Here and there but generally south....

Well we are back to the Island lifestyle……Southern California style.

We left Morro Bay after a fun visit with Bob, Pat and their daughter Lisa, after choosing a good weather window to pass around Cape Conception.  It is known as the Cape Horn of North America……I think that might be a little overblown myself.  For one thing it does not take very long to get around and the temperatures are never below freezing here…..it is after all, southern California.  But never the less we were careful to choose a good weather window and passed around the Cape at midnight, in calm seas and in company with Solestra, a fellow Bluewater Cruising Association boat that we last saw in Neah Bay, WA.

Bill taking Bob, Pat and Lisa for a cruise.

Bob, Bill and Scott all used to work together.

A hitchhiker

 As we approached the Cape the offshore oil rigs started to make their presence known.  At night these big islands of light invariably seemed to be exactly on the course we wished to take to Santa Barbara!  They were a bit intimidating at first but since they are immobile all we really had to do was steer clear. Phew!

Less intimidating in daylight

Santa Barbara is a lovely city with tree lined streets, nice old buildings and a beautiful waterfront that we spent four days enjoying with the crews of Solastra and Searover II, another Bluewater boat on the way to Mexico.  The next stop was Oxnard where we caught up with Kanilela, another Bluewater boat that we had first met in Morro Bay. 

 

Day of the dead decorations

Just some of the boats in Oxnard

Oxnard has a huge section of manmade canals and it sure was fun going shopping by Dinghy.  However the marina fee was high so we did not stay long.  We are now enjoying what Catalina Island has to offer in company with Kanilela and Searover II, Solastra has elected to keep working their way to San Diego along the mainland coast.

 

Neil Youngs boat was also in Oxnard, proudly flying the Canadian flag

  Catalina Island is experiencing a severe drought so things are pretty brown, but the weather is pleasant and the harbour is lovely.  There is also lots of good hiking, just beware the rattlesnakes and the buffalo…….I have not yet seen either though.  While here we have also finally finished our watermaker installation and it has been successfully tested!  Yay!  The signs about the drought everywhere were a good incentive on that one!

Kialoa is in the middle of the group

Made it to the top!  

All the way to Morro Bay

California Coastline.

The trip from Monterey to Morro Bay was uneventful, we left Monterey midday and had about an hour of lovely sailing weather before the wind got so light that we were only moving about two knots and the sails were slopping all over.  So we motored once again……people say that you will be surprised at how much motoring you do when cruising and we are indeed surprised!  It is much more pleasant, and easier, to be sailing and have the wind vane steering the boat. When we are motoring we have to hand steer so it makes the trip more tiring and it is much noisier......

On the approach to Morro Bay, Morro Rock stands at the entrance

It was a 22 hour trip to Morro Bay so we had some more night sailing (motoring).  There was phosphorescence in the water which lit up the trail of the dolphins (at least we think they were dolphins, it was too dark to see them) that were playing with Kialoa.  Although it was a little unnerving at first to see something streaking in towards the boat the light show was breathtakingly beautiful. 

Going for a Skegway tour with Scotts friend Bill, they are
a fun ride!  Thanks Bill!

The entrance to Morro Bay has a reputation for dangerous conditions but when we arrived it was calm and easy.  And life here is also pretty calm and easy.  Scott has an old friend living here so we have been spending time visiting with him and his family.  He also has given us a car to use, so getting around is easy and we have used it to get some shopping done.

We have also had the pleasure of a visit from John and Andrea and their son Kingston, formerly of Saltspring, now living near here.  We purchased Kialoa from them five years ago, with this trip in mind.  We are so grateful to be where we are.

Scott on the breakwater, note the shorts and tshirt  :)  we are loving the weather!

Morro Rock from the other side.

One of our neighbours haveing a crab dinner.  The sea otters are
making a delightful comeback and we have seen lots.

We are looking forward to a visit from some other friends, Bob and Pat, on Monday and then we will start to think about moving further South.

I am loving the pelicans!

Monterey

There is an excellent jellyfish display at the Monterey aquarium.

The only constant is change, and change is not always an easy bedfellow,  but one I am becoming much more familiar with.  We made the big change, leaving our home, our friends, our known places to adventure into a big unknown, and sometimes it is scary, only because it is not familiar.  Change is with us all the time now, a constant.

All this is just to say that we have not left Monterey.  And although it was an unexpected change of plans, we have found more here than we ever would have had our plans not changed.  So we slowly learn to embrace change.

the local head shop.....

Lots of little boats

 Monterey is a very pleasant town with lots of history and charm and it is set against the backdrop of a lovely bay with sandy beaches and warm sunshine.  What’s not to like.

