Make Me Laugh Again

(posted 02/25/24)
We sailed until nightfall last night, then pulled in the Jib and motored overnight. While sailing we hit a high of 8.6 knots. Motoring was 5.5 knots. We had issues putting the Mainsail in, We have roller furling, and when it works it is great. The rest of the time not so much. We did not see any sea life, we did see some birds. We had planned on taking about 20 hours to make this crossing, which is why we left at 1:30 pm, that way when we got to Refugio it would be daylight, but with having sailed fast, and oh yeah the time change we did not plan on, it was dawn when we arrived. We worked on the sail, and were unsuccessful, so decided to try again at anchor. Eventually we got in and anchored there is one other boat hereabout they are a couple of miles away and we can’t even see them from where we dropped anchor. We put out the starling antenna, and the first thing I did was turn off the priority roaming (that lets us have internet when we are away from shore or sailing fast. Cost to us is 46 pesos per GB, or about $2.70 per GB. This anchorage is considered part of the shore so the regular service works here.
Once we got the anchor down, we had breakfast, and showers then took a nap. It is pretty rolly here, we hope it will calm down later tonight. We are back to cruising!

(posted 02/25/24)
After breakfast and our bible reading, we headed out for our last stuff to do in town.
Pay for the marina $300 USD for 8 days (expensive).
Check out with the port captain.
High tide is 1:28 pm. It’s 20 hours to our next stop.
So, we are leaving afternoon. I turned on the mobil roaming for the Starling, we don’t intend to use it, but if you don’t turn it on before you leave, you can not turn it on later .
1335 left PP
By 1430, main and jib up, course 180 degrees (due south), 100 miles to go, engine off, making 6-6.5 knots no auto pilot. The boat is pretty balanced. I locked the wheel and the course is holding.
I have added a video.

(posted 02/25/24)
Out for breakfast (the stink was too much). We dropped off the wet towels from last night, then we went to the German place and got an awesome breakfast. Afterwards, a couple of try’s to get a new shower head, the one in our head broke so we took the one from the forward head. These are nothing special, just like the shower on a hose in a house. The only thing extra that we look for is a way to shut off the water while keeping the temperature adjustments the same. Three hardware stores, plumbing supply and Walmart for no joy. These things run about $20 on Amazon. We will look again in San Carlos when we get there.
Then back to the boat and took it out to dump the holding tank. It was a good day of motoring, and yes we did see dolphins. Then back and tied up.
Once we were at the dock Reneé went for laundry, and I cleaned up the filter on the vent line. Then started the water maker to fill our tank to maximize drinking water.

(posted 02/25/24)

A very busy day.
We started at about 8:00. Reneé took the laundry in, then when she got back, we started putting up sails, the staysail and the Jib. These are the sails forward of the mast. This took us a couple of hours. Then washed the boat, and cleaned windows, this took until about 5 pm. Actually, if you include all the work Reneé did on polishing stainless, this cleaning of the boat outside and in has taken at least a solid week. Somewhere in here, Reneé went back and got the laundry.
While washing windows, I fell getting from the cockpit to the deck, I was wearing sandals, and the only injury (besides my pride) is my little toe on my left foot.
At the end of the day we figured out that we overflowed the holding tank.

(posted 02/19/24)
We rigged the Main Sail
Got the dinghy outboard running, which included putting all the accessories in the dinghy, like the seat, the portable manual bilge pump, the life vests, and the ladder. Then we put the cover on it and put it away. It is now ready for travel. We need to buy some more two stroke oil for it, but since we filled the gas tanks, yesterday we are good for the season. We have 2 five gallon jugs, plus the 3 gallon jug that rides in the dingh. We have rarely used more than about 8 gallons for a season.
Looking at our list, and the weather and the tides, we think we will leave here on Thursday. Tomorrow we will put up the Jib, and Staysail, then wash the boat. Wednesday, Reneé will make a laundry run, and final grocery run and I will top off the water tank. Thursday, we plan to get underway. With a planned arrival in San Carlos of about 2 weeks later. Around March 7 Thursday.
This evening, we walked back to the yard to watch a life raft popping, this one was about 14 years past certification. The certification is good for 3 years. The cost for re-certifying when they are current is about 2/3’s the cost of a new one. When they are this old, they are not worth very much. When we bought our boat, it came with an out of date life raft in a valise, which took us an hour or two to get on deck. We checked on re-certification, and decided to buy a new one. Then donated the old one to the US Power 
Squadron in Oceanside for training. When they popped it, it shredded itself. I will try to put the video in this post. Here is the LINK.