wears a big fluffy black boa. Their music made me wish I could swing dance. We had a blast.

9/4/11: I went to Mass at Our Lady of Sorrows today. I took two shuttle busses and then only had to walk half a block to the church. It’s a beautiful old church and it was a nice service. Then Gina and I took the shuttle and went to Trader Joe’s to stock up before we leave tomorrow. It was the nicest one I’ve ever been to. We were going to take a cab over to Von’s after Trader Joe’s, but we did so well at TJ’s we didn’t have to.

This gigantic 150’ sailboat came into the marina today. Honestly, it’s so big it makes all of us 40-50’ boats look like toys next to it.

We’re leaving tomorrow by noon. Heading back to one of the Channel Islands for one night or two, then to Catalina for a couple of nights, then San Diego.

Looking For Sun

Half Moon Bay to ?
Monday, August 22, 2011: We had an uneventful trip from SF to Half Moon Bay (only a bit over 20 miles)—no wind, only a gentle swell. Fueled up first, then got a slip. The four adults went walking about and found a great little beach down the highway, so Rick went back to get the kids. We had a lot of fun on that beach. James shot me with a baby kelp—it’s like a water pistol. Then the war was on!  I took a lot of pics, can always erase the bad ones, I always say. Then the fog started rolling in and it got chilly fast. Had salmon with cheese raviolis at a local restaurant/fish market – it was excellent. They have a pretty good fishing fleet here, and the fish was very fresh. We leave tomorrow to go 50 or so miles to Santa Cruz. We are SO tired of fog every day. The internet here is very bad, so I’ll have to upload pics and do the other blog on the next stop,

Tuesday, August 23, 2011: Woke up to (surprise!) fog. We forgot to put the cockpit cushions under the dodger last night, so they're pretty wet this morning. Leaving around 8am for Santa Cruz, it's only about 50 miles. It will take us 8 hrs or so. Instead of Santa Cruz we went in to Capitola.


Wednesday, August 24, 2011: Left Capitola at 8am, seas very calm, thick fog,  got into Monterey at 11:30 am under sunny skies! Had a slip ID fiasco. We reserved slips for both boats, wrote them down correctly, then we (first in to a slip) went into the wrong one. Phillips' went to the beach. We went to Fisherman's Wharf, Cannery Row and the Aquarium. Had dinner on the boat. I was up very late poking around the internet.

Thursday, August 25, 2011: Foggy when we got up. Had a little meeting with Rick. We plan to go all the way to Santa Barbara, 220 miles, leave at 4pm. Will need to laundry and grocery shopping today to get ready for a couple of nights offshore. Weather for the trip is supposed to be calm and foggy.



