I like our lifestyle. We work on projects for a while someplace. Then, we go sailing someplace else and get to see how our projects hold up to reality. In the process, we get new ideas so that when we get to that someplace else, we do projects to implement the new ideas — and so on. I think we would go nuts if we only did projects without traveling, or traveling without the projects. Both are needed and in the right proportion with the right intervals. So having done a bunch of projects in Brisbane, it was now time to travel and see how our new capabilities work and how things hold up. The trip North to Drakes Bay was a non-eventful voyage. We motor-sailed into light headwinds with rain and drizzle. For us, the rain and drizzle were great. We don’t get enough of that kind of weather in Southern California, and we saw very little of it in San Francisco. So we enjoyed the passage and anchored in Drakes Bay in the early afternoon. That gave us most of the afternoon to enjoy the sights and sounds of this majestic location. During that interval, we had sunny and clear times and complete fog-ins alternating every few hours. Definitely not boring. We also had the entire bay to ourselves until late at night when another sail boat arrived.
We could have stayed in Drakes Bay for several days, but the weather to head South was perfect, so the next morning, we weighed anchor and set a course for the Farallones. I was looking forward to passing close by these rocky islands that I had heard stories of. We had nice following seas and increasing winds as the day wore on. Around noon, we passed close by the southern island and we set about to gybe so that we could head towards Half Moon Bay. The Gybe was uneventful despite the high winds that were accelerating us to 8 knots and beyond. Here we saw lots of whales. Several different kinds, lots of spouting and even a couple of tail-fluke shows–probably hump-back whales. As we approached shore, we spotted a couple of other sail boats heading South. We dropped most of our sails before we entered the Half Moon Bay channel leaving the main up until just before entering the harbor and completing a 50 mile sail.
In Half Moon Bay, we anchored near where we anchored on our trip North last May. With the afternoon sun, the place was just as beautiful as we remembered it. The green hills were fabulous in the sun which is how it was during our last visit. I am told that fog is more the norm. It was so nice that, like last May, we decided to stay an extra day.
Brenda keeps a very close eye on the weather models when we are traveling. We had good internet access, so I downloaded onto my Nokia N810 Maemo Mapper application updated NOAA charts, USGS topo maps and satellite photos of places we might visit on the way South. While I was downloading all that info, Brenda noted that the weather models indicated that by departing the next morning, we would make similar speed, so we planned another 50 mile leg to stop in Santa Cruz for a night and a day, then leaving late in the evening to make the longer distance down the Big Sur coast when the winds were lighter and also arrive during daylight at San Simeon where we could anchor and rest. That would bypass Monterrey (which was too rolly in the anchorage last May) and get us visits in two new anchorages.
When sailing, things never go exactly as planned. We did take advantage of the great fuel prices in Half Moon Bay by topping off the tanks with 80 gallons of diesel — the first time ever we have had the fuel tanks full. I think we took a year to use the 1/2 tank level that we launched Mahdee with — this is something I kid my power boating brother-in-law about. The old fighter pilot credo is that the only time you have too much fuel is when you are on fire. So, we now had full fuel tanks just in case, but I much, much prefer sailing.
As we pulled out of Half Mood Bay to raise the sails the wind was blowing strong. It was actually blowing stronger than Brenda and I expected that early in the morning. We raised the Mainsail and the staysail. Strange, the winds seemed to be dying, so we raised the foresail and the jib too. With all four lowers set, we were broad-reaching at slightly over 4 knots. Not exactly screaming. I could see a sailboat ahead of us going South with a spinnaker up. I think we were gaining on him. He probably noticed that to, because down came the spinnaker and with no sails, they pulled ahead, no doubt running their engine. I don’t give up on sailing that easily.
By mid-day, our speed was closer to 3 knots and if we gybed just past Pigeon Point, we could sail/drift right into our old anchorage in Ano Nuevo just before sunset. That’s exactly what we did. Of course, just as we were ready to drop sails, the winds came up strong. A typical sailing day — high winds while trying to raise or lower sails and while trying to weigh or drop anchor with the motor, almost no winds when you have the sails set and you want the wind.
Ano Nuevo was also just as beautiful as we remembered it from last May. It was also rolly, but I don’t think it was as rolly as in May. The swell was more from the protected Northwest rather than the exposed Southerly swell of last May. After months and months in the silty waters of San Francisco, I couldn’t help but be struck by how very clear the water was and the anchor came up clean as a whistle the next morning.
