S/V Adventurer

I've always been a goal oriented kind of guy. I seem to have a need to be working towards something. If I don't, I feel stagnate. I've had lots of little insignificant goals over the years, but the major goal of getting us to Mexico on our boat is about complete. On Sunday, we are leaving San Diego, crossing the border on our little floating home, and then we should be checking into Ensenada, Mexico sometime on Monday morning. Major life goal...check. Yesterday, Brenda asked, “what is your goal now that we've basically made it to Mexico?” It's an interesting question that has sort of thrown me for a loop. Since I've always had some major goal that I've been striving to achieve, and my goal of the last 20 years is basically done, what now? I hadn't thought about it until Brenda brought it up, but now my peaceful and zen state of mind is going berserk. I've been thinking that I could have a new goal of getting us to a specifi...

For the last week, we've been tied to the municipal dock at Shelter Island in San Diego. As glamorous as it sounds to be tied up at the municipal dock, trust me, it isn't as glamorous as it may seem. There has been a steady stream of vagrants, drug deals, thefts, and police busts during our week long stay. Last night, Brenda and I were going for our nightly stroll and ran into one of our “neighbors” being handcuffed and carted away (I use the term neighbor loosely. He happens to be living on a boat that doesn't run, barely floats, and is full of stolen goods that has been tied up at the dock close to us) Yeah, glamorous isn't the word I would use to describe this place. When we first pulled in to the municipal dock, there were a few cruisers that are on their way to Mexico, but the vast majority of the boats here are what we would call derelicts. I've done my best to keep my social and political views off of this blog and today is going to be no different...

I hope you have some time today, because I can tell you right now, this is going to be a long bit of rambling. We set sail from Oceanside, California this morning and have made it to San Diego, which is about as far south as we can go before we get to Mexico. It's kind of a big deal. It's such a big deal that I'm feeling a bit emotional about the whole thing (yes it's true, tough guys have feelings too). If you've been following along, you can probably do the math and figure out that we left our home waters about 2 ½ months ago. You may be thinking that 2 ½ months is a long time to sail the coast of the US and get to Mexico, but really it's not. I've been dreaming about this trip for nearly 20 years, so 2 ½ months compared to my 20 years of dreaming seems like the blink of an eye. I have told people for years that I was going to sail around the world someday. The dream started shortly after I bought my first sailboat in my very early 20...

The first thing I want to mention today, is the fact that we have left Santa Barbara after being stuck there for a handful of extra days while we had our boat repaired from our little hit and run experience. As nice of a place Santa Barbara is, the last few days of our time there left a bad taste in our mouth. It's unfortunate because before our little accident, we were absolutely in love with the place. I have been debating with myself whether or not I should tell you all about our experience dealing with the owner of the boat that hit us. It was such a shocking and depressing bunch of interactions that I almost feel like the story should be shared, because it's almost unbelievable in the boating community. Most boaters are a great bunch of people. Nearly every boater I have ever met would bend over backwards and give you the shirt off their back if needed. Yes, even power boaters (and yes John, that was directed at you...you're not half bad). But I don't ...

After a couple of days at sea, we have made it to Santa Barbara. Yes it's true, we are officially in Southern California. It's warm, it's sunny, and if I look out our window towards shore, I can see a beautiful sandy beach with palm trees lining the shore. I'm pretty sure that if you look up the definition of “we've made it”, palm trees lining the shore of a sunny and warm sandy beach come up in the description. We had a mixed bag of conditions on our trip here from Monterey - everything from warm sun as we left, to cold and damp fog within a half hour of leaving, to 20 knots of breeze on the nose, to flat calm, and even 30 knots of wind and a steep 10 foot confused swell as we rounded Point Conception. But right after we rounded Point Conception, everything changed. It is said that the Point is the dividing line between central and southern California. North of that line, it's common for the coast to be shrouded in fog, temperatures are cooler, a...

It's currently 3 AM, Brenda is down below sleeping, and I'm on watch. It's pitch black outside, it's foggy, it's cold, and even though there is a pretty steep 6-8 foot swell, the waves are hitting us from directly behind, so other than the surge from the boat surfing down the face of the waves and the odd out of place wave that hits us on our side, the motion of the boat is relatively calm (relatively is the key word here folks). We left Monterey early this afternoon with our sites set on Santa Barbara. It's only about 220 nautical miles away, but with the forecasted light winds, the passage should take us about 2 days. 2 days at sea really isn't terribly long, but it sure can seem like forever sometimes. Especially right now while I am struggling to stay awake and I have 2 more hours on my shift before I can wake up Brenda. I'm thinking about moving all of our clocks forward just so I can wake her up earlier. I have a few things that hav...