A Hunter 33
| Sailing to Catalina |
For our first sailing-oriented vacation, we chartered a 33-foot boat and sailed to Santa Catalina Island. Although we lived in the Los Angeles area for two years, we had never been to Catalina, and at just over 20 miles from San Pedro it was a comfortable sailing distance. We made the trip in September, when Catalina still has summer weather but without the summer crowds.
Both of us were somewhat nervous about the trip, seeing as it was our first time sailing outside of San Francisco Bay and our first adventure on the high seas. Mike assuaged his pre-trip nervousness by reading cruising guides, checking the chart, and otherwise preparing; Evelyn silently enumerated the disasters that could strike us on the open ocean. As we drove down Highway 101 toward San Pedro, Mike noticed that Evelyn got quieter with each mile. However, he didn't realize that her cold feet were becoming ice blocks.
When we arrived in San Pedro, we drove over to take a look at the boat. The charter company was closed, but we were able to get down to the dock. Mike had originally chartered a 30-foot boat named Snowbird, but the charter company had warned us that they might not be done with remodeling work on Snowbird's interior. (The Corian guy was running late.) The socket wrench set lying on the bare wood of Snowbird's cabin made it clear that we were going to be upgraded to Vision, the Hunter 33 docked next to Snowbird.
Seeing the boat and reviewing its rigging made Mike feel much less nervous, but it had the opposite effect on Evelyn. It reminded her how little experience she had. The boat looked unmanageably huge to her. It was docked in a cramped corner with no clear exit. As Mike was poking around on the deck, a loaded tanker and a cruise ship passed in the channel. Evelyn imagined knocking into several boats on the way out of the slip, drifting into the path of huge ships that blast their horns in warning, being tossed around helplessly in the ocean swell, and sailing past our unseen destination into the heart of the Pacific Ocean. As we drove to dinner, Evelyn said, "I feel sick."
Mike had promised from the beginning that we would turn back without argument if Evelyn ever felt in danger. We decided to cancel the charter and take the ferry to Catalina instead. After dinner we visited a bookstore and wrote down the phone numbers for a few hotels in Avalon. (We had no reservations, since we planned to sleep on the boat.) We spent the evening disappointed but also somewhat relieved.
The next morning we took a walk out to the marina breakwater. It was already warm, the ocean was calm, and we could see Catalina in the distance. The prospect of sailing over seemed much less frightening in the light of day, with our target fully in view. We reverted to our original plan.
Vision was a fully equipped cruising boat, with a shower in the bathroom, a complete kitchen, and a CD player (although we didn't plan to use most of these amenities). The guy from the charter company walked us through the systems, from the roller-furling headsail to the autopilot to the barbecue grill mounted on the stern rail. It would have been an overwhelming amount of information if Mike hadn't learned most of it in his Bareboat Cruising course.
We set out just after noon. Two guys from the charter company helped maneuver the boat out of the slip, and we motored toward the opening in the breakwater. As soon as we passed the Los Angeles Light at the mouth of the harbor, we raised the sails, trimmed them for a beam reach, and set a course of 175 Magnetic. (Surprisingly and somewhat confusingly, Avalon is almost due SOUTH of San Pedro, not west.)
We had perfect sailing conditions, with enough wind to keep us moving well but not enough to generate any chop in the water. We traveled at 3 to 4 knots for the first few miles; as the wind picked up so did our speed, up to 6 or 7 knots. We had the Pacific to ourselves. We only had to adjust our course once to sail behind a cargo ship. As we approached the island, the west wind shifted more to the southwest, putting us on a close reach. We didn't make a single tack during the four hours of sailing. First Mate Evelyn actually took a short nap at one point!
As we approached the island, landmarks became clearer and clearer. We sailed straight for the Casino, which marks the northern edge of Avalon Harbor. When we arrived, we dropped our sails, started the engine, and waited outside of the breakwater for the harbor patrol to assign us a mooring. The harbor patrol boat pulled up alongside. The patrolwoman asked us how long our boat was (33 feet) and how long we planned to stay (two nights). She assigned us to Mooring 103 and gave us a map of the harbor. "To reach Mooring 103, stay to the right of the green pier and turn down the aisle that starts with Mooring 88."
Rather than look at the map, Mike headed into the harbor, looking for Mooring 88. All of the moorings on the right had numbers in the 200s; Mike saw Mooring 87 to his left and headed towards it, ending up on the wrong side of the green pier. We were headed for a dead end. Mike managed an acceptable if not beautiful back-and-fill, turning the boat around in the tight space without hitting any of the parked boats. The harbor patrol boat offered to lead us to our spot, an offer we gladly accepted. We pulled up to the mooring ball and Evelyn had no trouble picking up the line and attaching it to the bow and stern of the boat. We turned off the engine and put the boat to bed (put on the sail cover, coiled the lines, and so on).
We were safely in port, now all we had to do was get ashore. We had towed a small inflatable dinghy behind us, and we had an outboard motor that we could mount onto it. Mike started trying to loosen the bolts that held the outboard to the stern rail. Evelyn could see that he was pale and tired from the crossing and from eating only an apple for lunch, and she encouraged him to forget about the motor lest he drop it into the sea. We could paddle the dinghy ashore. Mike climbed into the dinghy to try paddling, but found that the oarlocks were missing. Evelyn laughed at how forlorn he looked sitting in the little boat.
