OK, my Big Summer Adventure. I spent a week sailing on Little Cat in San Francisco Bay and the coast. Six days, one hundred and thirty nautical miles, six gallons of water, lots of one-minute noodles, seals, dolphins (porpoises), otters, a pelican, and a bit of SF Bay history.
Day 1. Early start to make the trip to the Bay from the Carquinez Strait. Mainly motoring until we round Pt San Pablo, and then its a sailing slog into a strong southwesterly and a flood tide towards Raccoon Strait. Richmond Bay is a blizzard of spray and white caps so head past to take a look at Horseshoe Bay as a possible anchorage - I want to be nice and close to the Gate so that I can get an early start out in the morning. Horseshoe seems too small to anchor safely so head back under Yellow Bluff, just south of Sausalito, and set two anchors for the night. Made a new friend with Pele the Pelican.
Day 2. Early start and its so calm on the Bay as we motor out to the Gate.
Finally! Me and Little Cat are outside the Gate where we can feel the ocean swell for the first time together. We encounter both dolphins and otters off Pt Bonita! (what I think are dolphins after a bit of later research are more likely to be Harbor Porpoises). We head out around Pt Bonita and along the coast past the Marin Headlands, Muir Beach, and Stinson Beach before heaving-to off Bolinas for coffee and a snack.
These are all legendary places for my family that we visited often when the little helpers were babies. I couldn't count the times that I have stood on these beaches and wondered how great it would to be "out there" sailing.
After coffee and snack it was a turnaround for the reach back through the Bonita Channel to the Gate. The wind built steadily until we were making very good time - didn't take long at all to eat up the coastal miles. Rounding Pt Bonita at max flood tide, we ran into the infamous confused seas next to the Point and the Potato Patch and got banged around a bit. The blast under the bridge towards angel Island was just that!
Later number crunching on GPSAR shows that we had our best speed yet over a nautical mile averaging 8.5 knots on the run back under the Gate.
Then it was two anchors down at Quarry Beach, Angel Island, where I had arranged to meet up with my new buddy.
Day 3. Another early start and calm conditions motoring from Angel Island out to the ocean under the Gate.
My goal today was to learn about the Golden Gate channel and bar and conditions in the Gulf of the Farallones. Things got lumpy by the time we reached Mile Rock, but the wind was still lightish on the nose so kept motoring out.
We passed Seal Rocks off Outer Richmond. You can just see our favorite breakfast Diner on the hill above Cliff House! Ocean Beach is beyond the rocks.
By the time we were about 6 nautical miles offshore the wind was starting to build and the swell was getting more insistent, so we hove-to to hoist the reefed mainsail, to make sure that we were all clipped-in and shipshape, and to have a snack.
Under reefed main, we headed out until we passed the last (first) channel buoy at the head of the GG channel 8 nautical miles offshore from the Gate. I was aware, of course, of the notorious reputation of the GG bar and had been monitoring my VHF weather channel, and had timed our trip to re-enter the Gate at the start of the flood tide just after slack (the safest time).
The conditions at the 10-mile San Francisco weather buoy had been reported all morning as 4 foot swell with a 20 second period - no problem. The swell frequency had been shorter than 20 seconds all day, but by the time we were ready to turn around the reported conditions were suddenly 20 knots of wind, and a 4-6 foot swell with a period of 4 seconds! Count it 1-2-3-4 seconds between waves. This means that even though the swell was not that large, the very short period made them steep and often breaking. So, we had a swift run under reefed mainsail back inshore with the steep and occasionally breaking waves on the aft quarter. Conditions were interesting and required concentration so that the the boat didn't broach surfing the waves, with a couple of waves breaking over the boat. These conditions were challenging but well within the capabilities of Little Cat, who showed herself to be an able sea boat. However, if the waves were any bigger, if the wind was much stronger, or there was a strong ebb tide against the wind, and we would have been working a lot harder. My take home learned from my little foray across the bar is that the wave frequency is the key to comfort and safety, and that one should plan carefully to avoid max current conditions over the bar.
