Catalina Island trip log

[mastreb]

All the years I’ve lived in San Diego and sailed the bay, we’ve never rounded Point Loma and gone north, which is one of the reasons I wanted to do a trip to Catalina Island from here. We have a beautiful coastline here, and while I’ve gone in and out of Oceanside, Dana Point, Newport Beach, and Long Beach by trailer, I’d never sailed between them. After buying an autopilot, the urge to actually use it struck, so I took a week off and planned an impromptu sailing adventure.

I spent the last nine days sailing aboard Luna Sea, and hit just about every reasonably reachable port from our homeport of San Diego. Knowing that we would be beating against the wind, I scheduled four days to get there, four days about the island, two to get back. Of course, the wind has a mind of her own…

Day 1: National City to Point Loma

We got a late start because I’d made too many installations and modifications at the same time and they weren’t all complete in time. We skipped washing the boat and went out dirty. Crew was myself, my wife’s brother (a live-aboard sailor of a 33’ Ranger), and my wife and three kids, so definitely a full boat.

I had to perform autopilot calibration and solder on the VHF antenna connector while dockside before we left. After stopping at the fuel dock, we decided that rather than trying to round the point and overnight in Mission Beach, we’d stop at Point Loma Marina where our membership gets us a free slip. On the plus side, the sailing in San Diego bay was quite nice. That evening my family slept aboard and my Brother-in-law went home as he was within walking distance of his boat.

Day 2: Point Loma to Oceanside

Day two we knew we’d have to power to make Oceanside in a reasonable time. We departed our slip around 10:00 a.m. and made for the point, rounding it easily. It’s very picturesque, with the old lighthouse atop the point, and the new one near sea level at the very tip.

We immediately ran into the Point Loma kelp forest, which I knew about vaguely from my fishing buddies, but had never been into. It was such as disaster I made a separate post about that. Long story short, Kelp sucks, full stop. After the trauma of clearing a kelp forest that is literally the same size as the peninsula of Point Loma, we powered WOT to Oceanside, doing about 16.5 knots with our crew and load. The kids had a blast (they love planning) but I dislike the noise and exhaust smell. During this time I use the autopilot quite a bit, but it was still getting its calibration legs and S-curving quite a bit.

We came into Oceanside harbor and docked at the police docks. The Admiral and Crew departed the boat at this point, and the Grand Admiral picked them up at the dock and took them home, about 20 miles to the south. Brother-in-Law and I slept aboard.


Day 3: Oceanside to Dana Point

The next morning my Brother-in-Law and I had breakfast at a restaurant in the harbor and then set out for Dana Point. There was little to no wind, so we motored along the coast of Camp Pendleton until the wind kicked up and we could make way by sail.

As we passed by, we noticed one of the Navy LCACs (giant hovercraft) waiting on their ramp for us to pass by, and then it took off in a storm of sand and sea-spray. It was pretty impressive. We had dolphins follow along for a while as well.

After a long slow sail, we sailed into Dana Point harbor right about dusk and settled into a guest slip there for the evening.

Day 4: Dana Point to Newport

We had the best sailing of the trip from Dana Point to Newport. The wind was on a Beam reach between 8 and 12 knots. I put the autopilot in windvane mode, where it steers the boat to keep the wind at the same point of sail, as soon as we left the Dana Point marina. The windvane mode worked so well (and the wind was so cooperative) that we literally did nothing the entire sail but hang out—we didn’t have to trim sheets, man the helm, or do anything but maintain a watch. For the last mile I set the course into Newport Harbor, and we sailed in about four hours after leaving Dana Point, arriving mid-day. We again availed ourselves of a police dock and took the opportunity to wash the boat.

A storm warning was predicted for the next day, so I made the decision to remain at safe harbor in Newport. Winds were predicted to be 25 knots, seas up to 9 feet, and driving rain.

