Uphill LA to SF

Getting ready to bring the Emily B back to her "home port" in San Francisco after our summer adventures in Marina Del Rey, Catalina and San Diego.

http://www.trawlerforum.com/forums/s36/sf-la-30-hours-21565.html

Small weather window Thursday/Friday between systems.

Plan on a Thursday AM departure from Marina Del Rey. Grinding up the coast with planned re-fuels (and maybe some food fuel) in Santa Barbara and Monterrey. Hoping to pull "under the Gate" Friday Afternoon/Evening.

Will pass VicTrawler as they continue their trip down hill. My guess is around Concepcion at the Harvest Platform. We shall sea!

I would plan more time

Unless your lucky I would expect the trip up to go slower than the trip down. Also expect to use more fuel on the way back. A friend of mine sunk his boat pushing it too hard rounding Point Conception. Take it slow, leave early and quit early.

Wifey B: Too bad you don't have the equivalent of the Gulf Stream on the west coast.

Scary said:

Unless your lucky I would expect the trip up to go slower than the trip down. Also expect to use more fuel on the way back. A friend of mine sunk his boat pushing it too hard rounding Point Conception. Take it slow, leave early and quit early.

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Excellent advice. Check you insurance with regards to navigation- that, if you have your policy set for navigation north of Pt. Conception during this time of year.

CeeBee,
Just checked Passageweather, and you are correct--conditions look very good for Thurs and Friday. With your speed I suspect you won't have a problem. Look forward to seeing you in the Bay sometime.
Safe travels...

Scary said:

Unless your lucky I would expect the trip up to go slower than the trip down. Also expect to use more fuel on the way back. A friend of mine sunk his boat pushing it too hard rounding Point Conception. Take it slow, leave early and quit early.

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Take it slow, leave early and quit early. Scary that's How We Roll! Yes coming uphill San Diego to Marina Del Rey we had to slow to 6-8 knots for a couple of hours after the afternoon wind picked up. We've got until Monday AM before the window closes.

Pau Hana said:

Excellent advice. Check you insurance with regards to navigation- that, if you have your policy set for navigation north of Pt. Conception during this time of year.

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Pau Hana "All Good" you did remind me to print off the new policy before leaving Thanks

Dawdler said:

CeeBee,
Just checked Passageweather, and you are correct--conditions look very good for Thurs and Friday. With your speed I suspect you won't have a problem. Look forward to seeing you in the Bay sometime.
Safe travels...

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Dawdler, Thanks! Yes looks like a Sweet Window, that's why we're rolling on Thursday, plan to round Concepcion Friday AM. The uphill climb. looks great until Monday. We scored the Guest Dock at Santa Barbara Yacht Club Thursday PM to hang in SB to time the rounding the Point.

CeeBee said:

Dawdler, Thanks! Yes looks like a Sweet Window, that's why we're rolling on Thursday, plan to round Concepcion Friday AM. The uphill climb. looks great until Monday. We scored the Guest Dock at Santa Barbara Yacht Club Thursday PM to hang in SB to time the rounding the Point.

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I may be down in the harbor Thursday afternoon. I've got to remove some electrical items from a boat down in Marina 1 before Friday. Drop me a PM if you need land based transportation for anything.

Underway http://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:2770500/mmsi:338163091/vessel:EMILY B

Recall advisory for Mustang PFDs?

BandB said:

Wifey B: Too bad you don't have the equivalent of the Gulf Stream on the west coast.

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They do. But on their trip, it's in the wrong direction. That and the prevailing winds is why the coastal trips are described as "uphill" and "downhill".

Emily B this morning at 10:52 hours Pacific.

Pau Hana said:

Recall advisory for Mustang PFDs?

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Pau operator error. Re-posted.

questionmark said:

I may be down in the harbor Thursday afternoon. I've got to remove some electrical items from a boat down in Marina 1 before Friday. Drop me a PM if you need land based transportation for anything.

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Cool thanks for the offer!

You made good time!

Giggitoni said:

View attachment 46272

You made good time!

