California or Bust - Missive 4

September 27, 2010: We ventured off to the sandy beaches of Santa Cruz meandering along the marina waterfront, out to the lighthouse and eventually to the boardwalk. Good thing it was Monday and the weekend crowds had dispersed. The temperature soared to a whopping 103 degrees ... it was soooo hot! I didn't even get a chance to work up to this heat. I did get to try out my cockpit shades and the solar panels were happy just perking along with all the sun.

The arcade had quite a history dating back to the early 1900's - I would have guessed it was a 1960's vintage facility that never grew up; which is exactly what some of the characters we have seen imitate. We are definitely close to Southern Cal ... bikinis, long stringy hair and leathery skin tanned by the sun. Bob managed to enjoy some lovely eye candy strolling on the beach but the cutest fellow I found was only 2 years old; at least he had cool britches and eye shades!

September 28, 2010: No fog this morning ... yeah! We had wonderful sail to Monterey, a short 24 miles. Getting into the marina and our slip was a whole other story. I have yet gotten use to the close quarters in the marinas let along having finger piers on both sides of the boat vs. a U-shaped slip where you share it with another boat with wiggle room between boats.

The marina ... it has a very narrow entrance with an incredible current flowing past the breakwater cement wall. We were assigned to A-15 ... the 2nd row of slips behind the wall ... the first row was labeled "H" (I don't get it) but I couldn't see whether the numbers were odd or even to figure out where to turn down the fairway. It didn't really matter as the current was so strong I got swept past my turn so now I had to flip around. Oh this was just great; but there was small turning basin sandwiched between the slips and the wharf and I got turned around.

Okay this was only half the battle. Now we are pulling into our slip and Ponderosa was like a ping pong ball bouncing off the sides ... there was only 6" clearance on each side of the boat. Our fenders are squashed to half their size keeping us off the dock, our bow hangs over the walkway in front, the stern out into the fairway. We are now securely captured with no damage ... just dodged a bullet and will live to see another day until we witnessed the 70 ft fishing boat pulling into the slip behind us. As he pulled into his slip (and bouncing off the finger piers) there was 12 inches to spare between his stern and ours. We stared in absolute disbelief; here we have traveled all over SE Alaska, BC and down the coast this far and our most trouble is in a marina! This is far too much adventure.

September 29, 2010: Time to be tourist as we visited Cannery Row and the Monterey Aquarium. The history here dates back to about 1546 starting with the Spanish explorers but in more recent decades the fishing and cannery business were the foundation of this community.
Cannery Row, situated along the waterfront, in its previous life housed canneries for the sardine fishing industry which was big time business in the 30's & 40's. Now days you have restaurants and boutiques lining both sides of the street.

The Monterey Aquarium is most excellent, geared especially well to the kids with play areas and exhibits right at the perfect height for the short visitors. I enjoyed the kids area too! The exhibits for the sea horses and jelly fish were very special and my favorite.

September 30, 2010: I spent most of the day upgrading our computer from Vista to Windows 7. It should have been slam dunk but we had the Vista Home Premium version which forced us to treat it like an upgrade from XP to 7. Oh well, it's back running.

For an afternoon break, we wandered to downtown Monterey. What a lovely area with businesses housed in historic buildings, a walking plaza with benches, flowers & trees and restaurants galore. You can tell that California has been hit hard these last two poor economic years; business life was pretty quiet.

October 1, 2010: The bus system is quite extensive around this area which provided us the opportunity to visit Carmel about a 20 minute bus ride from Monterey. In 1771, a Franciscan friar located the Mission San Carlos de Borromeo de Carmelo at the mouth of what is now Carmel Valley. By 1835 the mission and its holdings were divided among several large ranchos, pieces which ultimately formed Carmel-by-the-Sea. In 1931, a development company promoted ownership of lots in this seaside village.

The character of the community remains strong. The streets are narrow, winding and lined with trees and benches. High end businesses are located in traditional Spanish style town squares and court yards. The police department is discreetly hidden, the town is dog friendly and they claim to have a city ordinance banning high heeled shoes. And the official visitor guides states there are no street addresses. Locations are described as north or south of Ocean Avenue and on the east or west side of the street.

We sat and admired Carmel Beach while gazing over towards Pebble Beach Golf course. You could see where golf would be challenging to play with the winds from the sea.

Tomorrow we are off to San Simeon about a 12 hour passage.