Santa Cruz Yacht Club Hospitality!

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We spent another relaxing day doing small projects preparing for our departure from Santa cruz tomorrow morning. It was a gorgeous day filled with a lot of swell (waves) coming into the harbor. Wisely Bob decided we would wait until tomorrow to head to Santa Cruz Island (off Santa Barbara).

I got in another fun run up to the Boardwalk while Bob again did some small projects.

Then we joined friends at the Santa Cruz Yacht Club for a barbecue. Great people. A foreshadowing of the fun people we are yet to meet!

Watched a string of boats go out for a fun Wednesday race. A beautiful sight to see. And again the full moon guided us out to the lighthouse on a lovely evening walk.

Our next leg is a 40 hour overnight – a test of our two-man ability. We will check in with you when we get back to land!

Walking along, strumming a song…

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Today we spent a relaxing, restful day enjoying Santa Cruz.

I started my day with a fun jog around the harbor and out to the lighthouse. I was watching for Ha Ha flags on boats but found none. What I did find was a young guy walking along strumming his guitar. The epitome of Santa Cruz relaxation.

The Captain was not quite so relaxed. He spent his morning doing some the minor items on our list that we had not gotten to before leaving Berkeley. (captains have the tougher jobs).

We are docked next to Gandalf, the boat that Bob races on here in Santa Cruz. One of Gandolph’s owners, Bob Dewitt picked us up for a delicious lunch at a local golf course. And on the way back to the dock he dropped us by The Dollar Store to find a few more items. Great lunch. Thanks for the taxi service, Bob.

We went out to the lighthouse nearing sunset. The lure of a cocktail on the wharf convinced Bob to continue the walk down the beach. We watched the sun set from the restaurant and were thrilled to see a gorgeous full moon that guided us back to the harbor. We spent the whole walk turning back to see the sun’s final kiss goodbye and then turning around to glow in the full moon. Full moons let me know those that are no longer with us will always be watching. So glad they can enjoy this too!

Chance Of Rain

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“Chance?!!”. What do they think chance means? It rained all day! South winds right on the nose and precip with fog meant we were hunkered down in our foul weather gear behind the wheel, motoring our way south. Whereas yesterday we had some glorious sailing, today was diesel day. But, we’re now in Santa Cruz where we’ll stay for a couple days working on finishing some boat projects, seeing friends and waiting for more promising weather.
(P.S. Ann looks hot in her new foulies)

Out The Gate

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Finally! Left today at 0900 with many thanks from our group of “well-wishers” who came (I think they heard my Mom was bringing donuts). Anyway, thank you all for coming.
A great day. Many porpoises joined forces to wish us “bon voyage” as we passed under the Golden Gate Bridge. A foggy start, but as we went under the bridge, the sun and blue sky broke through for a fantastic departure into the Pacific.
Today’s trip was modest. We’re just meandering down the coast. Day tripping so as to get into the swing of cruising without getting thrown into the deep end all at once. So…we are in Half Moon Bay Harbor, anchored outside of the marina proper, but inside the breakwater. Ann’s chopping onions for a sausage/tomato pasta. Pretty nice snugged in here. Tomorrow, Santa Cruz (or thereabouts).
(This post brought to you with the wonder of iPad with 3G service).

Wow, It’s Time…

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What a stressful week, getting ready to go.  It kept being; “one more day” and then “maybe tomorrow…”.  Always one more thing that needed to get done.  Ready to go?  Not quite, the head just clogged.  Two days and ten feet of new hose later; “Uh, I think it’s going to work now”.  So hard to anticipate what you’ll need for a year or more.  The answer; “no-one really knows.  Just go!”

So, with that mantra in mind, we ARE leaving tomorrow (Sunday) morning.  8AM.  Sitting here right now after a nice break having a farewell cocktail with Mom and Dad and daughter Kelly, who also stayed for dinner.  Right now, we’re filling the water tank and doing some final packing.  Actually storing.  We’re finding places we didn’t know existed and stuffing “this and that” into the little cubby-holes.  Ann figured out that there was two inches of room underneath the three drawers in the main cabin floor and bought some low profile cases where we’re storing all kinds of stuff from emergency antibiotics to extra toothpaste.

Well, that’s it for now; we’re exhausted.  We’ll be starting to blog with more frequency once we get out on the “deep blue”, which would be tomorrow.

Crazy, Crazy, Crazy (by Ann)

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Here we are T minus six days (if the weather holds) and things are getting wild. The last week was spent finishing up my job of sixteen years at JStokes, while trying to get down to the marina to put in some quality time prepping Charisma.

