Anniversary Weekend

 We planned a four-day weekend to celebrate our anniversary and headed to Twin Harbors on Santa Catalina Island.  It was a great sail over in 12-15 knot winds; pinching the whole way we made it one tack…a pretty nice ride.  

We had just dropped the sails and were motoring towards the harbor when a group of dolphins broke from the pack and came back to play with us.  Even though we see this on a pretty regular basis, it's still exciting and amazing to me.

 

We settled into a mooring in 4^th of July harbor and went ashore for a cocktail – a tradition.  It was a bit windy and cool when we returned to the boat, but we decided to sit in the cockpit and enjoy the night.

I started hearing a lot of life activity in the water and it took a few minutes for Jason to declare we were surrounded by flying fish.  To verify this, we found one in the cockpit and one in the dinghy the next morning.  We passed, but Maya got her first taste of fresh fish…she wanted to eat the whole thing but I didn't think that was a good idea so Jason filleted it for her.

Saturday night we were treated to phosphorescent's.  Truly magical…our friend Captain Hank in Roatan says if you dive in and look up it’s like seeing the universe all around you. The water was too cold for that, so we just enjoyed the view from above.

Sunday we celebrated our first anniversary. The wind gusted to 25 knots throughout the day, but when it laid down it was sunny and hot…although not warm enough for me to get in the water – even with a wet suit.

Not much for big meals, we opted for tapas throughout the day – including the wonderful beer battered fish Jason caught. That evening we continued the celebration with a bottle of 2008 Turley Uberoff...yummm!

Monday it was time to head for home.

Life is like a coin.  You can spend it any way you wish, but you only spend it once. Lillian Dickson

First Wedding Anniversary

One year ago today we were married in Tortola, BVI.  At times I can’t believe it’s already been a year, and other times it seems so long ago.  We’ve had so many experiences in the past year and as each day passes we come closer to realizing our dreams.

It was important to both of us that our first anniversary be special.  When we got married we talked about going to Italy and Spain for this anniversary.  But with the purchase of Volaré earlier this year, that was no longer a practical option.  As it got closer we tossed around other ideas – a weekend in San Diego, a weekend at the local Ritz Carlton, taking the boat to Catalina or staying on the boat at the dock and continuing to work on the list.  Working at the dock and heading to Catalina made the final cut.  In the end, we decided that even though there are months of work to do, since we celebrated our honeymoon at sea, we should celebrate our first anniversary at sea.

Jason went out fishing first thing in the morning to add to our celebratory feast.  He came back with a 14" Calico Bass, enough for a great afternoon snack.  Being a bit squeamish about the hunting/fishing thing, I couldn't bring myself to take a picture of it so you'll just have to use your imagination. I"m sure I'll get over it eventually, as we're figuring fresh fish will be a great free staple.

It was the perfect first anniversary and we're looking forward to many more on the boat.

A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person. Mignon McLaughlin

Memorial Day Weekend 2013

It was a 4-day weekend for us and we had decided to make it a full on work weekend.  But, by the time we got everything packed up, to the boat, unloaded and put away it was already mid-afternoon.  With Jason’s birthday being later this week, we decided to start the celebration early and headed to happy hour.  Needless to say, there was no work done this day.

We got up early on Saturday and Jason headed over to his Dad’s boat to help install stereo speakers before starting on our own projects.  I set out for a walk with Maya and when I returned, resumed my teak scraping project from several weeks ago. 
Five hours of scraping and all I managed to get done was the top of the toe rail.  Jason seemed to think I was working harder than I needed to and decided to show me how it was done.  After about 10 minutes he stated that maybe this was a project we were better off hiring out so our time could be spent more effectively.  I will get bids and then we’ll see.


While I was outside scraping Jason finished wiring the new chart plotter, mounted the new autopilot display, removed the defunct rudder sensor, ran some tests to identify our electrical leak, rewired the inside front stereo speakers, fixed the regulator on the barbecue  and rigged the hammock. Obviously his time was better spent.

Sunday we slept in.  No work this morning as we prepped for company.  We had friends to the boat for sailing and barbecuing.  It was another beautiful day on the water with 12-15 knot winds.  And with a crew of our most experienced cruising/racing friends, we decided it was the perfect opportunity to try out our cruising chute. We need to fine tune the rigging, but she flies beautifully.

We returned to the dock and barbecued  on our very recently repaired grill, and enjoyed the evening with good food, good friends and dark and stormy’s.

The last day of our long weekend brought a little work and a little rest.  Jason got the cleaning bug and decided to remove and reorganize everything in the forward cabin.  Being the organized clean freak that I am this made me very happy to see piles of stuff that was designated to the remove from boat pile.  This project turned out to be more beneficial than either of us realized it would be when Jason discovered salty water in the forward bilge.  Now we have a new project on the list – find source of water, fix wood rot and epoxy bilge. And after all that digging around, we were ready for a cold beer and a dinghy float.

We never made it to our big project for the weekend – rewiring the battery switch panel.  But, there’s always next weekend….

A good holiday is one spent among people whose notions of time are vaguer than yours. John B. Priestly

San Diego Land Cruise

We took a break from our boat this weekend and headed to San Diego to stay with our friends on their Amel 53’ Super Maramu.  They had gone down a few weekends before and were surprised to find a hummingbird nest with two babies in their mizzen traveler line.  Research revealed that hummingbirds leave the next after 21 days, but when we arrived they were still there.  There seemed to be a female and a male; with the female being bigger and stronger and leaving the next for several hours at a time. The male could only fly a couple of feet and mama would come every 20 minutes to feed him.  They were close enough to touch and so sweet to watch.

 We were all looking forward to getting their boat out of the slip for a day sail, but knew we couldn’t take the chance of disrupting nature.  Instead, we took in some local sites and had our first real downtime in several months.  After all, there is plenty of time for sailing.

Cruisers toast:
Endless summer. Forever young.  Only the strong survive.

Mother's Day 2013

Since we spend every weekend on the boat, we figured that was the perfect place to celebrate Mother’s Day with our mom’s.  We served brunch – baked sausage, cheese and mushroom pan omelet, fried potatoes, assorted muffins and breads, strawberries and mimosas.  It was quite the feast and very impressive for our first formal boat meal.

After brunch we headed out for a sail.  It was a beautiful day on the water with 12-15 knot winds.  Everyone had a great time and we have some special memories.

A man's work is from sun to sun, but a mother's work is never done. Author Unknown