Still stuck in Santa Barbara

9-26-06 Tuesday
Yep, we got stuck in Santa Barbara. But, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. When we left Santa Cruz, there was a huge project list in my head, mostly things involving the deck and sailing gear that just didn't get attended to in the last year while I was still working. We focused on updating electronics and other ships systems. But I was always a bit dissatisfied with the state of the rigging on deck. Sailing the boat just never had the feel that I was used to on other boats that I had owned. Everything was too stiff, too much friction, or just worked when it felt like it.

After 2 weeks in SB, the deck gear is starting to feel like a Ferrari. Much more satisfying! It wasn't that it didn't work - it just didn't work like it should have. With the occasional consult with super-rigger Jon Payne and plenty of my own work, this boat is feeling much more ready. The boat used to have a spinnaker pole that extended to almost twice it's own length. This was a thousand-dollar-plus pole and was a bitch to use. As a result, I never used it. We looked hard at the pole and decided that there was only one length that we really needed anyway - so we cut about 14 feet of extending tubing out of it plus all the control lines and hardware. We made the pole about 20 pounds lighter. Then we just put some bolts through it to pin it and voila - a well-balanced pole that we can actually use.

Then the watermaker had a leak in the high pressure lines. Turns out that an O-ring got pinched in a fitting during assembly and wasn't sealing properly. The folks at HRO watermakers sent us a new O-ring seal and voila - as I write we are filling the tanks from the ocean - no leaks.

While we have been here, we discovered how hard it is to be trapped on the boat with no wheels. We got to borrow a car from the family at last, but for a few days we couldn't go shopping and I couldn't get parts. So we decided to buy some bicycles. We got some folding bikes on Ebay that fold up really small. They arrive tomorrow. And that will be the last thing keeping us in SB except for a flamenco party tomorrow night. The next report should come to you from Ventura.