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Yes Sir. Great smooth beautiful run Marina Del Rey to Santa Barbara. We topped of the tanks and are chillin' in SB waiting for Miss Concepcion to get a bit more period between the swells.

CeeBee said:

Yes Sir. Great smooth beautiful run Marina Del Rey to Santa Barbara. We topped of the tanks and are chillin' in SB waiting for Miss Concepcion to get a bit more period between the swells.View attachment 46275

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Heh, I almost plastered myself against that bouy one morning. It was in the wee hours, and I was getting back late. I didn't have any nav beyond a compass in the cockpit, the GPS was down below. I couldn't for the life of me spot that thing. I could hear it, and the sea lions, but with all the lights in the background I just couldn't pick it up. I popped below for one last check, and I was right where I wanted to be, on a track a hundred or so feet west of it. I went back up, still couldn't see it, so I decided to go forward for a better look. About the time I got to the shrouds that #&$^@&ing thing went right by, less than 5 feet away. I could have leaned out and almost high fived it. I was so surprised I almost soiled my foulies.

questionmark said:

Heh, I almost plastered myself against that bouy one morning. It was in the wee hours, and I was getting back late. I didn't have any nav beyond a compass in the cockpit, the GPS was down below. I couldn't for the life of me spot that thing. I could hear it, and the sea lions, but with all the lights in the background I just couldn't pick it up. I popped below for one last check, and I was right where I wanted to be, on a track a hundred or so feet west of it. I went back up, still couldn't see it, so I decided to go forward for a better look. About the time I got to the shrouds that #&$^@&ing thing went right by, less than 5 feet away. I could have leaned out and almost high fived it. I was so surprised I almost soiled my foulies.

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Yeah Santa Barbara is a tough arrival in the dark even when you have familiarity with the harbor. On the way down in August we pulled in at 3am. Buoy SB's faint light gets lost in the lights. The Red and Green traffic signals align perfectly with the channels small buoys and it gets super confusing.

Another thread but sailing in the Gulf of Mexico in a storm with driving rain at night that ripped the Mobile Alabama Buoy A off station......we found it. And thats a MUCH larger buoy than SB!

Getting ready to pull out of Santa Barbara for the uphill climb. We have that whole "Red sky at night" thing workin

Travel safe!

Home at last!

Giggitoni said:

Home at last!

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Yes Sir! The Emily B is Back. Now comes the hard part of the trip!!!
Cleaning her up!

35 Hours “dock to dock” and The Emily B is back in the bay.
Awesome adventure. Marina Del Rey to Santa Barbara a milk run.
What was “supposed” to be Light and Variable winds with 7’ seas at a 9 second period around Conception ended up being 15-20 with Gusts to 30. Seas were confused steep with no shoulder so you would just fall off them. Boat handled brilliantly, extremely stable, no roll her hard chines just throw the seas to the side. Passed Vic Trawler as we were rounding and chatted with Mark on the radio.
Conception to Arguello rough. A couple of smooth patches when we could pick up speed but lots of annoying wind chop.

After chilling for a couple of hours in Santa Barbara we pulled out at 6PM for the uphill grind. Once again the Flir Night vision camera proved invaluable. Allowing us to see the seas and make corrections in course and speed. Also due to the heavy confused seas allow us to get a picture of other traffic as the radar was basically useless in the sea state.

Three editorial comments. 1) I understand peoples privacy issues BUT if you go offshore and do coastal I think AIS should be Mandatory for all boaters. People just need to get over it, as the same person complaining is also carrying a smartphone with GPS and they are being tracked anyway. 2) we need to address running lights, a broad majority especially on sail boats are worthless in any kind of sea state and don’t have enough illumination to carry far. I have thought how useful it would be if offshore boats had a strobe attached to the highest point making them MUCH more visible. Mark (VicTrawler) was warning me on the VHF of a sailboat coming downhill on my bow and they were invisible until we passed and they were on the Beam. The movement of the boat made using binoculars impossible, the radar was worthless and with water flying everywhere the running lights were impossible to see. 3) Licensing when are we going to address the fact that you can simply but a boat, be a total dumb **** and take it out? We will still have Dumb Shits but they would at least be smarter!

