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Happy Way Bus
A retrospective (not a how-to) on creating custom chaps, for any other brave souls who embark on this sizeable sewing project. Also, the origin of the name of our dinghy, the Happy Way Bus.
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Choose Your Cruise
Wherein Jen ruminates on the beaten vs. less-beaten paths through our watery world.
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Baja
On November 3, we set out from Ensenada toward La Paz, in which we arrived on November 28. These weeks featured good fishing, numerous dolphin, turtle and whale sightings, periods of no wind and way-too-much wind, and overall were quite enjoyable.
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A Few Troubles in Solla Sollew
In the Dr. Seuss book after which our boat is named, Solla Sollew is a place where there are no troubles, or at least very few. Well, we’ve had a few troubles, and in the world of boats, they are unfortunately not “very few”. For short attention spans, I will skip to the end and tell you that we are temporarily repaired, back in the water, and have options for the next round of repairs in 6-9 mos., after a season cruising in Mexico.
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Channel Islands Adventure
We finally venture out to do a bit of "cruising" in the Channel Islands off the California Coast, visiting San Miguel, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, Anacapa and Catalina over 14 days.
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New-Cruiser Tips, vol.2
I'm very pleased with the anchor chain marking scheme we chose, and it's great to get it off our to-do list with the extra time at the dock in Morro Bay.
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Alaska!?
We visit Harry's old stomping ground of Petersburg, Alaska for a wedding.
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New-Cruiser Tips, vol.1
So far, most subscribers to this blog are friends and family. But there may come a day when other cruisers may stumble across this site, probably just setting out like we are/were, so it’s time I start speaking to them as well. Friends-and-Family (FnF), feel free to skip this post if you wish! Bit-o-Advice #1: When you toss your lines, really toss them. Go far; fully commit to cruising and early-on go someplace where you get a healthy gulp of the lifestyle. Don’t think that you can “kinda leave”, that you can keep one foot in your “old”/”normal” life and one foot in your cruiser life, that you can shuffle…
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Slow Cruz
We have started seeing touch of the “cruising lifestyle”, having visited Santa Cruz for a few days and now in Monterey. Nothing is YouTube-worthy, but we’re having fun. In Santa Cruz I took Harry to the obligatory Mystery Spot, back up to UCSC (my alma mater), visited his cousins Nina and Peter, and our friends from Emery Cove (Diane and Stefan) graciously brought their paddle boards for us to try in the harbor. One morning Harry went for a jog along the beach, and when he came back I was playing my ukulele in the cockpit while paddleboarders and sea lions were playing around us. “Cruzing” indeed. Now in Monterey,…
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The Freak Out
February 20 to February 23 was the event in my office I had committed to attending in person. I was to lead a training session for nearly a full day, then facilitate a few other sessions. Coworkers were flying in from the East Coast and our Sydney, Australia office; it was a big deal. And, it was one of the reasons we decided to park it in Half Moon Bay for a month – relatively easy access to the office. Harry had plans to be away quite a bit (work on reassembling and selling an old racing dune buggy that had been taking up space in his mother’s garage for…
