Well, we are finally in the home stretch of moving on down the coast. We've been here in Newport Beach for almost 10 weeks. It wasn't planned, but it worked out great. So much fun catching up with friends in Southern California. There was even a quick couple of trips out to Palm Springs. It's on the table that when we are done with our cruising life we may settle there, but that's for the future and for now we'll dream of a long fun sail onward to wherever.
Our list of projects is never ending, and I don't know a boat owner who wouldn't or couldn't agree. So far we've completed (or nearly completed) the main sheet rigging, the self steering wind vane, chaffing gear for our lifelines, added 200 feet of rode to our chain (I learned to splice chain and rode with the help of the internet, color me very proud!), ordered more parts that were needed (the fridge is here, just not in yet!), added more water tanks, cleaned and mounted two more winches, added some hanging dividers for more storage in the head, and a dozen other small items. Wow! When I started the list I forgot what all we've actually gotten done. We've been on a mooring ball for 12 weeks now! The solar panels work great! The engine is only run once a week just to top us off. The location has been perfect. There are 3 different boating stores within a couple miles and groceries stores are very convenient. The crew at the Police docks are very friendly and the showers I've found to be OK (I like very hot showers). It's been a great place to recoup after the experience we had going down the coast. We can stay aboard the boat when we want our privacy or head to land to walk around. It's been mostly sunny, but we have our days of fog. I can't really complain about the fog or the cool days when I think about the fact we've not seen a day under 50 degrees all winter and some days it's gotten up to almost 80. Not bad after all those years in the grey wet Portland winters we endured. They were so hard on us that the last two years Scott and I had to leave the Northwest for the winters. I'm starting to finally realize that we aren't going back this year. It's usually early March that we start back, February is usually a month of apprehension in our household, but not this year. It's nice to know it is really only gonna get warmer from here on out.
Well, I just wanted to put in a post. I haven't done so in such a long time. Hopefully the next post will be from "down the road"....
