6/15/05 - santa cruz to moss and back

[alantani]

launched out of santa cruz and got the boat wet for the first time this year. i started out by dragging the boat out of the yard with the motor down, cutting up the lawn with the skeg (ouch)! drove to sants cruz with no mishaps, bought a sandwich, drink, bait and gloves from todd at bayside, realized i forgot the downrigger release clips and bought a pair at shamrock's (spreading my money around), and launched the boat. i'm happy to announce that i remembered the drain plug, but forgot the instructions for the new electronics. well, at 10am, the boat is finally wet!

so i marked the harbor entrance and the 1 mile buoy, and was able to figure out the new autopilot. i plugged in the numbers and proceeded at 6 knots on a heading to moss. yes, the break in schedule for my new engine is 2000 rpm for the first hour, then 3000 rpm for the second. i arrive at moss at noon and hear a request for fuel from a boat near the moss harbor entrance. quick detour and your friendly neighborhood vessel assist wannabe is headed back out to the happy hunting grounds. that when someone pipes up that no one has caught a fish since 8AM, but is was red hot before. not to be discouraged, i dropped a line in anyway (did i mention that i was solo?) and sent it down to 90 feet. after 10 minutes, i'm bored and send a the line down to 150. HOOK UP!!!! watermelon apex with a huge 8/0 beaked siwash hook. now i have to net the darn thing. it must have wanted to die, because it swan straight into the net. i happily announced my kill, and got a nice thank you from someone that heard the news, sent a line down and hooked up as well.

now the hard part. getting home. it was like victory at sea. up and down the entire way back. but the autopilot helped tremendously. while i motored slow, i actually got the cockpit scrubbed down with soap. once the swells seriously picked up, i was back and forth on the throttle just to keep from digging the bow into the next swell. it took 2 hours run from mulligan to santa cruz.

once back, i scrubbed down, packed everything away for the drive home and found myself stuck in road construction and detours. it took 30 minutes just to get out of santa cruz. but hey, a fresh salmon dinner made it all worthwhile.

glad to be back on the water.