As of tonight I have cleaned and shined all but four “holds” on the boat. We figure that we will clean everything out and then start provisioning.  Cleaning everything out includes compacting Bob to fewer drawers so that I can have at least one to hold my 12 allowed items of clothing (including my underwear!) just kidding – I think get more items. Meanwhile at home I am packing up my bedroom. I’ve lived in that room for 28 years! Hard to pack it up – but why am I whining? I’m leaving for the trip of a lifetime! And I am very excited about it.

I am amazed at what it takes to prepare for such a long adventure. I have legal issues to address, animal issues, heck, kid issues too! The lists have kept me up late at night often, until my dear friend, Karin, convinced me to prioritize and focus on the trip. Thank you , Karin!

Thank goodness that Chuckie has been helping with our HaHa costumes. Tinker Bell is done and will be a show-stopper, Peter Pan is done, Captain Hook is close and the crocodile is almost done. Thank God for Chuckie’s help.

And the week was filled with parties! Family, friends and work. I am truly blessed and am loving all of the good wishes. Soon this blog will be from the water! Thanks for all of your support. Please, live vicariously with us!

Ann

Counting down the days

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We’re about a week and counting.  Trying to leave next Thursday, 10/6 (or so) pending weather, and whether we have all our gear packed, stowed and ready to go. Been working very hard this week. Ann’s been cleaning and organizing down below in the cabin and I’ve been pulling cables and wire to get the two new solar panels and the 1000 watt voltage inverter running. Long story short, the panels are working (two Kyocera, 130 watt panels wired in parallel to double their amperage), a Blue Sky “duo” regulator (to run the panels and a water generator that we’re waiting for from Hamilton Ferris). Spent waaayyy too long in the Lazarette wiring stuff, but the result is pretty cool. I took us “off the grid” four days ago. The refrigerator runs all night and pulls the batteries down, but the panels, one of which faces the morning sun, power the boat back up and by 9AM, the batteries are completely full again. Really fun to watch how self sufficient we are becoming.Here’s a couple pics of some of our work including the watermaker and THE LISTS! Everything at this point with only a week left is about lists.
Watermaker     Everything has to go on a list, or we instantly forget!

Watermaker lesson

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A quick post to note a lesson in watermaker 101.  After installing it, I wanted to run it as much as possible to see what would break BEFORE leaving for a year or more.  That meant running it in the Marina, since I don’t have time to leave the dock and go out into the Bay every couple of days.  I only ran it at very high tide, presumably when the water in the Marina was at its cleanest.  Well, it worked for a couple weeks, but this weekend I ran it and WHEW! stinky water.  Fortunately none went into the tank, I found it in the sampling water.  Rotten egg smell which means marine organisms are clogging (and dying) in the filter.  The water in the marina is just too still and warm and grows a lot of algae.   I immediately did a fresh water rinse (pushing tank water back through the filters instead of pulling salt water).  Smell gone.  Then pulled the main filter.  Filthy!  OK, removed and put a new one in.  No more watermaker in the marina.  Until we leave, I’m just going to do a 2 minute fresh water flush every five days, to keep the water from getting stagnant in the watermaker as recommended by the manufacturer.   Less than a month and we’re in the open ocean!

Getting Ready To Go

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Been a while since the last post, but been spending time getting ready for the big trip.  In October, 2011, Ann and I leave for Baja where we’ll spend a couple months, then in March, 2012 we’ll leave for French Polynesia.  Don’t have a firm plan yet, just know we’re leaving and once we get there we’ll see how long we want to stay.

So, in preparation it’s been a busy Spring and Summer:

  • Put in a Spectra Watermaker (pic below)
  • Hauled and painted the bottom
  • Put in a Frigoboat refrigerator (pic of Keel Cooler, the bronze looking thing, below)
  • Bought a new boom (the old one had a permanent bend and was looking like it was getting ready to break.  Ballenger Spars made a new custom one)
  • Took the Cetol off the teak cockpit seats/floor with a heat gun.  The Cetol was waaaay too slippery when wet.  Took two days, but result was excellent.  Now I just have to bleach the wood, sand a bit and recaulk a couple seams and we’re good to go.
  • Bought a new “blue water” fishing pole and reel.  The other one was too small for the kind of fish we were hooking.

Those are the “big ones” and my wallet is lighter, but Charisma is happy.
Also got some brand new storm sails, wheels for the dinghy (to make it easier to haul up on shore) and a bunch of smaller projects to get ready to go.  We’re now in full speed ahead mode with about one month to go before we leave.

Still to come:

  • Solar panels that I will hang on the lifelines/rails
  • A water generator.  Ferris makes a unit you can tow behind the boat.  A small prop and 75 feet of torque-rope and it turns a small generator that puts out quite a lot of electricity for the batteries.  Great for tradewind sailing.

Well, that’s it for this catch-up note.  The blog’s gearing back up.  Keep in touch!

polishing-the-topsides.jpg

keelcooler.jpg   watermaker.jpg