Bodega Bay Photo Gallery

We left Fort Bragg in the early morning on Tuesday, September 15th. Hoping to leave about 0600 but it was still dark and we didn't want to cross the bar in the dark, so we waited 'till daylight at 0700 to head down the Noyo River and back out to sea.

Rolly seas were on tap getting out of Fort Bragg, with no wind and 6-8 foot swells for the first several hours. This seems to be the pattern we get for our passages. Every time the wind would build and we'd raise the sails, then the wind would die, the sails would slat, and we'd have to take them down again.


Kirk dousing the mainsail...again.

And try as we might to ensure that everything is well stowed below, as soon as the rollers start bouncing us around, inevitably something goes crashing in the cabin. Meanwhile, Tosh is becoming an amazing boat-cat, and while we're bouncing through the waves, he wants us to come down below to play fetch, or be out in the cockpit with us! Tikka is still unsure of the whole travel scene, but comes right out to the cockpit the minute the engine stops.

The passage from Fort Bragg to Bodega Bay should have taken about 12 hours, but we had 1-2kts of current against us all day, and it ended up taking 15+ hours. Not what we had in mind, entering the challenging Bodega Bay channel in the dark! We'd done that before on a delivery in 1991, and certainly didn't plan to ever do it again in Due West! Apparently the universe had different plans for us...

Cool animal sighting of the day: just off of Bodega Head in the dark (no moon), we ran through schools of flying fish, all lit up with bioluminescence as they skimmed across the waves, flying in both directions off to port and starboard as we came through the waves. Also lots of bioluminescence on our wake lighting it up in neon-green.

Friends of ours who were a day ahead of us saw tons of whales on their passage. We didn't see any, but did hear a PAN PAN PAN (US Coast Guard non-emergency announcement) over the VHF radio, asking all boaters to be aware of the large numbers of whales in the area between Bodega Bay and San Francisco, so we'll hope to see some more whales soon!

By 2200 we found our first red buoy off Bodega Head but then had some confusion finding the Bodega Bay entrance light. As we approached the jetty we saw a myriad of flashing red and green channel lights. But trying to pick out the navigation lights against so many lights on shore including red taillights on cars was a little bit tricky for the first few minutes.




The entrance and channel looks like a piece of cake in the daylight!

Once we lined up with the range-markers and found the jetty entrance the flashing red and green lights soon sorted themselves out and we found the channel. We made our way slowly through the dogleg jetty and winding, shallow channel. With Kirk shining the flashlight on each channel marker along the way, and the help of our trusty chart plotter and the 22 waypoints Heidi had programed in from the mouth of Bodega Bay into the marina, we were tied up at the dock by 2330 hours. Whew!

We awoke to a cold, gray, wet "Seattle-in-November" kind of day, and hunkered down below with the furnace on all day. Where is this California SUN we keep hearing about?? Luckily it showed back up the next day, and got progressively warmer all week and today it was in the mid 80's.

Bodega Bay - The Birds
The Hitchcock movie The Birds was filmed here, and there are references to it everywhere.

Speaking of birds, we had a little Yellow Warbler join us aboard midday during our passage. It hopped all around the cockpit and rested underneath the dodger for a while, then we couldn't find it and thought it had flown away. Once in Bodega Bay, we talked to our friends Becky and Dave on Tranquility who said they also had a little bird on their boat that had died. We thought maybe our Yellow Warbler had flown off to their boat and then died. But the next day, Kirk found our little bird dead, underneath the teak platform by the steering wheel. Kind of sad but apparently it's common for birds on migration to get off course, fly out to sea, get tired and die. Erie to be in Bodega Bay with a dead bird aboard! So we figured we had to watch The Birds while we were here. Not so scary this time around.


Our Yellow Warbler


Schoolhouse from the movie The Birds

Our fishing buddy Cap TD from Crescent City followed us on down the coast via truck. He grew up in Bodega Bay and still has lots of family and friends here. The day after we arrived, he showed up to take us on a driving tour of the area, complete with hundreds of stories about Bodega Bay in the 60's and 70's, tales of the filming of The Birds, old-back roads lined with fragrant eucalyptus trees to Sebastopol, Occidental, and the town of Bodega, a stop at his sister's house--the family homestead, and a night-visit to Bodega Head to listen to the pounding surf.

We've spent time here before and Bodega Bay has always been one of our most favorite spots. Happy to be back we took a 6-mile round-trip hike from the marina back up to Bodega Head the next day to see the amazing views in daylight. Truly one of the most spectacular spots on earth, if you've never been here we highly recommend it!


Hike to Bodega Head.


Bodega Head looking north.


Bodega Head selfie!


Multi-colored ice plant on Bodega Head, looking south.

Cap TD stopped by again today to take us on another tour, down to Tomales Bay and the boat yard where his beautiful f/v Sea Pride was rebuilt and launched in the early 1970's. More back roads, fun tales of yesteryear, and a fantastic Mexican dinner topped off the day. We are sure gonna miss this guy! Hoping he will come and join us for a week or two in Mexico or Panama. Meanwhile, if you are ever in Crescent City, stop by f/v Sea Pride to say hello (if he's not out crabbing or fishing), and let TD know you are a friend of ours. He is one hell-of-a-guy!


Cap TD and Heidi at Marshall Boatworks, Tomales Bay.

Tomorrow we say goodbye to Bodega Bay as we head south to anchor in Drakes Bay, just north of San Francisco. This will put us in perfect position to ride the flood tide into the Bay and under the Golden Gate Bridge on Monday. We'll head for Sausalito Yacht Club for a couple of days, then possibly on up the Sacramento River Delta... stay tuned!