Marina Del Rey To Dana Point: October 11th - 16th, 2023
The “Poop” Dock at Marina Del Rey.
For our unplanned stop, in Marina Del Rey, we decided to just enjoy ourselves & not get any work done! So we decided to walk over to the Venice canals. Yes, you may not know this but our legs are very very long & we can take one step & land on the East Coast & then another step & cross the Atlantic & one last step to get to Italy!
Actually, for those of you who may not know, there is a Venice in California. This area was created around 1905 & they waterways were used recreationally. However, by the 1950’s, the canals & homes were in shambles. Apparently they stayed in a state of disrepair until 1993. Now the area is beautifully restored & so fun to explore & walk around in.
Fun excursion in Venice, CA!
Marina Del Rey Marina had a lot of conveniences, like a 5 minute walk to a Trader Joe’s, but we were excited to finally set sail to somewhere that was a little more surrounded by nature.
And by sail, I mean motor about 3/4 of the way & then sail the last few miles. We were pretty stoked though that we actually could! Using just the genoa, we sailed at up to 6.3 knots!
We moored around 5 PM. Instead of relaxing right away, Matt thought he’d send & receive messages by sending his phone up the mast. Actually, he explains it better:
“ I pulled my phone up the mast in a bag to get a better signal and pick up texts and email. I found, doing that left it suspended there about 25 feet up our mast. -I suited up, tied into the main halyard and climbed the mast with the boat hook, which Kendall suggested. She was a great safety belayer and it was a relatively smooth operation that would have not happened were it not for my dumb mistake. The lesson is to make sure that whatever you pull up a mast has a way to pull it back down again. Boy, I'm sure glad I learned that lesson. I'm sure I'll never do something like that again. . .
Sailing over to Emerald Bay, Catalina!
Emerald Bay sunset.
The next morning was fairly leisurely. It was nice & sunny. So I decided to take an ocean shower. My definition of an ocean shower is putting on a bikini, lathering up in ocean/reef safe shampoo & body wash, then jumping over the side of the boat & quickly rinsing it off in the ocean before racing over to the step ladder to get back on the boat. -It was a bit of a shock to my system. I haven’t been in cold water in quite a while & didn’t handle it as well as I wanted to. At least it was warmer than Santa Cruz!
Matt went in the water, & stayed in it, to put the prop zinc on. Then he cleaned the rudder & hull a bit.
So, San Simeon had its flies & Marina Del Rey had its seagulls. What did Emerald Bay have? Wasps! Lots of wasps! I can’t remember them ever being so bad in ALL the times I have spent here. They were incessant & I ended up getting stung twice! We even had to keep Zephyr inside most of the time we were on the boat so that he wouldn’t end up eating one.
This was definitely motivation for getting off of the boat & onto shore for a while. Matt got the dinghy into the water from the bow & put some oars on it. -We decided to save the extra pain of getting the outboard onto it for another day. He rowed the 3 of us to the beach. Where, he & Zephyr ran around quite a bit before we all hiked the steep but short trail up to the bluff.
There I took some scenic shots & then got all my emails, texts, etc. before heading back down to the beach.
We got back to the boat, had lunch & then I edited videos while Matt went snorkeling. Although, every few minutes I went up on deck to make sure I could still see him around the rocks.
Full day in Emerald Bay.
On Saturday morning it was time to move on again. We motored MerSea over to the isthmus to stop to get fuel. -I thought it would be less crowded than Avalon. I was wrong. Although, we were able to pull up to the dock initially, we got booted off because Catalina Express was coming in early to let off passengers & get some fuel. Therefore, we thought we’d just motor around for 10 minutes & come back when they were done. However, what we saw coming into the bay changed our minds…. hundreds of people on wave-runners! Well, maybe not hundreds but at least 50 to 60. It seemed that they were all coming from the mainland & therefore they were going to need fuel. And being smaller than us & sneakier, they would probably be lined up at the fuel dock for hours. So we decided to just skip getting fuel there & head on to Avalon.
I have decided to not talk about the process of getting a mooring ball in Avalon. In my opinion, it is not an efficient process. Although, some disagree. I will leave it at that.