Friday, August 26, 2011

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Sunday, August 28, 2011

And We’re Off Like A Herd Of Turtles

Eureka, CA to San Francisco
Monday, August 15, 2011: We left the dock in Eureka (public marine) at about 8:30 am, under blue skies (Yay!), no wind, temp 59’, water temp 64’ (!) Crossed the bar with no problem, it was like a millpond—glassy. Our customer Randy Peterson piloting m/v Hank was just in front of us. Beautiful morning!
Lunch was chips, cookies, crackers and cheese—too lazy to fix anything else. Lazed around in the cockpit reading (The Book Thief-I’m liking it).
Saw whales! Think I got some good pics.
Dolphins came up next to us, but by the time I came up from down below with my camera, they were gone.
Tried sailing (headsail only, poled out on starboard side) for awhile. Had good wind, but winds shifted, which put our pole on the wrong side of the boat. Brought in the sail.
Winds from morning to mid-day were light. Between 2pm-3pm winds built to about 20 knots.  Changed from shorts to jeans and sweatshirts. No more sunbathing today!
3:45pm: light fog moving in, no more blue skies, wind at 23 knots gusting to 25, seas building, rolling ride .The boat is getting pretty noisy with dishes and pots and stuff shifting with the boat movement. Time to stuff towels around things! According to the chartplotter, at our current speed, our ETA in San Francisco is tomorrow at 3pm.
Dinner was turkey sandwiches-so lazy about cooking on this trip. Seas are rough. Terry took the first watch at 8pm and winds were out of the north at 25 knots, gusting to 30. We briefly considered watching from down below. We have the radar set up so it will display on our TV monitor and the laptop at the nav station has our charts, so we have everything like we do in the cockpit. It’s so much warmer and cozier below!  We did that for about 20 minutes, then Terry went up to do a proper watch.
When my turn came we had clear skies, lots of stars and our friendly waning moon-beautiful! By midnight we were socked in the fog, winds were still high, and seas were very rough. It was not a pleasant night. I was so sleepy. I had one of those brain spam things where the same song keeps playing over and over in your head. In this case it was “I know an old woman who swallowed a fly…” Then I made a boo-boo on the chartplotter, playing around because I was bored. I accidentally erased our route and alarms were going off and all kinds of noise! I had to wake Terry up and have him help me fix it. I am determined to learn that radar/chartplotter/autopilot setup so I can do it without him.
While on watch the Coast Guard out of Eureka was issuing a pan-pan for a vessel that had yelled “help!’ over the radio, but the CG was never able to hear more or figure out where the boat was. They eventually called off the pan-pan until further notice. Sure hope it worked out ok.
Because of my little fiasco, I let Terry sleep longer before I called him up for his turn at 4:30am. I went below and slept like a rock.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011: Woke up to fog, but there was less wind and things had calmed down a lot. We were slowed down a bit last night, looks like we won’t get in to SF till between 5 and 6pm. Breakfast was scrambled eggs with onions, bacon, cheese, sour cream, salsa and cilantro, Lunch was left-over spaghetti. Still foggy at lunch time.
Went under the Golden Gate Bridge at 5pm, had a spot o’ Ron Zacapa Rum to celebrate! Docked at Schoonmaker Point Marina, their office was closed, so we just took an empty slip. We are exhausted. For some reason this little overnighter from Eureka kicked our butts, even though we had no emergencies. All we can think about is dinner and bed. Went to the the restaurant at the head of the dock to have dinner, but at $20-25 per plate, we changed our minds. Had Costco hamburgers onboard and tried to watch a move (Dear Frankie), but fell asleep halfway through. Went to bed and slept like a rock.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011: Thought of Mom all day. I can’t believe it’s been four years. It seems like a much shorter time than that.
We spent the night at the Schoonmaker Point Marina in Sausalito last night. It was a nice facility ($52-yikes!). Terry was talking to the crew of this big 100’ yacht (mv Sin or Swim), and they had just come up from San Diego. In the salon was a big ol’ granite table. It was so rough, the table came off and slammed to the floor and broke! That’s precisely why I don’t have a granite table in our salon.
We motored over to Alameda to the Grand Marina, where Rick and Gina had saved us a slip across the dock from them. Internet! Gina made us French dip sandwiches. Then Terry and I walked the 1.6 miles to the West Marine to trade in our failed fresh water pump, and also buy an extra one. With our Port Supply card we got it for $84 instead of $140 retail. Then we walked to the Lucky Market and stocked up on groceries $150) and then took a cab back to the marina ($10). Made hamburgers. We went over to Endeavor and had Kamis and learned how to play “Fill or Bust”, a dice game. Lots of laughter, James beat the socks off of us. He’s dang quick with his math for the score keeping. Terry and Sydney traded verbal barbs back and forth. She really likes to try to get his goat. It’s a mutual thing.
Thursday, August 18, 2011: We are waking up later each day! Terry was trying to hurry me up so we could leave, I was trying to load pics to the blog and catch up on email. Mia says Bryan is engaged to Donna! She also told us that a customer of ours that Terry really really liked, George Mendenhall, had been stabbed to death (in April) by his handyman, who was later shot and killed by police. What a shock! He maintained a place in Bend and was very active in the community there, and people wrote comments about how much he would be missed.
So we pulled away from the dock in Alameda, and when we got out in the bay, we put up our main, then practiced reefing. It made me a nervous wreck because we have never done it before. It was a bit of a rodeo, and wasn’t pretty, but we got the job done. The winds in this bay are amazing! Then we put out just a bit of the staysail and with the one reef in the main we had a nice sail under the San Rafael Bridge on our way to San Rafael to deliver our watermaker for repair. Docked at the little yacht club there for free, then Terry took a cab to the Spectre factory while I did our laundry for the first time! I used that plunger thingie I got online from that outfit in Caldwell (or Nampa, can’t remember). It worked fine, and now I have laundry hanging on my cute little rubber clothes lines I bought, where you don’t have to use clothes pins.
We then left San Raphael, motored over to Ayala Cove on Angel Island and met Endeavor, where we moored stern and bow. It’s nice to be away from the dock and at anchor. The whole island is a state park, and is where the immigrants (particularly the Chinese) were held until given permission to enter the country. Kind of like an Ellis Island of the west coast. Dinner, the rest of the movie “Dear Frankie”, and bed.

