Yes, that’s right, you’re looking at the northern Golden Gate Bridge wing.  We are headed out of San Francisco Bay!

The decision came Sunday.  It was a hectic few days of last minute provisions and boat preparation.

Which way do we turn?

Headed South

Weather window says – go left – so we are…headed south.

We spent the spring and summer waiting for a weather window to go north.   We missed one window and another has yet to come long.  And now, it is fall.  The calendar says summer but we feel fall in the air.  It seemed wrong (to us) to go north for winter, when we missed the reward of summer in the Pacific Northwest.

So, for one more year we remain fair weather friends with the PNW.

Ship Mate Under the Bridge

This container ship chased us out of the bay.  Notice that wall of water he is pushing.  It makes for a big wake! We moved to the northerly side of the entrance, steering clear of him.   After the ship passed we turned left – into his wake.  It’s better to take a ship wake on the bow than to be rolled – and rolled – and…

El Nino

The final key to the decision on direction came this past week.  The National Weather Service announced an El Nino for this upcoming winter.  That means colder than average temperatures and more than average rain.   Okay – we go south!

Half Moon Bay

We have a nice window ahead of us.  We plan to take our time south and enjoy ports along the way.

Next stop is Half Moon Bay.  Today is a short cruise – 33 miles.  It is a good shake down cruise, gets us out of the bay with the flood side of slack tide, and makes the next leg of our voyage shorter.  We will anchor in Half Moon Bay for the night and get underway tomorrow morning.

Stand by as we voyage south – with the sun.

[Note:  Photos on this post were taken with my new cell phone camera, uploaded directly to WordPress, then inserted into the blog manually by me. I still have to learn how to edit photos in WP.  Oh, the joys of modern technology!]