San Juans To Newport OR - Aug 16 to 20, 2002

We had one last fine meal and sunset at anchor in the San Juan Islands (Mackay Harbor on Lopez) before heading out the Strait of Juan De Fuca and down the coast. Don J, our neighbor from across the street in Portland, was our crew. Don is buying a boat out of Sydney BC with two partners and wanted some ocean experience before bringing his own boat down the coast.

Because of the summer fishing season, it was impossible to get a slip in Astoria, so we did a 2 night cruise to Newport from Neah Bay. Winds were light the whole time (nothing over 12 knots true) and coming from directly behind us (so it was max 7 knots apparent). The final 10 hours into Newport, we got rained on.

Newport to Eureka - Labor Day Weekend 2002

Our crew for the 40 hour trek down the Oregon Coast was Graham C. and his son Steffan. Graham is from New Zealand, so prior to the sail we procured a Kiwi flag to fly at the port spreader (below the radar reflector).

It was quite windy for the whole trip, except for the last few hours into Humboldt bay. South of the Oregon border, we experienced lots of wind. NOAA had predicted 30 knots or less out to 20 miles from the shore, but they erred somewhat. At 12 miles out we were in a full gale; 45 knots sustained winds, 52 knots peak and seas from 15 to 20 foot. The boat did fine under "bare poles and full dodger", although stuff was flying down below. An hour after we furled the last scrap of headsail, P.Y. had had enough. She poked her head out the companionway door and demanded that we reef. My reply: "Uh, sweetheart, we're already under bare poles...nothing left to reef"

Entering Humboldt bay, there was lots of marine life. In fact the krill was so thick that it completely clogged the cooling water intake strainer. The strainer wasn't pulled until a few days after we were docked, and filled the boat with dead shrimp smell. Yuck.

We arrived in Eureka on Labor day. The town was having festivities across the river from us, including a fireboat and a Coast Guard demonstration of a helicopter and rescue swimmer.

Eureka to San Francisco - Sept 8 to 15, 2002

In Eureka, our friends Bill and Nataila J. on their Morgan 41 "Desperado" caught up with us and we buddy-boated all the way to San Francisco with them. We had met Bill and Natalia in the San Juans, in Parks bay on Shaw Island (for a great picture of Parks Bay, see the cover of the August 2002 issue of "Sunset" magazine).

As it was just P.Y. and I, we tried to make in a number of short hops, but ended up with another two night passage. Nothing like watch-on, watch-off for 48 hours - its a real joy. Our first stop from Eureka was to be Noyo Marina, in Fort Bragg. Unfortunately, Noyo had silted in and the folks from Ross Island Sand and Gravel (a SE Portland company) were dredging it. There were only a few slips available; when we attempted to pull into the first one, the boat ran aground in the aisle, even before our bow reached the finger pier. P.Y. was on the bow with the mooring line in her hand. "A little more babe, your almost there." "Uh, sweetheart, we are aground". We waited for the tide to float us off and headed for the second slip. Same story. We waited for a little more tide and pulled into the slip. (From the charted depths, we knew we might have a problem if we got somewhat out of the channel, so we had planned our trip so as to enter the Noyo River on a rising tide.) At that point, we knew that the boat would be resting on its keel when the tide went out. We made the decision to leave at high tide for Bodega Bay.

The trip to Bodega Bay was done under beautiful clear skies, but marginal winds except for near Cape Mendicino, where we had 30 knots plus. North of the Cape, the water was red with krill and thick with marine life. We identified 3 different types of whale and the seabirds and pinnipeds were everywhere. I tried to take a picture of the Moon and Venus, but the digital camera just isn't fast enough to do it from a rolling boat deck.

Bodega Bay is the town where Hitchcock filmed "The Birds". We know why. There is only one in the picture, though. (The town is across the bay, up the hill).

We spend a few days in Bodega Bay and moved on to anchor in Drake's Bay, around Pt. Reyes and about 30 miles from San Francisco bay. Drake's Bay is open to the ocean from the south, but the weather was coming from the Northwest. The anchorage was still windy and choppy, though.

The next morning we entered the Golden Gate. The fog was Thick. In fact, a land bird (sparrow?) had gotten disoriented in the fog and rested on our rail for a couple of hours before moving on. "Desperado" had a passenger, too (perhaps the same bird?). We entered the Golden Gate from the main shipping channel - buoys were spaced a quarter-mile apart but you couldn't see from one to another. Lots of shipping traffic - radar is a necessity in conditions like this. Desperado made a risky maneuver between two incoming ships (the white dot near the bow of the second ship is them).

We couldn't hardly see the Bridge until we were right there.

Once we got past the Golden Gate and into the Bay, it opened up. We headed Northeast, past Sausilito to Angel Island and moored at the state park.

San Francisco Bay - Sep 15 to 20, 2002

Angel Island is 800 foot tall. Bill and I hiked the trail to the top and took pictures of the Bridge and City.

After a few days on the mooring ball, we moved to a marina downtown. Had an awesome sail across the bay. While we were there, the weather was very uncharacteristic for San Francisco in September. 80 to 90 degrees for all three days.

San Francisco to Half-Moon Bay - Sep 20, 2002

On Friday September 20, Steffan and his friend John joined us for a day hop to Half Moon Bay. We had great weather and good winds as we tacked out of the bay. Outside, in the ocean, it was only blowing 6 knots, and on the nose.

We finally got to see the bridge from the ocean side.

Half-Moon Bay to LA - Sept 21 to 27, 2002

Our friends Ted and Nita flew down to SF to meet us in Half Moon Bay for the trip to LA. A day trip to Monterray, where it was so calm we didn't even wear our harnesses and tethers. We saw a 4 foot, 300 lb, Sea Turtle in Monterray bay. He was close to the boat and staying on the surface...my biggest regret on the whole trip was not turning around to take pictures.

The 40 hour trip from Monterray to Santa Barbara, around Pt. Conception, was done in a heavy fog and light winds. Our course took us through a forest of oil drilling platforms, but we didn't see a one until we entered the Santa Barbara channel. You could see them on radar, and hear their fog signals, but the classic sight of lighted-up platforms was not to be, at least for us. ("Desperado" came around Pt. Conception a few days later under clear skies and a good breeze. Go figure.)

The monotony of the fog was occasionally broken up by pods of up to 40 White-Sided Dolphin playing in our bow wake. What a bunch of show-offs! One dolphin was particularlly hammy - he would buzz the boat to make sure he had an audience and then proceed to do a whole repertory of tricks: front flips, back flips, rolls, etc.

Ted abandoned ship in Santa Barbara, where we relaxed for a couple of days. Then on to Oxnard, done under sail - a classic broad reach. The winds and sun failed the next day - we had to motor into LA, where we pulled into Marina Del Ray. In MDR, we had free moorage at the Catalina dealer's marina, set up by my friend Scott from SF (who had bought two boats from the guy), as the dealer had many of his boats in Long Beach for a boat show.

After the weekend, we moved to the public docks in MDR at the park. Beautiful, sunny, Southern California. Palm trees and a warm breeze. An oddity here is the shrimp. They sit on the seafloor of the marina and make clicking noises all night long - snap, crackle, pop. Its like mooring in a bowl of Rice Crispies.