Saturday, December 20, 2008

San Francisco to San Diego



We left San Francisco (8/26/08) with a good wind and nice sailing but it was very short lived. After 4 hours the wind got lighter and lighter and the seas got rougher and rougher; I know it makes no sense but there were 2 swell patterns and a bit of chop on top. We intended to sail straight for Santa Barbara and went out about 20 miles. We decided to alter course for Monterey about midnight since we had to start the engine when we were making less than 2 kn and rolled from toe rail to toe rail. We spend the day and night in Monterey and left the following day by thick fog (2 boat length visibility) just about the same we had for most of the trip. we ended up motoring all the way to San Simeon and entered the bay by almost zero visibility at 10 PM. (Thank god for radar and Chart Plotter) We stayed there for 2 nights and left in the morning early, again thick fog for Morro Bay. 4 Hrs. later we entered the bar at Morro Bay again all powering and near zero visibility. However the ocean was calm with a NW swell of about 6 feet (very comfortable) we really enjoyed Morro Bay over the Labor Day weekend with the fog finally lifting. Today was NW 10 - 15 kn wind forecasted and we thought to leave for Santa Barbara. Well, there was about 3-5kn SE wind and calm seas. (NW swell 6+- ft) 3 Hrs. later we entered Avila Beach and shortly thereafter the fog rolled in again. Well, the tomorrow forecast is again for 10-15kn NW wind and we will leave very early for Santa Barbara once more. 9/4/08We are in Santa Barbara after another trip mostly motoring from Avila Beach. At 4:30 PM we hoisted the spinnaker and sailed to Goleta anchorage with very light wind (boat speed 4.5kn). We just made the anchorage at 8:30 PM with the last of daylight. The next day we motored to Santa Barbara Harbor and were able to get a guest slip, unbelievably reasonable for this area (60 cents a foot).

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