No pictures, but the best experience of the day was seeing both seals and dolphins (porpoises?) surfing past in the swells like little bullets as we ran back to the Gate.
Back under the bridge and I decide to check out Aquatic Park as an overnight anchorage. I followed the regulation of sail only in Aquatic Park, but once inside ended up turning the motor on to stop from drifting across the little anchorage in the strong wind.
This is a great spot, but the westerly - now a wind warning - was howling across the water, so we headed back out the tiny entrance and fetched across the Bay back to our cosy little spot on east Angel Island.
Quarry Beach on the east side of Angel Island is protected from the prevailing NW, West, and SW winds, and must be one of the prettiest beaches in the Bay. I had it pretty much all to myself for 4 nights.
Day 4. All fun and no work? The bottom of the boat was very fouled, so I took the day off from self-indulgence to beach Little Cat and give her a good bottom scrub. In a few weeks I'll beach her again to put on a new lick of bottom paint, but today it was just a good clean. It was on with the wetsuit and into the water with the scrubbing brush - brrr.
And then it was time for a short walk up to the historic site at East Garrison above the beach. This was an army mobilization/demobilization base used during the Spanish American war, WW 1 and WW 2. Around a million men passed through this site during these conflicts. It was handed over to the Parks Service from the 1950s.
Then I took a short walk above Quarry Beach and took the last chronological picture before the camera battery went flat of Little Cat and San Francisco.
Day 5. Up anchored early in the morning and motored around to Ayala Cove on the west side of the island for the luxury of tying up at a slip (berth) for the day and going for a walk around the Island.
On the way we swung through China Camp at the north end of Angel Island. China Camp was the site of the immigration station established at the turn of the century and processed perhaps as many as a million people before it was closed in the 1940s. So, along with Fort McDowell at East Garrison, that means that around two million people passed through the one-square mile area that is Angel Island in the first half of the 20th Century alone.
After tying up at beautiful Ayala Cove, I took a walk around the Island - its only about 4.5 miles to complete the full circumference. I checked out all of the campsites for possible future family camping trips and enjoyed the spectacular views of The Bay. I bought a great book at the Ayala visitors center: "Miwoks to Missiles: A history of Angel Island" by John Soennichsen.
The remainder of the afternoon was spent cutting and whipping short lengths of 3mm low stretch and knotting them to my new mainsail for the reef points. At Ayala, the slips have to be vacated at sunset, so retreated to a mooring buoy in the cove for the evening.
With the camera flat the pictures for today's post can be a retrospective meditation on the sheer luxury of cruising on a Tiki 21.
All kidding aside though, cruising on a Tiki 21 is more doable than it looks as long as you are comfortable with fairly spartan camping. The main drawback is the lack of shelter on deck and that you can't sit up in the cabin without the hatch open - as long as it isn't raining or super windy these are not big issues. With one person there is plenty of room, but two people would be max for extended cruising.
Day 6. Left Ayala at 5.00 AM to catch the flood tide to the Carquinez strait. Took a swing up the east side of the Tiburon Peninsula to check out Paradise Cove. There is a lot of fairly revolting displays of unbridled wealth at the water's edge in Tiburon - must be a lot of bankers living here (lets face it, I wouldn't be sailing a Wharram if I was a one percenter). Caught the flood tide and the wind freshened - I was tied up at the Marina by 11.00 AM. Big tidy up, load up the car (which was surprisingly still there), and scrubbed down Little Cat.
Six days, one hundred and thirty nautical miles, six gallons of water, lots of 3 min noodles, seals, dolphins (porpoises), otters, a pelican, and a bit of SF Bay history - all right!
Day 1. Early start to make the trip to the Bay from the Carquinez Strait. Mainly motoring until we round Pt San Pablo, and then its a sailing slog into a strong southwesterly and a flood tide towards Raccoon Strait. Richmond Bay is a blizzard of spray and white caps so head past to take a look at Horseshoe Bay as a possible anchorage - I want to be nice and close to the Gate so that I can get an early start out in the morning. Horseshoe seems too small to anchor safely so head back under Yellow Bluff, just south of Sausalito, and set two anchors for the night. Made a new friend with Pele the Pelican.
