This, That, and the other Thing

Monday, Sept. 8^th – We all slept in after the long night and had a leisurely breakfast and then went ashore for some Frisbee, playing on the beach and hike around the island one last time! Mary and I built a sand castle which we then proceeded to run and jump on, destroying it completely. No one will ever know that it was there! Mid afternoon we hauled back anchor and set out for SFYC once again.

Tuesday, Sept. 9^th – It was a work day around the boat.

Wednesday, Sept. 10^th – Got to go to the big city! We took the ferry over and spent the afternoon tromping around San Francisco. We went to the ferry building market place to get ice cream and see the shops, watch the people go by. Walking from the pier to market place we went by a little sitting area with a sign that read, “people watching area”. We were quite amused by that one. After ice cream we walked up to Chinatown to wander through endless shops filled with junk, but someone entertaining non the less. We quickly grew tired with that and made our way to Little Italy for some pizza and dog watching at the park. Bermise Mtn. Dog, two great Pyrenees, bull terrier, a couple labs, and TWO husky puppies. The cuteness overload was almost too much. We stopped to pick up some cannoli’s on the way back to the ferry (cause you can’t go to Little Italy and not get cannoli’s) and started the trek back. After a quick stop at the playground, which included spinny chair things, and another great sign that read, “adults must be accompanied by a child”. 

Thursday, Sept. 11^th – Today was a work day and library adventures with Mary!

Friday, Sept. 12^th – We found a sewing machine in the city that we could use to fix up our spinnaker so Mary, Annie, Holly, Rosie and I trekked onto the ferry with the spin and headed for the National Maritime Museum where a friend had a sailwright we could use for the zig zag stich we needed! While Anne and Holly stiched away, we headed with Erin (our savior with the sewing machines!) down to the boats which they have under their care and were able to tour some of them. VERY COOL, see the pictures below!

Saturday, Sept. 13^th – We had a morning full of guests (relatives of Martha herself) and a couple returning the original Taffrail Log that Martha used when she was first built, we strung up all our new halyards! YAY! And it was a good thing we did because a couple were starting to get pretty worn out and frayed. Some had been on the boat for more than 10 years! With our new halyards and some new sheets led, we headed out of the bay for evening in Bolinas Bay, just north of San Francisco for a night away from the city, which was perfect.

Sunday, Sept. 14^th – After a very rolling night resulting in not much sleep for me I hung out the boat instead of going to ashore and read, slept, ate and then repeated while the crew played in the breaking waves (a little bit jealous but I also knew that my body could use the extra sleep, plus there will be much more of that in Mexico). We ate a delicious lunch of ramen noodles, perfect for the cool air and clouds that were rolling in.

With a sail planned for Monday (the crew from Seaward), we had to leave Bolinas and head back to the city but we had a beautiful down-wind sail all the way up under the Golden Gate Bridge (the sun even came out). The schooner Seaward (http://www.callofthesea.org/home.php) which runs educational programs and does charters in the bay area, invited to come alongside them for the evening and we rafted up and shared stories for the evening.

Monday, Sept. 15^th – The Seaward crew came onboard around 10 for a day sail around the bay and we had a blast!!! It is one thing to have people come onboard for a day sail and teach them, which I love, but to have a crew come on who already know how to sail was just simply awesome. We raced back and forth across the bay before sailing out under the bridge and then back under. Being able to trade stories about our sailing adventures, where we have been and what we are looking to do in the future made the day just spectacular! After dropping them back on the Seaward (very sad, we wanted to keep them) we headed to Angel Island to anchor the evening. We decided to try somewhere else, Hospital Cove, for the night which turned out to be not so good. All the ferry and boat traffic made it VERY rolly, weeeeee (not so much actually). But we made it through the night with all the shallow water alarms, resetting anchor and getting blown every which way.

Tuesday, Sept. 16^th – Early this morning we decided to move anchorages because of the roly-poly-olys and spent the morning playing on the beach, swimming and collecting an amazing amount of sea glass. I have never found that much anywhere! This afternoon we headed up to Alameda for a couple days where it is more of a working mans town and we actually find some real boat things that we need. Tiburon/Belvedere where we have been staying is very nice, but it is not very real, all very expensive with no real hardware shops, grocery stores, etc. Alameda is very cool, nestled up in east bay and motoring past all the big freight carriers and docked across from a coast guard base, better not misbehave for the next couple days J.

The amazing cockpit crew from the race on the 6th! (finally found the photo)

The taffrail log that made its way back to Martha, what a beauty! Taffrail logs were used to measure the distance that you traveled, long before GPS systems came into play. The round dial would be attached near the stern of the boat and the fin would be attached with a long piece of line and stream out behind the boat. The fins would spin when water flows past and this in turn would spin the back of taffrail log, spinning the dial to tell you how far you have traveled. 

