Friday, August 19, 2011

At Monterey with the sea lions

Monterey Bay
36 36.244 N, 121 53.440 W

Yesterday we left early in the morning, around 6:30 am to head south to Monterey. There was a little hiccup starting the engine (we now suspect a grounding issue) but overcame it and continued on. It was foggy most of the way with visibility of 1-2 miles. Initially the seas were reasonably flat but later in the day they built to 1-3 ft swells with 1-2 ft chop on top most from the WNW with the wind which helped. We saw very little traffic, mainly fishing boats when we were within 10 miles of Monterey. At one point I wondered if the AIS was still working as I saw no vessel traffic. Since my Iphone was getting connection, I checked the marine traffic website, http://www.marinetraffic.com/ais/, and entered Windarra, and it found us. It's that amazing.

We are at the Monterey Marina tucked into a slip. Windarra is 47 foot with a 14.6 foot beam. Our slip is 50 foot with a 15.5 foot beam, so we are wedged in with a fender or two on each side. Jumping onto the dock as we came in was a little problematic. There are a LOT of sea lions here in Monterey. They are on buoys, on docks, on boats, on the beach, etc. To keep them off of the finger piers folks have built plywood barriers. They seem to work well to keep off the sea lions but they also make it difficult for someone like me, who does not jump or leap well to get off the boat and onto the dock to tie a line before we careen into the dock. Luckily the boat resident sharing our finger pier was on the dock and she provided assistance.

Later in the evening Rich and I walked down the dock to go out to dinner. We saw one of the 'resident' sea lions on a finger pier several slips down. He was a very large fellow. We were both glad that he was asleep as we would not have wanted to challenge him without a cattle prod.

Today we have some chores to do. Over head we hear the sound of Lear jets landing at the nearby airport. Apparently there is a famous collector automobile auction here this weekend.

No worries,

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