Sept 24

5:50 am awake

Coffee. Then it’s time to gear up after our long, long break. I dig out the long johns and extra layers, and haul my stuff out into the cockpit and make ready for the day. Our plan is Port San Luis Opisbo which is a pretty short day, and then to the dreaded Point Conception in the predicted lull tomorrow.

Today was my first estimated date of return but we aren’t even at LA yet. I haven’t bothered trying to come up with a revised date for now. I will wait until Santa Barbara where the travel distances are much shorter. Mark still needs to be back in BC before the first of October and is pretty sure he is leaving from LA.

6:30 am

Off dock. It’s a warm wind but a light one, so no sailing for now.

6:45 am
35° 21.6065′ N,120° 52.2675′ W

We turn the last corner and leave Morro Bay behind.

As we clear the breakwater, the wind gains an edge of cold and our sea legs welcome back the swells. Standing on ground that wasn’t constantly moving has been just plain weird.

The Santa Annas are being predicted in the coming days, which will bring high temperatures in Southern California (into the 100s F) and potentially cause us wind problems with onshore winds up to 50 mph. If we are lucky they will manifest further south and then be gone when we get there. For now all we want to worry about is Point Conception when we decide to go.

8:00 am

Tim spots the first whales of the day off in the distance. There is a new kind of bird out there flying in small flocks really low to water and maneuvering at high speed. Fun to watch.

8:15 am
35° 13.7066′ N,120° 56.4685′ W

We raise the main with one reef, sailing downwind in 12-15 knots.

8:30 am

There is a huge school of dolphins way off the starboard side. We can see a long wall of white foam in distance and with the binoculars it turns out to be a massive number of dolphins thundering along. Since we are ahead of Sea Esta anyway we tack to try and get closer and end up chasing them back the direction we came. We never do catch them, though, as they are both faster and more maneuverable than we are. Eventually we tack back and resume our original heading.

9:00 am

Sea Esta calls and the first change of plans for the day is announced. The decision is made to do the long day to Cojo Bay, 55 nm and 10+ hours away. I’m good with that because it makes much more sense to me since the weather is good and a short day leaves us with nothing to do at anchor.

9:20

In the distance off Sea Esta‘s stern we spot 3 or 4 whales in the morning sunlight bouncing off water. Pretty; worthy of a painter or much better photographer than I.

9:40 am

We haul the gennaker up from below and get it rigged to go. Then I hoist the sock and we are flyin’ along at 6.5 knots with gennaker and main together; way faster than we can motor.

Paradisea and Pinocchio are 5 or so miles behind, also heading for Cojo and Harlequin is back there too somewhere. Looks like we all decided to make the most of the good weather, although most had expressed a plan to head to San Luis.

10:45 am
35° 1.9176′ N,120° 55.5180′ W

Now we are sailing along hitting 8.3 knots occasionally and it’s a great sail–very comfortable and a lot of fun.

I’ve got a good signal so I decided to post a blog entry. Turns out the signal’s not that good and it’s oh so painful getting the images to upload. But eventually I get it done. Lucky you!

11:30 am

Winds are climbing and get up to 19-20. We decide it’s time to haul the gennaker down, but it was grand while it lasted. Bringing it down was fun as the swells and the higher winds made me feel like I was dangling on the end of a giant kite. Woo-hoo…

But we are still making 7+ knots with just the main as the winds grow to 22-23 knots.

We spot a sun fish off port maybe 4 feet away and then another even closer a bit later. It’s to bad they go by so fast; they look fascinating and I’d love to look at one closely or at least get a decent picture.

1:00 pm
34° 45.8313′ N,120° 50.3459′ W

The winds are calming although seas remain steep with a short frequency. This means the distance between each wave is smaller than we’ve been experiencing and the anchor is occasionally just a foot out of water, and once or twice actually submerged as we hit the trough between waves.

We are still making speeds in high 6s though.

1:40 pm

Ho hum, more whales. But wait! There’s a dozen or so dolphins as well. That’s more exciting! Seriously, it’s like we are starting to treat whale sightings as mundane, we’ve seen so many in this trip.

There is an offshore oil rig in distance. That’s new. Oh, and more whale spouts.

2:15 pm
34° 38.1738′ N,120° 48.0613 W

The winds die to 5 knots just off Point Arguello which is the first of two closely related points that make up the “Cape Horn of the Pacific.” So we roll in the jib and start the engine and carry on our way.

One of the things we have been seeing with alarming frequency is those mylar balloons that say happy birthday or some such other celebratory phrase. I guess they are tougher than regular balloons and when they land out here they float on endlessly. It’s a bit sad the number we have seen.

I spot some sea lions (Donna says they’re porpoises) bounding out of the water between us and Sea Esta. They sure move fast when they are determined; and while I’m pretty sure I’m right, they look a lot like dolphins on the move and are just as fast.

It almost appears the oil rig we have been coming up on is under tow. There is an AIS target right in front of it moving at less than 1 knot. But then again, maybe not, as there are two more off in the distance. We do hear a call on the vhf saying there is a boat performing ROV operations in the vicinity, so maybe that’s what’s going on.

Then we spot a third platform. Seems like there’s oil to be found in Southern California.

I notice a huge structure on the coast line and check Google only to discover that Vandenberg Air Force Base is just off the port side. What I see is SLC 6, where the space shuttle had been planned to be launched. I haven’t been able to discover if they ever did do any missions from the West Coast as the Challenger disaster changed all the plans. Nonetheless, super cool!

3:35 pm
34° 32.3087′ N,120° 41.6592′ W

We are sailing again. We’ve got the main up with one reef and the genoa out, making 6.3 knots versus the 5.8 we were doing under motor. Our speed slowly climbs up to 7.5 as the winds also climb; the wind instrument is now showing 24 to 26 true.

4:30 pm

The consensus is we need to throw in a second reef. This is easier said than done when running downwind in stiff winds. There was some discussion about just toughing it out but what the hell, we need the practice anyway. To put in the reef we will need to heave to which is, as Tim succinctly puts it, going to be fairly violent. So for several exciting moments, as we swung up into the wind, with everything banging and crashing and heeled over almost 30° before we could backwind the genoa and bring us to a fairly stable stop, we had a wild ride all so we could let the main loose enough to work with. Then we worked to bring the sail down in a controlled manner while bouncing up and down the swells and still heeled over at a fairly significant angle. Once we got the main all cinched down again, we hauled on the main sheet and brought her around so we were now sailing downwind on the other tack. That meant we would have to gybe again, but we were heading offshore a bit so we we could clear Point Conception with a little extra room. All good fun.

So we headed out to sea for 10 minutes or so before we gybed back on original tack, which is always a touchy maneuver in anything less than calm winds. Soon we actually hit 10.2 knots surfing down the swells. These big points sure provide a lot of fun, but I would hate to be going the other way.

5:30 pm
34° 26.1957′ N,120° 29.8480′ W

We just passed Point Conception, which is the last big hurdle of the trip. We spotted and chatted to a sailboat named Sheila who was in fact going the other way. They were looking for a weather report and between us and Paradisea 5 miles back; we let him know the conditions he was facing. Watching him sure was uncomfortable as his bow would come up, and then crash down into to the oncoming swell. Didn’t look like much fun.

6:00 pm

We just rounded Government Point and are entering our anchorage for the night. It is literally right on the south side of Point Conception. The wind is suddenly warm and the whole environment has suddenly changed.

We try to maneuver around a bunch of massive kelp beds, fail miserably and slowly work our way past the crashing surf to where we can see Footloose, a 42-foot Katana catamaran, already anchored.

6:15 pm
34° 26.8886′ N,120° 26.4931′ W
Cojo Bay

All anchored. And I start stripping. It is so hot and my long johns and fleeces have got to go.

We are now sharing the bay with Footloose, Sea Esta, Harlequin, Paradisea, and Pinocchio. Four out of the six all destined for the Baja Haja.

It’s beautifully calm here but you can hear the surf crash all along the shore as the sun slowly sets over the point. And it’s still warm even after the sun disappears. I hang over the side and dip my toes in the water. Warm, but I’m not yet tempted to dive in.

The temperatures are still warmer than anything we’ve yet experienced, although I do grab a fleece as the evening progresses

We have a lovely dinner on deck and the stars are stunning with the Milky Way unraveling its splendor across the middle of the sky. There are so many stars. It’s one of those moments when you are reassured that it’s good to be alive.

What can I say? Beautiful, peaceful, glorious, amazing, all words to hint at the combination of peace and serenity being at anchor in this remote place with so few manmade objects to relate to and so many of nature’s glories to revel in.

Sept 25

6:40 am awake

I had a pretty bad sleep, the worst in fact, of the whole trip so far. Part of it was the anchor chain creaking on the bow roller as we swung around and part was that I was more than a little thirsty after the third, obviously inadvisable, glass of wine. But I was too lazy to get up and grab more water so there I lay, awake.

There was also the occasional odd beep from the main cabin and my phone would buzz. Hmmmmm…

7:22 am

Anchor up and we are off. But not without a few issues. The beeping I had been hearing was the inverter complaining and the house system was completely dead when we got up. Not even enough juice to power the solenoid to fire the stove to make coffee. Oh the inhumanity of it all! But the engine started fine so it was all good for recharging everything. But it’s another project…

The swivel on the anchor also bound, leaving the anchor in a position where we couldn’t bring it past the bow roller. But some manhandling popped it back into place and we got it all up and secure. Another project…

Footloose followed us out of the bay on almost exactly our heading so I guess we are all headed to Santa Barbara. The other three boats pull out about an hour behind us, but they are heading for the Channel Island to explore before heading on to San Diego.

Some frisky sea lions are racing us out on this sunny, warm day. They really are amazing to watch when they are going full tilt. The winds are south east at 8-10 knots so basically right on our nose.

8:30 am
34° 25.4321′ N,120° 19.7689′ W

There is very little swell and the winds are down to 5 knots or less. And it’s a straight shot to Santa Barbara so auto is going to do all the work today. We just need to try and stay cool and keep an eye out for occasional crab trap.

I started the day with no long johns and no windbreaker for the first time this trip. So far so good. I’ve just got my one fleece on and I might even be down to bare arms by noon.

10:15 am
34° 24.1893′ N,120° 8.6200′ W

Down to shirt sleeves. Woot!

10:25 am

We just drove through pack of porpoises. They were bouncing around right on our heading, veered off as we passed by and then joined us. They swam under the bow for 3 or 4 minutes before heading back to whatever important porpoise purposes they had previously been pursuing.

The water is much clearer here and you can see the dolphins easily as they weave and whirl alongside. Donna got some nice video.

It’s calm and peaceful but it’s also pretty boring; I don’t think I would want to do days of this. We are passing a ton of oil rigs and can see Santa Cruz Island off in the distance.

12:30 pm
34° 22.9845′ N,119° 52.5833′ W

We just passed an oil rig fairly closely (a couple of thousand yards) and the water was filled with scum and oil residue. The smell of crude in the air was almost like being back in Alberta in the patch. I really hope this well was having a problem because if they are all putting out this much crap then I think California has a big issue.

1:00 pm

There is a huge pod of dolphins in distance. It’s an amazing sight, almost like a huge standing wave spanning hundreds of feet. Another appears smaller, about 300 feet off the port side. They don’t stick around and are heading somewhere fast.

2:30 pm
34° 24.5770′ N,119° 40.8985′ W
off Stearns Wharf, Santa Barbara

Well we are now at anchor in Santa Barbara off Stearns Wharf. Today’s deviation from the plan was pretty mild, consisting solely of giving up on tying up at the marina and opting to anchor out for free. There was a moment there when I was thinking we might carry on the 22 nm to Ventura since the winds were finally up, but the lazy buggers among us won through and we called it quits for the day.

3:20 pm

We’ve unshipped the dinghy from the davits for the first time and are now tied up to dinghy dock. The entrance to the marina past the wharf and breakwaters was as crowded and congested as I have ever experienced. In the narrow, congested channel there were surfers, paddle boarders, sailboats, jet skis, inflatables with outboards, swimmers, sailing dinghies and big powerboats all coming and going within a broad spectrum of sense and nonsense.

A quick visit to the harbour master and then we are hitting the showers to clean up and cool off. It’s is super sunny and warm so I opt for a warm shower with a cold water cool down to finish it off. Lovely.

It’s very hot, probably 30°. We all meet up at the West Marine below the harbor master’s office, then Mark and Jim head for a beer, Tim and Donna go downtown and I follow them as far as the old wharf before splitting off.

On my way back I walked along the beach and got my tourist quota of California girls and bikinis. Apparently the heat is due to the Santa Anas and pretty unusual, so the locals are taking advantage.

I grabbed a beer back at the marina head and then indulged in some people watching. I was having a bit of a crisis as I couldn’t get a charge on my phone before I left and was down below 20%. I had to curtail the blog entries And Candy Crush playing. A bit later I moved down to the dockside and watched the ridiculous traffic in marina. Keystone cops anyone… Phone down to 8%!!

A little after 6, I met up with Tim & Donna and we piled into the dingy for the ride home. on the way we stopped for a happy hour glass of wine on Sea Esta and then headed on to Northwest Passage

I relaxed reading in my berth for a bit to work off some of the heat and then headed up to enjoy the cool night breeze in the cockpit.

Dinner was BBQ’d steak and carrots eaten under the stars on a warm and calm evening.

Tim fussed with the electrical system with no discernible results. The alternator didn’t look like it had been charging the batteries while we were motoring. Then he decided to try out his new Honda generator. We are officially one of those people now, but the road noise from the city was so loud I doubt anyone noticed us running a generator at nine in the evening.

So I went to bed.

Sept 22

7:30 am

I got up and headed straight to the shower. I got everything all ready, started the water and stripped down. But the water wasn’t hot. I tried flipping the knob the other way but nada. I splashed a bit of coolish water but it just wasn’t doing it for me despite a valiant attempt to tough it out. Then I wondered if there was a hot water switch like I ran into back in Bragg Creek.

So I stepped out into the main area at the exact moment that someone came into the the washroom. There I stood slightly damp with my half hearted attempt to get soapy, stark naked. We locked eyes. He smiled. I blurted out something about hot water and he assured me that the hot water worked automatically; he’d had a few showers already. So I thanked him and retreated back into the relative privacy of the showers. That’s my embarrassment for the month taken care of.

Oh, and he was right. The water was plenty warm by the time I got back.

Back on board I had my coffee that Donna had thoughtfully put in a thermal mug and had some peanut butter and jam on toasted bagels. While I ate Tim read from a paperback they’d picked up at a book exchange.