Getting fuel there wasn’t very fun either. And it would turn out to come back to haunt us.
Once we did get a mooring ball, we got the dinghy & it’s outboard & motored over to the dinghy dock & walked all over the town.
The highlight, for me, when visiting Avalon is going over to the Casino. No, it’s not an actual Casino. It was just given that name when it opened in 1929. There is a theater on the bottom floor & a ballroom on the top floor. My grandmother & grandfather used to go over there & dance in the late 1930s. My grandmother talked all the time about how much fun they had. Avalon was her favorite place! I can definitely get a sense of how special it was & feel her spirit when I’m there.
Sleeping in Avalon Harbor was a little less than ideal. 1st, through no fault of Avalon, it just so happened that there was a guy who seemed to think that the world revolved around him & that having large, BRIGHT blue lights on the water behind his boat were his right. I mean, did it matter that they illuminated the walls of buildings onshore? Nah! Not to him.
In addition, to the man-made issue, the surge was huge. -Although we were very close to the shore which always has the washing machine effect to it. In addition, the mooring line, which was on the port side & lined up with my ear, squeaked non-stop all night. At least the day’s theme of “not so easy” continued throughout the night. Gotta love consistency.
Heading over to Avalon.
Day 2 in Avalon was pretty fun! We rented a golf cart & raced around Avalon! Yes, it was a race that no one else knew that they were in. And yes, we won! Hopefully, they will be sending our trophy over to Ensenada so that we can pick it up there.
For lunch, we ate at the Bluewater Grille. They had me when I saw on their menu that they offered paella! It was a great experience. The food was so yummy! The service was excellent. We got to sit out on the back deck with Zephyr. They even gave him the five star treatment! He got a little brown baggie of 2 good sized treats & a big water bowl for his refreshment!
Once we got back onto MerSea we put the outboard back & the dinghy up on the bow again. After that, it was mostly an afternoon of getting stuff done. I worked on the blog while Matt took care of other boatly things.
Golf Cart Race, I mean excursion, around Avalon.
Just before 9 AM on Monday, a harbor patrol vehicle came up beside our boat & told us that we were tied too tightly to the mooring ball & that’s why our boat was surging so much! Yay! So glad we were informed of this so we could have no use for the great information. -Except to pass it on to others. You’re welcome!
Too bad this guy wasn’t working on Saturday, when we came in. Oh well. I’m sure it will be useful again someday. -Probably by the time we have just forgot this very useful lesson.
As we headed out of Avalon Harbor there was this huge cruise ship in the way. We decided to be polite about it & not ask them to move. I mean it was probably still early in the morning for cruisers & employees. Why wake anyone up? So we took the high road & went around them.
The day started out beautiful. Yet just a few miles into our motoring, fog came out of nowhere. We couldn’t see much past 50 feet in front of us! So Matt sounded our air horn every few minutes to warn any boats. Although most boats have AIS these days, right? Wrong! A decent sized fishing boat appeared just moments before it was in front of us. It didn’t have AIS & it didn’t sound any horn. Luckily, it was going a bit faster than MerSea so we didn’t run into it! They were lucky I didn’t have a megaphone! -Thanks for keeping the ocean more dangerous than it has to be at this day & age!
Eventually the fog did lift & we were able to see tons & tons of dolphins! -As far as the eye could see! It’s always amazing! We feel so lucky to get to see this so often!
Leaving Avalon for Dana Point.
Dana Point appeared & so did the wind, about 2 miles offshore. Not sure what the knottage was but it was on the higher side & we were too tired by this point to make an effort to put up the mainsail.
It definitely was surreal though. Kind of cool to sail into my childhood home on our own boat. -Where I entered the harbor so many times on other boats! I never could have imagined……
Land Ho! - Dana Point!
And that is today’s stopping point. It’s a good stopping point. We need the rest. You need the rest. Let’s all just take naps until next Wednesday!
Hip Hip Hooray! We have a brand new video out! See some of the live experiences we’ve been having on our voyage:
There’s more of where this clip came from! To see it, click on photo above!
I see you little bug & you’re all mine!
Thanks for reading! Wait until next week, when we have quite a snafu on the way to…. to…. -You’ll see. 😁
