RAQ (Rarely Asked Questions):
Q: Where do you commonly find clumps of indigenous eel grass in the Channel Islands?
A: In the raw water intake hoses for the engine cooling systems of pleasure craft.
Q: If you start at 6AM, in the dark, and it’s 65 nautical miles to the next port, and the winds are light and variable, and your anchor is doing one knot, how long will it take you to get to your destination?
A: Half an hour to untangle the knotted anchor rode, plus ten hours motoring.
Finally, going some place during daytime. Finally, sailing, with good wind. Our trip across from Santa Barbara to Santa Cruz Island was incredible. We started motoring, since we were meeting our friend Carol there at 3:30, but as the wind picked up, we switched to sails, and were soon moving faster than we had been under power — over eight knots at the peak.
Carol took the ferry to the island, and we picked her up at the dock. Sounds simple. Sounded simple when we talked to the park ranger about doing it. Wasn’t simple. There’s no real place to tie up to the pier at Scorpion Anchorage, just a ladder coming down to where the swell is beating against the pier. Just keeping the boat in place was a challenge. Getting Carol and all her luggage down the ladder safely was even more so. Carol told the ranger at the pier what we were planning, and they said, “Oh. I guess you could do that.”
But it worked, and she joined us as our first house guest of our journey aboard Gardyloo. And she was a great first guest, bringing both enthusiasm and food.
We moved over to Prisoner’s Harbor for the first night. There, on the next day, we got our dinghy together with its new electric outboard. Suzana and Carol were ferried to shore for a short hike, then back again.
The following day, we went out for a sail. But before putting up the sails, we noticed the engine behaving badly. Smoking, swearing, and playing pool. Actually, just smoking, and not putting out as much raw water from the cooling system as usual. A little exploration turned up a clogged raw water intake. And a half hour routing around under the floor, disconnecting hoses (“look, it’s just dribbling water into the bilge”), then poking the wrong tool down the hose (“look, now it’s gushing water into the bilge”), reassembling the hoses, and we were off.
We stopped briefly in Potato Harbor, a really tiny anchorage with cliff walls all around.
Then on back to Scorpion Anchorage for the night.
The following day, we rowed the dinghy (too lazy to get out the outboard again) to shore, some of us getting thoroughly drenched while beaching the dinghy. From there, we hiked up into the hills for a view of Gardyloo at anchor (and of the two ferries):
Back on the boat, we packed up Carol’s remaining stuff (minus all the food we’d eaten and/or she’d donated to our ongoing travels), and dinghied her and her luggage to shore. Amazingly, it got there dry. We must be learning. Carol took off for home, and we stayed the night at Scorpion.
The following morning, we got up very early, leaving at 6AM in the dark, in order to make it a (mostly) daylight sail to Two Harbors on Catalina.
The anchor came up with the chain tied around it in a knot. It took a lot of work and some ingenuity to untangle things enough to bring the anchor aboard. Even then, there was a knot in the chain that will have to be dealt with at Two Harbors. But good enough to move on.
Heading for Two Harbors, we saw another of the Channel Islands, Anacapa, plus a ton of dolphins, some of whom joined the boat for a time, swimming alongside.
In Two Harbors, we tried their unique mooring system (google Catalina mooring). It only took us three tries.
Then we dinghied in to town (with the outboard this time) to have dinner at the only restaurant. This blog entry is being written under the influence of the Mahi special, a glass of Pinot Grigio, and a very good flourless chocolate ganache.
