05/12/2002 - 05/13/2002
The winches are ready for some sailing
Forecasts predicting a tranquil week of weather along the central coast of California sounded like perfect motivation to head to the next destination. The plan was to sail to San Simeon and spend a couple of days prior to sailing to Morro Bay. The trip to San Simeon is approximately 80 to 90 nautical miles. With an estimated speed of 6 knots, fourteen hours of sailing (or motoring) stood between Monterey and San Simeon. Given the trip duration, we decided leaving in the early morning made better sense than arriving in San Simeon at night. At 3:00 am, the alarm clock sounded like the starting gun of the race to San Simeon. A weather check on the VHF along with a scan outside confirmed today as the departure date. Between the beautiful stars and the lack of wind, the forecast for tranquil looked right on target. Fire up Sven, our 76 hp Volvo diesel engine, and let's go.
Night time sailing is not an area of vast expertise for us. Sailing in Florida from Miami to West Palm Beach at night and a few evening sails on San Francisco Bay introduced the beauty of sailing at night. With Duncan cleaning up the dock lines and putting up the mainsail and Robin at the helm, we proceeded toward the first waypoint. Rather than seeing the lights from hotels and coastline businesses ahead of us, an eerie darkness starts to approach. The dark fog closes in, the wind increases and the swells pick up. Before you can say "Ugh - fog", Whisper and crew are enshrouded in fog. The visibility drops to less than 1/4 of a mile and the stars disappear. Robin claims the visibility only extends to the bow lights on the bow of the boat. The start of the journey quickly moves from tranquil to a navigation challenge. Using radar, autopilot and a horn blasting every two minutes, we navigate past the big point of land, Point Pinos, marking the south end of Monterey Bay. The eerie sound of the gong buoy marking the point surrounds us, but we cannot and never do see the buoy. Thank goodness for radar and GPS.
Robin does not look like she felt sick
Robin's theory on the kiss of death with respect to seasickness is threefold. First, for the first couple of hours at sea, try not to go below decks and the worst place to go below decks is the head (the head is the bathroom for you landlubbers). Second, be prepared for everything to prevent stress. The preparation checklist includes checking the weather and buoy reports, preparing meals the day before, setting up snacks and drinks in the cockpit, filling a thermos with hot water for tea, setting up jacklines and preventers, inspecting the rig, stowing all gear among many other little items. Third, when all else fails look at the horizon. An hour into the thick fog, Robin needs to go to the bathroom, is stressed and can only see the bow lights Whisper's bow. After stripping off the safety harness, life jacket, layers of foulies (thick gortex jacket and bib overalls), fleece, jeans, long underwear, going to the bathroom, putting back on the layers of long underwear, jeans, fleece, foulies, life jacket and safety harness, Robin returns to the cockpit and looks for the horizon after blasting the horn for its two minute interval. Whoops, no horizon. Shortly thereafter, Robin starts to feel a little seasick.
By 9:00 am, the fog starts to lift and Robin rallied from feeling sick. The Big Sur coastline peeks through the fog and haze. While tranquil does not describe the conditions, 20 - 25 knots of wind and non-tranquil seas coming from both the northwest at 7 seconds and the southwest every 13 seconds, the day is becoming beautiful. The coastline sparkles with cars driving on US 1. After reaching Point Sur, the course changed to a more southeast direction which proved more comfortable.
Point Piedras Blancas
In the San Francisco Bay and Monterey Bay, we listened to the weather channel on the VHF covering Northern California. The weather reported in Northern Californian goes as far south as Point Piedras Blancas. In preparing for the passage, a combination of Northern California weather reports and Southern California weather reports were needed since San Simeon is south of Point Piedras Blancas. While in Monterey, the Southern California weather could not be heard on the VHF. Somewhere around Point Sur, the Southern California weather channel started to come in on the radio. Passing Point Piedras Blancas meant we switched to listening to the Point Piedras Blancas to Point Arguello forecasts. This morning the forecast predicted tranquil for the next week and now the forecast predicts gale fore winds starting on Wednesday.
Duncan bundled up. At anchor in San Simeon.
San Simeon is just past Point Piedras Blancas. By 5:30 pm, Whisper's anchor sat on a sand bottom in 25 feet of water with 175 feet of scope in San Simeon Bay. Gazing from the cockpit toward land, we watched kids playing on the beach with the Hearst Castle perched on the mountain behind the beach. The town of San Simeon near the beach consisted of a church and a general store/restaurant. Breakfast at the restaurant is supposed to be tasty. At this point, we planned on going ashore tomorrow to check out the town and restaurant. What a difference a night can make.
The first couple of hours at anchor proved to be very calm and comfortable. After munching on manicotti and bread for dinner, we quickly proceeded to bed. Shortly thereafter, we encountered swells that rocked the boat from side to side anywhere from 10 to 20 degrees seeming more like 45 degrees if you tried to sleep. Duncan decided to put out the flopper stoppers. Flopper stoppers are designed to reduce the rock and roll motion of the boat in anchorages. In this case, the floppers did not stopper anything. Sleeping consisted of closing eyes and waiting for the next swell to toss us from side to side of the bed. By 5 am, the swell rolled Robin toward Duncan and we simulatenously said, "Let's get out of here." After listening to the weather forecast which now predicted the gale force winds for Tuesday, the decision to leave was finalized. In record time, Whisper's anchor was stowed and we were under way to Morro Bay.
Entrance to Morro Bay
From 6:00 am to 9:00 am, the ocean greeted us with calm, tranquil seas and winds. As a result, we motored for most of the morning. One cool phemonmenon with a calm ocean is the ability to see more of the sea life. Many otters munching on otter food (abalone, clams, mussels) paved the path to Morro Bay. En route, the discussion centered around the rolling in the anchorage at San Simeon. "Were we in too shallow (~25 ft.)?", "Did the incoming tide during the night impact the swell?", " Did the wind over the hill impact our roll?". These questions will surely be answered as we gain more experience in anchorages along the coast.
Gradually, the wind started to pick up to 15 to 20 knots. By the time we reached the entrance to Morro Bay, white caps dotted the ocean. Arriving at the entrance to Morro Bay at 11:00 am on a flood current allowed a smooth and uneventful entry into the bay. Rounding the dogleg channel toward the yacht club provided ample time to furl the sail and prepare for acquiring a mooring.
Morro Rock from Whisper's Mooring in Morro Bay
According to the cruising guides and the voicemail of the Morro Bay Yacht Club, moorings are available in front of the yacht club for visitors on a first come first serve basis. A mooring is identified by a ball in the water whereby a line from the boat is attached to the "mooring" to allow the boat not to deploy its anchor but securely attach to a permanent anchor provided by a harbor or yacht club. A cruise by the moorings revealed a couple of available moorings. Using the handy "Happy Hooker" tool to "grab" the mooring on the first try, Whisper floated calmly and non-rolling in Morro Bay. Aaah, let's get some sleep.