A statue to commemorate the founder of the the first mission
in Monterey.  The usual abuse of the locals ensued.......

The last remaining whalebone sidewalk......the bones were cut into
lovely diamond shapes...and turned into sidewalks......

It is the place where California government really began, under the Spanish it was where the cargo ships had to come to the customs house and unload all the cargo so it could be evaluated for duty fees.  When  Mexico gained independence from Spain most of the southwest of the US was part of Mexico and Monterey retained its position as the capital.  However when California joined the United States in 1846, the legislatures of the time moved the capitol to San Jose, it was later moved to  Sacramento where it remains.   

Yes we have been to the customs house, the first brick house, the whaling station, the museum at the Presidio, the aquarium, cannery row, fishermans wharf and the Tuesday street market.

And there are sealions, they sing us to sleep all night long…

Just one of the many

We continue

I thought this was an odd speed limit
for a construction zone, It turned out
that is the max speed of the cable cars.

San Fransisco is a great city!  There is lots to see and do, with cool buildings, interesting streets and a vibrant waterfront we have really enjoyed playing tourist here.  We have ridden on the cable cars, driven down Lombard street, taken a Duck Boat tour, been to Pier 39 and Fishermans wharf, checked out the boats at the Marine Heritage museum, did wine tasting in Napa Valley, had lunch in Sausilito, drove over the Golden Gate three times, once on purpose, been to the beach at the Presidio, drove by Haight & Ashbury, went up to the Coit  tower, Scott & Scott toured the Jeremiah O’brien (the last seaworthy Liberty Ship),  checked out the shops in Chinatown, had a great time with Scotts cousins, (Cousin Bruce took me out for a drive in his 56 ford fairlane, I was wishing I had a leather jacket, chewing gum and pigtails!), had a nice visit with our friends Kim and Jan from Sidney  and managed to get a few boat chores done. 

The famous Lombard street from the Coit tower

Boys at the beach

Scott, his cousin Bruce and wife Rhonda

The Duck boat broke down when we were on the water.  Everyone
had to don life jackets, you can see they were not too impressed.

Napa Valley's version of old faithful

Scott Cindy and Bucket on the broken down Duck boat, At least
 us boaties were having fun.  I am not sure why Bucket looks so
serious, he got to drive the duckboat before it broke down.

Cute fishing boats at fishermans wharf

Scott replacing the anchor light, 

After three weeks it was time to go and we are now on our way further south.  We left the Brisbane Marina early in the morning on Oct 3^rd in company with Velvet Sky, passed under the Golden Gate at 9:30 and motored in light winds and calm seas to Halfmoon Bay.  There is a lovely well protected anchoring area inside the breakwater there and we spent a peaceful night.  The next morning was another early start again motoring in light winds and calm seas to Santa Cruz.  That was the scariest harbor entry we have come across yet!  It is narrow, almost on the beach with big swells and crowded like crazy!  As we were coming in there were two stand up paddle boards and three kayakers just inside the entrance and a fellow in a dinghy coming around the corner and three sailboats coming up behind us!  We made it with no mishaps and just a couple more gray hairs.

Early morning departure

Goodbye San Fransisco

Velvet Sky on the way out.

We arrived on the weekend of the 100^th anniversary of the wharf so it was very busy and crowded and we were treated to fireworks on Saturday night.  Santa Cruz is an interesting town, with its amusement park right on the beach it was a little too crowded and touristy for me but Cindy and I did have a great ride on the roller coaster and Scott went on the log ride with me, but he says it’s the last ride he will ever go on!

Santa Cruz Harbour, the entrance is at the far end.

Santa Cruz boardwalk, the fun roller coaster can be seen on the
left.

Boardwalk and beach.

The other Scott and Bucket on the log ride.

We left Santa Cruz 10am on Oct 6^th and headed to Monterey, a short 20 miles away.  Finally with enough wind to sail we had a lovely peaceful crossing of Monterey Bay, with the wind vane steering most of the trip  (we had to hand steer towards the end as the wind got lighter and the wind vane was having trouble holding the course).   We  saw a big pod of dolphins on the way, they were crossing our path not going with us so it was a short lived sighting.

Today we will explore Monterey and tomorrow head further south.

A humpback sighting on the way!  Always exciting!

If you are going to San Fransisco.....

Leaving Fort Bragg

Some days it seemed that we would never get here…..and here we are.   Mid day on Sep 13^th  we passed under the Golden Gate bridge on Kialoa.  This is a huge milestone for us, one of those life moments that we will never forget.

