Santa Barbara...You Gotta Love it!

Friendly welcome committee.

We left Monterey on Thursday and did an easy overnight to Santa Barbara.  Point Conception, which is said to be "the Cape of Good Hope of California" was smooth and easy.  A new navigational obstacle that we encountered along the southern California coast was the oil platforms that were evenly spaced along the route.  On each of my three hour watches, I had dolphin (or porpoises) swimming in the bow wake. At times, there were just a few, at other times, there were dozens swimming along with us, welcoming us to Southern California.  I can't think of a more welcoming sight than these jovial creatures swimming with us as we sailed and motored south.

The crew at Brophy's Brothers in Santa Barbara.

Santa Barbara has been incredible.  Once we got here and into our respective slips, Kathy, Tim, Richard and I went out to dinner at a local seafood restaurant located right at the marina.  Oyster shooters for everyone (except Tim) and we were all happy campers with seafood galore.  

On Saturday, Richard and I went to a farmers market in Santa Barbara and got some prime produce.  There were booths selling every imaginable vegetable and fruit and we even tried jujube fruit. Once provisioned, we headed back to the boat to meet up with the Kathy and Tim to go explore the Santa Barbara Harbor Seafood Festival on the pier where we were docked.

Giant paella, that we never had.

We met up with the crew of Rhythm for lunch and walked the pier.  While local lobster was the star of the festival, the lines for the food tents were too long for any of us and we ended up walking down the beach and getting take out fish tacos which we ate at a picnic table on the beach. Tim was a bit apprehensive given his recent seagull experience in Monterey.  We really wanted to try the local paella, but like I said, the lines were way too long.

Sunday, Kathy, Tim and I went to the beach adjacent to Stearns Wharf.  We hung out on the beach and had lunch and then decided to bring out the frisbee and demonstrate our exceptional skills at that sport.  Early on, a guy, just walking the beach, joined in and we ended up tossing the frisbee (our triangle had suddenly become a square) for a good hour. Jim, our random fourth player, was a font of information about the Santa Barbara area and we readily soaked in everything he had to say.  Meanwhile, seagulls were tearing apart our beach blanket, and even though he didn't show it, I have a feeling that Tim was nervous.

Monday found Richard and I working on the dinghy and getting it ready for use.  We haven't taken the dinghy out since leaving Seattle and we had to unfasten it from the foredeck, inflate it, apply a protective coat to it and then run the outboard.  Richard took the dinghy out and ran it for about 15 minutes and came back stating that it ran well.

Happy Birthday Tim!

The 16th was Tim's birthday (he's going to be REALLY old, hitting 34 as we speak) and Kathy was scheming to pull off a "surprise" birthday party tonight.  Think about it folks, how do you plan a surprise party for someone who lives on the boat with you 24/7?  I tried coming up with lame excuses to drag Tim off of the boat but that proved to be a fruitless endeavor.  In the end, I think Kathy told Tim to go over to our boat and look at the registration numbers I painted on the dinghy...weak, but it worked (sort of, as Tim completely knew that something was up!).  Kathy made cake and we had a great time celebrating T's birthday.