The waves kicked up that night around midnight, and the police dock was heavily affected. We had three-foot waves coming into the floating docks, and you could hear boats all over banging around us. I had to get up four times through the night to adjust the boat’s dock lines in heavy waves, and could not sleep at all. About 2:00 a.m., a cleat knot that didn’t have a locking loop in it came undone and the stern began to slam into the dock. I never did get to sleep.

Day 5: Safe Harbor in Newport
The waves calmed down as the rain started, and the two of us wound up spending the day sleeping to make up for the previous evening ensconced in the boat. We finally ventured out into the rain around 2:00 p.m. to find something to eat, and then just went back to the boat and hung out aboard.

That evening was much better, very calm and we got back to sleeping on a normal schedule.

Day 6: Newport to Two Harbors

My wife met us in Newport Thursday morning and we decided to head for Two Harbors rather than Avalon, increasing the distance by nearly ten nm. In order to make the 40nm trip in one day, I decided to power at high speed for the first half and then sail. The channel was as calm and flat as I’d ever seen it, and we were directly into the wind anyway, so we set out from Newport Harbor to Two Harbors at WOT. I figured we would burn off one tank of gas and then sail.

With the autopilot steering, I stood watch but didn’t pay much attention to the charts, and we wound up doing 7/8ths of the distance before we ran out of gas. Good thing, too, because the wind was only five knots so it took us another three hours to close that last 1/8th of the trip. We sailed into Two Harbors around 4p.m. and moored. We blew up the dinghy and paddled to the Dinghy dock, then wandered around the tiny village of Two Harbors before eating dinner at their one (very good) restaurant.

Day 7: Two Harbors to Little Harbor

The next morning we headed out early towing the dinghy and went around the isthmus motoring into the wind to go west and then sailing once we rounded the point to a beam wind. We arrived at the opposite side of Two Harbors around noon. We decided to sail past to Little Harbor, and uninhabited campground, and arrived their around 3 p.m. We pulled in to find two other sloops at anchor, and so anchored between them using a fore-and-aft anchor with an 11 lbs. fortress on the front and a 7 lb. Danforth on the stern. They both held very well in the sandy muddy bottom.

We went ashore with the Dinghy and did a hike around the campground, spying a Bison on the hillside about a mile away. Catalina has a heard of 150 head of Bison that are remnants of a group abandoned on the island by a Hollywood movie shoot in the early ‘20’s.

On our way back to our boat, we struck up a conversation as we rowed passed the larger of the two other sloops, and were invited aboard. The crew of the other boat were already aboard, and so we made a party of six. Travis, the owner of the larger sloop, had been anchored in Little Harbor for five months, living aboard and working on his boat. He intended to sail to San Diego in a few months, and had been living aboard cruising for about 18 months. Cole and Clark (female) were a couple who’d decided to quit their jobs, sell everything, buy a boat, and live the simple life, which they were doing. They’d been at anchor for a few days and would be returning to Long Beach in a few more. Interesting folks all. Around sunset we paddled over to our boat and tucked in for the evening.

Sleeping on the hook was easy for me and my brother-in-law, but the admiral had a tough time with it, not trusting the anchors. I set an iPhone app with an anchor alarm to wake me up, and it never went off. In the morning, I assessed we’d had no drift at all, despite constant three footers rolling into the harbor throughout the night.

Day 8: Little Harbor to Avalon

We got up with the sun the next morning and set sail to Avalon. There was no wind at all in the morning, so we motored along in the company of another sloop. After about two hours, the other sloop launched its dinghy and motored over to us to inform me that we’d lost our Dinghy about a mile back. I’d been paying attention forward and to the coastline, and missed the fact that yet another improper cleat knot nearly cost me a $1000 dinghy but for the good grace of another sailor. We powered back to our drifting dinghy, and I cleated it off myself this time, taking time to teach everyone else aboard the importance of the locking loop on a cleat knot. Added a stopper-knot and clove-hitched the bitter end of the painter to a stanchion just for good measure.

The rest of the day was uneventful, but the wind never did pick up above 5 knots, so we wound up motoring all the way into Avalon, arriving in the early afternoon.

