We left Dana Point at about 2pm on Saturday, again expecting terrible weather, but instead got no wind and just a bit of rain. We had my sister and our friends Paul and Ulrik aboard, so we had a fun, but slow, motor up the coast.

As we had planned, we entered the Newport Beach breakwater at 5pm and were greeted by Keith, a friend of Chris' from UCSB, in his Duffy and our family friends Taylor and Steve who came out in Chris's little Avon to take photos and escort us in.

We had dressed the boat with the proper sequence of flags and arrived at the BYC where the dock was filled with our family and friends. Chris and I lit some flares and popped that bottle of South African bubbly that we've been saving for this very occasion.

After we got tied up, we all had a champagne toast on the dock followed by a casual party at the Yacht Club. Mexican food, of course, was on the menu. We showed pictures from our trip and had a wonderful time catching up with family and friends - many of whom we had not seen since we left three years ago.

It was a really emotional, exciting and all-around wonderful evening and I truly cannot think of a better way to end the trip. It is a day we have been anticipating for a long time and will certainly never forget.

We will we have a lot of great photos to post in our gallery soon (thanks so much to Steve Orloff)...so check back in a few days. We're not signing off just yet!