Passage to Santa Barbara
It is now time to leave San Diego and head off for our first passage and our first real step into true adventure exploring on Avante: north up the west coast of the US from San Diego to the Pacific Northwest. This is 1,200 nautical miles of upwind sailing. The First Mate, novice sailor that she is, is excited, anticipatory and just a little bit nervous. The Captain is just plain eager to get the adventure going!
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Wednesday, June 28th – Given the fact that our trip to the Pacific Northwest will be The First Mate’s first long distance sailing voyage and that Avante is still relatively new to us, The Captain has invited several sailing friends to join us on various stages of this trip. First will be Nelson Sharp, a friend from Telluride, who plans to sail to San Francisco with us. He says he absolutely loves passages. This is a statement that in the years ahead, after suffering through far too many attacks of sea sickness, The First Mate continues to find totally and completely mind-boggling. Those thoughts, however, are for the future, for, at this point in time, as we drop the lines to our berth in San Diego, she is a believer. Passages are great!
0615 -We are underway! Our first destination is Twin Harbors on Catalina Island. Winds are light, so we motor-sail, which means that the motor is thrumming away and the sail is up to give us a boost. Finally, in the early afternoon, we are able to turn the engine off and do a little sailing. Arriving in Twin Harbors, we tie to a mooring ball in the harbor. The number of packed-in mooring balls in busy Southern California harbors is amazing.
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Thursday, June 29th – Low clouds lie among the hills as we motor out. Conditions remain much the same as yesterday, but an increasing swell makes The First Mate queasy. What a pain this is! The Captain suggests she take the helm for a while, and with relief, she finds that looking out to the horizon and having her mind occupied with steering do overcome the queasiness. She is fine. Things are looking up.
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The Captain sets out our new fishing pole, and after a while — Zing!, we have our first fish. Eagerly our eyes follow the line out hoping to see our catch break surface, but The Captain says that it doesn’t feel right. There’s no real movement, no fight. What do we have? An unappetizing tangle of seaweed! Oh, well, there are plenty of fish in the ocean, and we will find one someday.
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The Channel Islands are located off the coast from Santa Barbara. They are known for challenging sailing and heavy winds that come up suddenly racing down from the shore out to sea. We motor into Smugglers Cove on Santa Cruz Island in the afternoon. Our first attempts to anchor will not hold, but eventually, the anchor does set.
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With time on his hands, The Captain decides to test his new wetsuit. Though we are not planning on going scuba diving, The Captain knows there might be times when a check under the boat or of the prop will be necessary in cold Pacific Ocean waters. The suit will be needed.
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It’s a Japanese made suit, size L, but it takes 2 of us to squeeze him into it and get the zipper zipped without catching flesh. Suitably attired in mask, snorkel and fins, he is set to explore the depths. Down, down and – uh-oh – up, up he comes. Like a cork, he pops out of the water. There is no way he can stay down. He had forgotten about a weight belt! Well, at least, he has learned this before he really needed to dive on the bottom. A weight belt is added to the list of items to buy.
The First Mate may not yet be anybody’s idea of a sailor, but she does know her way around her galley. Dinner is eaten out on deck tonight. Baked Haddock (store-bought) topped with fresh tomatoes, onions, garlic and parsley. We feast and enjoy the entertainment provided by the seals and porpoises swimming and surfacing around the boat. There is another J/160 in the anchorage with us, but it’s a distance away. If it were not such a chore to hoist the dingy and motor, The First Mate would love to motor over to say hello.
That night a sudden huge wind blows in, and we awake to an unfamiliar, loud banging sort of noise. Startled, we head up on deck to inspect. Winds are clocking in at 30 knots with gusts blowing much higher than that. We soon discover that it is the force of the wind and water around the boat and the vibrations of the rigging that are making all the noise. Fortunately, the winds are blowing from the shore so we feel a little easier. Not much, but some. Also, there are no other boats either directly upwind or downwind of us. To our relief, the winds settle down in about an hour allowing us some sleep.
Friday, June 30th – Early the next morning, The Captain and Nelson get up and start the motor to head into Santa Barbara. It turns out that we had dragged anchor a little, luckily not far and fortunately away from land and not into another boat. We had had trouble setting our anchor the previous afternoon. Those strong winds were a lesson. We thought that we had plenty of anchor chain out. We resolve to be even more diligent about anchoring and back down really hard to ensure that the anchor is well set. The Captain also decides to set the GPS each night to monitor our position and alert us in case of anchor drag.
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Leaving Smugglers Cove with winds at 18 mph and higher, The Captain sets the first reef in the sail, and we cruise along happily for about half an hour when the winds begin to slow. Within another half hour, we take out the reef, and shortly thereafter, we are under engine again. It was a great sail while it lasted.
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Securely ensconced in her preferred position out of the wind and the cold, The First Mate is a happy sailor. She also discovers that keeping her body as locked in place as possible and low where there is less feel of rocking helps her queasiness. She is going to conquer this yet!