It’s about this crazy guy who took a sailboat solo from Panama to Australia to rejoin his wife after WWII. He didn’t know how to sail and the story of his first attempt was both hilarious and frightening.

Then everyone (else) headed off for a run and I sunned myself on deck for a bit. Then it was time to beat Tim’s computer into submission. Apparently the restart did the trick because after I got it all plugged in and wired up it printed with nary a hiccup. Did I mention my feelings about Windows yet?

I finished my book (and the series) and spent some time fussing over what to start next. And then I started it. Life is pretty simple here at dock.

A few club members showed up to do some sailing. They have a nifty hoist system here. They just wheel their trailers (most of the small boats are stored in a compound across the street) and hook a three point harness to a hoist. Then they lift it up, swing it over the edge and drop it into the water easy as pie. A few minutes later they hoist the sails and sail off the dock.

Still in IT mode, I decided to set up the 24 inch monitor Donna bought. No big deal except that since both Tim and Donna’s computer have HDMI outputs there was no need for the adapter she had also bought.

After the team got back from their run I walked up to grocery store to resupply my stash of trail mix. I’d eaten the last of it a couple of days previously. It was a nice walk through a more residential area filled with succulent gardens and topiaried trees.

Upon arriving at the Albertsons I spotted a McDonalds and decided to indulge myself in junk food. The fries were distinctly less salty than their Canadian counterparts. I wonder if that’s a US thing or a Californian thing. The only other difference was instead of East Indian immigrants staffing the place, the workers were all Mexican. Different, yet oh so the same. I took advantage of the free wifi and wrote a bit.

Back at Albertsons I picked up more trail mix ingredients: raisins, peanuts and semi-sweet chocolate chips; I like my trail mix simple. Then I walked back towards the waterfront down a more commercial street and peered in all the shops as I went by. Nice little town.

The winds had been climbing when I left and they were going full bore by the time I got back. The boats were straining pretty hard at their moorings.

Tim was working on the broken cup holder. He had a bit of spare star board and had fashioned a brace for the piece I had snapped off. I helped with the last 5 minutes of the work and then retreated below.

By now the boat is really pushing on fenders. Our stern is facing into the wind which is blowing 25-30 kts in the bay. The waves are pounding into the transom and water is occasionally spraying over the back, even as far as in through the hatch.

Rafting was not the best idea in this situation and we are scrambling to get the fenders right between Sea Esta and us as well as making sure the ones on the dock side don’t burst under the weight of two 42-foot boats. The winds peak at 36 or so knots and blow most of the afternoon with lots of thumping and banging and halyards clanging to keep us awake down below.

So other than checking fenders and lines occasionally, I just hang out for the afternoon and relax.

Dinner is burgers and then around 8, Mark and Jim come over for Scotch night. I stick to red wine while the three guys sample scotch from Tim’s collection of 8 or 9 opened bottles that he cleared out of his Degnen Bay house when they moved out. There are Islay’s and 12- and 18-year old Glenfiddichs and a raft of other single malts.

I texted back and forth with Leslie while this was going on and eventually the evening wrapped up. The winds had died to nothing and the stars were out full force. It was actually a pretty nice night as I headed for bed.

Sept 23

7:30 am awake

This morning I started the day with a coffee followed by a shower. Hopefully the caffeine will prevent me from any more “shower moments”.

The weather is calm and glassy. No trace of the storm left in the harbor but I overhear some locals say the ocean buoy reports are still reporting some steep waves out there.

Everyone is off for a run again. I catch up on my last blog post and am all up to date again. Donna asked for the link so I guess typos count now. Hopefully Leslie will catch the worst of them.

I read for a bit and then headed out for a walk after the runners returned. I have got to remember to take more pics with my phone so I have something to post. Sometimes I think I should have brought the laptop and other times I’m glad I didn’t.

Morro Bay has a massive power station just like Moss Landing. They have these huge smoke stacks but apparently aren’t used unless they are needed. Not sure what that means in California but I’ve heard about their rolling brownouts. Maybe they fire them up in air conditioning season?

At the base of the smokestacks is the future home of the Morro Bay Maritime Museum. Right now all they have is a nice sign and three static exhibits. One is an old Coast Guard lifeboat, there is an old working tug and finally there is the DSRV Avalon.

The Avalon is one of two Deep Sea Rescue Vehicles, mini subs, that were created after the Thresher disaster. It was designed to be flown anywhere in the world and deployed to help rescue sunken submariners. So cool.

A little further down I came across a cat on the beach named Rascal. He was a bundle of curious energy. I think he was working for the paddle board rental lady. As they were headed back up to their van he put on a burst of impressive cat speed and then plowed right into the soft mesh of his carrier. How red was his face?

I also spot a couple of surfers paddling out towards the big rock. They are on their knees scooping the water on each side to propel themselves along in the calm water of the bay. It looks like a real inefficient method of propulsion.

On the other side of the long dune joining Morro Rock to the mainland is long beach with tons of surfers. The waves are crashing in and surfers old and young are hanging out beyond the breakers waiting to catch a wave. It’s just like the movies! There doesn’t seem to be much standardization of boards though. There long ones and short ones and even some in between ones. Personal preference? Maybe they just can’t afford to change them every time styles change? I hang out watching for half an hour or so before wandering back towards the bay.

There are 2 packs of about twelve sea otters each floating in some kelp beds. A couple have pups on their stomachs and they are busy grooming and fussing. I could just hear pups complaining, “Aw, mom…”

I follow the lovely path back towards town. Just past the place I met Rascal there is a sea lion just off the beach. He doesn’t look like he’s doing well, just sort of floating in a foot of water and raising his head to breathe every 30 seconds or so. There are a couple of Marine Mammal Rescue people there observing and putting up some temporary beings saying keep away.

Turns out he is a fairly large, crested male adult. It is not abnormal for them to sleep on beaches, lifting their head every once in a while to breathe. He’s apparently been there for an hour or so and they are keeping an eye on him. The only unusual things about it was the busy location; usually they like more privacy. Then, after about 7 or 8 minutes of me watching him he just took off. Apparently I was creeping him out.

On the way back I grabbed a hot dog for $3.78. Nothing is cheap around here. I also check out a surf shop. $600 for a board and another $600 for a wetsuit and I’d be all good to go.

The boats have all moved around by the time I get back. They guy on the end volunteered to leave the dock so Northwest Passage and Sea Esta moved over to free up the dock space for boats preparing for an event tomorrow. But I found them anyway.

Turns out there is a 6 o’clock happy hour at the club and we are all invited. So I settle in to read and relax while Tim and Donna head out to fill up the other propane tank. Then it’s just hanging out for the rest of the afternoon. By that I mean Tim tries to wash the boat without using water conspicuously and Donna does laundry and paperwork for San Diego and Mexico. I just read and write some more. Some crew huh?

We are still unsure of our destination tomorrow, just sure we are leaving at 6am. It might be Port San Luis Obispo or it might be Cojo Bay. One is 3.5 hrs away and the other is 10 hrs. 6 am seems excessive if we are only going to San Luis though.

The other thing that is up in the air is my final destination. It’s looking like Northwest Passage might possibly be taking its time on the LA to San Diego leg. If so I will likely get off in LA rather than wait to the 6th or 7th of October to arrive in San Diego.

Tim is looking up a replacement starter as we are having issues with this one engaging 100% of the time. And as he says, in his experience these things don’t fix themselves.

Happy hour was crowded. There were snacks, and pints for $3. I had a dark IPA which was weird. We talked to a few people and I did my token socializing before scurrying back to the boat after and hour and a half.

Chatted with L a bit online, talked destination arrival with Tim, ate some chicken wings and that was that. Just another day stranded on shore.

Sept 20

5:20 am awake

5:50 am off dock

It’s an early start and the sun has barely begun to show us its intentions to provide some light. We cast off Sea Esta and then follow suit in the shadowy darkness. The narrow channel is a challenge but not as bad as it was when we came in. I light up the buoys with a flashlight as we head out into the bay. I doubt Tim needed it with his eagle-eye vision but it gave me something to do.

It is calm with hardly any swell; much smoother than our entrance a couple of days ago. As we get out into the bay the swell height increases but the swell period is really long, so it is a gentle rise and fall; really quite comfortable and relaxing. It’s slow going at 5.2 to 5.5 knots.

8:30 am
36° 38.4126′ N,121° 57.8335′  W

Still calm. We are just exiting Monterey Bay. Carmel and Pebble Beach Golf Course are just ahead. There is a beautiful sunrise over the coastal hills with crashing waves and layered clouds. It’s incredible beautiful but the dozen or so pictures I tried to take failed to capture it. So I give up and just enjoy it.

9:00 am
36° 34.6285′ N,121° 59.3645′ W

The seas calm to glassy smooth water although the swell frequency returns to normal, with 8′ plus swells making the ride more like it’s been on previous days.

Donna is baking bread and sundry loaves and it smells great. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing although I guess anticipation has its rewards later. Still, I’m an eat-the-marshmallow-now kind of fellow and happy to be so.

The houses up on the hills are mostly mansions and some have some very castle-like silhouettes. There are at least 6 golf courses on the peninsula here, one of those being the famous Pebble Beach. We can’t see it though as it’s hidden behind a point as we pass by.

10:45 am
36° 25.8671′ N,121° 57.9889′ W

The sun is finally out. It’s been trying all morning but the clouds and mist were not cooperating. Things warm up substantially. Still no wind.

We just passed a lovely cutter-rigged ketch going the other way, but other than that it is pretty lonely out here. We are cruising about 3 nm offshore and the terrain is very hilly, small mountains really, with rocky shores and crashing waves. The highway winds its way along the hillsides following the shoreline; that must of been quite the project to build.

12:00 pm
36° 18.6396′ N,121° 56.1934′ W

We are just off Point Sur. It’s a big, big rock attached to the mainland by a narrow penninsula. Up top is a big light house and a meteorological station that look more like a fort than anything else. Around the corner from here is Big Sur, but frankly I have no idea what Big Sur is. Or, for that matter what a Sur is. Things to Look Up Later for $500 Alec…

We’ve rolled out the jenny and have picked up almost another knot of speed. But we are having to head off our rhumb line and it’s hard to say if the extra speed is helping in the end or not.

12:30 pm

We spot 2 humpbacks. The far one is breaching, launching himself out of the water and hitting the surface with a massive splash. He does this half a dozen times although often we just catch the splash. The other is quite close and we are treated to a few blows before he arches his back, flips his massive tail and disappears below.

The cloud and fog are back and once again we are sailing with nothing but white all around. The winds increase to 12-15 knots from behind but we leave the engine on nonetheless.

2:20 pm
36° 7.3893′ N,121° 48.8849′ W

Still motor-sailing making 6-6.5 knots. Still cloudy/foggy. We’ve long since lost sight of Sea Esta.

3:13 pm

We heard a whale blow and then spotted him about 200 feet off the starboard quarter. He just hung out there surfacing several times as we slowly motored away. They are so so big.

Visibility is still less than 2 miles but it is warming up again. So that’s good.

3:30 pm

Another whale ahead. Donna and I spotted a big splash and then saw him blow a few times before he showed us his tail and dove. Lots of whales in this country it seems. Always a pleasure.

A mountain top suddenly appears through a break in clouds. It’s a startling sight in an otherwise unbroken wall of white and gray where the shoreline is impossible to distinguish. And then out of nowhere this short range of mountain top appears shining in the sunlight like an unfinished painting on a dirty gray canvas.

5:00 pm
35° 59.8863′ N,121° 34.3089′ W

We move in closer and spend some time gybing back and forth near the coast. We are only half way through today’s trip plan but it’s already been a long day. At least this close we can see some of the sights. The hills are definitely small mountains now.

5:30 pm

We give up on having jib out. It’s not getting us anywhere and keeps our stern on the most uncomfortable angle to the waves. The sun is out again. For now.

6:15 pm
35° 53.7100′ N,121° 29.5260′ W

It is colder. The wind has a definite bite to it and it’s from the back so we can’t even huddle behind the dodger to get out of it.

Two more humpbacks appear close off the port side. They are finally close enough to try and get a picture so I snap a bunch with my phone. Still blurry though. Stupid whales.

7:25 pm
35° 51.2297′ N,121° 27.7531′ W

Dusk. We talked to Sea Esta On the radio. It looks like they are 4 or 5 miles ahead of us — almost an hour at the speeds we are doing now. We raise the possibility of heading to San Simeon which is an anchorage 3 hours away rather than sticking it out for the 7 hours we have left to get to Morro Bay. But everyone is afraid of getting caught in the upcoming winds tomorrow if we dawdle so we decide to press on.

8:15 pm

I was chatting to L via text, thinking I would go below to rest, when Tim decides he will take the first rest shift. 3 hours each will bring us just about to our destination. So Tim heads below and I settle in.

There is no moon and the Milky Way is ablaze in all its glory. There so many stars which just never see. The air is warm now that winds have died a bit. I was a proponent for trying for San Simeon mostly because it had been getting so cold, but now that it’s pleasant I don’t mind getting this leg over with tonight.

I read for a bit then chatted with Donna when she came up to keep me company. Oh so slowly the clouds inexorably creep back and the mists begin to form around us. The stars won’t last too much longer.

10:47 pm
35° 31.9591′ N,121° 12.8419′ W

Dolphins. Silver streaks in the water racing in from the blackness and leaving a sparkling trail behind them. As they come alongside their smooth backs and fins trail phosphorescent lines of bubbles that seem to make every surface glow. Then they surface, grab a loud breathe and streak off towards the bow.

It’s rough enough I don’t want to head out on the forward deck to watch even though I’m tethered to the jack lines, but I crowd the life lines and call the dolphins encouragingly as they zoom by. They accommodate me by falling back and catching up. Or maybe it’s just new dolphins.

It’s indescribably magnificent watching them in the dark.

Mow it’s starting to get even more misty and there won’t be much to see by the time Tim comes on shift.

11:00 pm

I’m heading down to try and catch some sleep for 3 hours or so. But before I do we are treated to even more dolphins. Really a highlight of the trip for me.

Sept 21

2:00 am awake
35° 22.2062′ N,120° 53.7692′ W

I got the alarm wrong. Again. I set it for 2pm. Luckily I wasn’t sleeping well and checked my phone at 2:01.

It’s foggy but calm and we are almost there. Sea Esta has arrived and have decided to just anchor for the night rather than mess round in the dark looking for a spot to tie up.

