August 31st - September 5... Goodbye to Summer

As I previously posted, we got to Willow Berm late on Tuesday the 30th.  We had the best of intentions for leaving early on Wednesday for our trip to Benicia but the boat was FILTHY.  Maybe it is the fact there is a lot of farmland around there but there was full on dirt coating the boat, plus all the spiders and spiderwebs that seemed to thrive everywhere we went in the Delta.

Bye bye Delta.  Until next year!

Matt had said he wanted to see a freighter up close.  We did just that in New York Slough.

So after lots of scrubbing we finally set off mid morning.  As we were getting towards Antioch it seemed rather rough.  New York Slough towards Pittsburg wasn't too bad but once we were out of the slough and turned south (in Susuin Bay I believe) it REALLY got rough.  We were taking water over the windscreen on the flybridge and were discovering some window leaks we didn't know we had.  We briefly entertained the idea of turning around and staying in Pittsburg but decided to carry on to Benicia.  This day there were no Coast Guards to run us off from the Port Chicago Naval Weapons Depot but we still gave it a wide berth.  Conditions were improving as we approached Benicia and we flirted with the idea of carrying on but with no good way to know what the conditions were in San Pablo Bay we decided to stop. 

Benicia Harbormaster's Office from our slip.

We had been instructed to pull up at the dock by the harbormaster's office to receive our slip assignment.  The wind was blowing us off the dock and we were basically we were trying to parallel park between two other boats in a space less than twice the length of our boat.  Matt was getting really frustrated but after a good 15 or 20 minutes he was able to get close enough to the dock that I could jump off.  At this point one of the people on the boat behind where we were pulling in offered to help out.  Matt snapped "we've got it NOW."  And of course within a few minutes of our finally getting tied up that boat left.  Thanks.  A lot.  Right.

We checked in with the harbormaster's office and they sent us over to a "35 foot" slip.  There is no way that slip was 35'.  We were hanging WAY off the back, as was the 32' boat in the slip next to us.  Oh well, it was only for one night!  We walked in to town for a late lunch and later walked the docks and met all sorts of really nice people.  There was a woman we met who lived on her houseboat.  She gave us a tour and it was HUGE and really nice.  She said she'd had it shipped out from wherever she bought it, somewhere in Nevada or Arizona I think.  Anyway, we had a fun time talking to her and many others.

The next morning I had to stand at the gate and hold it open as Matt walked the key over to the harbormasters office.  I am not sure how safe it is to have to have a key to get off the docks as well as on.  Seems dangerous in an emergency.  Anyway, we got underway a little earlier than we had the prior day.  San Pablo Bay was smooth as glass and we had an uneventful trip to Tiburon / San Francisco Yacht Club. 

One of the "brother's" in San Pablo Bay.

We met with Jay, the Port Captain of San Francisco Yacht Club, and figured out where everyone was going to dock, then had a delicious lunch there.  We took a walk around town and I saw a thrift shop.  Since this is a nice area I figured they'd have good stuff so I took a look and found a cute Tommy Bahama sleeveless polo shirt.  I called Matt in to pay for it for me and he saw the Tommy Bahama label and rolled his eyes, expecting it to be expensive.  $3.50. It was half price day.  Whoo hoo.  Matt liked that.  We ran into half the people from the cruise in as we continued our walk around town.

The view of our club boats from the SFYC deck.

We had signed up for dinner at the yacht club as well, despite a rather high price tag. We ate with two other couples from our club and had a great time--great food and better company. We somehow got on to telling "how we met" stories and they were great. We went to bed absolutely stuffed with big smiles on our faces.

We all agreed to head out at 11 on Friday morning as there was some concern about the tides and having enough water in the Looooong and narrow channel into San Rafael that leads to the Marin Yacht Club. Luckily we were in touch with someone who'd left from the club very early that morning who reported no issues with skinny water as he went through the channel so we went through with confidence. Though we did have a moment where the depth read " . " whatever that means!

We stayed at Marin from Friday until Monday. What can I say about it other than it was FUN FUN FUN. We took the dinghy up the creek and gawked at the houses (no dead body this year, that is another story), we tried stand up paddle boarding, we went fishing with Gary and Lucille on Panda Angler, we took a whole bunch of people up the creek on Pineapple Girl, we ate lots of great food and had a fantastic time. It was really tough to leave on Monday and head back to Coyote Point but the time had come to get back to reality. We had a nice ride back and the wind held off on REALLY blowing until after we were back in our slip. Note to self for next time, after a six day trip, stop at the pump out before going back to the slip! We had to make an emergency run to pump out this past Saturday to make up for our shortsightedness.