Drake's Bay

The trip from Noyo River to Drake’s Bay was mercifully boring. That leg of the journey rounds two capes (Point Arena and Point Reyes). They are both potentially “boisterous” according to the guidebook (and personal experience!). Today, the biggest swell we saw was probably 5’ and most of the day it was 3’-4’ with light winds.
We did see a few whales but other than that all we saw was a surprising number of sea lions. They come “surfing” by the boat with their heads far out of the water to get a good look at us. If you yell “Hi!” they quickly turn to look at you in a funny sort of surprised way (it doesn’t take much to entertain us on the boat!).
Just after we entered the anchorage at Drake’s Bay the wind picked up considerably and it howled most of the night. Fortunately, it’s a well-protected anchorage so all we heard was the creaking of the anchor chain and some small wind waves slapping against the steel hull. After a while, it just faded into the background and really didn’t disturb our sleep. With wind like that, I am really glad that we have such oversized ground tackle. A plow anchor for a boat our size is normally in the 75-90 lb range. Our anchor is 140 lbs! I also put out 10:1 scope of chain (no rope) and we really don’t have any fears of dragging.
We decided to sleep late since we are not departing the anchorage until 8am in order to time the passage through the Golden Gate narrows on the flood tide. The seas are forecasted to be calm enough that it’s probably not necessary to take that precaution but I have had enough of “exciting” seas for the moment! I also want to time our arrival at the marina on the flood tide since the water is very shallow on the approach (at low tide we’d only have about a foot of water under the keel!).
The morning came cold and foggy (and still windy in the anchorage). Even though it is August, we had to fire up the heater since it’s just COLD on the boat! I hope it clears up enough for a good view for Dad as we cross under the Golden Gate Bridge…..