Tim says the dolphins (they could actually be porpoises for all I know–just another thing to research later) came back and stayed with him most of the time I was below. Donna had caught some sleep before going back up and they saw up to 20 at one point. I guess he’s the dolphin whisperer on board, but I’m plenty satisfied with the few I saw.

2:40 am
35° 21.9461′ N,120° 51.2719′ W
Morro Bay

We came in the narrow channel in the fog and darkness with no issues and, after we spotted Sea Esta anchored, tied up to the mooring ball beside them. It’s of a Caribbean style mooring with a heavy line and a short pennant you can snag to drag in the line. Makes it much easier to grab but it’s way more slimy. But at almost 3 in the morning I will take ease of convenience every time.

2:50 am

Having just got up I am now back in bed. The floating dock of sea lions just a few hundred feet away are loudly serenading us but I’m not going to let that keep me awake.

What is keeping me awake is the nagging doubt that I actually finished tying up the mooring line. I’m sure I would have finished it but for some reason I just can’t remember doing it. So eventually I grab a shirt, pop the forward hatch and proceed to double check.

And of course it’s all fine. I duck back down my hatch, crawl under my blankets and fall asleep to the not-so-dulcet tones of irate sea lions.

8:40 am awake

It’s all calm and serene as I head out on deck with my coffee.

There’s a big rock here. A big rock. It’s called Morro Rock and I saw portions of it in the mist last night when we came in but thought it was a hillside. Turns out it’s a big honking rocky outcropping that guards the entrance to the bay.

It’s a bit of a kayak heaven here; there are kayaks galore with paddlers heading across the channel to the sandy point that protects us from the Pacific. Tons of sea otters as well, although not as many as at the last place we were at. Wherever the hell that was. I’m getting damned confused.

9:00 am

We cast off our mooring ball to go for a look-see. The Harbour Patrol slide by in their boat and ask if we needed a spot to moor. We let them know we are looking for fuel and they point out the fuel pier and then the yacht club docks for later.

As we slide by the yacht club, Paradisea is tied up and they say the spot immediately aft of them, marked off limits, should be ok for a few days.

So we swing around and head for fuel. Once again it’s a pier rather than a dock and we have to rely on the sketchy plastic bumpers that are haphazardly attaches to the oil-soaked pylons. But there is no wind so Tim manages to bring us to a gentle stop inches away and hopefully we won’t rub too much while we are here. I scramble up the ladder and tie is off.

They’ve got propane here so we unship the one empty bottle (it only lasted 2 weeks, Donna does a lot of baking) and haul it up the ladder to the pier.

The fuel attendant is super friendly but obviously new at his job. Either that or all his regular clientele are super anal about every nit and dot because he was making a lot of rote statements and repeating a lot of obvious information. But, as I said, a friendly guy. Costs for deisel and propane were pretty damn high though, but then it’s California.

Five minutes later we were tied up at Morro Bay Yacht Club behind right behind Paradisea. There’s another boat, Harlequin who is also Baja Haha bound and a third who isn’t. After Sea Esta fuels and then rafts to us that makes five boats tied up to Morrow Bay Yacht Club’s docks. We should be good to stay until Saturday morning when they have their dinghy races, which fits the current schedule.

Most everyone hits the showers but I decided to wait a bit and relax. I write a bit for the blog and decide to install Donna’s new all-in-one HP printer on her Mac. They have wifi here so I can download the drivers And other software. That’s the problem with these new laptops: no cd drives. The printer has got a wireless feature that allows her to connect without a network and after a bit, I have it humming along.

Then I try it on Tim’s Windows 10 laptop. Oh Windows…you make the simplest things so complicated. Oddly enough I get the ad hoc wireless printing going after a minimal amount of effort but do you think I can get it to print using a usb cable? I broke out some of the swear words I haven’t used since last time I was doing IT.

Eventually I gave up in an attempt to lull the laptop into complacency. Laptops are foolish that way. I’d be back.

After a bit I headed out for a walk. The road along the shore is crowded with art galleries, kayak and surfboard places and tons of restaurants. There are scruffy palm trees and succulent gardens filled with the same succulents I have growing in my little clay pots–except they are taller than I am. Not too crowded with tourists, although I guess it’s late in the season.

I grab a coffee and an apple strudel-like thing at a quaint yet slightly ramshackle cafe staffed by giggly high school girls, so I can use the wifi and catch up with Leslie. Of course I can’t get the wifi to work. But since I had a date, I fired up the data roaming and ended up having a lovely visit, catching up on all the gossip from home.

Donna (and Tim) have been spending a bunch of time trying to replace me. They have their nephew joining them for the Haha but he’s only 16 or so and now they are thinking they want at least one more crew since it involves several overnight passages.

It’s kinda weird hearing them describe your current situation to someone else in anticipation of your absence. They assure me I am welcome to stay, but since the Haha doesn’t leave until after Halloween, I am pretty sure I wouldn’t be very welcome back home afterwards. Or at the very least I would pay for it for a long time 🙂

The boat is empty when I return and Sea Esta is locked up tight as well. So I hung out until it occurred to me that I hadn’t restarted Tim laptop after installing the new drivers: rookie mistake. So I tried restarting Windows and it turns out Tim has his login password protected. Aaargh. Now I have to wait to see if that fixed it. I hate waiting. And Windows. And unnecessary passwords.

So I read. I might actually get some books done on this trip but it does look like my September totals will be kind of dismal. Oh the first world problems.

Eventually the gang come piling back to the boats. Turns out they were guzzling happy hour wine two boats down and getting to know all the neighbours. That’s a lot of socializing — I think I’m glad I missed it. Harlequin, out of Sidney, although the owners live in Point Grey, is apparently a highly customized job with lots of high tech everything. Seems like half of Canada is heading to Mexico.

Dinner is around 8, then after some chit chat and general lazing about, its time to hit the bunk and drift off with a book in my hand.

A note about my bunk. Tim added a connector piece so the two singles in the vberth are now one big double. Very spacious and comfie. But the connector piece covers a small step. In order to climb in, I have to jump–not too high so as to not smash my head into the ceiling, but with enough gusto to actually clear the lip with my knees. The height is slightly higher than my hip bone and seems custom designed to be perfect for maximum awkwardness. Of course short people using the space would probably look less awkward and more comedic, so maybe that was the intent all along. Anything for some entertainment on these long voyages.

So I just went to sleep.

Sept 18

6:30 am awake

The fog horn here sounds constantly but it seems to my unconscious brain to come and go, getting louder and quieter as time passes. I would wake up in the middle of the night and it would be a soft lulling background noise and then I would fall back asleep. Then I would wake up again and it would be this harsh, intrusive blaring. Luckily I would fall asleep again and it would become yet another sound-bite for my sub-psyche to twist into something new.

I slept last night with my damp gloves in the pocket of my fleece pants. The previous night they had been damp in the morning and they never do dry out if you start with them like that. It worked pretty well and I didn’t notice them at all throughout the night. Another thing learned…

7:09 am off mooring

We fire up the engine and slip the line from the mooring ball and we are off. There is a massive exodus of boats right now. There are the two of us and about 3 powerboats right on our tail as we turn up between the breakwaters. Up ahead there are two of those sit-on kayaks with fishermen heading out.

About halfway up the narrowing channel a 50-60 foot tourist fish boat loaded with people opens it up and passes us all. A pretty jerky thing to do as he throws up a significant wake and Sea Esta and us are tossed up and down, back and forth by the waves. But at least he went on the outside.

A few minutes later a 40-ish foot motorboat guns it while we are still between the breakwaters, but this one slips between us and the kayak and throws up a monster wake. The poor kayaker had to throw his legs over the side to stay upright and was nearly tossed from his boat. It was so unnecessary, and the twit in the powerboat made even more so by slowing down a couple of hundred yards away and starting to fish. Jerk.

It’s a great day and the bay is stuffed full of fisherman. The sun is shining with almost a full moon out as well. No wind, though, so we slowly motor south.

9:20 am
37° 16.8043′ N,122° 27.7814′ W

We’re still motoring in 4-5 knot winds from the south. Pleasant enough but we aren’t making many miles.

Two other sailboats exited the harbour with us. I can see one of them on the AIS. It is a 40-foot Island Packet called Paradisea who, when I check the website, are also registered for the Baja Haha.

All in all there are 4 sailboats headed south today from Pillar Point. I guess we are going the right way.

10:50 am

I set up the soft keys on the VHF radio so we can call AIS targets from the remote mic now. So Tim gives it a try with Paradisea and has a long chat with them. We pick up a lot of info and suggestions from all the fellow cruisers so it’s always good to reach out. I’m sure we will see them again.

The coastline is beautiful with picturesque lighthouses and rolling hills. Impossible to capture by camera though, which is a real pity.

I sent some messages to my parents letting them know our position and generally making sure everyone knows I haven’t fallen off the boat. Yet.

It’s a pretty glorious day and I start shedding layers. It’s nice to be getting some heat during the day rather than being damp all the time. But calling the weather here changeable is like calling winter a bit cool…

12:00 pm

It’s still calm and still sunny. Bonus. The winds are slowly climbing from behind, teasing us with the idea we might get to sail.

It’s pretty lonely out here but we do spot the occasional sea lion and porpoise. There are a few fishing boats about but nothing compared to what we saw in Washington and Oregon.

12:25 pm

The winds finally climbed above 10 knots and we’ve got the gennaker up again. It’s such a great sail and these are perfect conditions for it. The swells have diminished for the first time in days and we are doing 7.5 knots just a bit off our desired course. I could get used to this.

We hit 8 knots at one point as Tim maneuvers to try to leave Sea Esta behind.

Donna has been doing a bunch of research and calling around and our destination changes from Santa Cruz to Moss Landing because she found a yacht club reciprocal with the Elkhorn Yacht Club that gives us free moorage, showers and power.

Sea Esta cuts the corner on the north edge of Monterey Bay to cruise by Santa Cruz while we head out a bit farther before gybing onto a direct downwind sail right into Moss Landing.

2:00 pm
36° 53.8063′ N,122° 7.7344′ W

The winds slowly build to 15-17 knots, occasionally hitting 20. The gennaker is a huge sail and not meant for big winds as it can easily overpower the boat and send us over on our side so we have to keep an eye on the wind speeds since we can’t really tell in a downwind sail. The swells are also increasing again and the boat is starting to twist a bit too much as it moves up and down. We decide to dowse gennaker to be prudent.

We lose about a knot and a half as we start to sail only on the genoa (down to 6-6.5) but worse than that, we have to point up a bit and are no longer heading straight to our destination. C’est la vie.

3:30 pm
36° 52.0717′ N,121° 58.3886′ W

I spend some time catching up on the blog. The wind is up to 18 knots and we are still making 6 knots plus. The swell is definitely back so we are rocking and rolling, albeit pretty gently. It was a nice break while it lasted.

4:30 pm
36° 51.0409′ N,121° 51.7723′ W

The winds die about 2 miles short of our destination. As we try to roll in jib, we discover a small issue. It’s stuck! By working it back and forth we get it rolled in but it’s just another thing we will have to look at. It’s been said that cruising is just fixing your boat in exotic locations. So far that seems pretty accurate.

We motor in rest of way. The water here in Monterey Bay has a distinctly brownish tinge; I believe that’s a sign of an algae bloom. We spot some whales off in the distance as we near the entrance to Moss Landing.

We also see two sea otters as we enter breakwater. So cute.

6:00 pm
36° 48.8039′ N,121° 47.2308′ W
Moss Landing

We are all tied up at Elkhorn Yacht Club reciprocal dock with Sea Esta rafted up along side. The two sea otters outside the breakwater became over a dozen floating in the north slough (basin) where the yacht club is. There were also 20 or so seals hauled out in the exposed mud flats merely 15 or so feet from our dock. Add in a bunch of sea birds and pelicans and it’s a real wildlife bonanza. Apparently the whole area is some sort of wildlife preserve.

We receive a lovely welcome at the club house. As soon as we walked up the dock the various members gathered around on the deck asked if we were the Canadians and told us that they’d ordered pizza to celebrate. Nice. Then they ushered us into the bar.

I hadn’t brought any cash up from the boat so Jim floated me five for a beer. Everyone introduced themselves as they wandered by to chat for a bit.

We wandered back outside where, unfortunately, a discussion about politics was underway. A left-leaning Californian made the mistake of asking us what we thought of their election and her right-leaning dock mate jumped in and the conversation soon got out of control. I rescued Donna from the clutches of a slightly inebriated, pro-Trump almond farmer because emailing and nodding wasn’t working. But even trying to have a neutral position with her was an exercise in futility. It’s too bad that people can get so caught up in the rhetoric they can’t see the contradictions in there own positions. And I got another lesson in the mindset of American when it comes to their constitution. It’s a 225-year-old document, people. It really should be more of a guideline, don’t you think?

I eventually escaped to get my jacket and when I returned someone else had taken my seat and the conversation had moved on.

I brought back some cash and had another ale and chatted some more. The pizza never did appear so I decided to grab a (free) shower and then headed back to boat to relax and catch some alone time.

I listened to my music — while I’ve been appreciating Tim and Donna’s taste in tunes it’s actually comforting to be able to listen to your own stuff — and caught up on some blog entries. A bit later Donna arrived and served up the chicken she’s been baking. Turns out the pizza had languished waiting for pickup and was eventually delivered if a bit cold. Tim came by a little later and had his portion and we chatted about the day.

9:30 pm lights out

It’d been a long day and after puttering around a bit I climbed in to my berth to read and fell asleep pretty quickly.

Sept 19

7:40 am awake

I awoke to no changes in plans; that was a pleasant surprise. It’s starting to seem like a day without revising our plans is a rarity. We will hang here for the day and head out tomorrow. I had coffee on deck and enjoyed some morning otter.

A sea otter had just hopped his way onto the dried mud flat about 20 feet away and after having a roll in the sand, laid there grooming and sunning for most of the morning. I managed to get some good pictures and video. They are really ungainly on shore but still pretty darn cute.

I took the time to download the otter images to Donna’s laptop to double check I had gotten something sharp enough. Then, while I was there, I figured I might as well go ahead and download everything I’d shot up until then. I did a rough cull and left them for Donna to do with as she may. I’ve been trying to shoot 20-30 seconds of video everyday so she’s got a load of megabytes to deal with.

The big excitement being here apparently is since we have shore power, we and Sea Esta can catch up on our coffee bean grinding. Apparently we are living the high life aboard the good ship Northwest Passage.