In Avalon, we walked about town and then did a bus tour to the interior of the island, going up to the “Airport in the Sky”. The bus operator was very funny, and three-hour trip was quite enjoyable. After dinner at a nice off-the-beaten-path restaurant, we slept aboard at a mooring ball.

Day 9: Avalon to Oceanside, Oceanside to National City

We decided to take a day off the trip and get home, so the next morning we powered WOT -10% from Avalon to Oceanside. During the trip, we slowed down to run with a pod of dolphins that wanted to play, and I saw a dolphin get the biggest air I’ve ever seen jumping out of the water. She came out of the water about three body lengths high—it was quite amazing. We ran on the autopilot the entire way, and it did a great job of compensating for waves, moving about the cabin, and wind.

In Oceanside, we dropped off the Admiral, refueled, and my Brother-in-law and I again powered from Oceanside back to National City. This time we tried to stay outside the Kelp, but eventually had to go through it to get to the bay. We had more trouble with it and had to self-rescue using the Genoa to avoid being washed into shore (documented in the Kelp thread). We also saw a sloop that had been blown into the quay wall, with the harbor police attempting to pull it off as the crew stood by ashore watching. Made me especially grateful for the big motors we can mount that can actually stop and reverse our boats on a dime if need be.

Despite the favorable winds, we had a deadline and powered back to our home marina, put into a slip, and tied up, tired but happy after nine days aboard.

[kadet]

Thanks for sharing sounds like a great adventure for the little

[seahouse]

Nice story Matt – thanks for posting. Inspires me to just take off and do some touring in our area (sans kelp, though) .

- B.

[Herschel]

I appreciate your relating the details of your trip. I was struck by one similarity with lengthy trips I have tried in my home state of Florida. When I have tried to stick reasonably close to a schedule, I have ended up doing more motoring than sailing. I hope to "plan" my next trip with enough flexibility and time to wait for good sailing weather. Not sure how that will work out, but worth a try. Congrats, though, on a nice voyage.

[Ixneigh]

Forget sailing if you have work to return to, or other obligations. Even big keel boats motor a lot. If you want to do a lot of sailing, you should have lots of time like the people who sold all their stuff and are now just bumming around. Sounds like you got some nice days in at any rate.
Ix

[seahouse]

If you want to do a lot of sailing, you should have lots of time like the people who sold all their stuff and are now just bumming around.

Yeah – that's the real problem, Ix – life gets in the way. I'm looking forward to an early retirement. Maybe.

Hey! You just gave me a great idea! I'll just bum around and pretend like I sold all my stuff!!!

[mastreb]

Herschel, it's true: Schedules are the enemy of sailing.

What was particularly annoying about this trip is that the wind changed just about daily to be coming from our heading--had we done the trip in reverse order, we would have made good time by sail. We even had the elusive north wind in the channel when we were headed south. That would have been a rare time one could sail directly from San Diego to Avalon.

It had been my intent to sail first, make whatever distance we could, and then motor to get to the next port by sunset. Unfortunately, we never had any winds in the morning--they typically didn't get moving until 11 am at the earliest and more generally around 2pm, which meant we would have to motor first and sail second, and then motor again to make up time which is what we mostly did.

This trip did make me a true believer in the "power sailor" concept, which I'd always been skeptical of. I've often times said that I didn't care about power boating and only bought the ETEC-60 because it was the stock option. Our first full tanks of gas lasted us two years--that's how little we powered.

But it would have been very difficult to keep this schedule in typical keel-boat. We wound up crossing the channel at high speed both ways, which had always taken us ten to twelve hours in keelboats. And we would have had to beat against a very light wind in all directions for the entire trip, making everything take for ever and leaving us a few times sailing in the dark, which my night vision is simply not up to any more.

Being able to power at speed eliminated the need to trailer the boat to make the crossing: It literally took the same amount of time to power from Oceanside to National City as it would have taken to trailer the boat and transport it to oceanside by freeway, if one includes very fast unrig and re-rig times. And I got to spend that time on the boat at sea rather than in the SUV on the I5 and rigging.