We are little afraid to use because we don't want to lose it, but we also want to know if it works!

The Golden Gate from the other side, headed out to Bolinas Bay!

Beautiful sunset over Bolinas Bay.

We like to call this...Bird Poop Rock, now open for tours if you dare.

Sailing under the Golden Gate! What an amazing feat of engineering!

Near Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, there are docks built for the sea lions. Have you ever sat and watched some sea lions, they are hilarious. One fell asleep with his nose in the water. 

The first of the funny signs we saw on our day in the city. 

Second of the good signs that day...

The things that you find in Chinatown...still not sure what to think of this one. 

This sign, I just can't. TO PERFECT. 

Fixing the spin! Yay for Erin and the National Maritime Museum.

Erin and Chris talking about how you plank a ship and the techniques you use to make sure water does not get in. 

The pier where you can tour a bunch of the boats that the National Maritime Museum has.

Balclutha

Everything is super size!!

The anchor chain is HUGE, bigger than my foot and I don't have small feet. 

Another of the great signs.

Once again, everything is huge on Balclutha

They have weird cottage cheese...

Angel Island is the west coast equivalent of Ellis Island.

I have never found so much sea glass on one beach! And so many pretty colors :)

Annie being a pro at slack line.

The amazing banana split that Annie and Rosie shared, I'm getting in on it next time.

The Great San Francisco Schooner Cup

Tuesday, Sept 2^nd – lazy morning around the boat. We took the bus into Sausalito to visit the Bay Model by the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers. We ate lunch at a place called “Fish” and then went to the Bay Model. The Bay Model is a small scale model (sort-of, it does take up an entire building) of the entire bay area. It was originally designed to let engineers see how water moved throughout the bay and see how dredging here or there effected the flow/movement of water. There are many dynamics that go into play. After that we headed back to the boat, stopping at the grocery store along the way. We also found the library today!! They have great books for sale, free wifi and guest cards so that we can rent books/movies while we are here!

Wednesday, Sept 3^rd – after a morning of cleaning the boat inside and out, we moved further into the harbor for the evening/night of the presentation. Mary, Holly, Anne, and I spent the afternoon in the library working on different things. After an early dinner, we opened the boat for tours before the presentation. Robert gave an excellent talk about Martha’s history, restoration, present and future work.

When Martha came under the care of Robert and others, she was in need of a lot of work. Just to give you an idea of some of the work needed, her bottom needed to be replaced and re-planked, the entire sternpost was rotted out and her keel needed to be re-built. All of this work ended up taking 15 years to complete, but Martha was, and still is, worth it. With all the work that was done, Martha was able to push harder and expand the work that she was doing, including this offshore year.

Thursday, Sept 4^th – The crew went out for sail around the bay to practice setting and striking sail in preparation for Saturdays race. We had the intent of setting our light air sails, and we did! However, we blew up on of our spinnakers. Oops! Don’t worry it is fixable. The wind was a little bit stronger than we were hoping for. We set our other spinnaker for a minute or two but decided it was best to probably strike it and set the job instead. With only the reefed main and the jib, we were easily doing 8 knots. Talk about wind ripping through the bay. After the exciting day sail, I spent the afternoon hauling little Mary up the masts to wax the tracks and putting whippings on our new three-strand line we got today!

Friday, Sept 5^th – With the race course in hand and our crew plus day sailers on board, we set out to sail the course and see what it was like! We had a blast playing around in the bay. What a blast, again! I just can’t seem to get over how much sailing in the bay is! We set one of spinnakers only to have it blow up(shred right down a seam), but we rallied and pulled it down quick! We set our second one (which we call the chicken chute) for a couple minutes but decided the wind was just a tad to strong! We already have a sewing machine lined up to fix the spin and get back out there!

Saturday, Sept 6^th – RACE DAY! With the whole race crew on board, we had an excellent breakfast and then motored out to set sail and practice around the start line until it was our turn. The great San Francisco Schooner Cup uses a staggered start with slow boats first and two divisions, Gaff and Marconi. The winds were between 15-20 knots the whole afternoon, with a strong ebb flowing out of the bay. Fabulous sailing all day and a strong showing of the Bay schooners. Martha started 35 minutes after the first boat. There were 10 schooners overall and an honorary schooner/ketch chasing everyone.
We started catching other boats by the windward mark and were able to reel in the fleet by the bottom of the course and were able to pass Elizabeth Muir while we all started climbing back to weather (between Alcatraz and the city water front.) Local knowledge prevailed on the beautiful schooner Elizabeth Muir and they nipped us by 3 seconds with an exciting gybing duel at the finish. My competitive side definitely started to come out during the last couple minutes as we made our way to the finish. After the race we dropped sail and headed into the harbor for the barbeque party after the race. With a short and sweet awards ceremony we sat down with burgers and chicken and chowed! We were hungry.