Tim and I worked on the jib issue. The furler at the top was binding for some reason. We fixed it by slacking off the jib halyard a bit and relieving some of the tension. Who knows what changed to make it seize like that, but it’s good to go for now.

Then I got my first ride in a bosun’s chair. I went up to the first spreader to hang a new flag halyard so we could fly the Baja Haha burgee on our port side. It was a pretty easy climb with Tim belaying me. Maybe next time I will get all the way to the top but I’m content with the baby steps.

I took a break while Tim worked on Sea Esta’s reefing again and walked up to highway for a look at the California countryside. It’s a very busy highway with constant traffic; crossing it would be like a really nerve-wracking game of Frogger. I opted not to wander further. The countryside itself reminds me of Kamloops: lots of scrubby hills with patches of green here and there.

I spent the next couple of hours in the sun and read and relaxed for most of the afternoon. Mark commented several times that I hadn’t moved but that was a base lie. I went from one side of the boat to the other several times to follow the sun.

In between times I watched all the seals haul out on mud flats as the tide dropped. They are so lazy and prefer to just stop in shallow water on a falling tide and then sun themselves until the tide come back again. I also watched the pelicans fish and then fight off the various scavenging birds who are too lazy to put in the fishing time. Some of them are pretty cheeky buggers trying to literally take the food out of the pelican’s mouth.

Tim changed the oil as we’d done 160+ hours of motoring. I stayed out of the way and read some more.

We later had a brief meeting about our next steps. The majority want to cast off at 6 am tomorrow and put in a 20-hour day, planning to arrive at Morro Bay at 2 am. This is on account of a weather system moving in Wednesday and Thursday.

The yacht club has a Monday night dinner so we decided to join in. Dinner was roast pork, veggies, salad and garlic toast at for $9. Great deal. They really are friendly people here. It reminds me of a Legion with lots of camaraderie and pride of place. Of course we are, as Donna pointed out, middle-class white people so who knows how it would have gone if we were Hispanic or Arabic. She’s a bit sensitive to stuff like that after an encounter they had driving across the U.S.

I grabbed a last shower, and spent an hour or so reading and blogging before bed. Tomorrow is an early day.

Sept 16

6:30 am awake
Noyo River basin, Fort Bragg, California

I crawl out of my berth, dress and head up on deck. Pretty soon there is coffee and toast: peanut butter and jam on toasted garlic bread–the kind with whole cloves of garlic in it. It was…unique.

We’d scheduled our morning around the imaginary fuel dock opening. I say that because no one actually knew what time the dock opened but everyone was sure their estimate was right. The “consensus” before we went to bed was it opened at 7:00 am. Well it turned out that not only were the hours imaginary, but the whole dock was. Tim chatted up a local as we were readying to cast off and it turns out there is no fuel dock in Fort Bragg. Huh.

7:46 am off dock

I grab the stern line and Tim casts off the bow. Then I give the boat a gentle push and we are backing out of our slip.

The trip down the river is really picturesque with tall wharfs and restaurants lining the shore as we head north. Then the river turns west and we slowly pass underneath the tall bridge and out into the shallow bay.

As we exit we zig a bit to check out the sector light behind us. It shows white if you are on course, green if you are too far to port and red if you are too far to starboard. We saw it last night when we came in but were too busy looking for transits to realize what we were looking at.

There is big swell at the bar and we can see Sea Esta getting tossed around as she heads out.

10:20 am
39° 14.2270′ N,123° 49.9943′ W

A grey whale surfaces closer than a 100 feet off our side. It’s almost starting to get blasé. Almost.

Conditions are calm with a 5-knot wind. But it is misty and damp, so not exactly pleasant.

11:15 am

We are treated with warm cookies. But I only get one. Sigh.

1:15 pm
38° 57.3899′ N,123° 46.8057′ W

Currently off Point Arena with its lovely traditional lighthouse off in the mist. We came closer inshore to see the sights and cut the corner; staring at fog gets pretty boring hour after hour.

As we get closer in we get a view of some majestic sunny cliffs. It’s like we were on the California coast or something.

I spend a couple of hours blogging on my phone while Tim did minor boat repairs. All in all it’s pretty pleasant. Then I talk boat cooking with Donna for a while; she mentioned Pampered Chef products. It is something to look into as Donna has some awesome stoneware loaf pans from them.

A bit later we pick up some current and are motoring along at 6 to 6.3 knots.

2:50 pm
38° 49.6612′ N,123° 41.9774′ W

Sailing on broad reach with the engine off. Lovely sailing weather as we zoom right towards the coast of California. We must be in wine country by now. Sea Esta is charging along parallel to the shore, wing on wing, but we should be faster.

3:50 pm
38° 46.7317′ N,123° 35.5993′ W

We gybe to keep off the rocky shore and head out in 19-20 knot winds. We are going 7.2 to 7.8 knots now. It is still sunny but Sea Esta is gone in the fog that is gathering offshore, so it likely won’t last.

5:05 pm
38° 38.6580′ N,123° 30.9479′ W

We gybe again. The low-lying clouds are back and our sunny day has disappeared. But we’re still zooming along. Sea Esta has pulled away slowly but steadily so I guess theirs was the winning strategy. But we never took the reef out of the main so that’s our excuse.

The California coastal highway meanders along the coast above the cliffs just like in the movies. We really must be in wine country by now. It’s picture perfect but impossible to take a picture of.

6:10 pm
38° 36.9647′ N,123° 23.1558′ W

Another gybe. It’s weird doing these big long tacks; not like coastal sailing at all.

Although we were passed by Sea Esta on last tack, it looks like we might now be reeling them in. We are making 7-7.5 knots, just screaming along, but it feels like a gentle breeze. I could get to like this downwind stuff. But soon we enter back into fog and lose sight of Sea Esta. Welcome back to cold and damp.

7:00 pm
38° 32.0283′ N,123° 20.3277′ W

We rolled in the jib and are sailing with the main only, pretty much directly down wind.

Tim spotted another of those bird collections we had seen a bunch of days back. It’s directly in our path and we will drive right through the middle. Then we spot a whale heading straight for us maybe 60 feet off the bow. He dives down and swims directly under the boat only to surface again off our stern. Then he dives again and I see his torso twist and tail go sideways as he does a 180 and heads back to the mass of birds we scattered and the ball of fish we obviously just drove through. Super cool.

We spot a few more bird flocks ahead and off to the sides and each comes with its own whale spouts. It’s feeding time in the Pacific. Like I said, super cool.

8:00 pm
38° 27.9359′ N,123° 14.9785′ W

Well, it’s dark now. Dinner is pizza up on deck and we are still sailing downwind. I fired off a text to Leslie with my current position just so she a) knows I’m still alive and b) knows I’m thinking of her.

These kind of trips seem to be about diminishing resources. Over time we create a sleep deficit that we never manage to make any headway on. Each day ends with you a little more tired and each morning starts with you a little less recovered. I assume at one point you find a balance. Or maybe you just crash. I guess I’ll have to wait and see. Or at least get some continuous, stress-free sleep. But I’m tired.

On a side note, it turns out Tim is as wimpy as I am when it comes to hot beverages. Using these damn thermal mugs means we have to wait 20 minutes before we can drink our tea without scalding our tender mouths.

8:30 pm

The winds are dying. Speed is down to 4.5 knots

10:00 pm
38° 20.0307′ N,123° 7.0162′ W

We are still sailing with the winds variable, making 4-4.5 knots.

11:30 pm
38° 17.3865′ N,123° 2.4109′ W

As we get to the buoy that marks the reef outside our harbour, we prepare to drop the sail. But the engine won’t start. The start battery seems to be completely dead after a full day of just sailing in the fog. Not only that, it made every light in the boat dim when Tim turned it over and shut down a bunch of electronics. That’s not good.

Tim went below and switched the batteries to combine the starter and house bank and hit the starter again. The engine started right up and we all breathed a sigh of relief.

We turned the instruments back on and I steered us into the wind so Tim could drop the main. Then I turned towards shore and hopefully some sleep.

12:10 am
38° 19.8268′ N,123° 3.4835′ W
Bodega Bay

We are all tied up at fuel dock in Bodega Bay. There are two big breakwaters we had to maneuver between in the dark and then a long zigzag channel marked only by the occasional nav light and day beacons. My night skills are getting a workout. But I managed to get us to the marina without incident and on dock without pranging into anything.

There is no power here, which is worrisome. We decided to forego paying for a slip and will just wait until 8 am when the fuel dock opens, fuel up and move on.

So we hit the sack. Yay!

Sept 17

6:05 am awake

Well, apparently the fuel dock hours we read were for October. The regular hours are 6 am to 9 pm and we were awakened suddenly by the fuel dock guy banging on the hull.

He was pretty good about it and we fueled and topped up the water tanks. He even offered us a spot off the main dock where we could move to if we wanted to grab breakfast at the local restaurant. The cheeky bugger spotted my magic cup of coffee and sent me back aboard to fill his cup up as well. Nice guy in the end, though.

7:15 off dock

I get to go through the channel again but this time it’s visible. There is a huge mudflat that the channel is dredged into. On either side there is anywhere from zero to six inches of water. Wander off of the marked channel and you are instantly aground.

Unfortunately my phone was charging and I’d left my camera below so I got no pictures. But there were herons and white cranes standing in the shallows and tons of pelicans and gulls squabbling in the mud.

About halfway out the 3 to 5 feet we had beneath the keel started to disappear and suddenly we thudded gently, grounding in sand bottom in 0.2 feet of depth. Then about 20 feet ahead we did it again. Thankfully the water got deeper immediately afterwards.

We exited the channel and headed out of the bay. Breakfast was served and we settled in for a shortish day. A few porpoises made a momentary appearance but apparently we really are boring.

9:00 am
38° 10.8732′ N,123° 1.1945′ W

We are motoring into SE wind of about 4-5 knots. Somewhere along the way it is decided our nice short day was a waste of time and “we” decide to bypass Drake Bay and go past San Francisco on to Pillar Point in Half Moon Bay.

These people keep reading the guide books, getting me all excited and then skipping the destinations. It’s cruel and unusual punishment and I haven’t even done anything wrong. Much.

10:43 am
38° 1.9750′ N,123° 2.8706′ W
Point Reyes

We spot a few more whales and a lot of fishermen. This point can be bad in certain conditions, but these sure aren’t them. There is absolutely no wind.

The point is all rocks and cliffs and look really dramatic but it’s cloudy and misty and we see only a small hint of the majesty that is lurking behind the point at our original destination of Drakes Bay.

12:00 pm
37° 56.5132′ N,122° 58.1589′ W

We are entering the start of the southbound shipping lanes to San Francisco. We decide to head a bit east to parallel the lanes while Sea Esta opts to cut across.

It is dead calm. Tim spots what we believe are some tiny sharks/fins in water and we see them again and again for the next few hours. Very weird.

We also spot our first sunfish. At least that’s what I think they are called. I didn’t get a good picture but they are these big white blobs floating near the surface on their sides. We see a bunch more over the next few days. Also very weird.

We have lunch and spend some time troubleshooting battery/charging issue. We don’t really come to any sensible conclusions other than something seems hinky.

1:10 pm

It’s really warm and I start shedding layers. And the sun is out and it’s a beautiful day. Hazy on the horizon, though, and although we are less than 5 miles off shore we could be in the middle of the ocean for all that we can see anything.

There are, however, these funny annoying flies that don’t shoo easily. You get “swarmed” by 6 or so at a time and they crawl up your face or arms and won’t leave unless you brush them off.

More sunfish floating on surface. Still weird.

4:15 pm
37° 38.0294′ N,122° 37.9002′ W

Tim finally breaks down and decides to raise the gennaker. It lives under my berth so he had to take that all apart and shove it up the forward hatch. This is the giant colorful spinnaker with a charging bull on it that we had flown briefly on our circumnavigation, but he’d taken it into a sail loft and had it cut down.

A spinnaker is loose footed and hard to manage, but it’s like a giant parachute for sailing downwind in light winds. But it is really, really hard to manage without a bigger crew. Having been cut down, it’s now a cross between a genoa and a spinnaker. The foot is attached to the bottom of the forestay and you have to fly it in one side of the boat or another. That means you have to sail slightly off the wind and gybe when you want to change direction.

But it has a long sock that allows you to raise the sail and then raise the sock to release it. To take it down you just pull the sock down and you are left with a long tube, which is pretty easy to a manage on deck. The two of us handled it fairly effortlessly.

We started sailing 6 to 7 knots with just the one sail. Cool.

Another curious whale showed up but really, we must be totally boring because he was soon gone.

7:01 pm
37° 29.9180′ N,122° 28.9948′ W

We drop the gennaker and motored into the breakwater at Pillar Point Harbour, Half Moon Bay. This is about 20 nm outside of San Francisco Bay and about parallel with San Jose.

Sea Esta is already there at anchor but we opt to pick up a mooring buoy. Tim still has that cool mooring ball threader on a stick and a couple of minutes later we were done for the day. We rigged up a tarp to keep the moisture off everything and retired below for some delicious chicken thighs.

9:30 pm lights out

Once again we get to talking and we change the destination at the last minute. Now it’s a 7 am departure of Santa Cruz. We will have to see if we actually get there.

Sept 12

7:30 am awake

It’s sunny but cooler; around 55° F. I had a lovely cup of fresh ground coffee then headed off for a shower.

At the last couple of ports I have noticed the fisherman’s memorials. In Newport it was names, dates and vessels inscribed in blocks set into the sidewalk along the old harbourfront leading to the commercial docks. They were right-reading heading east until we passed the entrance and then switched the other way.

Here in Charleston it’s a fenced-off memorial at the head of the docks looking out over the breakwater with a beautiful bronze sculpture and a few little alcoves and benches. The names are inscribed in the base of the sculpture. The inscriptions differentiate between ships lost with people aboard and people simply lost at sea.

There are plenty of dates in the ’30s and ’40s but more significantly there are still many with dates in the 2000s. It’s a sober reminder that the sea actually is a harsh mistress and there are still some livelihoods that come with a steep cost. Something to remember the next time we enjoy our fresh sushi dinner.

Back from shower. Donna and Mark are off for a run, and Tim is doing housekeeping, or is that boat keeping, chores. So I decided to walk up to the friendly neighborhood wifi hotspot and check in with the Internet.

Opposite the restaurant there is a drying mud flat. Last night I saw a bunch of teenagers out in their gumboots searching for clams. It is so different here and obviously not overharvested as the Salish Sea. It’s too bad that nature rarely seems to be able to keep up with man’s voracious appetites. But at least here on the Oregonian coast she seems to be making a go of it.