Another super valuable piece of equipment are the cheap but effective Midland Walkie Talkie radios allowing you to communicate with other crew. Invaluable If someone is on the flybridge and other crew below it allows you to give them the heads up of approaching seas and simply to stay in touch. You’re off watch and the engines slow? Allows a quick check in. Need help with something while you’re on the Helm, Boom!

Overall a great solid adventure, meeting many of the awesome people in our boating community up and down the coast. Running into new friends on Trawler forum and the sense of accomplishment and learning with every trip.

Congrats on completing a great trip. Your vessel seems perfectly suited to your goals, likes and preferences. Thanks for taking us along!

FlyWright said:

Congrats on completing a great trip. Your vessel seems perfectly suited to your goals, likes and preferences. Thanks for taking us along!

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Hi Al,
Thanks! I was going to reach out to you and say how cool the visit to SF Vessel traffic was that you put together. I read the post about the visit on this trip and bummed I missed it.

CeeBee said:

Hi Al,
Thanks! I was going to reach out to you and say how cool the visit to SF Vessel traffic was that you put together. I read the post about the visit on this trip and bummed I missed it.

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Sorry you couldn't make it, Chris. I found it very interesting and informative.

No reason we can't repeat the trip next spring if there's enough interest.

CeeBee said:

the radar was worthless

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What radar? Why worthless? I am guessing that the sea state necessitated a high interference rejection / low gain, with the result that the sail boat's return was filtered out? Do you know the size of the sail boat? How far offshore were you? I find that further offshore (to a point, maybe 40nm), there is less traffic, and what traffic there is tends to be bigger (ie, more visible on radar and otherwise), and more likely to have AIS, a proper watch, etc.

Thanks for sharing the details of your adventure. My next trip is also MdR to SF, but we won't plan to stop along the way.

FlyWright said:

Sorry you couldn't make it, Chris. I found it very interesting and informative.

No reason we can't repeat the trip next spring if there's enough interest.

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Al, you have interest from One! I'm sure there are others who would love to join. Awesome you put it together.

MYTraveler said:

What radar? Why worthless? I am guessing that the sea state necessitated a high interference rejection / low gain, with the result that the sail boat's return was filtered out? Do you know the size of the sail boat? How far offshore were you? I find that further offshore (to a point, maybe 40nm), there is less traffic, and what traffic there is tends to be bigger (ie, more visible on radar and otherwise), and more likely to have AIS, a proper watch, etc.

Thanks for sharing the details of your adventure. My next trip is also MdR to SF, but we won't plan to stop along the way.

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Hi thanks for weighing in. It wasn't really about "that sailboat" as much as a general observation about offshore and coastal safety redundancy including better running lights. AIS is obviously extremely useful as it is precise, provides a significant amount of data while serving as a a layover on almost every piece of Navigation equipment. I'm really surprised how few mariners in general use this valuable equipment up and down the coast.

I'm also not a "fan" of Radome units preferring the sampling rate and horizontal bandwidth of an open array, although the radome is what I have. Thus at that particular moment we were getting tossed around pretty well the Radome's sampling rate was pretty useless for smaller targets regardless of settings.

In the perfect world I would have any Radar unit mounted on Gimbals as when you get up out of the water at speeds 14-18 knots (which we do with Twin Volvo Penta 300 HP D3's) the attitude of the boat alone sans gimbal becomes technically challenging with the bow rise for forward facing targets.

Radomes sweet spot to me is that it is effective for coastal shots of landmass and larger cargo ships and freighters, based on the size of the target. When we navigate (as we often do) in Heavy Fog I tend to use the buoy setting as it is the most valuable for smaller target registration and identification. Also in those conditions the bow attitude is not a problem as we are working at slower speeds so it is operating on a more stable plane.

Have a great trip, look forward to reading about your uphill climb and seeing you around the bay.