October 27 (Tuesday) through October 30 (Friday) Arrived in Bodega Bay, CA

Our next opportunity to leave Humboldt Bay did not present itself until the following Monday. We probably wouldn't have left if it wasn't for a fishing vessel that entered the bar and moored just down from us.  With a need to verify the bar condition apart from the Coast Guard's report of 12 foot breakers, I rushed over to the fisherman to ask about the bar.  "Oh the bar.  It's fine.  It was really calm coming over.  Yeah they are exaggerating [bar condition]. You will be fine."  assured us the fishing boat captain.  With this vital intelligence, we headed toward the bar instead of the pump out station which we would have needed for another 4 days of stay at the marina. We made it through nervously but like the fisherman was saying we were fine.  Big swell but no breakers.

On our way south, we passed two major rough-sea milestones: Point Mendocino and Point Arena.  Point Mendocino is noted for its turbulent waters and high winds.  When one looks at the underwater topography, one understands why.  It's a convergence point for multiple ridges called Mendocino Triple Junction where turbulent seas can be present.

Before passing Point Mendocino, we were blessed with a siting of a large pod of White-sided Dolphins.  We were surprised to see so many at once.  They stayed with us long enough for us to capture them on our video.  See below.

Check out their snouts and eyes.  It's difficult to capture their faces normally. They were only about 2-3 ft long.   

Lucky for us here are the videos of their visit. Click on the links below.

White sided dolphins visit our boat

White Sided Dolphin mega pod

Sophia is controlling the poor man's auto helm.  We tied lines to the steering wheel and pull the lines based on the direction we want to go.  It's kinda like reins on horses.

In full rain gear ready for rain. 

Bodega Bay

 Although we wanted to pass Bodega Bay and motor into the the Bay of San Francisco, its hazardous bar report helped decide to hang out in Bodega Bay until the next front subsided.

The following morning's look at Bodega Bay and it's series of markers.  The black lump in the water closer to the boats is Sona paddling toward me. 

Thank God for the moonlight that peaked out of the dispersed clouds at 10PM.  It lit the way for us as we entered the bay entrance.  Before entering we knew that it would require a close coordination between Jeff and I.  It was to be a long entrance marked with total of 20 sets of red and green buoys.  The scary part is that half of them weren't lit! Again, we employed our electronic gadgets at the helm and the bow along with a set of hand held walkie talkies for relaying confirmation of buoy sightings. Once we entered the marina, it was quiet and serene.  Searching for cleats on the dock, I saw a dark lump about 4 ft long at the spot where I needed to land on the dock.  As our boat glided closer, the dark lump moved and started barking at me.  We had disturbed a sleeping sea lion.  Afraid to jump onto the dock, I waited a little longer so I can find a landing spot away from the disturbed creature.  Thankfully, it was annoyed enough to slide into the water and leave the dock.  We were able to tie up at midnight safely and turn off the engine.

Next morning, we met a delightful person named, Sona. She introduced herself with a compliment on my white rain boots.  She is from southern California and keeps her beautiful boat Galetea (Island Packet 38) here in Spud Point Marina.  Monthly trips bring her up here to keep up with her boat maintenance.  Her and her husband, Mike plan to cruise around the world as we do but aren't quite ready to set sail.  It sounds like in about two years, it will happen.  She is one of these high energy women who have so much to share and as a former elementary teacher and outdoor educator she loves kids.  As we exchanged our journeys to Bodega Bay and how the two separate trips were based on graces from God, we had a lot more to share and to talk about.  Sona says it is so refreshing but rare to talk to people who are so ready and aren't afraid to talk about God.  I agree.

Sona took our pictures saying that it's so hard to get a family photo when on a boat. 

Per Sona's recommendation, we called a diver who cleans boat hulls.  From the top of the water, we can see long strands of brown growth on our boat hull that must have been slowing us down.  The diver showed up in his 18' Sea Dory (so cute!) with his dive gear.  Efficiently he suited up, tied up to his air supply hose, and swam under our boat to scrape its bottom.

It looked so fun that Anna said she wanted to try it. 

Look how clean our boot stripe is now. 

On our walk into the town of Bodega Bay. we saw so many different birds.  Pelicans have always been so interesting to me.  With it's enlarged beak, it seemed somewhat awkward to me.  But, seeing it in real life and close up in its elements, it's a very graceful and elegant bird.