I’ve packed up everything and I think I’ve got a load of laundry. So it’s time to head up and get it over with since we have a down day. I think Donna’s planning on something similar as well.

Rings and stuff

I “lost” a ring just as we were leaving Victoria this spring. I still have it but the shell inlay had started to fall off so we packaged it away to get repaired. Didn’t get that done yet. Then I broke one of the three intertwined rings on my puzzle ring. And now the outer spinning ring on my third ring has finally worn its way off and I’ve lost it off my finger twice. I think I’m going to have to put it away and I’ll be down to just one piece of jewelry…I’m not sure what to think about that since I’ve worn multiple rings constantly for over 20 years.

WB V is tied up here as well. She is an older Nordhavn 46′ that was tied up briefly in Victoria. She had just been offloaded from a ship that transported her from the east coast. We tied up behind when we returned from that short trip with my parents and had to tie up on the outside of D dock for a night. He has been all the way up to Juno, Alaska since then and is now heading south.

Laundry goes quick as mostly I have synthetics and they dry pretty fast. I get a few more pages in but this month’s book totals look pretty dismal so far.

Tim is still cleaning up some stuff in the bilges and Donna has been visiting all the other boaters so it looks like the walk across the bridge into the other part of town is off. I popped into the local bar and grill for a drink and some wifi but it was stuffed to the gills. After waiting around a bit a few people wandered out and I snagged a spot.

I noticed Leslie posted a picture of her book on sale on reading with a pencil but I couldn’t figure out how to like it as me. So Leslie, take the like as given 🙂 I am so excited and proud.

I grabbed a burger and coffee from an efficient and totally awesome waitress with purple hair. I have to say that none of the burgers in the US have impressed me: a bit dry and overdone. But the fries were good.

I wandered back to the boat to read a bit. Tim was just finishing up and Donna was back with her laundry. So Donna and Tim wandered off to go shopping for boats bits and I hung out.

A couple of hours later they were back and we headed over to Sea Esta for a happy hour beer. While we sat in their cockpit, Endearing, a 52-ft Ocean Alexander that we had last seen in Newport, came in in winds gusting to 26 knots. The transient dock is full, but Tim hailed them and found out the dock master had invited them to use the commercial side. So Tim scoped out a slip and they headed out to get their lines and fenders adjusted. We met them on dock and helped get them tied up before resuming happy hour.

More weather by committee followed. After a bit of round and round, we decided to go at 7 am and tentatively committed to a 20-24 hr trip to Crescent City. Then we headed back to Northwest Passage to start dinner and relax even more. I think I am going to be relaxed out soon, although the alternative seems to be stressed out. A bit of reading and a bit of Candy Crush and a hint of writing before a late supper pretty much rounded out the evening.

It’s a cold night. It doesn’t bode well…

Sept 13

6:15 am awake

It didn’t sound like anyone else was up so I got dressed and headed for the washrooms. Along the way I encountered both WB V and Endearing making read to cast off. So I hung around and helped with the lines.

Back at the boat everyone was up and around and we started readying the lines and firing up instruments and engines.

7:05 am off dock
Leaving Charleston Marina, Coos Bay

Sea Esta was off first but we caught up to them in the channel and turned out towards open water. WB V was still in the bay putting out his outriggers. He’s single handing so I imagine that it is all a bit of a challenge.

We motored out between the breakwaters and got a bit of a ride crossing the bar. WB V behind us had some serious rolling action going; one of the downsides of a powerboat.

8:15 am
43° 19.9359′ N,124° 26.2058′ W

Donna served a delicious breakfast of toasted egg sandwiches, and the local sea lion greeting committee was out to wish us a good voyage. The sun is out and the air is thankfully warm; the nights have been so cool I was anticipating shivering all day.

We are motoring along with moderate swells. As we get further out we will be able to turn so they are on the stern and the rolling will stop. Winds calm down a bit.

We’ve left WB V behind but heard him chatting with Endearing, who is about about 3 nm ahead. Sounds like it will calm down even more, and everyone is predicting a good trip, at least for the first part of the day.

We spotted a big pod of sea lions porpoising up and down like they were, well, porpoises I guess. They sure are beautiful to watch when they are on the move.

Then I discovered my sunglasses were broken 🙁 I managed to wedge them back together and stuff them between my nose and my toque. I guess it’ll do until we hit port.

11:15 am
43° 1.4346′ N,124° 37.7308′ W

Got a text from Leslie unexpectedly; that was nice but I hope our plan covers roaming text messages. Everyone is chatting on the radio about AIS and positions. Seems Serafina is also out about 20 nm ahead, having left from Port Orford.

11:38 am
42° 58.8745′ N,124° 39.0276′ W

Tim spotted whale spouts close off starboard. A little later I saw another further off the port side. The gray whales have a much smaller spout and a smaller arch of their back when they surface.

12:23 pm
42° 54.0119′ N,124° 41.4244′ W

The winds shift south suddenly. We’d been tracking a fog bank off Cape Blanco for a while anticipating the end of our nice day and just when we reached the leading edge of the cape we entered the dense, dense fog and the winds suddenly swung 180° and built to 20 plus knots. This made for some very, very confused and uncomfortable seas.

We radioed back to Sea Esta to give them a heads-up as they had a lot of sail out.

Then we spent the next hour or so bashing into wind and waves overtop an opposing swell with boat speeds as low as 2 knots. It wasn’t the most pleasant thing in the fog and mist.

2:43 pm
42° 46.0733′ N,124° 41.3344′ W

The fog lessens and visibility finally improves. We turn east around Cape Blanco and the confusion in the waves also diminishes a bit. But it certain doesn’t go away.

We are treated to hot brownies and man, do they ever hit the spot. We are considering sailing in 13-15 knots of wind. It should help cut through the waves and really, we couldn’t go any slower.

3:00 pm

Killed engine. Sailing 5.5 knots on jib alone.

4:15
42° 43.0764′ N,124° 34.5846′ W

The engine is back on. The winds is 8-9 knots from SE, which is essentially on the nose.

5:30 pm

Finally some sunshine. But we are burying the bow into waves as we come sailing down the backsides. Tim is starting to wonder how waterproof the $70 green LED nav light he just installed is.

This is the most ‘uncomfortable’ we’ve been on this trip. Still, we are better off than Sea Esta. It’s a great boat and as long as we brace ourselves we ride it out pretty well. Donna, who is susceptible to seasickness, generally stays below and has the worst of it, in my opinion. But thanks to the miracle of sturgeron (a medication apparently and unfortunately not available in the US and Canada), she has a fine time. She has a future as a spokesperson for the brand, or as at least a pusher as she’s been sharing the secret and the drugs with all the boats we’ve met in the way.

8:00 pm
42° 29.6911′ N,124° 32.8025′ W

I’m off watching and heading below to rest. This is an all-night passage and we are going to try 3 hour watches this time. I shed my outer wear and try and arrange it so I can find it again in the dark and then just crawl under my sleeping bag, which I am using as a comforter.

We are still crashing up and down in the waves and I experience some significant air time and negative G’s as I am launched upward as the bow dives and then eased rather forcefully into the mattress as the bow rushes back up the next wave.

So I mostly just dozed. It wasn’t the worst sleep I’ve ever had but if I wasn’t so stubborn I would have rigged the lee cloth in the main berth for a smoother ride.

11:00 pm
42° 18.3211′ N,124° 29.5536′ W

It so cold and more damp than you could possible imagine outside of my snug bed. It feels like a light layer of moisture is covering everything I own.

A few minutes later I am dressed and back on watch again. The moon is out so night vision is less of an issue. It’s amazing how bright the moon is when there are no competing sources of light.

It’s also much calmer and while we are still roller-coastering, the crashing has stopped. My knees actually ache from bracing myself and having them smash into each other as I was bounced up and down. Isn’t boating life absolutely fascinating?

Tim heads below and I am alone except for Sea Esta’s lights off in the distance.

Sept 14

1:00 am
42° 10.5778′ N,124° 26.8353′ W

Some fishing boat lights appear off to starboard; I figure they are 10 to 11 nautical miles away.

I am spending some time reading. With my ereader’s backlight on dim and providing I glance up and scan the horizon every few pages it works out pretty well. The touch screen even works with my gloves so I stay pretty warm.

The winds are 11 knots on nose, so sailing is not all that fruitful since we want to make time.

Tim comes back up 2-ish and I head below to grab a few hours of much-needed sleep.

5:30 am awake
41° 50.2823′ N,124° 16.9496′ W

The water is glassy when I come up. Tim is wrapped up in a blanket to keep the water off. The condensation is incredible. Some time in the night we have crossed the border and now we are in California.

We round the reef off Point St.George ducking between the rocky shore and a mass of rocks offshore.

6:30 am
41° 45.9228′ N,124° 16.1740′ W

It’s dawn and we are side by side with Sea Esta as we turn toward Crescent City. It’s odd timing for our arrival and we are wondering why we decided to arrive so early in the day.

There are rugged shadows from the huge pinnacles just offshore. Giant monoliths that warn us away from shore with their foamy bases.

7:30 am
Crescent City, California
41° 44.6138′ N,124° 11.3469′ W

We round the breakwater following the buoys in and pull up to the fuel in front of Sea Esta. This fuel dock is a big wharf (which means it is fixed on pylons and does not ride up and down with the tide). We pull up alongside a row of tires with our fenders out and I toss the lines up to Mark, who is already up on the wharf. Then we scramble up the ladder and wait for the fuel boat to show up.

Now we talking about continuing to Eureka, which is 58 nm away. That puts us in around 8 pm and we can just sleep then rather than wasting a day and a half here in Crescent City.

We hit the washrooms and then fuel up. The hoses are lowered to the boat and we have to use a nozzle adapter to get the massive commercial fuel nozzle to fit our tanks.

Then we move over to a temporary dock and wash down the boat while we wait for Sea Esta. It seems we had scooped fuel dock spots from a lovely Valiant 50 who had been waiting patiently at the admin dock. Then they had to wait even more as Jim couldn’t get the adapter to work on his Catalina and had to fill jerry cans and transfer the fuel by hand. Tim got the boat pretty clean while we waited.

It was after 9 so I wandered across the harbour parking lot and grabbed some new sunglasses from Englunds. $14 USD later, I was back in business.

The longer we stand on the dock the warmer it gets and eventually I have shed three layers and am considering losing my shoes and socks. Welcome to California, I guess.

Sea Esta finally finished fueling and floated over to fix their f*cked-up furler. And that turned into a big production as one of the screws was seized and ended up stripped by the time they were finished.

I decided to wash my neoprene gloves. Something had been smelling tres, tres funky in my cabin and it wasn’t me or my socks. Turns out neoprene gets pretty rank. Anyway I washed them in soapy fresh water and we will see how that goes.

10:00 am depart dock

The winds 4 knots from the west and we are motoring in glassy conditions. It’s sunny again and I leave my gloves (both pairs) out to dry.

11:05 am
41° 40.0314′ N,124° 11.9380′ W

We’ve actually got full sails out with the engine off; that hasn’t happened much on this trip. We are making 5.2-5.5 knots, which is decent.

At 11:30 or so Tim goes back to bed to catch a few z’s.

1:00 pm
41° 30.5122′ N,124° 14.0545′ W

The winds have swung and died, so I decide to start the engine and furl the jib. I spend some time fussing with the main to try to avoid having to drop it, which would entail waking Tim. Eventually I get it so it’s not banging around although it really isn’t providing much to our forward progress.

2:15 pm

It is hot enough to actually be seeking shade. A glorious day!

2:30 pm
41° 22.4249′ N,124° 15.6578′ W

The weather changes. Again. Cloud rolls in just as Tim is up and about, and we have to describe the beautiful weather we were experiencing as it sure as hell isn’t anywhere in evidence.

2:45 pm

Due to our delays in Crescent City we decide to skip Eureka. We would be getting in pretty late and the conditions seem good to do Cape Mendocino. That’s the big bugaboo on this trip where conditions are often fierce and highly changeable. Sort of like what we experienced at Cape Blanco, but on steroids. It means another overnighter, though, as the next stop would be Fort Bragg and that’s another 70 or 80 miles away.

3:00 pm
41° 3.8875′ N,124° 22.8007′ W

I hit the sack since I am going to need my rest. I read for a bit and managed to doze.

6:00 pm

Back on deck the weather is foggy with visibility limited to 100 yds or less. It doesn’t look like we will we doing much sightseeing.

We drop the main for night and motor on.

8:00 pm
40° 52.4445′ N,124° 27.1351′ W

Visibility is even less than it was before and it’s almost dark. Tim heads down for his rest break.

8:50 pm

Sea Esta hails us on channel 16. They seem to have shredded most of their alternator belt but don’t want to stop and replace it. It’s still pretty calm out, but Jim wants to try Mendocino and then duck into Shelter Cove and change out the belt at anchor. They are running under reduced revs so I slow down as well; I can see them about a mile and a half back on the radar. We will try and hang back in case they lose the belt prematurely.

11:15 pm
40° 36.9148′ N,124° 35.5308′ W

Tim is back up and I head below for rest time. Man, is my berth ever chilled and damp. So I crawl completely under the sleeping bag and try to sleep.

Sept 15

2:00 am
40° 24.5536′ N,124° 39.7523′ W

I’m awake again after an ok sleep. Time to suit up and head up. Once again it’s wet, wet, wet.

2:30 am

Before Tim headed below, the winds started to climb to 16 to 18 knots behind us so we rolled out the jib and started sailing downwind. It sounds like a lot of wind but since the boat is moving at 6 or so knots the apparent wind (what we feel) is only 10 to 12 knots. If we were going the other direction, we would add the boat speed and it would feel more like 20-24 knots.

Since we were at the turning point at Mendicino we decided to leave the motor idling in case the winds dropped again in the lee of the cape. Yah. Right.

3:21
40° 16.7987′ N,124° 34.7160′ W

So Tim sets the sails and leaves, and 10 minutes later the winds increased. And now I am sailing away in 24-28 knots of wind making 7-8 knots of speed over ground.

I had said semi-jokingly after our first all-night passage that I wanted to do at least one more so I could try sailing at night. But all by myself around Cape Mendecino in winds in the mid 20s was not actually what I had hoped for. Manageable, but a little less than desirable.

But the boat sails well and other than the quartering seas slewing us from side to side every four or five waves it’s not excessively intimidating.