Luckily, an excellent solution was at hand: Mike turned on the radio and called for the shore boat to come pick us up. Avalon has many nice services for boaters, one of which is a taxi service to and from your boat. Within minutes, the shore boat pulled alongside, we climbed in, and it took us ashore.
We ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant overlooking the harbor and the promenade. Our prediction of a quiet off-season was wrong. We had come during a marlin tournament. The harbor was filled with big fishing boats and the town was filled with groups of hearty men. After dinner we oriented ourselves to the town, finding the tour ticket booths, the breakfast places, and the public showers. Evelyn bought a pair of earrings. As the sun went down, we returned to our boat for the night.
The boat offered three options for where to sleep: a queen-size bed with little head room or ventilation at the stern, a "vee berth" (named for its shape) in the bow, or an air mattress in the main cabin. We elected to sleep in the main cabin for its combination of space and ventilation. Unfortunately, we couldn't fill the air mattress as fully as we would have liked. When one of us got up, the other would drop and feel the hard wood underneath. Outside we could hear the kind of noises familiar to anyone who has stayed in a busy campground: voices from nearby boats, the hum of generators, unidentifiable sounds. All accompanied by the rocking of the waves, made less gentle as people cruised by in their dinghies. We didn't sleep well, even after moving to the vee berth about halfway through the night.
The next morning we collected everything we needed for the day and called the shore boat. We showered in the public showers, then had a wonderful breakfast in a restaurant overlooking the water. From there we saw a cruise ship anchored outside of the harbor, with a tender shuttling people ashore. Staying ahead of the crowd, we bought tickets for an afternoon bus trip to the interior of the island and for the evening movie in the art-deco theater in the Casino.
We walked through town, then for a mile up to the botanical garden on the slopes above Avalon. It was very warm away from the water even though it was not yet mid-morning. The garden emphasized indigenous plants and desert plants. It was relatively small but nicely laid out.
The Wrigley Memorial, which overlooks the garden, was elegant — the white granite engraved with animals and plants found on the island. Sitting in a cool spot overlooking Avalon, we had our first real peace and quiet. We lingered for a while before walking back down to town.
We strolled through town, stopping at shops. Evelyn bought a sailboat charm for her charm bracelet; Mike bought a hat. After lunch we met our tour bus for a trip to the undeveloped interior of the island. The landscape was not too different from our East Bay hills, albeit surrounded by ocean. We saw a few of the famous Catalina buffalo, but only from very far away. The day was unusually clear, so we could easily see the mainland and the smog over downtown Los Angeles. We visited the Airport in the Sky, Catalina's high altitude airstrip.
The warm post-lunch ride made us both sleepy. We debated about returning to the boat for a nap, but decided to relax along the promenade instead. The town started to take on its expected off-season quiet as the cruise passengers returned to their ship. In one of the shops Evelyn found something she had long been looking for: a pretty, mid-sized, reasonably priced bag to use for the gym. We had dinner at a seafood restaurant with a view of our boat. From there we watched the cruise ship slowly turn and head off to Ensenada.
After dinner we meandered toward the Casino. We were among the first people to enter the theater and admire its impressive art deco elegance. We watched the movie Collateral, which was stylish and well acted but had too many unbelievable parts to be completely compelling. We strolled back to the pier in the warm evening. As the shore boat took us to our boat, we could see that the harbor was much quieter with the fishing boats gone. We slept in the vee berth.
The next morning we went ashore for breakfast, then prepared the boat for departure. We planned to travel up the coast of the island for a ways, then cut across the channel back to San Pedro.
Although we had the sails ready, there was no wind to fill them. We motored north up the Catalina coast toward Two Harbors. By the time we reached Long Point, the widest part of the island, it was uncomfortably hot and still windless. We unfurled the bimini (the canvas cover used to protect the cockpit from the sun), turned toward San Pedro, and engaged the autopilot.
With the engine running and the autopilot steering, we simply sat back and watched for traffic. We ate lunch in the shade of the bimini. We flushed our holding tank. Evelyn read a chapter of her book. We spotted a shark fin about 10 yards off the starboard beam. We looked at the flat water and prayed for wind.
With perhaps five miles left to go, just as Mike had resigned himself to motoring the whole way, we started to feel the stirrings of wind. Tired of the throb of the engine, we shut it down, raised our sails, and crept along at one or two knots. With the helm back in his hand, Mike felt the breeze become more consistent, then start to strengthen. We could both feel the boat picking up speed. By the time we had the Los Angeles Light firmly in our sight, the wind was up to 10 knots and we were really sailing! Thank you! Mike pointed the boat up into the wind for a while just to feel the wind in our faces and enjoy sailing the boat. It was a much better way to end the trip than simply motoring into the harbor.
The wind was still enticingly strong when we dropped our sails at about 4:00. As we headed into the harbor, we noticed how many marinas and channels there are in Los Angeles Harbor, the third-busiest port in the world (behind Hong Kong and Singapore). Did we remember which one we came out of? Mike thought so, but he did pick one wrong channel before finding the proper slip.
We made the tricky turn into the slip with assistance from a man on the dock. Our expedition was complete; we were back safe and sound. Once we were tied to the dock, Mike started tidying up the boat while Evelyn unloaded our personal gear. We spent the night in Culver City, then drove home up Highway 5 the next day.