On our way, we came across a grove of eucalyptus trees.  We collected some leaves as souvenirs. 

Ice plants strewn along the side of the road as ground cover.  Among its succulent green leaves, there are these purple treasures now and then. 

Bodega Bay is full of birds and of many variety.  We have seen most of them in our neighborhood in Sandy Point but here are some that we haven't seen, especially pelicans.

These are marbled godwits. Sona, the bird expert, tells me that you identify them by its rounded body and long beak. 

These pelicans are so graceful as they glide in the sky.

A close up of a brown pelican. Notice the little bit of yellow above it's eye. 

A pelican in flight looking for that fish to dive for. 

What's the difference between storks and pelicans?  Searched on google and here is the answer:
Pelican: long bill, throat pouch, short legs, and swims well
Stork: shorter bill, no throat pouch, long legs, and better at wading

 Sona, the naturalist, the writer, the sailor, the teacher, the artist, and the faithful child of God, invited us to go bird watching at 7:30AM in the morning! It wasn't the best time for us but the girls and I were eager to learn and experience what Sona had to show us.  We saw and heard: starlings, blue bird, morning doves, ravens, godwits, plovers, herons and sea gulls.

Near shore, there were lots of "stackers" rocks stacked by various people who passed these paths. Sona said we must build stackers.  So, we did. As we were builidng, a man passed by to teach us that in other parts of US and other countries these stacked rocks are used as a way to communicate to those who pass in your path.

She was a gift from God to encourage us, befriend us, and to help us know that there are other fellow Christian Cruisers out there. It's funny but all the cruiser blogs that I have visited and researched have not really dealt with the subject of God.  Many mariners believe that there is a higher force out there but seldom talk about God in the way Sona does.  How can you not when you are out dealing with the elements and know that there were many close calls? How about the beauty that surrounds you in the sun rises and sun sets, a sudden delight that sets in your heart as you watch a large pod of dolphins weaving around your boat, or realizing how small you are in the big ocean among the millions of bright stars in the sky?  God's majesty surrounds us and is everywhere if we just look and listen.  Among our exchanges we shared our experiences with the Holy Spirit, holy detachment, and simply how God's love is so immense that it's incomprehensible for the human mind.  What a blessing she has been for our stay at Bodega Bay! Our boat is now full of her generosity: a bag of fruit and vegetables, a sack of potatoes, and gifts of her prized possessions for the girls and myself. We pray that they will soon be underway on their boat to live their dreams. In this small world, we may meet again and tie up next to each other in some foreign water.



For those who know us well, they know that Jeff is the king of Belgian Waffles and how much we love hanging out in the morning making delicious breakfast.  We were lucky to have Jeff's famous Belgian waffles waiting for us after our bird-watching adventure. One of the power hungry appliances we brought is our waffle maker.  We love our $13 waffle maker.

Buttermilk Belgian Waffle Recipe

Buttermilk Belgian Waffles.

·        2 cups all-purpose flour

·        2 tablespoons sugar

·        2 teaspoons baking powder

·        1 teaspoon baking soda

·        3/4 teaspoon salt

·        2 cups well-shaken buttermilk

·        3/4 stick (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted and cooled to room temperature

·        2 large eggs (separate yolk from whites)

·        Vegetable oil for waffle iron if needed.

1. Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl  

2.  Whisk together buttermilk, melted butter, and egg yolks in another bowl, then whisk into flour mixture until just combined.

3.  Beat egg whites in a separate bowl until foamy and fluffy.Fold in the egg whites carefully into the batter. This step is how we get our waffles so light and fluffy with crunchy sides.

4.  Cook waffles according to manufacturer's instructions until golden and cooked through, about 3 minutes. 

5.  Transfer the cooked to rack in oven to keep warm, keeping waffles in 1 layer to stay crisp. Make more waffles in same manner.

October 23(Thursday) through October 26 (Monday) More of Humbolt Bay, Eureka CA

We are still in Eureka. Our expectation was to leave earlier to head further south but I guess it wasn't meant to be.  Humbolt Bay Marina has been the longest stay so far with a total of 11 days.  The following scenes are what we have seen.

Red sky in the morning Sailor's warning. We should have heeded the old wives tale for the bar condition wasn't so great for us.