3:45 am

Tim popped his head up and reminded me to kill the motor. It’s really rolly now with us burying the port rail on the downward slide and then rolling completely over and burying the starboard rail as she tries to recover and the next wave hits. Fun stuff. And the few bits of things not secured have gone flying below, making quite the racket; but Donna seems able to sleep through it. Funnily enough she did pop up before the weather and waves went nuts wondering if we were ok. I guess she took our assurance to heart and just went back to sleep.

I am now seeing 30 knots of wind in gusts and the speed surfing down the waves is consistently over 8 knots. So Tim leaves again.

4:30 am
40° 10.4821′ N,124° 30.5549′ W

We’ve cleared Mendocino and the winds are lower at 18-25 knots. I lost Sea Esta on the radar hours ago and there was no way for us to hold back our speed.

And Tim is back up because of a squeak. A noise on the steering system is being transmitted right to where his head lies and he was worried that something was wrong. We can’t diagnose it but determine it’s not critical.

So he disappears below again.

5:00 am
40° 10.4634′ N,124° 30.5414′ W

My shift is over and I hit the sack, Cold damp straight through and dozy as all hell.

8:00 am awake
39° 56.0163′ N,124° 17.0930′ W

I didn’t get much sleep.

Everything is even more cold and wet and so very damp. I really, really didn’t want to emerge from my cocoon.

But I stoically geared up and hit the deck anyway and was greeted by a little morning whale. Lovely. I guess it’s worth it. A coffee and breakfast pancake almost had me feeling human again.

The sails are down and we are motoring again. The fog continues to come and go.

9:00 am

Tim heads below to seek his bed and whatever sleep he can find.

I decide today is a data day so I turn roaming back on and connect to the sporadic Internet. Then I sent my mom a happy birthday message and a picture of me huddled in the cockpit. Aren’t I a great son?  🙂

It looks like after 50 or so hours we still have 5 to 6 hours to go.

10:21 am
39° 46.5728′ N,124° 6.1650′ W

We are motoring at 5.5 knots in a not-so-dense fog. There is nothing out here but us and Sea Esta, who magically appeared sometime during Tim’s watch. They decided to forgo the stop at Shelter Cove and forge on.

Right after I note how empty the seas have been I spot a funny marker: it’s a bright yellow float with brown flags on 4-foot poles with two other floats, one blue and one yellow, attached by a line. I have no idea what it was doing floating 10 miles offshore.

11:00 am

What I am calling an albatross is circling the boat almost as if it was looking for a landing spot. I refrain from making any rhymes just in case.

It’s a grayish bird slightly larger than a gull with a huge wing span and the wings are long, narrow and sleek. They soar about 6 inches off the water hardly flapping at all. It has big feet that splay out when it lands on the water. So it’s an albatross…right?

11:20 am

Tim is up again and we finally get a sunny break in the fog.

A fishing boat crosses our bow, drops a big orange float and then cuts between us and the trailing Sea Esta. No idea what he was doing but we are still 10 nm off coast and the water depth is over a thousand feet.

2:00 pm
39° 30.8216′ N,123° 53.2163′ W

I spend some time splayed out in the aft cockpit reading and relaxing in the sunshine while we continue motoring at 5.5 knots.

3:30 pm
Noyo River Basin Marina, Fort Bragg, California
39° 25.4530′ N,123° 48.1041′ W

We turned into the wide river mouth with one eye on the depth gauge. Northwest Passage draws almost 8 feet and the guide book say this places is only 7 feet at datum. We are an hour before a low tide of 1.4 feet so we should be ok. Tim tries the Coast Guard for more up-to-date info but they aren’t much help except to say it should be fine according to their book

?
It’s a lovely entry under a big bridge that spans the narrow river. Docks and restaurants line the first part of the river as we turn south and follow a fishing boat named Dottie about half a mile up the river to the boat basin.

It’s a really pretty harbour that we are too tired to appreciate.

5:00 pm

We are all tied up and signed in and head up for a shower. It’s probably the most disgusting shower I have seen in a while. But it was wet and hot, and I had my sandals.

We gathered on Sea Esta for a beer and a dinner of pulled pork that Donna had been working on in her pressure cooker. It was great, but I think we would have been appreciative of any hot food that didn’t move.

Everyone was a bit loopy and we had some laughs at each other’s expense. It turned out that Sea Esta had not managed to get their main down before the big winds hit off Mendecino. So they spent a bad couple of hours completely overpowered and running before the wind. But they survived and it was all good in the end.

Then it was back home and off to bed for a much-needed, uninterrupted sleep. I think I was zonked out before 8:30.

 

Sept 10

4:50 am awake

Newport, Oregon

I head out to the washroom and the stars are amazing. Orion is shining so bright you can see all the stars in his sword. Not something you ever see in the city. The cats are still there skulking around; I imagine they are truly nocturnal in this environment. No one is interested in scratches, though.

Back at the boat everyone continues to dither with the revised forecast not helping much. Seems the weather farther south is going to increase to gale force and although that shouldn’t impact our sail to Coos Bay, it does mean our backup plan of going further to Port Orford is off the table.

6:05 am depart

It’s a go and we slip our lines and head out just as the sun starts to lighten the eastern sky.

6:30 am

As we cleared the bar and exited the channel Tim decided to give the mainsail a try as it will be downwind the whole way. On our first try at raising it, we (I) get a batten caught in the lazyjacks. So I had to drop it down again and clear it before hauling it back up. Then the headboard got tangled in the top of the lazyjacks (or so I think) but it won’t uncatch as I lower the main and so I have to pull it down by hand.

You have to imagine me up the mast about three feet in 20 knots of wind and 4 or 5 foot swells. You have to hold on tightly with one hand, literally hugging the mast, and try and get some leverage to haul down the sail with the other. Somewhere along the way we realized that the headboard was not in fact caught on the lazyjacks but the person who’d reattached the main halyard yesterday had failed to centre it between the two jacks and had just threaded it through the starboard one. The main wasn’t going anywhere like that.

So I had to carefully unscrew the main shackle and walk the halyard aft, thread it back through the lazyjack and then climb back up the three feet of mast so I could screw the shackle back on. Of course I also had to hang on, not let go of the halyard, thread the pin through the hole and tighten the screw, all at the same time.

So inevitably, my hand slipped, the halyard jerked out of my hand and went flying away. I growled a very inappropriate expletive as I slid off the mast steps, banging my shins and watching the dangling halyard head downwind like a not-so-colourful streamer attached to the top of a very tall mast.

Tim and I took turns lunging for it as it swept back and forth wrapping around every other line in sight but eventually I grabbed it as it swung around the backstay for the second time. All this, remember while the boat is pitching and rolling and we are still tethered to the damn thing, limiting our mobility. In retrospect it was likely quite comical to watch.

The thing one needs to realize is if the halyard had started to withdraw back into the top of the mast then someone would have to go up to get it; otherwise we would have no mainsail. Climbing a 50 foot mast is not a fun prospect when you are not tied to a dock. But we did snag it and it was all fine. Except now I had to unwind the rat’s nest of crisses and crosses around the topping lift, the backstay (which is completely enclosed by the solar panels) and the brand-new running backstays on either side Which seemed custom designed to make this situation an even bigger clusterf*ck. Eventually, however, we got it untangled again, centred between the lazyjacks and ready to be attached.

Being of somewhat moderate intelligence and capable of learning a lesson, this time I took a huge bight of the halyard and tied it to my pfd. I wasn’t losing that sucker again. Back up the mast, trying to line up the shackle with the hole, tighten the screw and not get pitched to the deck, I eventually got the shackle attached securely and climbed down to pant heavily in the cockpit for a while.

Back when Leslie and I chartered the Shearwater the charter company had left a list of extra charges we could incur if we were careless or negligent. One of them was around $100 if we “skied” the halyard. We both read that as rhyming with treed and had no idea what it meant. Eventually it dawned on us it was “skied” as in the past tense of “to sky”. Then we wondered what kind of idiot would do such a thing. Now I know.

Oh, and it turns out the careless bugger who didn’t thread the main halyard correctly through the lazyjacks in the first place was also yours truly. Not my day. But Tim was pretty good about it. And the only real downside in the end was a bruised shin and that we are at least an hour behind Sea Esta now.

7:10 am

Back on course with reefed main but still motor sailing.

9:45 am
44° 20.8114′ N,124° 14.3912′ W

It’s sunny and clear and the wind is almost directly behind us at 15-18 knots. But with the swells on our quarter it isn’t easy to keep the sails filled, so the motor stays on so we can make time. We are making 6-8 knots surfing down the swell which will keep this under a 12-hour day. Every sixth or eighth swell is super huge or comes at a weird angle. The autopilot can’t comfortably handle it and keep the sail filled, so we are hand steering. But it’s a beautiful day and pretty warm so no one minds.

11:30 am
44° 10.1770′ N,124° 18.5607′ W

The fog rolled in from offshore and our beautiful day has turned foggy, misty, even soppy. Visibility is 100 yards or less and now we have to keep a sharp lookout in every direction. Thankfully we are more than 7 miles offshore and crab traps and other traffic seem to be nonexistent.

1:46 pm
43° 55.6199′ N,124° 21.9027′ W

Still foggy. Still have to hand steer due to that pestiferous following swell.

Somewhere around 2-ish Donna joins us up on deck and suddenly we get a little ray of sunshine, both metaphorically and literally, peeking through the fog.

2:30 pm

We drop the sail (without drama) since the wind is down to 12-ish knots and to keep the sail filled we are having to head too far inshore. The sun slowly burns the fog away and once again we have warm sunny weather.

3:30 pm
43° 45.4541′ N,124° 21.1710′ W

The swells are almost gone (or so I thought) so Tim rolls out the headsail to see if we can sail again. I respond by eating an apple and closing my eyes for a rest in the sun.

5:00 pm
43° 36.1513′ N,124° 17.4745′ W

The damn fog is back. I blame Serafina. They hailed us on the VHF as they exited Reedsport just off our beam and enquired if we were in any fog. We weren’t. And then we were.

I’m back at the helm and keeping an eagle eye out for everything as we are now about 3 miles out. But it seems that Tim had just turned us further in and the seas are following us, which changes the rolly motion to a gentle up and down. But now we have to follow the coast so it’s back to the rolly-bouncy motion.

7:52 pm arrive
43° 20.7960′ N,124° 19.2681′ W
Charleston Marina, Coos Bay

It was still foggy when we hit the first entrance buoy to Coos Bay. It came looming out of the fog less than 100 yards away before we got a Mark I eyeball on it. I could see it on the chart plotter and the radar and Tim has his famous eagle eyes so it was all good.

We followed the line of red and green buoys in and eventually spotted the north breakwater. The channel gets narrower and narrower as you get further in so we bounced visually from buoy to buoy trying to hug the starboard side to avoid any possible outgoing traffic. Just inside the mouth of the river I picked up an AIS target and a few minutes later a big tug and barge passed us in the fog on our port side. Eerie.

The entrance to Charleston marina is a zigzagging channel and it was a lot of fun to navigate. The problem is that the navigable channel is dredged but there is still lots of water on either side that is all a big shoal. If we wander too far to either side we will run aground. It’s a bit tough on your nerves at the best of time. When you can’t see the next buoy it takes your alertness to a whole ‘nother level.

But eventually we rounded the last red marker and spotted the marina. Sea Esta had let us know there was a space right in front of them, so all we had to do was find them. Luckily the transient dock is right on the end and it wasn’t much hassle to pick them out in the dim light and fog. We were the last ones in.

When we arrived we were both wet and damp. The moist air had penetrated throughout pretty much everything I was wearing and a chill had started to set in. I was glad to have a chance to go below and start shedding clothes and drying out.

We tidied up the boat and then had a beer. Dinner was soup and biscuits and soon after I hit the sack. There was some talk of trying to get one more short leg in tomorrow but I am doubtful. Serafina is saying they are going but I don’t see the percentage as the weather is still going to crap a bit further south at least until Tuesday.

Sept 11

6:00 am awake
It was pretty obvious we weren’t going to go but it still took a bit of discussion to arrive at that conclusion. Weather routing by committee…I guess it’s a thing.

So I had a coffee and settled in to enjoy the morning.

Both Tim and Donna didn’t have internet on their phones last night and still don’t this morning. So they called the helpful people at T-Mobile to find out why. Turns out their unlimited North America roaming package has some fine print. If T-Mobile doesn’t have towers in a particular location, say Coos Bay, they switch to one of their many partners like say AT&T. But the partners, while they will honour the phone and text packages, won’t extend that to the data package, and subsequently impose limits. In the case of AT&T that limit is 100 mb each month. So when you hit your roaming limit for any given partner they cut you off with no option to acquire more…not even if you are willing to pay for it.

Thus Tim and Donna’s mega data plan is currently useless until the 19th or until we find a different set of towers somewhere down the Oregonian coast that are either T-Mobile or anther partner besides AT&T. As Tim would say, “Nice.”

I also learned something about mildew. While Tim and I were talking boat he mentioned his cored hull below the waterline helped prevent moisture buildup. When I mentioned mildew in unreachable places as being a concern of mine, he said mildew wouldn’t appear on fiberglass; it needed something organic to grow on. That’s why it would often appear on pillows because it grew on the oils and detritus from people’s scalps. Ah ha! That makes so much sense. He also said it is one of the reasons that doing things like cooking bacon etc. can be a bad thing on a boat because the oil gets everywhere and provides a base for the nasty black growth that is a boater’s bane.

Dock Life

The transient dock here at Charleston Marina is the local favorite hangout for people who like to crab from the dock. And there are a lot of them. It’s like a tailgate party with lawn chairs, coolers and lots of families joining in. Apparently when Sea Esta came in yesterday they had to evict a bunch of crabbers and their pots to get a spot. They were all gone by the time we arrived but they were back in force this morning starting as early as 6.

In general this coast certainly has crabs galore. I wouldn’t have believed the crabbing in and around Newport was sustainable. Hundreds of fisherman were bringing in dozens of crabs each. One fellow I talked to with a couple of dozen crab had actually been fishing. The crab traps were just an afterthought. In the PNW a couple of crabs is considered a good haul.

In the early afternoon I spent a couple of hours writing below to stay out of the wind. While the sun is out, it’s also windy and cold and not really outside weather–unless you are a crabber, I guess. But there is no way we really wanted to be out sailing in that. Serafina, however, did pull out per their plan around 6 am. Hopefully they made to their anchorage at Port Orford before the winds built.