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0900 – Hailing the Santa Barbara Harbormaster, we request a berth in the marina. We are told that they have one berth remaining for a boat our size. “If it is still available when you get here, you can have it.” With little wind, we go to full throttle. We arrive at the marina in an hour and get the berth. We knew we needed to get here early on this July 4th weekend since the marina will not take advanced reservations, but we did not think that by 1000 we would be getting the last one!
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Tied up and secure, everyone is hungry. Eggs and bacon anyone? There are no dissents.
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Susan and Don Bennett, friends of ours from our early 1970’s Navy days in Naples, Italy, live in Montecito. They come down to the boat for cocktails that evening, and then we all go out to a local restaurant for dinner.
Saturday, July 1st – A full day on land! Should The First Mate dare admit this? She has a bit of cabin fever after the confinement of the boat, and we were only out for three days! Between the queasiness, the drowsiness caused by the motion of the boat and the imposed inactivity, she is wondering if she might go stir-crazy? How will she ever be able to do a lengthy passage which this dream of theirs to sail the world will require? “Well, time will tell,” she counsels herself.
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Meanwhile, the 3 of us enjoy a day in Santa Barbara hiking and walking around with a bit of shopping thrown in for diversion. The weather is perfect, but the July 4th weekend crowd is almost overwhelming. Coming from little Telluride, it sure is a change.
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That evening, Telluride friends, Sheila and Stephen Wald, join us on the boat for cocktails. A sailor and former sailboat owner, Stephen is thrilled to be standing at the helm of Avante.
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Not far ahead of us lies Point Conception, a small peninsula where the coast turns north. We must round this point on our way to San Francisco. Unfortunately, this point has a nasty reputation for its heavy winds and turbulent seas. Everything that we have read and heard advises caution regarding weather at Point Conception. Although our goal is to leave Sunday, the weather forecasts say to wait until later in the week. Winds are now averaging over 25-knots with gusts much higher, and the direction of the wind would be right on our nose. No, now is not the time to brave the Point.
The delay puts us in a bind. Nelson has to fly out no later than next Saturday to attend a wedding. That means we need to be in either Monterrey or San Francisco for him to have access to an airport. Wednesday, therefore, is the latest we could leave Santa Barbara in order for that to happen. If not, he will have to fly out of Santa Barbara leaving us to round that point by ourselves when a good weather window finally appears. There is nothing to do but keep our fingers crossed and monitor the weather forecasts one day at a time.
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The wind may be blowing out off Point Conception, but here in Santa Barbara, it is absolutely perfect with blue skies, bright sun and balmy temperatures.
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Monday, July 3rd – It continues to look like the first possible sailing date to get decent conditions at Point Conception will be later in the week. How ironic that we had such light winds on our passage north from San Diego and now we have too much wind to continue on! Santa Barbara has nice winds, however, and with a few chores done, the 3 of us head out for a sail.
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Tuesday, July 4th – Weather conditions at the Point are still ugly while the wind here in Santa Barbara remains perfect. We invite Susan and Don Bennett out for an afternoon sail. Out in the bay once sails are raised, Don assumes the helm like a true former Naval Officer.
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Even though we have not lived near each other since our Naples and then Harvard days in the 70’s, we have kept in touch. Now with children grown, we have the time to visit. Susan and Don will be joining us in Telluride later this summer for golf and a good bit of fresh mountain air.
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A while later, Nelson assumes the helm showing he is unencumbered by anything as regimented as Naval protocol.
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On a downwind leg, with extra helping hands, we raise our large bright yellow spinnaker. The First Mate is not enamored with this spinnaker or any spinnaker on Avante. The forces are strong, lines are complicated, flying it can be tricky, and it always (in her mind anyway) has an issue. But fly it we do, and it is beautifully impressive.
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July 4th ends perfectly for those aboard Avante. Sitting out on deck in the evening finishing the last of our wine, we watch the fireworks burst directly overhead. There could not have been more perfect front row seats than we had. Being “stuck” in Santa Barbara does have its good points!
Wednesday, July 5th – With continued wind warnings for Point Conception, we give up any thought of leaving today. Unfortunately, Nelson’s schedule cannot be put off. He decides to leave this morning to give himself plenty of time. We are sorry to see him go, for it was great having him on the boat. The confidence he gave The First Mate with his presence was wonderful on this first leg of the trip. We are further sorry to see him go because he had been as eager as we are for the first-time experience of sailing under San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge into that famed harbor. The First Mate jokes that if she can figure out how to superimpose a photo of him with us going under the bridge, she will do so.
It looks now that the earliest we will be able to leave is Saturday. We decide to rent a car to get more done with the extra time we now have on our hands. A trip to Costco and the grocery store re-provisions the boat. The First Mate gets her hair done which is wonderful. All the laundry is done. The boat is cleaned. We are ready!