PHOTOS:

http://campsherman.smugmug.com/Schooner-Race/n-LpXvv/

Password is: Martha (case sensitive)

Sunday, Sept 7^th – After a week of being in a fish bowl, we were ready for some relaxation somewhere else. We headed to Angel Island to find a spot to spend the night which involved poking around 2 coves, checking not only tides, but currents and then finding a spot deep enough to hang for the night without grounding ourselves at low tide. We eventually decided on Ayala Cove and anchored the bow out and then stern tied to the outer mooring. After the very eventful afternoon of finding our spot, we watched a swimmer get himself stuck in the strong currents of the point and slowly start to fade behind the corner and we caught a glimpse of a frantic hand waving. Holly and I went out in kayaks to try and help, turns out he was picked up by a boater going by and they dropped him in near shore. We then hiked up to the summit of Mt. Livermore for a 360 view of bay! SO COOL. At some point during the night we were all jolted awake by a loud sound of some sort and ran up on deck to see if we had pulled the anchor our and were sitting on the rocks, but we were all good. Something hitting us (no scratches, dents, etc. though) and we all tried to fall back asleep without worrying to much about all the little noises the boat was making as the current swooshed past.

 Next three photos are from the bay model, they don't really do it justice though. 

This is a perfect quote for me and sums up perfectly what happens once I get around water (of any sort).

THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE. WOOOHOOOO

Mary playing in the rigging!

It is just so cool, I couldn't help posting another picture :)

The City!

The little island of Alcatraz...haven't explored it yet though. 

Cool trees (slightly dead) on our hike up Mt. Livermore

Part of the 360 view from the top of Mt. Livermore

Anchored in Ayala Cove

Our new paddleboard is fantastic!

San Francisco Yacht Club

I flew into SFO at 11:30 and made it safely to boat to go right out on a fantastic day sail around the bay. The wind was ripping and we were hauling back and forth, playing in the waves and with the wind.  SO MUCH FUN, made me realize how much I missed this boat in the two weeks I was gone. Though I am a mix of emotions about being away for a year, I know that it is going to be an adventure like one I have never had before. Through all the smiles, laughs, and tears, I know it is going to be an experience I will never forget. 

We are moored at the San Francisco Yacht Club (a very fancy place) for at least the next week or so doing presentations and tours. We then hopefully move onto some other clubs in the Bay.

P.S. Sorry about the short post, we are off to explore San Francisco today!

Just a couple photos from this summer!

Sea Lions on Whale Rocks in the Straights

Great Blue Heron on my last day in PT

Mt. Baker looking majestic as ever

Sand, Varnish, Repeat

My last days here in Port Townsend have been filled with work and more work to get the boat ready for offshore!! We have started tackling some big projects but also trying to knock off some of the smaller ones. 

As of yesterday, Robert finished installing the water maker (takes salt and desalinizes it) and we successfully made water! Yipeeeeeeee!! 

The High Frequency Radio has been installed and is working. We can even listen to what they are saying in Hawaii! 

Our small boat, Ryder, has been sanded, primed and gotten a fresh coat of white paint outside and we flipped her over today to the inside. Her oars were also sanded, varnished and painted to make things nice and shiny once again! 

The combing rail in the cockpit has been repaired of its wounds and is ready for the big sand and varnish once the fog lifts and the rain clears!

The forestaysail and jib have been bent on and with a little love here and there, are flying wonderfully. I spent yesterday at the sail loft with Holly and we working getting a bag for the storm trisail figured out (plus put Martha's race number on, 226!), built the mid-ships bimney, and made covers for the kayaks. 

With only 2 days left here in PT, the coming year is becoming more and more real. It sinks in a little bit more everyday. I truly can't wait for what the next is going to bring. I know that it is going to include adventure, experience, and whole lot of laughter, maybe some tears to. Anyhow, it is going to be AWESOME. 

Can't to share this experience with you all :)

love always, Meryl

P.S. Here is a great article about Martha's upcoming year from the PT Leader! http://www.ptleader.com/news/schooner-martha-is-bound-for-transpac/article_820d984a-227b-11e4-9fb6-001a4bcf6878.html

My parents surprised me!

The 28th started out as any old turn around day filled with laundry, grocery shopping, and cleaning. Until there was a knock on the boat that turned out to be my parents surprising me! They kept is a secret for months, I don't know how they did it honestly, and the rest of the family knew to. 

July 29th-

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!! Now it is a little late, but hope it was a great one, wish I could be there to celebrate with you. We started out with a very exciting sail across the straights into a big fog bank. We tested the stomachs of all on board. We headed up Rosario St. bound for Spencer Spit. In the southern end of Lopez Sound we found Adventurous (a fellow schooner) and played around with them a little bit, racing back and forth across the sound. Sailing is great and all, but its fun when you can play around with other boats, especially schooners :).