Then I went for a walk. It’s a small fishing town with not much to see. And the combination of it being a Sunday and September 11 means everything except the corner store is closed. I did find free wifi outside the Portside Restaurant and Lounge and spent almost an hour texting back and forth with Leslie and checking in on all my social media. I’ll go back later and post some blog stuff.

I also saw a bunch of huge piles of oyster shells across from a sea food store. Some of them were also bundled in netted bags like they were for sale. I wonder if there is a market for them. There was a momma and 4 kittens hanging out under a table in front of the local store. I got in some good scratching time and sent off a picture to C so she could be jealous. The black one had this lovely hint of auburn in his fur. So cute and mom was so ready to let them go.

Back on board I read for a while and snacked on cake. Donna made some tea and she and Tim headed up for showers after their run. I had one bright and early with lots of hot water. Turns out later in the day the showers are a lot cooler. Lucky me.

Winds are now 25 knots at dock so it’s a bumpy day. One boat, Selkie a Jenneau 42 DS, came in having done a straight shot from Victoria. We heard them call in on the radio to the Coast Guard and later Tim called them back to let them know about the strong cross wind and the now empty spot behind us that had held Serafina.

Then T&D headed into town to find a wifi hotspot and I continued to blog. As of this point I am actually all caught up. I wonder what will happen next?

Well the Customs saga continues. When Selkie came in they contacted the Coast Guard since they couldn’t get hold of the CBP. So when the Coasties came down Tim mentioned he also couldn’t check in since they had no contact info. He’d even contacted Bellingham early in the morning but they’d given him a number that was out of service. So while T & D were out looking for wifi, the Coast Guard guy came back and asked for our cruising license info and our IDs and gave me the cell phone number for the local customs guy. He recommended we call just in case.

When I got back from posting a blog entry I let Tim know and he called in. It was all good but still were told we needed to call in at the next port and “No, we don’t have a contact number for that port.” Seriously, you’d think it wasn’t a federal agency with the little amount they seem to know about each other.

I spent an hour reading below. It’s a cold wind today and impossible to stay warm on deck. Eventually we wandered over to Sea Esta for happy hour. Mark mentioned his blog is, or at least his blog entries are, entitled Running Down the Coast — get it … he’s a runner and he’s running down the coast … clever eh — so I will have to look it up later. 7:30 found us back on Northwest Passage and smelling the delicious dinner in the oven.

It looks like another late dinner and early evening. And there’s no gimlets in sight. Sigh.

Sept 8

7:30 am Awake

I got up and sipped coffee from a real mug. Eventually after savoring coffee at the right temperature, I got dressed and joined the conference over on Sea Esta. Seems Jim didn’t have his reef line installed and was trying to get it rigged. That went on for a bit but I eventually wandered away so as not to keep getting in the way.

There were four other boats on dock heading south. While I was sitting on deck Seraphim arrived; they had been communicating with Tim previously by email as they were also heading for San Diego to join the Baha Ha Ha. Later that night one more Canadian boat pulled in for a grand total of seven transients heading south. One of them (a French boat) was ultimately heading for French Polynesia.

As I was walking down the dock the single-hander aboard Tiger Beetle mentioned our starboard upper spreader seemed to be bent. Sure enough, something had put enough force on it to bend it up 15 or 20 degrees. This was a bit of an issue since the rigging is what keeps the mast up and the sails flying.

Tim was also doing some engine work trying to patch a pinhole leak in the exhaust. It seems the boat wanted to stay in Newport for a while. I was going to go shopping for sunscreen and toothpaste but decided with all the hooplah to just run to local marina store and see what they had there.

There are tons of coast guard boats here. I’ve seen more boats and Coasties here in one day than I think I’ve seen in total in the PNW. Since we are right across from the fuel dock, they all pull in daily to fuel up. One of the fellows on the dock, Cody, a Texan, says this is the coast that all of the members get sent to for training. Supposedly the most rugged waters and challenging conditions in the U.S.

We turned the boat around to relieve some of the force on the starboard shroud and Tim decided a trip up the mast to check out the spreader was called for. So we broke out the bosun’s chair and I belayed him up the mast. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason for how the damage occurred, but the stainless steel tang that was riveted to the mast was definitely bent.

At that point it becomes a discussion on what to do about it. Nobody was enough of an expert in stainless to know if just bending it back would weaken the metal significantly, and drilling out the rivets to remove the tang seemed like an excessive solution.

So we called around. Tim called guy who referred him to a local rigger. Turns out he was local to Newport, Massachusetts. I got a number from the guy at the fuel dock for a local marine service guy and he agreed to come down and look. Then it was sit-around-and-wait time for a bit.

After he arrived there was a lot of talking and head scratching and eventually Tim ground him up using a winch to take a look. The consensus was straightening the tang and locking the shrouds in place with some cable clamps would solve the problem. Tim had removed some old wire running back stays and it was also decided that building some new ones out of amsteel (a synthetic line similar to spectra) might help prevent it from happening again.

So Tim caught a ride to the local chandlery and picked up some parts (the fellow, whose name was, ironically, Mike Chandler, was kind enough to lend Tim his 20% discount).

Meanwhile I hung out and chatted with the neighbours and generally relaxed in the sun. As the day went on the winds climbed and the boat had a distinct tilt to it.

After Tim got back we hauled him up the mast again where he installed the clamps and had to resew the leather chafe protection. Something that was a lot more difficult 50 feet above the water in the wind than you would suppose. The chandlery didn’t have all the parts for the back stays so it was going to be another trip to the store and another trip up the mast tomorrow.

So while I was standing around on dock watching Tim dangle from a halyard he shouted to me to go help a MacGregor down the dock. The small sailboat had lost power on its outboard and the strong winds had blown it onto Tiger Beetle. There was only one fellow on board with three small boys. When I got there the master of Tiger Beetle had wrestled the boat into the small space between the sterns of the docked boats and was trying to keep it pinned stern-to to the dock. I clambered aboard and tried to get a line on the stern of the French boat to keep the MacGregor from bashing into the Beetle while everyone desperately tried to get the outboard restarted.

Then another shout from Tim had me abandoning the MacGregor to scurry back up the dock to help fend a newcomer off the dock as he’d mistimed his turn and wasn’t able to get into his slip.

Then it was rushing back to the MacGregor where they managed to restart the engine and we cast off and I rode over to the fuel dock where they could catch their breaths and investigate the engine issue. Then it was a run back to our boat to send up some tools to Tim and eventually lower him back down to the deck. I got quite the workout there for a few minutes.

Then it was a beer and dinner and a quiet night before bed.

Sept 9

7:30 am awake

After a nice cup coffee I headed up for a shower. I ran into the MacGregor guy who chatted my ear off as I attempted to brush my teeth and grunt in response. Nice enough guy but a typical farmer with a typical rural outlook on life. Except for the drawl I could have been talking to someone in Brooks.

Tim and Donna had walked into town early to pick up the new battery and hopefully catch a ride back, so I sat in the cockpit and caught up with writing.

10:10 am

The battery showed up and we got it installed. Then we moved the boat over to the fuel dock to top up the tanks and change slips to try and get out of the wind.

Lunch was a toasted egg sandwich. Have I mentioned how spoiled we are?

The Customs guys (4 of them) show up as we leave the fuel dock. Tim had talked to them the day before and received a mild reprimand for not checking in upon arrival. Sea Esta was stubbornly insisting they had been told at entry they didn’t need to check in so they hadn’t. Since they were away on a run the CPB guys stopped by and reminded us politely that Sea Esta had better call them, but the 4 officers and generally martial milling made the message sound a lot more intimidating than polite.

Then it was time for a long walk across the bridge to the old town docks where Englunds Chandlers was located so I decided to tag along. Of course tagging along with runners Tim and Donna is a bit of an exercise in itself but I survived the 2 mile or so journey.

We crossed the gorgeous Yaquina Bay Bridge, which was built in 1936 and was Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works Project no. 932. It’s a gorgeous piece of Art Deco architecture with ornate concrete and metal work. It’s really too bad we as a society can’t afford to build things like this anymore.

Exiting the bridge and turning right we passed the Coast Guard station and entered the old docks area, which has been revitalized as a tourist destination with gift shops and tons of fresh seafood places. What makes it interesting is the fishing docks and plants are still there in and amongst the ocean-view restaurants.

We stopped in to see the source of all the noise we’ve been hearing constantly. It’s a special set of docks reserved for sea lions, and man are they loud. They are a protected species so they tend to take over space and make it there own. We also ran into Mark there; he’d been on a bit of a run and was looking for lunch.

Right beside the sea lions was a familiar sight. The old undersea gardens that lived in Victoria so long is now here looking a little shabby and long in the tooth but still a going concern. It’s still even owned by the Oak Bay Group so I guessed they just decided it would be more profitable here in Newport.

The chandlers was stuffed full of stuff I “needed” but I managed to restrain myself and got away without buying anything. Tim and I headed back to the boat and Donna went off to Starbucks for coffee and wifi.

Back on board I learned to splice amsteel as the lines needed loops in each end. Pretty easy if you have a fid (a fancy type of splicing needle).

Then I belayed Tim up mast again — I say belayed because unlike the fellow the day before, Tim actually climbs the mast. All I do is make sure he doesn’t lose any ground as he inches up. He ran the new blue running back stays from the spreader and then cleaned off all the bird crap and algae while he was there. On the way down he cleaned the first spreaders as well and then we were done aloft … hopefully.

Then it was time for a beer. I wandered up to the Rogue Beer outlet by the marina showers and picked up some Hazelnut Brown Porter. Jim and Mark came by and we started a conversation about whether to stay or go that ultimately lasted until we actually left.

The crux is the weather about 100 miles south is turning bad in the next few days. It’s looking like we can’t get much further until Tuesday so is there any point in leaving beautiful Newport? And there is a small chance that the weather will come early and we would be 77 miles south and not able to come in to port. The range of opinions on the dock is vast and a lot of people are insistent that leaving in the morning is a poor choice.

Personally I think the weather predictions look good and it’s purely a matter of whether we think being one leg closer to Cape Mendocino has any value. That’s the cape that has all the unpredictable weather and marks the end of the “dangerous” Northwest coast. So I think it’s fine to go but think staying is a better choice if we have another three days to wait for good weather.

Later when Tim wandered off I had another long philosophical conversation with Donna. She got a thoughtful soul and is fun to wax spiritual with. It always makes me realize how much I do embrace modern spirituality in my core, but just don’t have any patience with the bullshit trappings associated with “new age” thinking. The Lord’s Prayer had it right: “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”  Do we need more than that? There isn’t really any need for God or any other divine presence to be a part of that simple philosophy.

Later, after dinner, when I walked up to the bathrooms by the fish-cleaning station I ran into the local pride of feral cats. There were a few adults and about 6 gangly teenagers, all black or black and white, feasting on the scraps they could get at. Very skittish but they would casually ignore me in that cat way as long as I held still.

Back at the boat it is bed time but there is still no absolute decision; but the votes are such that we will likely be up around 5 am and head out to Coos Bay.

Sept 6

6:00 am awake

6:30 am up and around

It was a misty morning and the wind was building — it was probably the flapping halyard that woke me– but the boat was still quiet so I tiptoed out and headed for town.

7:00 am

Just down from the head of the dock there was a small cafe so I popped in to use the washroom and enjoy a good old-fashioned truck stop coffee (a $3.26 truck stop coffee–Starbucks hasn’t done us any favours).

It was one of those old rundown, refurbished and then run down again small-town places — I felt right at home. This such a working town; across the mouth of the river there are houses and condos but over here it’s working class and damn proud of it. They did have wifi so I made use of it and checked in here and there.

As I left I ran into Tim and Donna on the quiet street and Donna decided on a cup for herself. I remembered too late to mention the extortionate pricing so she also got to enjoy a very expensive cup of not-so-great coffee. Unfortunately for her she’s a fan of the good stuff and didn’t see the the nostalgic value in sludge-like quality.

Lucky Girl is also also planning on a 10 am departure so it looks like we will all be pulling out together again. They are heading up the Columbia, though, so this will be our last encounter. Our plan is to do the 150 nm trip to Newport, Oregon. That will mean around 24-30 hours of travel time.

Back at the dock Sea Esta reported a bad solenoid. They manage to get the engine going only after the judicial application of a hammer. That’s a bit worrisome if they can’t get it started again once we leave the dock.

Then a bit later as we prepared to get off, we found we couldn’t start our engine either. The starting battery was dead. After a bunch of checks Tim pried off the caps and the battery had run dry. We topped it up and plugged into shore power to get the battery charger going, and 10 minutes later we were up and running. But that battery is likely cooked and we will have to replace it the next time we stop.

Then we moved over to the fuel dock and filled up with diesel and topped up the water. The engine started right up so hopefully it will hold a charge.

10:00 am departure

We motored out into the Pacific and angled out to sea. The winds had died so it didn’t look like we would be doing much sailing. A little while later we spotted some orcas. There were 4-6 of them heading in the opposite direction.

11:00 am

We raised the sails hopefully in 6-8 knots of wind only to have the wind drop to 3-4 knots. So we fired up the engine again and motor-sailed along in the sunny and warm weather. I began shedding clothes and settled in to enjoy the day.

12:10 pm
46° 46.2523′ N,124° 11.1197′ W

We gybe and head further offshore. I think we will stay 12-15 nm out for most of the trip.

Eventually we shake the reef that was still in the main and continue motor sailing at around 6-6.4 knots speed over ground.

1:00 pm
46° 42.4484′ N,124° 14.5002′ W

We finally killed engine and were sailing downwind at a heading of around 205°, making about 5.5-6 knots. It’s so nice to just listen to the wind and the waves.

It occurred to me that trips like this really go much smoother than one has a right to expect. Every one of us out on the water generally has a strong personality and there are a lot of moments when — if you will forgive my regressive terminology — there are too many chiefs and not enough injuns. Certainly the instances of oneupmanship are high when discussing boats, weather etc., but it seems that socially we have a built-in filter so all the bullshit just slides off and we hear the underlying truths and realities. That way we (and by we I suppose I mean men) can actually get things done.

Not that anyone on our trip is outrageously bad or anything but by necessity there’s a lot of alpha out on the ocean blue.

2:10 pm
46° 35.7409′ N,124° 18.3327′ W

Lunch left me logy so I decided to indulge in a nap/rest in the sun. Northwest Passage doesn’t have much cockpit space to spare but I managed to wedge myself in and relax in the rolly seas.

