My wife and sailing partner, with the master at arms..RJ..

Waiting for the storm to pass, got used to this.. Was waiting it out in Brooking's Oregon.

We are now in Oxnard, California. The end of our journey. It's been a real struggle.  
We left Santa Barbara on September 28th. We never could get our motor fixed so we had to motor down here using our dinghy motor. It took twelve hours to go thirty miles. A Honda 2 horse is a great little motor but doesn't move a big sail boat very fast. Ha! Of course, no wind in our favor. Just more butt pain stuff. Now we our trying to get our boat settled in a slip until we can return for her.  We will be back in a few months with a trailer to haul her out. In the mean time, we will rest up and get a few things fixed. Until our next voyage...I wish you all peace, and may the odds, be ever, in your favor.

THURSDAY----

This morning, we saw a terrible sight. One of our fellow anchored neighbors boat, either dragged anchor or he lost his anchor....ran aground. Captain just got out of bed and looked out the hatch. He said "Looks like that boat is going toward shore". By the time I got out of bed, it hit the beach!!
We turned on the radio and heard the may day. The guy was calling the harbor patrol and just wanted to get off of his boat! It was slamming back and forth.
Harbor patrol came to the rescue but couldn't do much. It was too far stuck. The poor guy got off his boat and had to sit on the beach all day and watch it break apart. As his stuff was washed ashore, he put it in a pile.

We went to shore and I caught a bus to go find a decent grocery store that doesn't charge an arm and a leg for provisions. What an adventure that was. First off, you have to really pay attention to where you are going so you can get back. Second, you have to be on the lookout for a store. Hopefully, you can get off of the bus before you go way past the store and have to hike back. Anyway...I did it. This is the first time I had to do it all by myself. It's not alot of fun to pack all the groceries by myself. I'm not doing it again.

We are feeling alot better today. I did some fishing! Caught three!! We ate them for supper. Pretty good too!  We've been doing some work on the boat. Bob & Bart come out once-in-awhile in his dinghy. He always brings a bottle and some mix and we have a drink with him. He is amazing.
I don't mind being out on this boat all the time. The hard part is going to shore in the dinghy. We take R.J. with us and she is a pain to get back on the boat. She likes to go to shore. She wants to stay on land.   Can't blame her.   At night, the rocking & rolling of the boat makes it impossible to sleep.

Today...we are both sick with colds. Lots of coughing going on. We are anchored out in Santa Barbara Channel. When we got back to the harbor, our motor quit. The boat nearly hit some boats that were tied to the dock. Captain was yelling alot, again, so as soon as we got close to a dock, I jumped off the boat and ran for help. A gal at the office radioed for some guys to go help Captain.
They escourted the Ruby Jean right into the nearest slip. It was impressive.
Now we are waiting for pay day. The weather is cold and the boat rocks & rolls all night long. Not much sleep again.
The people that are anchored around us are interesting. The biggest boat out here has two big ole dogs aboard. The dogs never get to go to shore. A young couple are on the boat and I think they have some personality problems. There's another boat close to us with a strange fella aboard. He starts his noisy generator up at about dark and leaves it running most of the night. One night, he cooked something on his bar-b-q that smelled like trash. All night long....it was so grose. I have my suspicions about what he was cooking. The next day, he sure had alot of visitors stop by in their dinghies. His boat is named "Jolly Mon". Everyone stopping by yells "Hey Jolly Mon!!!! Sometimes he must be passed out cause they can't get him to come out of his cabin.

BEAUTIFUL SANTA BARBARA

We have arrived at Santa Barbara. It has been 3 days since we left Santa Cruz. THREE DAYS out on the ocean! It felt like we were in a washing machine. Pt. Conception and Pt. Arguella can be and were nasty!! While Captain was doing some navigation with the laptop, a big wave spashed over it and that was the end of that. Actually, I have to admit that was my fault. Captain's cell phone got the front of it cracked too. That was his fault. Then it started raining. We got down in the cabin and closed the hatch cover. We have an alarm that goes off when the auto pilot is in trouble. It went off but we just huddled together and stared at the auto pilot. It was just to dangerous to get out there. No sleep all night long cause I figured we would have to abandon ship at any time!
Actually, it's not possible to abandon ship. Where are you going to go? At the time...I had to face the reality of sink or swim?  We had  our storm gear on, life vest, even R.J. had hers on. Captain had our water proof bag that contained our passports, I.Ds and money. I had my pockets full of candy. Did a little repenting.  I was ready to die.  The Ruby Jean stayed afloat though!! She really impressed me.
That was the first night. We finally got threw the storms. I fell asleep and when I woke up, the sun was shining in my face. It was calm and I was one happy First Mate. Captain wasn't as happy as I was.
There was no wind, and we were almost out of gas.
We decided to wait around for the wind to blow. Not much  choice about that either. We were next to an oil rig. I still can't believe how prettily lit up  they are at night. They look like Christmas trees. I took some pictures but they didn't turn out well.   We bobbed around the rig all day, all night and half the day after that. No wind! I was enjoying myself sun bathing and  reading a good book.
 We kept trying to call Bob as he should have been in Santa Barbara by now. Captain decided to use what gas we had to get closer to Santa Barbara. Engine started and we were off!!   After a few miles, my phone rang and it was Bob!! Hey!!  I told him our situation. He told me to call him when we ran out of gas and he would dinghy us some gas. Hey Again!!!
Believe it or not, we made it to the  break water of Santa Barbara!! Gave Bob a call and then we waited.  When we saw him coming in his dinghy, it was one of the best sights I've seen. It still chokes me up to think about it. He and Bart!! Even R.J. was glad to see Bart!  We finally got to the harbor. I think I did kiss the dock when I got off the boat.
After checking in and getting a slip, we got to rest up. I like this place alot. It's such pretty country and a clean harbor. Our auto pilot seems to be done for. Now we have to steer by hand.
A cruising ship came into harbor one day. Well...they can't really get into harbor. They anchor way out where the water is deep and they boat people to shore. That was interesting. A couple of days before the ship arrived, the harbor put up flyers all over to tell us of the arrival of the ship. Lots of people would be coming to shore. I've never seen so many people in one place that don't speak English. People from different countries. One thing I noticed about them...every one likes to party. Also, alot of tall people. The ship stayed two days. Then...just like that, it was gone.
Here are some pictures of the party bus/boat that the tourist party on. They have food, drinks and music. Dancing and all that. First, it's a bus and they drive all over the harbor and parts of the town. Then they drive right into the ocean and motor all over playing music and having a great time. One night while we were walking R.J., the bus drove into the water and broke down. Couldn't get the engine started. They had to call a tow truck to get it out of the water. All that time, people just kept dancing and having a good time.

 

On Thursday, September 8th, we headed for the Channel Islands. What a ride that turned into! I got to steer the boat for about an hour and a half. Then we got to  "windy lane"  and things got wild! It was what they call exellerating. We made it to Smugglers Cove and anchored. One other boat was there. We were getting hammered by the wind. After awhile, lots of boats started coming in. Some people were frantic. Couldn't get their anchors set. One guy lost his dinghy on the way in. People do strange things when they're stressed. It got dark and we all tried to get some sleep but it was ruff all night. The next morning, all was calm and sunny & warm. We did some fishing and sun bathing. Captain ran around in the dinghy, looking for fishing spots. It was sad to see that the kelp beds were all gone. No kelp beds...no fish. We stayed another night. It was rock & roll all night again. Come daylight, everyone was packing up and heading out of there. Us included. Back to Santa Barbara we headed. Stopped at Ventura harbor but decided to go back to Santa Barbara. At least we could spend some more time with Bob.