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.