 

We left Fort Bragg on the 12^th planning a stop in Bodega Bay but conditions were calm, the boat was moving well and Scott was feeling less seasick than usual so we continued on.  Marshall needed to get home and we wanted to be in San Fransisco. 

24 hours after leaving Fort Bragg a rather tired but not sea sick crew on
 the approach to the Golden Gate Bridge

This is what the underside of the Golden Gate Bridge looks like
I know that everyone has wondered about that!  

We had motored the whole way from Fort Bragg but the wind picked up just outside the Golden Gate and we were able to turn the engine off and live out our dream of sailing under the bridge.  And best of all, Scott was not feeling at all sea sick so he was able to fully enjoy the moment!  

We then proceeded to have a fantastic three hour sail all the way to the Marina where we are staying.  The bay was incredibly busy with sailboats and we think we saw more of them in those three hours than we saw on the rest of our trip.

San Fransisco Skyline

On Sunday we bid Marshall a fond farewell and see you soon, he will be crewing with 

Velvet Sky when they travel from San Diego to Cabo  San Lucas so we hope to see him then.  Thank you Marshall for all you did in helping us to bring Kialoa to San Fransisco, we are so grateful to have you as a friend.

Velvet Sky had elected to stop in Bodega Bay so they arrived at the Brisbane Marina shortly after Marshall left us.  We have now rented a car together and will be doing some exploring of this lovely city.

This leg of our trip took 23 days, we departed Seattle on Aug 21^st and arrived here on Sep 13^th.  We had a total of 192 travel hours and 144 of those were spent with the engine running,  not an enviable number…..however I guess too little wind is better than too much wind

Hootie and the blowfish enjoying the San Fransisco Bay

Our grateful thanks go out to all those who have been a part of supporting our dream, by words and by deeds, in large and small ways, you have all helped to get us here

Eureka! And further on  

Sep 9th

We left Crescent City early in the morning on Sep 7^th, in company with Velvet Sky and our new friends Scott, Cindy and their son Bucket who are travelling the same route as us.  We set up a radio check in with each other every two hours, and each time Velvet Sky was further ahead of us, however our lesser speed has one advantage, by the time we arrived at Eureka they had arranged for moorage and guided us into our slip in the Marina.  What a treat!

Eureka is about 5 miles up the river so it took a while to get there after an uneventful bar crossing (this is where we make the transition from sea to inland waters, the Columbia river bar being a notoriously bad one).  There is not much going on in Eureka, it appears to be a town in decline, but admittedly we did not spend much time there as we left the next afternoon to make a 100 mile (20 hour) trip to Fort Bragg.  We did not spend enough time thinking about the state of the tide at Eureka as we were busy timing our departure from Eureka so that we would arrive at the Noyo River bar (Fort Bragg) on the flood tide which is the best time to cross the bars.  Because the weather conditions were so calm and our entrance to Eureka had been so easy we were perhaps a little complacent, and left on the ebb tide.  It was sporty! Not dangerous, but definitely sporty!  A little more respect ensued.

Velvet Sky crossing the bar at Eureka, photo courtesy of Marshall, I was too
busy hanging on to take pictures!

The weather was calm and we settled in for a long motor, all was going well, we passed around the dreaded Cape Mendocino so quietly you couldn’t even tell we were there.   But after Cape Mendocino there is another point called Punta Gorda, this one made us feel like we travelling in a giant washing machine, not so much fun for me and Marshall and even less for Scott.  That kind of action is not good for someone prone to seasickness…

But that only lasted for about 40 minutes and then it was back to smoother waters and enough wind to sail for an hour or so under the full moon.  Magic!

Pelican at the riverfront

Looking up the river from the bridge

Velvet Sky arrived at Fort Bragg about 7 am, radioed us directions to our slip, then they went for a well deserved nap.  When we arrived at about 10 am we (easily) crossed the bar and then we were in the narrowest waterway we have been in yet.  The Noyo River is quaint and lovely and is lined with marine businesses and boats in various states of disrepair.  The Marina itself is fairly large and unlike most of the other Marinas we have been in has very few derelict boats hanging around.  (With the exception of Crescent City, which just had very few boats)  It’s nice to see boats being used and taken care of.

With our first sunshine in days we were delighted to strip off the layers and enjoy a quiet day hanging around the waterfront and catching up on missed sleep.

The Skunk Train

Scott and Bucket at a big Redwood

Today we took a ride on the Skunk Train, a four hour trip up the Noyo river through the Redwood forest, picked up some things we needed for the boat, went to the local farmers market,  got some delicious local tomatoes,  grapes and goat cheese and had happy hour with the good folk on Velvet Sky.  I can’t complain about my life.

Always good advice before crossing any lines!