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| Yellow Bluff, Sausalito |
Day 2. Early start and its so calm on the Bay as we motor out to the Gate.
Finally! Me and Little Cat are outside the Gate where we can feel the ocean swell for the first time together. We encounter both dolphins and otters off Pt Bonita! (what I think are dolphins after a bit of later research are more likely to be Harbor Porpoises). We head out around Pt Bonita and along the coast past the Marin Headlands, Muir Beach, and Stinson Beach before heaving-to off Bolinas for coffee and a snack.
 |
| Pt Bonita and the Gate |
These are all legendary places for my family that we visited often when the little helpers were babies. I couldn't count the times that I have stood on these beaches and wondered how great it would to be "out there" sailing.
 | ||
| Muir Beach |
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| Stinson and Bolinas |
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| California coast looking south from Bolinas Bay |
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| Hove-to in Bolinas Bay for a coffee |
After coffee and snack it was a turnaround for the reach back through the Bonita Channel to the Gate. The wind built steadily until we were making very good time - didn't take long at all to eat up the coastal miles. Rounding Pt Bonita at max flood tide, we ran into the infamous confused seas next to the Point and the Potato Patch and got banged around a bit. The blast under the bridge towards angel Island was just that!
Later number crunching on GPSAR shows that we had our best speed yet over a nautical mile averaging 8.5 knots on the run back under the Gate.
Then it was two anchors down at Quarry Beach, Angel Island, where I had arranged to meet up with my new buddy.
Day 3. Another early start and calm conditions motoring from Angel Island out to the ocean under the Gate.
 |
| Rounding Pt Blunt, Angel Island in the AM |
My goal today was to learn about the Golden Gate channel and bar and conditions in the Gulf of the Farallones. Things got lumpy by the time we reached Mile Rock, but the wind was still lightish on the nose so kept motoring out.
We passed Seal Rocks off Outer Richmond. You can just see our favorite breakfast Diner on the hill above Cliff House! Ocean Beach is beyond the rocks.
By the time we were about 6 nautical miles offshore the wind was starting to build and the swell was getting more insistent, so we hove-to to hoist the reefed mainsail, to make sure that we were all clipped-in and shipshape, and to have a snack.
 |
| Hove-to next to the shipping channel |
Under reefed main, we headed out until we passed the last (first) channel buoy at the head of the GG channel 8 nautical miles offshore from the Gate. I was aware, of course, of the notorious reputation of the GG bar and had been monitoring my VHF weather channel, and had timed our trip to re-enter the Gate at the start of the flood tide just after slack (the safest time).
 |
| Seals on the last Channel Buoy |
The conditions at the 10-mile San Francisco weather buoy had been reported all morning as 4 foot swell with a 20 second period - no problem. The swell frequency had been shorter than 20 seconds all day, but by the time we were ready to turn around the reported conditions were suddenly 20 knots of wind, and a 4-6 foot swell with a period of 4 seconds! Count it 1-2-3-4 seconds between waves. This means that even though the swell was not that large, the very short period made them steep and often breaking. So, we had a swift run under reefed mainsail back inshore with the steep and occasionally breaking waves on the aft quarter. Conditions were interesting and required concentration so that the the boat didn't broach surfing the waves, with a couple of waves breaking over the boat. These conditions were challenging but well within the capabilities of Little Cat, who showed herself to be an able sea boat. However, if the waves were any bigger, if the wind was much stronger, or there was a strong ebb tide against the wind, and we would have been working a lot harder. My take home learned from my little foray across the bar is that the wave frequency is the key to comfort and safety, and that one should plan carefully to avoid max current conditions over the bar.
No pictures, but the best experience of the day was seeing both seals and dolphins (porpoises?) surfing past in the swells like little bullets as we ran back to the Gate.
