~ MINI YACHT CRUISING ~ Angel Island Panoramic | South Bay | The Boom Goes Bang!

As you may know, it’s been my ambition to sail to Bodega Bay for some time now. Well today was not going to be that day, again. Several of you, perhaps me included, now doubt if we’ll ever make it that far north.
We set sail in much the usual way, motoring out of the harbor in the morning fog forecast is from the south, with luck to push the ever hopeful north. To begin, the winds fails to materialize at all and thus we labor under the steady din of the iron genny. Hours later we arrive
and without regret, a night is spent blissfully at anchor
by noon the following day, we lay the gate and push into the bay
dodging the first of many cargo ships, container ships and oil tankers
transiting the golden gate and the infamous “potato patch” is best not taken lightly.
One must beware the significant tidal current
and especially the threat of wind over tide
I find the free open-source program “OpenCPN” to be an excellent navigation and route planning application,
which I run on a laptop, secured below decks

HMB to TI (Tue, 06/06):

approx 20 miles *to GGB*
conservatively @3.5 kts, that will take ~6 hours
Aim to arrive at slack water (followed by ebb!)

consulting the tide tables we note that

slack is 4:36 PM
arrive at GGB 3:36 PM

giving us a suggested departure time of: 9:30 AM (or a bit earlier)

We get through with no drama and make way toward our stop for the night
the next day sees a quick hike up to the top of Angel Island
for what must be the best view of the entire Bay Area
It’s been several days now, and a marina starts to seem like a good idea
but what’s with SF marinas being so tough to get into these days?
why on earth they make it so difficult for transients, one can only imagine
perhaps its something to do with those wayward souls in Richardson bay
anyway, some marinas are now prohibitively expensive
some are closed to transients
some have bizzare and baroque procedures for getting registered
and a few are a quick and convenient phone call away
the south bay it is then

its a gray morning but jonah has the bit between her teeth
she’s starting her homeward run up under the bay bridge
past the city waterfront, and out into the infamous slot
the wind is blowing, and for a while
we get too close to the wind shadow of the skyscrapers
and are left luffing off the embarkadero
with ferries jockeying for position at the docks
the engine is quickly started
and we avoid any unecessary complications
then the wind returns and we tack our way up
past alcatraz and onward to the bridge
through the gate and winds go light
and the code zero, slash tweener, slash “kite” is deployed

if there’s one thing ive learned, or not learned
over and over again
it’s that it aint over till its over…
after a nearly flawless 6 day cruise
and under the remit of let no good deed go unpunished…
just before reaching our home port
i turn to avoid a racing fleet of 505 dinghies
and accidental gybe in suddenly strong wind,
causing the mainsheet to part company with the boom
in a quite violent manner
highlighting that after 37 years, and PO repairs
aluminum’s gonna corrode
oh well, that wasn’t exactly “bluewater” spec
we can rebuild her
make her better, stronger, faster?
stay tuned for the exciting new mainsheet attachment method!

i found this boom bail for my 2″ diameter boom, from racelite
now that looks more business like, bluewater even, but I will reserve judgement until it proves itself at sea

in order to appreciate the gravity of going north
along the california coast up past Point Reyes
one needs to understand the local geography and prevailing wind conditions
afterall, who among us wants to go to windward in that!
so we must wait for a weather window
ideally with southerly winds for a couple of days
then in the event of making the harbor at Bodega
one is left with the very real prospect of getting stuck in port
due to the return of unreasonably high winds

all this is to say that i’m a chicken,
some might call it prudent
or maybe a bit of a fair weather sailor
but it’s all relative, right?

so i needed a new steaming light as the original was no longer servicable
having decided on a masthead all-around light that could double as an anchor light
eventually i settled on the Perko fitting
but the problem was how to fit it to the mast?
being somewhat handy with 3d modeling and having a 3d printer
i felt compelled to solve the issue by designing a custom bracket
the top of the mast is rather busy with the backstay, sheeves for the main halyard, etc
therefore, i wanted something that could attach on the side of the mast
i began by modeling the profile of the mast extrusion
then a quick mock up of the perko fitting
and finally designed a bracket the would attach the light fitting to the side of the mast
the finished item was printed in uv resistant ABS plastic with 100% fill to make it strong

The sailing vessel Jonah
The best little ship on the ocean
if you’ll pardon my bias