San Francisco, California

Posted 2 September 2010

We left Crescent City at 05:00 am on Saturday morning 28 Aug. We had a beautiful sailing day and night, doing boat speeds 6 to 7 knots and with the currents and some surfing doing 8 to 9 knots. We did a fantastic 140 nm in 24 hours. On Sunday the winds picked up a bit, blowing a constant 18 to 23 knots, gusting at times 28 to 30. This tremendously increased the sea swells. At times the swell was bimini height (about 8-12 feet). We dropped the smaller jib and hoist the storm jib. We were still doing 5 to 6 knots. It was very tiresome and we could not do more than 1 and half hour watches at a time. There was also a big weather system just behind us, so we decided to come to San Francisco instead.

I took a video when the seas died down a bit standing in the companion way looking aft, did not feel too comfortable to film during the bigger sea swells.

We arrived in San Francisco on Monday afternoon 30 August under a thick fog. We could not even see the bridge. We had the camera ready, but only fog with a little bit of bridge visible.

We went downtown today using the train system. Very efficient. We had a great day walking and visiting all the touristy spots. We took a ride back on the Cable trolley. What an experience that was. At the end of the line they rotate the trolley to reverse the direction. It is a very beautiful city and it reminded us a bit of Durban in South Africa.

There are some strong winds forecast for Saturday and Sunday and possibly Monday. We might just coastal hop to San Diego, not sure yet. We will most probably only leave next week.