Family Letter - March, 2002
Well, we moved our boat, Cottonwood, from Long Beach to San Diego. It was a beautiful cruise down the coast. We would like to keep it a bit closer to home in San Clemente, but right now there are no 50 foot slips available between San Diego and Los Angeles. We know because we have reservations at 7 marinas ranging between a 2 and 8 year wait! We have been down to the boat almost every weekend enjoying the sun and doing little fix up projects, inviting family to visit us and stay on the boat and cruise San Diego Bay. See Cruising to hear about the trip down and see pictures. We have been taking walks along the shore, finding new stores and restaurants to visit, and generally exploring our new environment.
We have lots of little projects to make the boat ours, (See Projects) but nothing major. Our Cottonwood has really been maintained well and is in great condition and should last another 30 years according to our Wooden Boat Expert surveyor. We have been cleaning and polishing inside teak walls and doors, as well as adding little homey touches such as pillows and throws and new sheets and bedspreads. It is already really cozy. Sitting in the sunny raised pilothouse is a special place to read, and be able to see the dramatic skyline of downtown San Diego.
The last couple of weekends in San Diego have been a bit windy and chilly so we haven't taken her out in the bay as we had planned. We need to practice anchoring and getting the dinghy down from the top of the boat with the winch, but we figured the windy conditions were not the best to practice in for our first time. We are most anxious to try out the new larger dinghy and see how it handles and how fast we can go. There are a lot more places we can explore in the bay with the dinghy without taking the boat out and we like being down close to the water and occasionally getting a bit of sea spray. Several restaurants have boat docks which would be much easier to visit with the dinghy than trying to find a spot for Cottonwood.
The last few months have been everything we had expected and then some. Driving down to San Diego to the boat is like having mini-vacations every week. We always have something to look forward to and always have something to keep us busy and involved in together. And if we just want to snuggle and read or watch a video we can do that ,too. The boat is big enough to even give us each a little space if we need it (which we seldom do) . Les has his little workbench below in the lazarette in the stern of the boat and I (Lynn) particularly like to sit on the bow and read or just bag some rays.
Love, Lynn and Les
