Back from the islands intact!

This past weekend Alli, Tijn and I took a trip to Pelican Bay again. We had 12 kts of wind going out and coming back, so it wasn't as bumpy or wet of a ride as last time. On our way out we saw a whale (my guess: pilot whale, black, pointy duck-bill like snout and a little fin fairly far back), and a superpod of dolphins. Alli rode the bow to check out the dolphins, and Tijn jumped in and I towed him, but he didn't really get close to any of them... We made landfall near Diablo again, and then started downwind towards Pelican. Fry's was practically empty and really beautiful looking, so we wanted to go in and check whether we could anchor there. We started sailing in, and the wind kept diminishing, so to continue pointing I brought the main really really close in. Then we must have come out of the windshadow of some giant rock, because a nasty gust caught us and Shadow broached. We got water gushing over the side coamings into the cockpit when we developed this insane angle of heel. It took me a couple scary seconds to blow the mainsheet, because there was so much force on it. Lesson learned: you probably want to motor into anchorages with steep funnel-like cliffs. I still want to stay at Fry's some night.

So we got to Pelican and anchored a bit closer to the cliffs this time. Later these two fishing boats came along and dropped anchor right over where I thought mine was -- that was annoying -- and proceeded to have boat-to-boat yelling conversations. Sigh! But they piped down soon enough, and when they weighed anchor the next day nothing was tangled, so no harm done.

Dinner was awesome, the moon was spectacular, the swell at night was really mellow and we barely budged from where we were pinned between the anchors. Overall, stressless. After breakfast we all jumped in the water in our wetsuits (cold!). I scrubbed the bottom of the boat, and Tijn and Alli went ashore for a few minutes. We then dried and warmed ourselves, and headed back. The trip back was fast (4:30 hours) and totally uneventful.



Alli and I getting ready to jump in.

More sailing...

You're probably wondering why I try to write a post whenever I use the boat. It's just so I can keep track of how much I actually sail, kind of a quick and dirty way to have data to amortize the cost...

So, on Monday I sailed with Tijn and Alli, and yesterday I went out with Mel and Loren. Great wind both days, about 15 very close to shore and petering out to maybe 10-11 a little further out.

Yet another pre-islands checklist

* repair thru-deck masthead light conduit (#6 screws)
* empty tank and refill with just water
* check gas situation
* pick up butane for stove DONE
* find smaller bucket for new anchor rode
* charge battery DONE
* check what ropes we have on board and reconcile with new ropes
* clean hullsides (might do at the islands)

And, unrelated to the trip:
* scrape dinghy bottom... again
* do dinghy outboard oil check

This week in sailing...

Tijn, Philipp and I went out Tuesday.
Tijn, Alli, Robin and I went out yesterday.
Good wind on both occasions. Fixed the forestay/backstay ratio yesterday, which relieved the weather helm a bit. Forgot to put the cotter rings back in though, so I have to go out again tonight...

... and a couple more photos

This time from our point of view on board...

Rodeo

One of the highlights of the trip to Santa Cruz island was when Ian decided riding Shadow's rail in 15 kts of wind and 4 feet of swell was a rodeo, and started making all the motions! Yep, it's a workout for the core muscles! Which brings me to my quote, courtesy of Good Old Boat's newsletter:

There’s one thing about bashing to windward. You never forget, for one minute, that you are at sea in a sailing boat.

--Tristan Jones

First trip to the islands!

This past weekend, with all our preparations finally done, we took off for our much-anticipated island trip. We left SB Harbor at noon on Saturday and were done anchoring at Pelican by 6pm. Initially there was little wind, but as we got further out into the channel it picked up. By the time we reached the island it was probably blowing a little over 15 kts, so we tucked in a reef for navigating close to shore. We made landfall at Diablo and then ran down (wing-on-wing) to Pelican. We anchored very close to the western wall, and had absolutely no trouble with the bow and stern arrangement. We put all the foulies out to dry, wound down a bit and made indian dinner. Once night fell, we hung out in the cockpit and looked at the stars and meteorites -- it was Perseid shower time, and we saw some really spectacular shooting stars! I was surprised to see that most boats didn't have their masthead anchoring light on at night. We did...

We got up not too early in the morning and made tea. Then we hung out for a while, and later Tijn went for a swim around the bay. He took the composite picture above from the top of the bluff overlooking the anchorage. Shadow was the smallest boat at the anchorage by some 4 ft, and it's pretty obvious in the photo! We packed up and weighed anchor at 12:30, and we were back in SB and anchored by 5pm. The wind on Sunday was a bit mellower, but still probably about 14 kts or so when we got close to shore.