We made an attempt to leave Eureka on 23rd of October because the weather reports sounded fair for us to head south.  Be aware of these Pacific coast stopovers.  Most of them are mouths of rivers that run from the mountains to the east and are often make the entrance and the exits so challenging due to the sand bars that are present.  We followed two fishing vessels out to the bar and on our way to the bar saw those very fishing vessels heading back toward us.  Common sense tells you at this point that if seasoned fishermen are turning back from the bar, then it surely should be a sign for us sailors with limited engine speed to turn back.  Don't worry we did.  But, we wanted to see the bar for ourselves.  At the bar were 10-12 ft rolling breakers, which just isn't captured in the photos. The girls were very pleased about the waves, thinking finally we get to splash through some.  Not today...

While we are underway, Cutip hides in either the girls' berths or our berth.  When we are docked she is more her usual self and can be seen sleeping on pillows or blankets. 

St. Bernard in Eureka, CA

Sunday came around and we were able to attend mass at St.Bernard.  Beautiful nave and the alter.  Deacon Frank Weber gave a very funny, engaging, and historical homily about October 1962.  Most of us weren't even born so the history lesson was necessary.  It was the year of Second Vatican with the threat of the Cuban Missile Crisis.  He talked about how the world watched as US demanded the Soviets to remove its nuclear missiles from Cuba. In the age of the Iron Curtain full of fear and suspicion of the Soviets, some warned of the imminent World War III. Apparently not many know the role of the pope during these tense times. It's not really clear who called who but Pope John XXIII was asked to use his international diplomatic position to make a statement about the crisis in hopes of creating the bridge of communication between the two nations. His work came in the encyclical titled Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth) which called for "more human" world order and broad human rights. Khrushchev pulled his missiles and Kennedy secretly agreed to pull US missiles in Turkey. 

Red Sky at night is sailor's delight.

Check out the heron walking around.  Our deep draft of 7.5' would be stuck in that mud.  Actually, it did get stuck in the mud when we initially arrived, so we relocated to an outside tie with the big fishing boats.

Sun in the fog. 

October 16th (Friday) through 22nd (Thursday), 2015 Still in Humbolt Bay of Eureka, CA

Guessing it's the Humbolt State University rowing team.  The girls thought it was so funny how the coach was on a motored dinghy yelling at the rowers on her megaphone.  At first I thought a woman was having a fight with someone on the dock near our boat so I peeked out to find the coach on her mega phone.

Waiting for the favorable weather window we were wondering what we should do to occupy ourselves in Eureka.  Well, let's just say that our lives have taken a dramatic slowing down in pace. The weather seems to be predicting all kinds of havoc along the coast especially around where we are.  Surprisingly the weather inland was a lot more favorable with warm sun and light breeze. Between a few days of small craft advisories and a gale warning at sea, we went to the grocery stores everyday including a nearby Costco, which by the way groceries are our second highest expense so far on this trip.  Also, a record was set for us when we walked out of  Costco with a bill less than $50! As typical with one critically needed item - sliced cheddar cheese -  the rest were impulse buys. Having an early dinner at Costco, we reminisced the meals we had at the crowded Bellingham Costco. It's odd to relate being a member of Costco with the security that I used to have.  Not having a car and having to walk everywhere have really humbled us. When I used to drive around town and see the homeless, it was really easy to just zone out or drive by without much thought of the homeless.  On foot the image of the homeless remain longer in my brain because I am forced to walk pass them and can't hide in my car to drive by fast. Compared to many hanging around the boardwalk here near the marina I know we are very privileged.  In fact compared to most, we are very privileged.  But, why do I feel like a vagabond?  We walk around with our backpacks and I watch those on bikes with longing.  Hanging out in Eureka I have come to realize that I lived a fairly affluent life.  I never felt rich but I knew that I had the means to do anything and go anywhere my heart desired. Was it a good life?  It was comfortable but we were so busy that I didn't have a moment to realize how comfortable I was. Isn't this yet another blessing and an education for our family to really see the people on the streets even for a short while to become a part of their community?

I wonder how many years this future Marina Center has been in the plan.  

Going on a grocery run. Note the backpacks.  The future of the Marina Center is a quite large piece of land (~10 city blocks) cordoned off by chain link fence across the street from the marina.

Old town of Eureka seems to be famous for these old Victorian homes.  These are the more famous ones but there were plenty we found on our 40 min walk to St. Joseph for vigil mass on Saturday.

Cason Mansion.  Its sign said, "Ingomar Private Club". Too bad it wasn't open for viewing inside to learn more about its history. 

Painting contractors may be in high demand in this town . 

