Malo, A Boat Named Bad: Eureka to Drakes Bay

The time has arrived where we need to be moving southward again. Our broken batten sail slides have been replaced by a stronger type. We have been hanging in and exploring Eureka for 9 days now and with a good weather forecast, we decided to leave early to hopefully pass through “The Humboldt Bar” during dead low tide. There has been much discussion and weather watching for this departure. Apparently, this bar is the second most treacherous bar on the west coast. (the Columbia River Bar is the worst).

The town and harbor was just waking up as we started our departure. The fog was still hanging around on the water.

Our new friends, Pajo and Ava on Cinderella where leaving to head south as well. They have an electric motor on their boat, which did not go as fast as our diesel motor. But we have to use fuel and they use renewable sources like the sun to charge their battery. I hope we will run into them again as we both head south

We are motoring through this large bay to get to the entrance.

As we got closer to the jetty entrance, Dan was pretty alert and observant to the wave conditions in the bar. Should we go or should we stay? Surfers were hugging the north side of the jetty and catching some pretty good size waves.

It doesn’t look very scary from the picture, but the waves were big enough to scare me. We hugged the south side which was the recommended side, and it looked much better. We went for it and lived. It was a relief!

When we got out the bar, we headed the boat into the wind so that the sails could be raised. Then I got to handle the helm. I never got sea sick on this 2 night, 2 day passage because I used one of my new scopolamine patches. Hurray what a joy! Notice how I strap myself in the boat with leash or safety line.

You can see the cool Nav-Pod that we use to navigate from. The Raymarine System is very cool. We can see wind speed, wind direction, water temperature, speed over ground, other boats, land features and so much more. Dan installed and I assisted with the install of this system when we were in Alameda where we first bought Malo. I am very thankful we have it!

On these overnight passages, we need to catch up on sleep when we can. Here Dan is taking a snooze. If it were me, I would’ve gotten a few more pillows.

While the sail was pretty mellow during the day, it really perked up in the evening.

Since we take turns for the evening watches, it just so happened, that I was on the helm and Dan was sleeping, and very quickly, the wind picked up to 35 knots of wind! I was having difficulty managing the sails. I hit the steering wheel with a knife which makes a rather large noise down below. Fortunately, Dan heard it, peaked his head up the gang way to assess the situation and went below to put is foul weather gear on. I was very nervous

but tried to keep my senses together. When Dan came up, he was able to get Malo under better control. He added a second reef in the main sail and even made the jib smaller. This helped trim the boat better. I was still pretty frazzled though.

The hardest part of sailing for me right now is dealing with the large swells that seem to continuously roll down the coast. It makes for a pretty choppy ride with the sails flapping a lot especially in the lighter winds. It is also very difficult for me to sail at night. I have found it best for me to use the auto-helm and my job is to watch for other boats. The auto-helm will take care of steering the boat. It is much more boring for me to not be able to helm. Once I get my confidence up and more practice under my belt, I hope night sailing will be more enjoyable.

I find great peace in know that eventually the early morning sunlight will come and it will be daytime again. Below is a picture of a sunrise in all it’s magic and beauty.

The winds were light, about 6-8 knots and Dan wanted to try out our new gennaker sail the Code One we had made from a North Sails loft in Portland, Oregon. It was designed for lighter air. Here Dan is on the forward deck, rigging the sail. It was pretty sweet once it was tuned up. We got to sail a couple hours with this sail and then the wind started to go over 10 knots, so we took it down and put the jib up again.

As we were finishing the last part of changing the sails, I yelled to Dan that there were whales on starboard. This pair of whales were coming right toward us! It was both very cool and a little freakish because they were so close and it appeared they might hit our boat. But no, they must of sensed it with their radar and dove down to avoid a collision. We were both so excited. It was not over however, because as we looked around us for the next 20 minutes or so, it became apparent we were in a pod of whales! We heard them when the came up for air and what a sound they can make. We saw the water get shot up in the air on the exhales. It was very exciting and special.

Here are some photos of sailing, sunrises and California coastline. We sailed past some beautiful looking wilderness areas - one of which is a hike I did with my friends Diane and Emily several years ago. We backpacked 21 miles along the coast on the Lost Coast Trail. It was spectacular then and is still.

Finally after 2 full nights and 1 and one half days of sailing, we decided to stop at Drakes Bay which is actually part of Reyes Conservation Area. We would arrive about noon, a nice time to enter any new harbor. Much to our surprise, a couple of seals started following our boat and playing with us. They would look at us, then dive and pop up somewhere else near us. Soon, we noticed there were several seals. I tried hard to get some good photos, but they were much more clever than I. Here is one of the better shots.

Dan decides it is time to fire the motor up and take down the sails in preparation for entering Drakes Bay.

Entering Drakes Bay at Point Reyes, California

While it looked like a wide open bay, it is important to follow the buoys to make sure we are in the channel. Here you can see a few seals enjoying the sunshine while sitting on the green buoy marker, which signaled for us it was OK to go farther into the bay.

It was absolutely amazing. On our port side was an old coast guard station and a couple docks. Ahead of us was a lone sailboat anchored in front of some interesting scalloped sandstone type cliffs. In the distance we could hear the roar of the ocean surf and some barking sea lions.

It was time to set our anchor. We thought all was great, until about one hour later Dan noticed our boat was sideways to the wind, when it should be pointed into the wind. Something was not right. He figured the anchor line had gotten wrapped around our keel.

We quickly put the dinghy together on the foredeck and Dan went out to try to fish for the line and unwrap it from the keel. No luck. It was pretty windy by then, so it was difficult. I suggested putting out a second anchor (we have three). He thought that was a good idea. It meant digging out the second anchor from the V-Birth and hauling it out in the dinghy. That went well. But it did not solve the problem of the first anchor line getting wrapped around the keel. This required investigation, so Dan was the brave one, put on his shorty wet suit, fins and snorkels and diving he went. He unwrapped the line, but it had already

worn away a section of the keel which would need to get refinished in the near future.