Having not made it to Santa Cruz, it was time to re-plan the trip. The models predicted that the winds would be non-existent until about 11AM, but then the winds should be good for a 50 mile day which would get us near Carmel. I have always wanted to see Carmel from the water. The guide books are not nearly so enthusiastic. We thought that if we got there before dark, we might be able to get in and anchor despite the reports of kelp, and if not, we would continue South over night when the forecast winds would be reasonable and arrive in San Simeon sometime during the following day. We decided to save the forecast onto the computer since we were not sure if we would have internet access for the next couple of days.
Monterrey bay was forecast to be a wind hole with no wind, so we headed slightly off shore in very light winds to avoid the bay entrance. We had all sails except the staysail up as we crept along at 2-3 knots. Two other sail boats with not a stich of sail up motored along the shore and past us. But, as the day wore on, the winds crept up as forecast. Soon, we were actually going fast enough to get to Carmel before dark and I could see that we were going to pass the sailboats with no sails up off in the distance in Monterrey Bay. Also, as the winds came up, we saw the whales again. Apparently they like wind and waves because we saw no whales in the calmer winds near Ano Nuevo.
Pretty soon, we were moving right along at over eight knots and surfing down the faces of some of the waves. Lots of fun in the daylight. Mahdee was a little squirrelly in these conditions. It was time to take some sail down and the obvious choice was to drop the foresail. It was being partially blanked by the main anyway and then we would be able to point more towards Carmel without the sail flogging in the lee of the main.
Normally, while dropping the fore, Brenda steers and ensures the halyards which run to the cockpit run out smoothly while I control the halyards at the foreshrouds and ensure the gaff comes down smoothly and stays horizontal. It took Brenda (or me) full attention at the helm to keep Mahdee pointed right, so I decided to drop the foresail by myself. It came down very nicely. We left the main and jib up until we got closer to Carmel.
I like to train and practice so that when things are going badly, emergency actions are not being done for the first time. One area that I wanted more practice in was heaving-to. In San Francisco Bay, we hove-to under various sails. With the two sails of a sloop there are may less sail combinations. But the best hove-to configuration can also change with wind and waves. We were not entirely satisfied with our hove-to angle in the Bay winds. I wanted to heave-to with mainsail only in moderately high winds with waves. Here was our chance. The winds were probably around 25 knots, the waves were pretty steep, but not too big. So, I say to Brenda that we are going to drop the jib on the run, and then come up on a starboard tack and heave-to. She is not thrilled, but I think she also wants to see how Mahdee will sit in these conditions.
I go forward to drop the jib and tie it into the bowsprit netting and Mahdee is still scooting along at over 8 knots with full mainsail. While running, I like to rig preventers and vangs on the boom to better control the spar. The preventer keeps the boom from coming back and gybing if the wind shifts or the boat yaws off a wave. The vang holds the boom down so that it doesn’t ride up and down and chafe the sail on the rigging. Mahdee was designed with a jaunty mainsail and foresail which keeps the boom up high on a run. This is good since a surefire way to break a boom is to have it rigged with preventers and then have the boat roll and drag the boom through the water. Mahdee is unlikely to do that.
The vang and preventers are especially important in light winds and rolly seas. We had waves, but with lots of wind directly aft, the mainsail really didn’t need the preventers too much so the plan was for me to remove the vang and preventer, haul in the sheet and then we’d turn up into the wind for a starboard hove-to position. I released the vang and then went forward to release the preventer and Brenda kept Mahdee on a rail straight course. But, the instant I released the preventer, the wind died completely. The big waves were still there, and without the full and drawing mainsail to stabilizer her, Mahdee started bucking. The main boom was bouncing up and down and with the fully released 200 feet of main sheet, the boom was also sweeping from port to starboard and back again.
I had secured the vang line to the boom, but the shockled preventer was ripped out of my hand and shot aft towards Brenda. Brenda saw it coming and went into defensive mode crouched next to the steering housing with a hand over her head to keep the lines from around her neck and one on the wheel to try to steer. By the time I got back to the cockpit, the 200 feet of mainsheet was wrapped around everything and tangled with the preventer. The preventer line had been sucked through main sheet blocks, several of which had multiple lines going through where only one was intended to be. Meanwhile, Mahdee was still bucking and the boom was bouncing and the shock loading on the sheets and preventers made it very dangerous to get hands near the blocks. Brenda was still hunkered down steering from the cockpit sole and I worked cautiously to pull in the mainsheet and untangle the sheet.
Eventually, I had the main sheeted in and we worked Mahdee into the direction of the waves. The windex, however, was spinning around and around and the tell tails were slack and the only thing happening was that the short steep waves were rolling and bouncing Mahdee all over. So much for that experiment. Nobody would want to heave-to with no wind, so it wasn’t exactly a failure. We started the Cummins engine and motored into Carmel to look for a place to anchor for the night.