Front of St. Joseph Church

A serene alter with BVM to the left.  Kudos for you if know what BVM stands for. 

The other high point of being in Eureka for almost 8 days is that I have been inspired to bake.  At home I baked but always felt that I had to fit it in between this and that.  Here, I am not deterred by raised dough recipes that require more time to rise twice to their delicious fluffiness. We didn't bring a rolling pin so had to improvise with  a 2 liter seltzer water bottle.  It worked well.

Yummy Cinnamon Rolls.Easy Cinnamon Rolls Recipe

Made another batch the next day for a second day of cinnamon goodness. The crew approves.

Gloating here with a close up. 

The following day I made sweet fluffy bread rolls.  They are so buttery and soft but had to ration these for our passage down south tomorrow. Maangchi's Bread Rolls 

While I was busy baking the girls were playing with Pingy and Foxy and creating an animated movie. 

See Ellie, the girls love their Pingy and Foxy that you gave them. Perfect size. 

Anna is taking pictures of every move and gesture to capture a very short scene while the prop handler, Sophia, prepares for the next shot.  

Humbolt Bay Sunset

October 14 through October 15, 2015. Humbolt Bay- Eureka, CA.

Left Port Orford in the morning.  Was a little  worried the anchor would be dug so deep we wouldn't be able to get it out, but it came up just fine.  Getting here took almost all of 24 hours.  The day started out beautiful with great clarity and visibility.  What the forecast sited as a patchy fog after midnight turned into dense fog from 10 nm off the coast all the way in to the marina.  Thank goodness the seas were behaving.  We navigated mostly through our chart plotters available on three devices: Simrad chartplotter at the navigation station inside the boat, Navionics App on our tablet and cell phone.

It’s a bit eerie steering in the middle of the night, no visibility, thick fog, and the only guiding light you have is on your compass and your handheld Navionic app.  We steered not by sight or markers but by compass, chartplotter with AIS transponder, and radar.  These technologies again became lifesavers as we entered into Humbolt Bay in the morning fog.  The fog was too thick to navigate from buoy to buoy by sight, and the handheld devices had some limitations.  We didn’t update the charts for details in these areas so it didn’t have all the buoys identified.  A radio relay from the Nav Station inside the boat to the helm was started once we entered the bay.  I must say it was great display of team work. 

Found a used book store in town.  Woohoo!

Walking around Old Town in Eureka, CA.  Gotta do the touristy things like take pictures in front of a landmark. 

Came all the way to California to eat New York pizza.  It was really good.  The Force 10 just isn't big enough for pizza.

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October 13 thru October 14, 2015. Port Orford, OR

Caves in the cliffs.  On our way out of Coos Bay. 

We set out of Coos Bay, OR thinking that we’d either stop in Crescent City, CA or Eureka, CA if weather allowed.  

It was a high pressure system, clear skies, and unseasonably warm temperature most of the day.  The girls were mostly bored and didn’t know what to do.  I haven't been able to get Sophia to take another turn at the helm since leaving Jones Island, when she shrewdly observed that "the boring thing about steering is you either have to keep the wheel straight, or keep turning it back and forth."  Yep, that pretty much sums it up.  The course south was somewhat choppy but the clear sunny skies made up for the ups and downs.  Soon, as the late afternoon drew near, the winds were getting stronger and the swells were getting bigger.  The 4 pm forecast update included a small craft advisory that wasn't there earlier.  Another dark night with wind and waves- not a fun prospect.

In the lee of the Port Orford cliffs, looking south the following morning.  Despite the cliffs, we had 20-25 knot gusts during the night, a taught 250 ft anchor chain & snubber, and bow veering back and forth.  Oh yes, and westerly swells rolling into the anchorage.  Didn't get much sleep.

After studying the guide books, the charts, and the weather reports Jeff suggested that we duck into Port Orford.  It was not a marina but a sheltered cove from the northerlies. Exactly the kind of cove we needed.  It took 2-3 hours to get into the cove, and in that time we spotted a whale, pod of porpoises, and three pelicans. Dropped anchor at dusk.  The winds and the swells calmed once we were got behind Port Orford’s high cliffs.  There are launching ramps but not docks, only dry dock.  The fishing boats pull in and the lifts pull the boats out of the water for storage on dry dock.  It’s different than most ports but I guess it works well in Port Orford.  What really captured my awe here were the rocks that surrounded the cove.  High cliffs with a few mansions were present to the north, to the east was the dry dock with all of its fishing fleet, and the south was the landscape of peppered rocks standing on water.