Instead of beating, we motored whenever the winds were unfavorable. Cheating? Nope. We weren't racing anybody but the calendar

[mastreb]

Oh, I forgot the funniest thing that happened on the trip:

Turns out the HMS Regina, along with other ships of her majesty's Royal Canadian Navy, were in the area near San Clemente Island (a Naval Reserve) performing live-fire exercises, which they announced on Channel 16 a few times a day.

Using the Canadian pronunciation of Regina. With a pronounced lisp. It took me a half hour to convince my Brother-in-law, was literally in tears, that I was in fact certain that the ship's name was "Regina".

Matt

[rwmiller56]

Good trip log!

I don't blame you for waiting out the blow in Newport. I was in Newport / Irvine area on Tue & Wed for a business trip, and the storm on Wed was quite bad for that time of year.

Roger

[bhbell]

Oh, I forgot the funniest thing that happened on the trip:

Turns out the HMS Regina, along with other ships of her majesty's Royal Canadian Navy, were in the area near San Clemente Island (a Naval Reserve) performing live-fire exercises, which they announced on Channel 16 a few times a day.

Using the Canadian pronunciation of Regina. With a pronounced lisp. It took me a half hour to convince my Brother-in-law, was literally in tears, that I was in fact certain that the ship's name was "Regina".

Matt

Hey guys. The HMS Regina is named after the city I live in, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.

The city was established during the reign of Queen Victoria. Regina is the Latin word for queen. Proper English pronunciation rhymes with a female body part. This causes great hilarity for our neighbors to the south. Nothing unusual for us.

If you are ever in Canada, look at any coin, it will say, " DG Regina Elizabeth Ii "

Our Very unofficial city slogan...

" Regina, the city that rhymes with fun"

[bhbell]

Oh, I forgot the funniest thing that happened on the trip:

Turns out the HMS Regina, along with other ships of her majesty's Royal Canadian Navy, were in the area near San Clemente Island (a Naval Reserve) performing live-fire exercises, which they announced on Channel 16 a few times a day.

Using the Canadian pronunciation of Regina. With a pronounced lisp. It took me a half hour to convince my Brother-in-law, was literally in tears, that I was in fact certain that the ship's name was "Regina".

Matt

Hey guys. The HMS Regina is named after the city I live in, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.

The city was established during the reign of Queen Victoria. Regina is the Latin word for queen. Proper English pronunciation rhymes with a female body part. This causes great hilarity for our neighbors to the south. Nothing unusual for us.

If you are ever in Canada, look at any coin, it will say, " DG Regina Elizabeth Ii "

Our Very unofficial city slogan...

" Regina, the city that rhymes with fun"

[bhbell]

One last detail. It is actually the HMCS Regina.

All ships in the Canadian navy are HMCS ( Her Majesty's Canadian Ship ).

OK, I'm done.

[mastreb]

"Regina, the city that rhymes with fun"

(and oh yeah, they did say HMCS, which, in the U.S. Navy, is a rank: Senior Chief Hospital Medical Corpsman)

[cptron]

Great log and says why we have the trailer sailer. To thwart the enemy (time)

[Herschel]

This trip did make me a true believer in the "power sailor" concept,

I think you have expressed the nature of cruising in our boats well. I have always thought of the larger cruisers that are designed to be motored and sailed at the same time as true "motor sailors", but the nature of your log and use of the term "power sailor concept" certainly validates the way my trips have turned out. Three years ago my wife and I "power sailed" down the St. Johns River from Sanford, Florida to Jacksonville, Florida. Then my son and I (after a little rest) returned upriver. This was a total distance of about 300 miles. About half of the river is wide enough to try to sail, but half must be motored due to its narrow, winding nature. Between the schedule and the wind, mostly we motored, but when time and circumstances allowed we would sail for awhile. I think the "power sailing concept" term captures the essence of the "sail when you can---motor when you can't" opportunities that the MacGregors give us. I had come to think of this approach as not being true cruising due to the limited sailing, but I think you have coined a term that captures the unique opportunities that these boats give us. Neat!