Back under the bridge and I decide to check out Aquatic Park as an overnight anchorage. I followed the regulation of sail only in Aquatic Park, but once inside ended up turning the motor on to stop from drifting across the little anchorage in the strong wind.
 |
| Aquatic Park, San Francisco waterfront |
This is a great spot, but the westerly - now a wind warning - was howling across the water, so we headed back out the tiny entrance and fetched across the Bay back to our cosy little spot on east Angel Island.
 |
| Passing The Rooock on the way back |
Quarry Beach on the east side of Angel Island is protected from the prevailing NW, West, and SW winds, and must be one of the prettiest beaches in the Bay. I had it pretty much all to myself for 4 nights.
 |
| Quarry Beach |
Day 4. All fun and no work? The bottom of the boat was very fouled, so I took the day off from self-indulgence to beach Little Cat and give her a good bottom scrub. In a few weeks I'll beach her again to put on a new lick of bottom paint, but today it was just a good clean. It was on with the wetsuit and into the water with the scrubbing brush - brrr.
And then it was time for a short walk up to the historic site at East Garrison above the beach. This was an army mobilization/demobilization base used during the Spanish American war, WW 1 and WW 2. Around a million men passed through this site during these conflicts. It was handed over to the Parks Service from the 1950s.
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| The "1000-man barracks" |
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| Last picture show |
Then I took a short walk above Quarry Beach and took the last chronological picture before the camera battery went flat of Little Cat and San Francisco.
Day 5. Up anchored early in the morning and motored around to Ayala Cove on the west side of the island for the luxury of tying up at a slip (berth) for the day and going for a walk around the Island.
On the way we swung through China Camp at the north end of Angel Island. China Camp was the site of the immigration station established at the turn of the century and processed perhaps as many as a million people before it was closed in the 1940s. So, along with Fort McDowell at East Garrison, that means that around two million people passed through the one-square mile area that is Angel Island in the first half of the 20th Century alone.
After tying up at beautiful Ayala Cove, I took a walk around the Island - its only about 4.5 miles to complete the full circumference. I checked out all of the campsites for possible future family camping trips and enjoyed the spectacular views of The Bay. I bought a great book at the Ayala visitors center: "Miwoks to Missiles: A history of Angel Island" by John Soennichsen.
The remainder of the afternoon was spent cutting and whipping short lengths of 3mm low stretch and knotting them to my new mainsail for the reef points. At Ayala, the slips have to be vacated at sunset, so retreated to a mooring buoy in the cove for the evening.
With the camera flat the pictures for today's post can be a retrospective meditation on the sheer luxury of cruising on a Tiki 21.
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| Home sweet home |
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| The kitchen, and um, bathroom |
All kidding aside though, cruising on a Tiki 21 is more doable than it looks as long as you are comfortable with fairly spartan camping. The main drawback is the lack of shelter on deck and that you can't sit up in the cabin without the hatch open - as long as it isn't raining or super windy these are not big issues. With one person there is plenty of room, but two people would be max for extended cruising.
Day 6. Left Ayala at 5.00 AM to catch the flood tide to the Carquinez strait. Took a swing up the east side of the Tiburon Peninsula to check out Paradise Cove. There is a lot of fairly revolting displays of unbridled wealth at the water's edge in Tiburon - must be a lot of bankers living here (lets face it, I wouldn't be sailing a Wharram if I was a one percenter). Caught the flood tide and the wind freshened - I was tied up at the Marina by 11.00 AM. Big tidy up, load up the car (which was surprisingly still there), and scrubbed down Little Cat.
Six days, one hundred and thirty nautical miles, six gallons of water, lots of 3 min noodles, seals, dolphins (porpoises), otters, a pelican, and a bit of SF Bay history - all right!
Good stuff, Roger! Yes, indeed, short-period seas are ugly! First time out in Vaea, I was trying to get back in to Angels' Gate (San Pedro)in a wind against tide situation: the distance between crests of the 4' swells was the length of the boat. . .I finally gave up trying to beat in, gybed and went downwind to Queens Gate (Long Beach) I suppose if I had done 150 degree tacks I could have made it, but it would have been way past dark! Not good for rank amatuers ;~)
ReplyDeleteKim, Your Tiki 26 looks beautiful. I haven't seen a 26 in the flesh yet - they look like a great all round boat and more practical than the 21 (for cruising and open water work).
ReplyDelete