Petaluma River revisited

This last March, Ray (Giggitoni) and I transited the Petaluma (CA) river. (See the thread "Petaluma River.") This week, Ray and I introduced Al (FlyWright) and his friend Gene for a repeat. The trip went faultless navigation-wise due to experience gained from the previous voyage (the charts don't reflect the long-term absence of dredging) but not without some "fluttering hearts" when the depth-gage readings were minimal.

The voyage and time spent in Petaluma were interesting and fun, BUT THIS IS AN INVITATION FOR THE NEW PARTICIPANTS to highlight their adventure.

Here, Ray's Mahalo Moi, Al's FlyWright, and Gene's Bot (pronounced with a long oh), are following the Coot downriver Thursday, May 23:




After leaving the mouth of the Petaluma River, there is a narrow channel leading south in the San Pablo Bay. So much water, but so little navigable:

the Petaluma slough, has barely been called a River to get gov. Dredging action... Which last happened 5-6 yrs ago. It's one of the fasting silting rivers in the west, and holds somewhere, a record for moving dirt.



Mark,

Thank you , for allowing Linda and I to have a look at your beautiful boat. I'm figuring I'm one of the few around here to have looked out the Coot's reversed raked windows.
an honor, for sure.

Beautiful boat . Here's a picture we took while having dinner before meeting you.



I know.. not much to look at.

Al,
Was nice meeting you too. Thanks for extending out a hand to shake and letting us know you were going to be there.
We'll have to meet again and talk fishing !

Petaluma's turning basin.

This weekend 60 to 100 boats are expected to fill the basin for the Petaluma Yacht Club's annual Memorial Day celebration (May 24-26). (The "D" Street bridge tender will be busy!) Here a tall-masted sailboat is going up the river yesterday -- probably getting an early start for the celebration. It was preceeded by a half-dozen or more motorboats, usually in pairs.



This morning I checked out the May newsletter on the club's website. A chart of the basin's dockside water depths is contained therein. The docks are public: free day-use, $23 overnight, three-night limit.

Giggitoni said:

Petaluma's turning basin.

Click to expand...

Now that's a photo! What kind of camera is that?

SeaHorse II said:

Now that's a photo! What kind of camera is that?

Click to expand...

Thanks, Walt. I merged four photos using Photoshop. I used a Nikon D300s with a 17-55mm lens.

Photoshop can be handy...especially when a Searay sneeks in between Mark and Al...!

Gotta say-that picture looks a whole lot better without the SeaRay in it! It is just totally out of character with the surroundings.

As a former Sea Ray owner I am offended (not really) but cruising in a 34 GPH Sea Ray boat led us to our current Defever so I have to laugh. Its kind of like politics both sides have their ups and downs.
I know a bunch of Alameda boaters are heading to Petaluma shortly as they love the area, when arriving on a flood tide.

We got out just in time!! As Mark mentioned, the place was going to fill with various clubs Thurs/Fri.

Normal protocol here is to stern tie, but with just a few boats there, we were able to take advantage of it and all got stbd ties. None of our four boats are stern-tie friendly.

FlyWright said:

We got out just in time!! As Mark mentioned, the place was going to fill with various clubs Thurs/Fri.

Click to expand...

Various yacht-clubs' sail-ins to Petaluma are common on the weekends. That's why our Petaluma ventures were scheduled for the weekdays.

While we had a scheduled 12:30 opening for the "D" Street bridge, we arrived at 12:10, so we had to dawdle in the narrow channel until the bridge opened at 12:50 despite Ray's frequent calling to the non-responsive, part-time bridge tender. During the 40-minute pause, FlyWright anchored, Coot tied up aside a tug, and Mahalo Moi and Bot shifted gears to stay in-place.



A sailboat which had arrived earlier had schedule a 1:00 opening, so it appeared the bridge tender split the difference for us all or had completely forgotten/ignored our 12:30 appointment.



The winds that day were very strong, so it took most of us to handle Gene's tall, wind-catching-profile boat at the dock. (In this view, I'm pulling on the bow line while Vickie and Meg are pushing the hull.)