Friday, August 19, 2011: There has been some discussion on the two boats about what the next destination is once we get our watermaker back. All of us want to get to warmer weather, fast. Terry and I are considering going up the Sacramento River Delta, where it’s supposed to be very warm. The Phillips’ are more interested in leaving SF and heading south to maybe Santa Barbara, where it’s also warm. Terry and I feel bad that we have been to busy to do any tourist stuff since being in SF. It's not that we feel deprived about this, but we don't often get to SF, so opportunities to be touristas here are rare. The Phillips’ were here a few days before we were, and have been to Sausalito, Fisherman’s Wharf, and on Hornet, a retired aircraft carrier. Understandably, they are ready to move on. So….we’ll see what happens. Today Terry and Rick took the boat back over to San Raphael to get our repaired watermaker. They got the job done fast, thankfully.I stayed on Endeavor and watched movies with the rest of the Phillips clan. Fun, lazy, foggy, chilly day.


Saturday, August 20, 2011: We are at South Beach Harbor in SF. Had a great day (see my other blog), but I haven't walked so far in one day in years! I was wearing flip-flops for most of it and now have a nice blister on one foot. We took 4 cab rides today and in each instance it took forever to get a cab. After Billie Elliott, unmarked cars would pull up and ask us if we needed a cab. Sure, like we're going to jump into some strange car! But it was a fun day, despite our transportation problems. I'm exhausted but happy. Got to play the tourist in SF!

Sunday, August 21, 2011: Chinatown today. I couldn't believe all the strange and unidentifiable stuff for sale in the markets. The spices and teas smelled so good. Huge rush and crowds of people. Do the Chinese do their grocery shopping on Sundays? We took the bus over there, and that worked out fine. Ate some good food too. What a difference eating authentic Chinese food makes!

Terry has misplaced his Kindle. It's on the boat, we just can't find it. It's very weird. So he's using mine at the moment.

We leave SF tomorrow around 9am for a short hop to ______ (I can't remember the name of the place-Half Moon Bay, I think. So we'll be leaving SF and heading back under the GG bridge and out to open water. It's only about 26 miles away, so it will be a short trip.

Terry and I can't believe how BUSY we are and how each day just flies by. It's making my head spin.

Our Baja HaHa flag gets attention from others who are doing the HaHa as well. It's a great way to identify HaHa boats you see around marinas.

Just got an email from Susan Gamboa. She wants to swing by for a visit. I didn't contact her because we were only actually in SF proper since yesterday. I wrote her back and told her where we are, but I imagine it will be tough for her to see us before we leave in the morning.

Off to bed, I'm beat, even though it's only 9pm.

When Wee Ducky Dawdles..

So Kathy wanted me to post some of my thoughts so far. We left Anacortes on August 1st and are now in Eureka, CA. The trip down has been great! We've had some issues with equipment, but the actual travel part has been just as I expected. The more I'm on Harmony when we're offshore, the more confident I am that she was made for this. We haven't actually sailed yet. Terry wants to be cautious and take our time so that we're more comfortable with the boat motion when it comes time for him to move out of the cockpit forward to set up the sails. We will probably sail on the leg from here to San Francisco. This morning he rigged up a pole to hold our headsail out because we will have winds from astern (coming from behind us) as we go to SF. So if everything looks good when we get out there, we'll try to do some sailing!

Last Tuesday night I was on watch from 8pm to midnight. The winds were constant at 30 knots, gusting to 35. Wow, what waves! The moon was almost full and looked beautiful on the water. I got a bit bored, so I started singing loudly to myself. I ran out of songs and  I started going through all the childhood songs, and of course, "Wee Ducky Dawdle" was the first one I thought of. I have briefly considered asking Terry if we should rename Harmony after the song Daddy taught us, but don't think he'd be too wild about that! Somehow sailing vessel Wee Ducky Dawdle doesn't seem to suit Terry's image of us!

Anyway, "Wee Ducky" is now dawdling in Eureka for another day, and will leave tomorrow at around 9am.

About This Blog

I already maintain a blog about our cruising adventures on Harmony. But I wanted a more informal place where I could post shorter, more frequent entries of my actual thoughts and impressions, my personal journal about our travels. I won't be posting any pics here, and in truth, it won't be of much interest to anyone but myself and maybe close family.