After a while I indulged in a bit of blog writing. I am mostly making notes during the day and revisiting them to fill in the details. The WordPress interface on the phone sucks and really doesn’t like offline editing so I am using Notepad for notes and IA Writer to do the final draft before I paste it into WordPress whenever I can find signal.

I still haven’t recovered from lunch and am feeling a bit like I ate an entire Tony’s New York Style by myself. I am pretty convinced it’s just indigestion but the seas are pretty damn confused and there are some steep 10+ foot swells hitting us on the port quarter so maybe I’m fooling myself.

I keep drinking water and start paying more attention to sailing and less to my phone to see if that helps.

3:13 pm
46° 30.1063′ N,124° 20.6920′ W

We roll in the jib and fire up the engine in dying winds. That takes us from 4 knots to 6.5 knots and we start making better time.

4:15 pm
46° 23.9561′ N,124° 21.8655′ W

We caught up to Sea Esta. They have a monster genoa and make much better time downwind than we can.

Tim spotted some huge spouts on the horizon along our heading so maybe there are some whales in our future.

By 4:22 we passed right by them. There were probably 3 or 4 humpbacks and we got reasonably close before they showed tail and dove out of sight.

I’m not feeling much better, but am still convinced it’s more indigestion than seasickness. I don’t feel queasy and it is definitely centered in my gut. More of a belch-y thing than a pukey thing. I guess time will tell.

5:20 pm
46° 18.9010′ N,124° 22.6823′ W

Well, all the sails are down. The swells are huge and the jib was filling and crashing each time we slid into a trough. Dark isn’t that far away and it seemed better to get it all down and snug while we still had light since it was obvious we weren’t going to do any real sailing tonight.

The swells are easily exceeding 10 feet and the other boat disappears except for its mast each time we slide down. The tips of some of the swells are starting to break, forming little waves that loom behind and above our sterns. While there is no danger of them actually landing on us, it is an eerie feeling to see that wall of water rush towards you before the stern slowly climbs up the slope of the wave and you pop back up on top. Then you do it all over again.

I’m feeling a bit better; not 100% but if I’m focused on something else I forget about my grumbling gut.

Another 5 or 6 whales appear off starboard side. They are generally quite close — less than 100 yards — but the speed differential means they go by pretty fast.

7:45 pm
46° 6.1304′ N,124° 20.5348′ W

The seas are calmer now. And the water is gorgeous in the fading light. It’s so warm I don’t need gloves and standing in the wind is downright pleasant.

8:30 pm
46° 3.3954′ N,124° 18.9869′ W

It is almost fully dark and I am alone on watch as Tim has headed below to lay down. I’m now tethered to the boat and moving back to the wheel is more of an operation but at least that means no one will get lost overboard in the darkness.

We are motoring along with no sail at around 4.3 knots. Last we saw Sea Esta had also dropped their sails although it looked like there was a bit of drama involved in that operation. We found out later one of their lazy jacks broke and they had to dump the sail partially on deck before the could stuff it back into the sail bag.

10:15 pm

I’ve been chatting with Donna for a bit, but she’s headed below to sleep so she can keep Tim company later. Sea Esta is now astern of us and I can see her mast and running lights.

There is no moon and it’s cloudy so there isn’t much else to see besides the far-off glow of some big fishing boats.

11:20 pm

I am starting to notice the phosphorescence in the water. The frothy wake of the boat is all illuminated and there are all these bright sparkles in the water as we zoom by.

Sept 7

12:00 am
45° 44.4749′ N,124° 13.9020′ W

Tim came up around 11:40 and we chatted after he checked our position and the radar etc. Then he sent me below for a 4-hour break, letting me know he will wake me if he needs me.

He had set up the pilot berth (a narrow mid-ship berth) with a lee cloth (a curtain-like strip of fabric to keep you from rolling out) but I elect to head to my v-berth and just wedge myself against the hull with pillows.

The swells have moderated a bit since this afternoon but every once in a while one will send you flying if you aren’t holding on or braced.

I don’t sleep much for the first few hours but inevitably zonk out an hour before my shift and like an idiot I forget to check the volume on my alarm.

4:50 am
45° 13.4465′ N,124° 11.1053′ W

I wake up and my alarm is frantically vibrating on the bed beside me with the volume turned down. So I popped up and went to apologize to Tim. He was all snugged in with blankets to try and keep off the dew and not outwardly irritated with his lax crew. Still it was a rookie mistake.

We talked for a bit, wiped down the foggy dodger and then he headed below.

The clouds had disappeared and the stars were spectacular. Tim had mentioned he’d seen a few shooting stars and been visited by a few porpoises. Apparently they are like glowing torpedoes as they zoom through the water in a phosphorescent streak. But their visits were always short-lived.

It was just a little while before the glow of dawn starred to appear over the shore side. I did spot a shooting star among the myriad stars, but alas no porpoises deigned to visit me.

The rest of the morning passed peacefully, with only Sea Esta’s running lights in the distance to keep me company.

8:00 am

Toast and coffee on deck. Everyone is up and about but I decide to just stay up and catch up on sleep later. No wind at all but still some fairly large swells.

8:40

We are joined by a couple of sea lions for a while but they quickly abandon us to our fates. We are slowly angling back towards shore and spot 8 or so small fishing boats bobbing about.

9:00
44° 48.0360′ N,124° 7.3857′ W

Fog is closing in and we start to keep a sharp watch on the radar.

Several giant orange-and-white jellyfish float by.

10:23

The fog has thickened and visibility is less than 100 yards. So that’s when a humpback decides to surface 40 or 50 feet directly off our bow. If it had been a boat, I would definitely have labeled it a near miss. (A couple of days later we found out it was likely a gray whale and not a humpback.)

The fog gets worse and now we are dodging crab traps, small fishing boats, big fishing boats and the aforementioned large marine mammals.

Eventually we spot the green entrance buoy and can start our run into Newport.

11:46 am arrive
44° 37.4377′ N,124° 3.1479′ W
Newport, Oregon, Yaquina River

The fog was thick. Thick.

The fact is there was 100 yards or less visibility. Tim radioed a nearby AIS target to make sure he sees us on his radar and the large fishing trawler decided to slow down and not crowd us.

We knew there was a dredging operation going on but suddenly this huge dredge loomed out of the fog in the port side. Tim had seen it coming on the radar but it was shocking to me, as I stood on the bow, to see it suddenly appear.

Eventually we were passed by the fishing boat. He must have got impatient because he radioed us to ask if he could pass us. We were happy to let him by, but unfortunately he was going to fast for us to follow him in.

The giant Art Deco bridge suddenly loomed above us and then the fog broke. Inside the mouth of the river the sun was shining and all our worries about trying to find the marina disappeared.

On the other hand, the first thing we did after turning in the breakwater by the marina was run aground. We decided to give up in our designated slip and dock on the outside of the transient peer. We got off the bottom with some judicious wiggling and tied up to the dock.

We had motored over 24 hrs. So far not much of a sailing trip.

We walked up and registered and the I grabbed a roll of U.S. quarters and hit the shower. I needed a shower. It was a glorious shower. Then I just hung out and read and rested.

Dinner was at Rogues Brewery. This is a brewery that shares the same South Beach real estate as we do. I had a flight of ambers along with a albacore fish and chips. Totally delish.

I checked in with the sketchy free wifi. And then wandered back to the boat. I hit the sack at 8 and fell asleep watching Magic Mike on my iPad.

Sept 4

6:50 am awake

Get up, get dressed in the semi-dark and try to remember where you put everything night before so you don’t destroy your night vision. But there’s coffee when you emerge so it’s all ok.

7:30 am depart

Its a calm morning and Sea Esta casts us off and we slowly drift away. Then it’s simply a matter of firing up the engine and we are off.

While Sea Esta raised their anchor we take a slow tour of the harbour and docks and then follow them out into the strait.

8:56 am

Cape Flattery. That’s the big left turn moment when we exit the relatively protected waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and head south along the rugged Washington and Oregon coast. As with all these momentous moments in my sailing career to date it was a non-event.

We turned south and continued to motor in a small swell with no winds. Still it’s an accomplishment and we will be in the Pacific for the rest of the trip.

9:35 am
48° 20.5334′ N,124° 45.3532′ W

We spotted a humpback and watched him sound with a flap of his massive tail.

One thing of note is that the U.S. weather broadcasts are quite different than the Canadian ones. Their male voice is much more stern and authoritative but it still has some quirks. The one that got me was the hourly announcement  that there was no pleasurable precipitation. I kept wonder what that was. A warm rain? Enough rain for a good shower? Maybe it would rain hard enough to be like one of those massaging shower heads? Eventually I figured out it was measurable not pleasurable which took the mystery out of it and ironically enough reduced the pleasure.

11:00 am
48° 12.0367′ N,124° 47.9520′ W

Nothing happening. No wind, swells, lots of water.

1:00 pm
48° 0.9295′ N,124° 46.0987′ W

See above.

Sea Esta is zigzagging trying to limit their roll. The Baltic’s deep keel and heavier displacement makes it a gentler boat than the Catalina in Rollin seas. They, however, have a full enclosure so I don’t feel very sorry for them.

1:36 pm

Tim whipped out his harmonica, well one of them: he has seven I think (A B C D E F & G), and treated us to some solos. He’s pretty good although like most amateur musicians he insists he’s not so hot.

Be that as it may he did attract a couple of porpoises for our visual pleasure. They didnt stick around long–probably more punk oriented and just not fans of the blues.
The Catalina kept rolling and performed even more zigzagging to try and keep the swell off their quarter and we just plowed steadily along.

Eventually we came in sight of Cake Rock which resembles nothing less than a giant cake. Go figure. It did mean we were getting in sight of the entrance to La Push so that was exciting.

There weren’t even ripples on the water and I spent some time on the side deck watching our bow wake disturb the glassy water of the Pacific. Mesmerizing and beautiful. So I shared it on Instagram.

A little later a couple more porpoises came by but no one wanted to play.

2:55 pm arrived
La Push, WA
47° 54.7037′ N,124° 38.2175′ W

La Push was our first bar entrance but it was a non-event. Beautiful, but other than having to pay attention to the buoyage it was no different than entering any other harbour for us. Most (all?) of the ports in Washington and Oregon are in river mouths. That means there is usually a delta of some sort where the water crashing in from the pacific both suddenly shallows and constricts. This can make for some big waves and dangerous conditions. The Columbia River bar is said to be one of the most dangerous and treacherous in the world. But like the tidal rapids in the PNW, if you pay attention to the weather and time it right they should be no issue. We have plenty more to do so I guess we’ll see.

No one was answering on the radio so we picked random slips and tied up. A Fishery guy did pop over to see if we had caught anything but that was it. We never did find anyone and so ended up with a free night of moorage.

I headed out for a walk as everyone else was talking about going for a run and I didn’t want to get swept up in their insanity. It’s a native community but there is a terrific beach on the other side of the breakwaters and tons of tourists camping and staying in some beautiful waterfront cottages.
I went looking for some sunscreen but they were sold out; huh. Along he way I encountered Jim and Mark staring down the beach. Apparently they had lost Donna. A bit later I found Tim who had likewise lost Donna. Donna is starting to remind me a bit of Leslie who also has a habit of getting lost.

Back on board we had a visit from Lucky Girl who is a Selene trawler (maybe 40-45 feet). Apparently they were in Neah Bay last night as well but we hadn’t spotted them in the dark. They were on their way to Portland and also were planning on stopping in Gray’s Harbor next.
Then it was time for a beer. Jim and Mark popped over and we discussed plans. There was a bit of a heated discussion on safety, pfds and mob drills but it was all resolved in the time-honoured fashion of each to his own.

Dinner was tasty burgers and after we did a few chores like topping up the water tank and engine checks. I will admit sitting in the evening air that I gained an appreciation of Leonard Cohen. Although since I don’t really know his stuff I did embarrass myself by asking who we were listening to. I mean I’ve heard all the songs before by different performers but who actually listens to Leonard Cohen? I guess from now on that’ll be me.

The rest of the evening was spent sitting quietly on deck with the funky disco led lights and relaxing.

Sept 5

5:50 am awake
6:00 am depart

We beat Sea Esta and Lucky Girl off the dock and across the bar but the trawler soon passed us and the two sailboats angled out to sea. breakfast was waffles which Donna did in this cool single-sided waffle pan.

7:23 am

We put the head sail out in winds SW at 5 knots. Pretty soon we were cruising along at 6.0 knots with the motor still running.

Eventually though we had to roll the sails back in, but Sea Esta stubbornly kept her main out and zigzagged back and forth. 

9:15 am
47° 37.8264′ N,124° 37.9374′ W

We picked up an AT&T about about 5 nm offshore so everyone immediately checks their phones like a bunch of teenagers.

A bit later we spotted a couple of other boats but they were going the other way.

11:00 am
47° 30.0859′ N,124° 29.5289′ W

At this point we are motoring 3 nm offshore but decide to move in closer so we could at least enjoy the scenery. So Tim had a nap and I played that boater favourite, Bird or Crab Trap. There are a lot of crab traps.

12:25 pm

A bazillion birds started flocking to a spot just off the starboard side with dolphins diving in and around them. Then suddenly they all took off and moved ahead of us and gathered again. There were pelicans, cormorants, gulls and and something I am calling murrelets but who the hell knows what they really are. Anyway, we guess it was a herring ball but whatever it was it was cool to see the birds converging.

Speaking of birds, I keep seeing these black stubby gull-like birds swooping mere inches above the water and moving up and down with the swells. It’s a terrific but of acrobatic flying.

2:50 pm
47° 8.7814′ N,124° 16.2876′ W

Still motoring.

3:50 pm

A couple of porpoises came along and were cavorting in the rain that finally caught up to us. I am starting to get wet. 

5:30 pm
46° 54.7574′ N,124° 10.5088′ W

Still wet but at least we are crossing a relatively benign bar. 

6:24 pm arrived
46° 54.6005′ N,124° 6.7178′ W
Westport Marina, Gray’s Harbor

It was a 68 nm day but we are settled in the transient moorage at Westport Marina in Gray’s Harbor, Washington. Tim and I break out the tarp to keep the rain out and sit relaxing and enjoying a Bud.

It’s a huge fishing town, really reminds me of the oil patch. A local deckhand looking for work stopped by to chat and beg a glass of water. Sounds like fishing is another boom and bust industry for the workers.

The transient space is only $25 but the facilities are pretty sparse. I am starting to dream of a hot shower. Dinner was pressure cooked ribs but I too tired to gorge.

9:14 pm Lights out