Wow, hard to believe it’s already been over four months. Seems like yesterday I moved aboard.It’s such a joy to be living on “Charisma”.  Great neighbors, beautiful boat and easy to go for a sail.  All I have to do is disconnect the internet and I’m off (well, almost all).  Nonetheless, I keep everything put away, so it’s as easy to go sailing as before I moved aboard.So far, I’ve loved falling asleep at night listening to the rain on the overhead, hearing the wind in the rigging and feeling the gentle rocking on the water.  Sunrises and Sunsets in the Marina are also a treat.     
Now I can’t wait for the warmer weather to try out the hammock I got for my birthday!

Friday, July 11th meant one thing that we’ve been looking forward to for weeks: our weekend moored with Shanti at Angel Island.  Shana and I left Berkeley Friday afternoon in small craft warnings.  A very wet ride and two hours later we were successfully moored in Ayala Cove and awaiting Jon, Heather, Kaarrrvin and Eli’s arrival in Shanti.  We launched the dinghy and Shana decided it was as good a place as any for the much anticipated “first beer” ceremony.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    The gang arrived soon enough and so began a great weekend and not a bad sunset!                                                                                                                                                                                                          On Saturday, Eb (aka Silver Eagle) came over on the Ferry and we all went for a hike around the island.  Highlights were a bird’s eye view of the start of the Single Handed Transpac (the idea has been percolating with Bob ever since) and a great picnic lunch by Kev and Eli.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               After a great hike/great day, back to the boats for some cocktails and BBQ.  Cocktail hour did bring about a small disaster.  While trying to make Dark and Stormies (i.e. rum and ginger ale), Kaarrrvin grabbed the Scotch decanter (they aren’t labeled, but he HAS sailed on Charisma enough to know…) by accident and poured a vile concoction that all agreed would forever more be named the “Burnt Bagpipe”.  Still gives me the shivers thinking of the taste.  Over the side it went and all was forgiven but definitely not forgotten.  The other “incident” of the weekend were the burnt mango muffins.  Great idea and they tasted great, but the paper cups that I cooked them in burnt and for the rest of the weekend we had the aroma of burnt muffins wafting through the boat.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Sunday dawned and Shanti had to go back.  Among other things, Jon and Shana were racing at 11 and needed to be back in Tiburon to board Elusive for the race.  As part of a great deal, er, I meant HUGE SACRIFICE, Bob had to stay on the boat the rest of the day at the mooring relaxing in the Sun until the racing was done and Elusive dropped Shana off on their way home.  Nice day!  Music, nice warm, sunny cove, good book and as a bonus, I got to watch the “carnage” around me as other boats dropped on and off the moorings.  For the weekend, I saw two collisions and a rope tangled in a prop as one boat was leaving.  They had to get a diver who came over from the mainland to cut the rope so they could leave.   Fortunately other than being raided of beer by the Elusive crew, we were otherwise unscathed and had an uneventful trip home.