Trip to San Diego, What Worked Well and What Didn't Part 2

This and the next post will highlight a few things that worked well on our ocean voyage.  As I mentioned in Part 1 the boat did great overall in various wind and sea conditions.  Pretty much exceeding my expectations for a 45,000lb cruiser.  The Tayana 48's naval architect, Robert "Bob" Perry, lived up to his reputation and is quite an impressive architect.

Just another beautiful sail on the ocean!

I will save my favorite for last...otherwise the following are not in any particular order.

1. Staysail



Staysail set waiting for the coming storm...

The Staysail gets an honorable mention.  It is nothing spectacular, looks like new, and was never used as intended by us before this trip.  We did have it inspected by Ballard Sails and they gave it a thumbs up.  We also hoisted it at the dock and all worked good.  Once used out on the ocean, I was impressed at how steady it held the boat in winds over 25 knots.  It hove-to (kept the boat steady, relatively in one place) very well during gusts of 40+ knots during one nighttime storm in the Santa Barbara Channel (more to come).

2. Watch Schedule
The crew; Doug, Julie and Curtis, all agreed to a 2 hour watch schedule during the day and a 3 hour watch schedule during the night.  We rotated through each night watch in three days giving each crew a chance at one of the 3 night watch times.



Hailing White Raven on night watch... not sure why my Nobletec SW was not on the screen

The rotation worked very well and we pretty much kept it for the whole trip.  We even loosely planned in who would prepare our one joint meal each day.  From noon to 13:00 (1:00 PM) we officially all spent time together eating and talking, although we spent a lot of time together outside this slot as well.

Manna Watch Schedule
Start	End	Day 1	Day 2	Day 3
6:00	8:00	Doug	Julie	Curtis	This shift prepared lunch
8:00	10:00	Julie	Curtis	Doug
10:00	12:00	Curtis	Doug	Julie	This shift cleaned from lunch
12:00	13:00	All	All	All
13:00	15:00	Doug	Julie	Curtis
15:00	17:00	Julie	Curtis	Doug
17:00	19:00	Curtis	Doug	Julie
19:00	21:00	Doug	Julie	Curtis
21:00	0:00	Julie	Curtis	Doug
0:00	3:00	Curtis	Doug	Julie
3:00	6:00	Doug	Julie	Curtis

Each person going off shift was responsible for making a log entry of their watch and current conditions such as position, heading, SOG, wind, temp, pressure, etc.

Julie getting ready for the 9PM to Midnight Shift as we all enjoy the sunset

3. Meals and Snacks


Mmmm ...Tuna Poke

As mentioned above we all had one main meal together each day.  The rest of the "meals" were basically prepared and eaten whenever one felt like it.  Having rotating shifts makes it very easy to have small meals or snacks throughout the day and night when a person wanted something.  No traditional 8-5 three meals a day on the ocean!  We did learn Doug was the master at making salads (pictured below with the master salad chef himself).  They were a particular favorite of the rest of the crew and well missed even now!

Tuna again???  Oh Yea!

Snacks were great to have.  Salty, sweet, spicy, bland, crunchy, soft, crispy, nuts, fruit, vegies with dip... we pretty much had it all!  Maybe in a future post we can dig up a list of items we brought on the boat.  It was a lot!  We were able to bake, BBQ,  and stove top cook for most of the trip.

Julie with her wagon load of the "last minute" snack run before leaving Friday Harbor

4. Fishing Gear
I am not sure if it was just one of those "being at the right place at the right time" moments, but tuna fishing worked out very well!  I did learn some quick lessons at the get go.  First you (or maybe just me) cannot effectively tie a knot in 100lb test leader.  After loosing the first lure at the knot I crimped on some stainless leader and then crimped onto the lure.

Getting the fishing pole ready to go ... maybe for the second ... or third time

The next fish we fought for quite some time.  Finally it did a long run and found a backlash in my reel and with no drag the line stopped instantly and the fish kept going.  Got the lure back, but the body was trashed.  Before loosing the fish we did see the jumbo Albacore with it's super long fins on the surface and it was at least twice as big as the one we caught.  Not sure what we would have done with 50lbs of fish!

Almost got it to the boat!

Third time, new lure, we caught an approx. 20lb Albacore.  It was great and kept us in fish for the whole trip with 5lbs left in the freezer when we got to San Diego.  All of the above fishing events took place in about 4 hours.  Knowing we did not have room for another fish we pretty much stopped serious fishing at that point.

Messy but good!

Here is the 7" Savage Sand Eel lure that worked very well:

And that is it until next time... but do not fret it should not be long.  I have the third post about half done.  Until then thanks for tuning in... Curtis.