In mid-July Kitty and I completed Koan's move to Moss Landing. The trip up was stunning. We encountered lots of whales in San Simeon Bay, South of Point Piedras Blancas, and motored along that stretch enjoying the show.
Point P.B. still had more breeze than forecast, around 11 kts on the nose, but the sea state was manageable this time, so we pushed on. I will never get over the psychological imprint of that spot. It's truly a minor Mordor in my mind.
We passed it just before sunset and switched to taking night watches. There was a long swell running, but everything else was straight forward. I had an especially surreal watch around midnight, during which the fog broke for a few miles and I was treated to the most breathtaking sky. The milky way looked like hot coals, I shit you not. Then the moon rose over the mountains behind Big Sur. It looked huge and it was the color of a blood orange. I actually spent a few seconds staring at it trying to figure out what it was. I dragged Kitty out of bed to show it to her, but she wasn't as impressed (so sorry!).
Dawn came upon us just before Pt Sur, so we got to see that when we crossed it. We kept on motoring and things got interesting as we approached the Monterey headland, which has a huge kelp bed offshore. The wildlife started to multiply, and pretty soon we noticed what looked like explosions in the water. It turned out the Monterey Bay was experiencing a sardine hatch, and humpbacks had come in to feed. Watching the humpbacks do their thing while traversing the Bay was absolutely the coolest thing ever.
Moss Landing Harbor is in an estuary, so the sardine density was especially high at its outlet, and so was the whale density. It sounds crazy, but the situation was so jaw-dropping that we didn't get any photos. There were whales breaching right and left of us, within 100 yards. I kept thinking that they outweigh the boat by, oh, 50x, maybe 100x? If one were to hit us, we'd be goners. And on top of that, I wasn't quite sure how to observe the "do not harass whales" law which requires me to shut off my engine when within X feet (can't remember how many) when I obviously needed to go right through their midst to enter the harbor. So we plugged on, and kept our eyes open and just soaked it all up.
Neither of us had ever been to Moss Landing before, but we had no trouble finding the guest dock and the harbor master and arranging a slip. I think I might have slightly scared the guy though, as I walked in, reeling from 24 hours on a pitching boat, hair all crazy, wearing foulies, and a bit giddy from dodging whales.
And there Koan stayed for the next 4 months. Kitty and I paid her frequent visits, Jim and I took her out on a whale watching trip, Dan and Hucks came up and explored the area, and I generally fell in love with Moss Landing.
And then in December I passed Koan on to her excited new owner. I know she'll take good care of him and vice versa.
Let's see where the breeze takes me next...
Point P.B. still had more breeze than forecast, around 11 kts on the nose, but the sea state was manageable this time, so we pushed on. I will never get over the psychological imprint of that spot. It's truly a minor Mordor in my mind.
We passed it just before sunset and switched to taking night watches. There was a long swell running, but everything else was straight forward. I had an especially surreal watch around midnight, during which the fog broke for a few miles and I was treated to the most breathtaking sky. The milky way looked like hot coals, I shit you not. Then the moon rose over the mountains behind Big Sur. It looked huge and it was the color of a blood orange. I actually spent a few seconds staring at it trying to figure out what it was. I dragged Kitty out of bed to show it to her, but she wasn't as impressed (so sorry!).
Dawn came upon us just before Pt Sur, so we got to see that when we crossed it. We kept on motoring and things got interesting as we approached the Monterey headland, which has a huge kelp bed offshore. The wildlife started to multiply, and pretty soon we noticed what looked like explosions in the water. It turned out the Monterey Bay was experiencing a sardine hatch, and humpbacks had come in to feed. Watching the humpbacks do their thing while traversing the Bay was absolutely the coolest thing ever.
Moss Landing Harbor is in an estuary, so the sardine density was especially high at its outlet, and so was the whale density. It sounds crazy, but the situation was so jaw-dropping that we didn't get any photos. There were whales breaching right and left of us, within 100 yards. I kept thinking that they outweigh the boat by, oh, 50x, maybe 100x? If one were to hit us, we'd be goners. And on top of that, I wasn't quite sure how to observe the "do not harass whales" law which requires me to shut off my engine when within X feet (can't remember how many) when I obviously needed to go right through their midst to enter the harbor. So we plugged on, and kept our eyes open and just soaked it all up.
Neither of us had ever been to Moss Landing before, but we had no trouble finding the guest dock and the harbor master and arranging a slip. I think I might have slightly scared the guy though, as I walked in, reeling from 24 hours on a pitching boat, hair all crazy, wearing foulies, and a bit giddy from dodging whales.
And there Koan stayed for the next 4 months. Kitty and I paid her frequent visits, Jim and I took her out on a whale watching trip, Dan and Hucks came up and explored the area, and I generally fell in love with Moss Landing.
And then in December I passed Koan on to her excited new owner. I know she'll take good care of him and vice versa.
Let's see where the breeze takes me next...
