Sail Cutthroat

Cutthroat Adventures 2009

12 August 2009

Many of you have raised this very pertinent question since my last blog – “What happened to the Central Coast?“ It’s not like we could actually do the Jeannie thing and cross my arms, blink, and there we are…docked in San Diego. So let me provide some explanation to this last leg of our summer 2009 West Coast travels down the coast.

We enjoyed our couple of days in Monterey, visiting old friends (Bob and Ruth Ann), and touring the beautiful town. Monterey has this awesome Aquarium that we visited. For such a small town, this place was packed with people – lots of families and small children. The City of Monterey has done a superb job with this facility. If you’re ever in the area, make it a “must do” stop. It’s well worth it! Yes, and the Photo Gallery found at the tab top right has lots of new pictures to see.

“From Monterey, we made the 100 mile sail continuing down the California Coast to Morro Bay. There are really not too many other safe harbors between Monterey and Santa Barbara. Morro Bay is the last entrance with one of those potentially nasty little bars where you must take special care when entering and leaving. So we needed to again time our departure from Monterey and arrival to Morro Bay with a flood tide and a daylight entrance. The area is pretty remote by California standards – largely agricultural and the harbor is home to numerous commercial fishing vessels taking advantage of the abundant and richly populated sea life. Speaking of sea life, we saw more whales, porpoise, sharks, birds, etc. than we have seen in the past 4 years of sailing the Pacific. And it wasn’t just at the Aquarium! From Morro Bay, we made a brief stop at San Luis Obispo only for the purpose of timing an early morning arrival to round Point Conception (still 40 miles @ 7 knots – you can do the math. We had to leave EARLY). This particular piece of real estate has the reputation of being very rough and has been nicknamed the Cape Horn of the west coast. We really weren’t looking for another Cape Mendecino experience – too close to home at this point. So we left early and despite our good intentions and well thought out plans, the wind gods were not looking favorably upon us. Again, the wind just came out of nowhere and there we were with 12 foot seas, and 35 knots of wind. It was also incredibly foggy making this somewhat dangerous. Yes, there’s no rest for the weary. We never did see the shore as we passed this otherwise distinguishable land feature. Once around, the skies opened, the sun broke through, the wind died back to its morning calm and the high seas retreated to the modest 2 – 3 foot swells so common to this part of the Pacific. We were finally back in Southern California. Five hours later we were tied up at the beautiful and friendly Santa Barbara Yacht Club. We’ve been trying to get space there for many years – but to no avail. So we were excited.”

Oh, wait just a minute…none of the above after leaving Monterey really happened. It was my first attempt at fiction and describes the way this trip was supposed to go. We didn’t’ stop in Morro Bay or San Luis Obispo or even the Santa Barbara Yacht Club. I still couldn’t get a reservation there! There were also no winds or high seas rounding Point Conception (although it really is referred to as the Cape Horn of the west coast). The weather was calm with very light winds and virtually no seas. Quite boring actually and memorable only from its lack of excitement. The sea life was in fact real, and exceeded all previous memories.

Back to non-fiction…Our “plan” was to leave Monterey and make all of these stops to include spending some time in the Channel Islands and then off to Catalina to meet up with good friends, Ed and Nancy on the s/v End of Watch II. But as most of you know, my Mom’s health has been especially dicey this summer and we were expecting to hear that her next destination would be the Venice Hospital’s emergency room. Well, that call came as we were leaving Monterey. Now, one of the good things about coastal cruising is that we can generally maintain cell phone coverage most of the trip. So we could keep pretty much in constant contact with my dear sister-in-law, Anna who was the “stuckee” on Mom Wag duty. Charlie, acting as the “stuckee in training” (yes the one who just left the boat in SF), got to stay with Mom until I got home. Well that didn’t’ work for too long and Anna decided she needed more help than they could provide. Mom/Marie suffers from congestive heart failure (among other things), and she was accumulating lots of fluid. The docs decided to remove it, and this sent her circling the drain and losing an immediate 15+ pounds putting here system in major distress which then put her in the ER and ultimately a rehab facility.

So we decided to put the boat in high gear, ripping through the last 400 miles and get to San Diego so I could get back to Florida bringing our little summer cruise down the coast to a rather abrupt end. Fortunately, we have spent lots of time cruising the Channel Islands and all points between Point Conception and San Diego in the years prior to heading Cutthroat south. This was our stomping grounds and while we would have thoroughly enjoyed revisiting those lovely areas, shortening our trip at this point doesn’t in any way take away from the absolutely fabulous travels we’ve had these past months and certainly over the course of our Pacific odyssey.

Once we rounded Point Conception, we did make a brief stop in Ventura, CA where we met up with Mike and Maureen from our Puerto Vallarta days (m/v Aaron Sawyer). We spent a lovely evening with them, and our good friend Ilene who all live in Oxnard. In part we stopped there awaiting the availability of our slip in San Diego, since we were arriving earlier than originally anticipated and getting moorage was proving to be more difficult than anticipated. We also briefly linked up with another FirstCommand colleague, John Spruill and his new wife Karyn whom we had not previously met. We always meet up with John whenever we’re in the area and

I flew back to Florida shortly after arriving in San Diego but Roger remains in California getting the boat all put back together and cleaned up. Cutthroat is moored right back at Sunroad Marina where we were previously located. We are in a larger slip where we can leave our dinghy hanging off the davits (didn’t fit in the old slip). The downside is that all our marina buddies are still on the J and I Docks, and with the exception of one very attractive sailboat right next to us, we are surrounded by large, ugly powerboats that restrict any view we might have had. Oh well – since we won’t be living aboard anyway, it really makes little difference. As a matter of fact, we decided to put our beloved Cutthroat on the market. We’ll see what happens with that – it’s such a great time to sell stuff! It’s time for us to be in Florida and move on to the next phase of life – which I’m very confident will be just as busy and perhaps even more exciting – okay, that’s a stretch. But whatever we decide to do, it will be fun and we will thoroughly enjoy it! Of that, I have the greatest confidence.

I will continue to provide brief updates from time to time – especially if we have some real…or possibly even imagined excitement. Yes, it’s time to probably make stuff up (MSU)…it will be fun!

Oh, and by the way, I picked Mom up from rehab yesterday. She is doing remarkably well having gained about half of the weight back and although she looks quite frail still is in her usual great spirits and figuring out how to drive me crazy again. Looks like life is getting back to normal and will be 100% once I get my little baby, Roger home this weekend. Thanks for all you kind messages and good wishes for Marie!

Until our next blog, perhaps when the s/v Cutthroat finds the perfect new captain and crew, we wish you fair winds and following seas. And we wish each of you your own exciting journey and next great adventure!

Elise and Roger

s/v Cutthroat