July 30th- 

While went for a hike, I hung out on the beach with the girls and we played around and made a driftwood fort! It was pretty awesome (if I do say so myself). We set sail early in hopes to make it to Sucia (another new place for me!) and anchor up in Echo Bay and we did! It was a long sail, but totally worth it, it is an amazingly beautiful place. Just as we were sitting down to dinner, someone came up and asked if we had any tools to help another boat. Turns out that a small sailing vessel has hit the reef while trying to get out of a tide rip and had been demasted. The rigging brake on one side and the mast and sails went under. However, the rigging was still attached on one said with the mast lodged under the reef and stuck.  Robert went over with the fellow and was able to work with the elderly couple to break the boat free from the rig and move the boat away from the shoal and moor them safely to the Coast Guard Buoy. It is a good lesson for all that you always need to be paying attention to what is happening around you and to not rely on just one piece of equipment. In the end, they were both ok, just a little shaken and were able to motor home the next day, and we finally ate down to a cold dinner, but delicious either way!

July 31st-
We had an early breakfast and then went ashore on Sucia for some exploring and with every intention of a hike, but the beach/rocks proved much more interesting. I'm still a little mountain goat at heart. We found a big log on the beach and rolled into the water with every intention of riding it to the rocks and making a bridge, but as you can imagine, that didn't happen! We happily got wet and played around for a couple hours building bridges and riding the currents down between rocks. There was absolutely no fun had today :). We headed to Deer Harbor for ice cream and fuel and then onto a friend of Robert and Holly's to moor up for a couple hours to visit and play in the water (which was much warmer than usual). We took the small boat out for a sail with no wind, which always proves to be interesting. We had dinner and then a lovely evening sail/motor to Fish Creek for the night. 

Aug 1st- 
After an extremely relaxing morning of pancakes and bacon, we headed out to hike Mt. Finlayson and then out to Cattle Pt. Which was beautiful per usual, and Mary hike the whole thing only a week after getting out of her cast. YAY!! While motoring out to the straights, we came across some quite beefy sea lions lounging on Whale Rocks, those things are HUGE! And we were able to sail onto the hook in Watmough (which has very quickly become my favorite place). 

Aug 2nd- 
We hiked up the cliff for the AWESOME (yes, it is still just as great as the first time) rope swing. Swung high and soared free. Last day is always the hardest, but we sailed beautifully off the hook. 

With this being the last trip and having finalized a few things I can now make this public. I have been invited to join Martha and the rest of the core for their entire offshore year!! And of course I said yes. We are going to be heading down the coast to California for the fall doing races here and there. Onto Mexico for the winter to work on the boat and play and then back up to California in the spring to do more races and then Transpac starts in July! After Transpac, we will head back to Victoria for the Wooden Boat Festival and then home to PT! If you are interested in more information or want to see me before I leave, the week of aug 25th is your time! I will continue my blog and posting pictures so you can keep track of where I am :)

<3 Meryl

Driftwood fort. I will always be a kid at heart. 

My parents having fun at the rope swing on Watmough. 

This view never gets old!! 

Just to give you an idea of the crazy amounts of water moving around here. 

A basic idea of the year! You can also find it here http://www.schoonermartha.org/schedule/ if you have trouble reading that. 

Wooden Boat Foundation Trip

July 25th- 
The Wooden Boat Foundation Auction Winners boarded today and we set sail for the Straights. We made it up Rosario with the flood and all the way up the east side of Cypress Island to anchor at Pelican Beach (new place for me!). It is a more exposed place to anchor so we have to time when there are not going to be big tidal differences. 

July26th-
We hiked up to Eagle Point in the morning for an amazing view as well as some very intense fog banks rolling off the water and up the land, very very cool(see pictures). We then tried hard to fight our way down the west side of Cypress against a very strong flood but started to go backwards so we turned the motor on and made it to Lopez Sound for some great sailing and then out again to anchor in Watmough for the second evening. 

July 27th- 
Once again hiked up the side of Watmough for the rope swing and view. No matter how many times I do that hike, it is special every time. There is something about Watmough that just pulls you and makes you feel special, it is a magical place that you really can't describe to someone, you just have to be there and feel it. We had a blast on the rope swing, I swung so high I went horizontal! I just love that swing, maybe a little to much.

The three couples that we had the pleasure of sharing the trip with were a blast. They jumped right in and started hauling on lines and tying knots. They even jumped in the water with us! Thanks for a great trip, wish it was longer.

Very cool bug we found! 

Purple starfish!! My favorite :)

I have been working very hard out here, just in case you had any doubts.