Lessons learned...

My trip started on Monday with my best friend Gene in his 42 Jefferson, Bot (long ‘o’). We hit the river midday to get the best currents, hoping for a push through the Carquinez Straight on the delayed ebb and then turn up Mare Island Straight on the established flood. I cruise at 7.5 in still water and we timed it right with 9.6 Kts through C Straight and about 8.2 into Mare Island Str.
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We arrived at the Vallejo Marina, home of our own Giggitoni (Ray) and markpierce. [/FONT]Ray and Vicki were dockside ready to assist if needed. I learned many lessons this week. Lesson 1: Grand Banks owners lives a notch above us blue collar Californian owners. Here's a shot [FONT=&quot]of a designer trash bag being carted off of Ray's Mahalo Moi.

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We had a nice dinner at the marina restaurant, The Sardine Can, before Mark and Perla arrived.

(more to follow)







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We returned to the marina and enjoyed some drinks on Gene's boat before calling it a night. In order to arrive at Petaluma at high tide, we'd need to leave at 0800 the next day.



Mark was the first on out of the chutes with a 0730 departure. He radioed back the San Pablo water conditions for us as he scouted out ahead of us. The rest of us shoved off at 0800 sharp. By the time he reached the narrow channel to the Petaluma River in San Pablo Bay, we caught up with him.

We entered the river together and proceeded up in single file.



Much of the scenery was classic Californian rolling hills with vineyards and small settlements.










After a short wait for the D Street bridge tender to arrive for work, we entered the turning basin and secured to the dock in close to 20 kt winds.



There we were met by the previous owner of FlyWright who was interested in seeing what she looked like after 6 years in my hands. He and his wife boarded for a 'differences tour' which we all enjoyed. They approved of the changes and left with some improvement ideas for their 42 Mikelson. I also learned a bit more of the history of my boat and the age of some of the improvements they made. We each hope to see more of each other over the coming years.

We relaxed on Tuesday and wandered around town and had a nice dinner together. Later the ladies assembled jewelery on Mahalo Moi while the men did what men do on the manly Carquinez Coot.

Next day we had a Tasting Tour scheduled at the Lagunitas Brewery for 3PM, but that left most of our day open. This allowed for the commissioning launch of Mark's new dinghy, C Coot.



As Meg and I were heading past the boats toward town, I spotted C Coot floating free on a collision course with FlyWright. The full story can be read here. Suffice to say that no one was injured and no vessels were sunk. BTW, my boat wasn't the only thing the C Coot collided with that day!

(Lesson 2: double check the lines)



By 3PM, we arrived at the Lagunitas Brewery for the tour. We immediately learned that the tour starts with a heavy load of tasting before the touring. My kind of tour!

I'll spare you the commentary in lieu of pictures which speak volumes...










After the tour, the tasting continued at the Tap Room. Gene and I each had to try their 16 beer sampler.









(Lesson 3: Next time, go with the 5-beer sampler!)

On Thursday, we shoved off at 1130 for our scheduled bridge opening. We all headed for Vallejo where Gene and I again spent the night before coming home on Friday. We all enjoyed one more meal together Thursday evening at the local Asian Buffet (Thanks, Perla!!)

(Lesson 4: Next time stick to one serving of calamari and half the dessert plate!)

Petaluma-Vallejo was 4:20/28NM and Vallejo-Willow Berm Marina Pumpout-Riverboat Marina was 5:10/41NM. The last pic shows the one-way totals.











All told, 19 hrs and 138NM for FlyWright. It was a fun and memorable trip. We're looking forward to an Angel Island trip in the near future.

(Lesson 5: Next time these guys want to go for a cruise, don't miss it!)

A great time was had by all!

Cruising toward Vallejo, CA through San Pablo Bay

20130523142651 - YouTube

Bot on San Pablo Bay - YouTube

There's an article in this month's magazine Latitude 38 about cruising to Petaluma. If you can't/don't get a free copy at a local marine store, it's available on their website.