After leaving Half Moon Bay the ocean was calm and we saw several hump back whales as we were motoring. There was little to no wind to sail. Later on we saw 10 knots of wind behind us so we put up our sails. 10 knots became 14 knots, then 18 and by the time we got to Santa Cruz it was 20+ with huge swells. We entered the harbor in the surf. This was the first time we had experienced “riding the waves”. This sounds like something we are going to have to get use to as we enter harbors from the ocean. Thank goodness we had reached our destination. At one point when I (Bev) was at the helm the waves hit the rudders with such force I couldn’t hang onto the wheel and the huge waves spun the boat around. We motored into the harbor and reserved a slip for 3 days. Needless to say, I was glad to be done sailing for the day. Out came the bikes and we were off to explore. When entering the harbor we could hear screams from people on the roller coaster at the boardwalk so we headed in that direction. These theme park rides are a great way to prepare yourself for sailing in the ocean! Low pressure is moving into the area tomorrow and the locals are complaining it may rain. It’s funny because being from Seattle it won’t keep us from having fun 🙂 We will leave on Monday after Kevin meets with the repair people at Raymarine Electronics about the broken raydome.
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