The girls desperately wanted to hit the beach, but we stayed put on the boat all day the and a second night.

Note to self- anchor closer to the cliffs next time.

The girls and Jeff decided to make colored pencil drawings.  They are always drawing, coloring, painting, and sewing. We are going to run out of room for all their creations.

Sophia is always thinking of Cutip whenever we are enjoying the sun.  Cutip is becoming more used to the engine noises, swells, and the boat in general.  Meanwhile, Cutip seems to approve of Jeff's increasingly cat-like behavior- like waking numerous times during the night to wander around the boat.

This fishing boat joined us in the cove sometime during the night.  .

October 6 (Tuesday) thru 12 (Monday), 2015. Hanging out in Charleston-Coos Bay, OR

Always looking for that great tree to climb and they found one.

The girls made "the humble nation of dribble" castles at the beach. 

While the girls enjoyed playing at the beach, Monica thoroughly enjoyed scrubbing the boat and getting rid of the green grime we carried from Sandy Point. 

 

Bus ride into town for a grocery run. For a 20 min ride, we spent 1 hr getting to Safeway.  There we found a recycled can and glass compartment.  It’s Anna’s great fascination with making money with no-investment: take Washington bought canned goods and recycle it for 5 cents a can in Oregon.  I believe there was fairly popular episode of Seinfeld where Kramer went all over NY with cans from a different state that doesn’t charge for can deposits.  You guys know which episode I am talking about. My Anna may become future Kramer! Ahhhhh!  Real successfully funny shows become popular and are so amusing to us because we all identify closely to these ridiculous characters.  Dilbert is another good example of how some really smart people have made comedies out of our miseries in cubical based corporate world in the case of Dilbert and weird deep desires we all have but are too ashamed to admit, comically Kramer has no shame.

Though the bus ride was a lot longer than needed to be and louder than desired, we took the opportunity to observe the town of Coos Bay and its bus riders.  We noticed that everyone was very helpful and went out of their way to accommodate each other.  Coos Bay was a small town inhabited with really nice people. 

Fog rolls into the bay as we return to the boat from shopping.

As we approached the marina we noticed a group of photographers taking pictures of the marina in the fog.  Did I get this right, teacher?

As Saturday approached I started to get nervous about whether we’d be able to make it to mass.  That morning, I reserved a cab ride for the vigil mass at 5PM on Saturday.  The weather turned really blowing it’s forecasted 25 to 35 knot winds with rain.  This kind of weather was not my idea of sightseeing around town and going to mass.  So, I changed my cab reservation to Sunday Mass.  Sunday morning I had a weird feeling that I needed to be extra vigilant that they haven’t forgotten about us.  Well, when I called that about 45 mins before pick up time, the dispatcher didn’t have my reservation.  They said their computers are down but they now have the info to pick us up at 9:45 for a 10:15 arrival at St.Monica’s Catholic Church.  Yes, the church happened to be named after my saint. We all rushed out of the boat to line up at the Marina Office by 9:45AM.  No Taxi.  To keep this long story short, let’s just say that the taxi arrived 10:15AM! This is when I wanted to arrive at church.  It’s always better late than never so we gratefully climbed in the taxi and attended mass late.  Never before had I felt such gratefulness and great longing to attend mass.  As I was waiting for a taxi that didn’t show a sign of picking us up, I had a little tantrum within myself towards God.  Why would God not want me to go to mass?  When I am trying so hard and go out of my way to attend mass, why would God make it difficult for us to attend mass?  None of this made sense. By the way I don't believe in bad luck or coincidences. There is always a reason and purpose for the good and the bad that happens in our lives. After mass and after having a nice greasy lunch at a local diner, I realized why God created that wrinkle on Sunday morning.  My understanding is that he wanted me to know what it felt to really desire God.  It was a blessed day with a beautiful mass that I immensely enjoyed.  This all may sound a little nuts and overly dramatic but attending mass has almost become a mission impossible on this trip. Not knowing which port we are going to be or if we are going to have transportation to get to the nearest church, we have to trust in God to lead us.   I am going to take it as a blessing. 

This sand bar was a 1/2 hour walk from where we tied up at the dock, but could not be ignored since it was in the girl's direct line of sight.  Most notable feature was the squeaky sound the sand made when you walked on it.