One goal for myself on the boat was to become adept at cooking seafood. Prior to life on Scooter, I could make a mean tilapia fish taco, and I felt comfortable keeping shrimp from getting too rubbery but that was about the end of my seafood resume.
Scooter’s kitchen is the happiest place on earth.
So far we’ve been able to catch/cook/eat: Rock crab, Dungeness crab, Oysters, Butter Clams, Manilla Clams, Geoducks, Mussels, Urchin, Spiny Lobster, Scallops, Tuna (not caught yet) – Salmon, Sheepshead, Mackerel, Jacksmelt, Bonito, and now Calico Bass.
One favorite mainstay dish has been ceviche. We almost always have tortilla chips and limes on board.
I don’t usually like avocados but I’m sure glad Taylor insists on keeping them on board when a fresh fish comes along.
Albacore made a very flavorful ceviche. Raw albacore might be the best fish flavor. Bluefin has an amazing sushi texture, but in our ceviche never got much firmer. It seems better in sushi rolls, sashimi, or maybe a poke. But perhaps that’s cause it was a really high-quality fish and I felt bad cutting it into small enough chunks.
Bonito was similar to the Albacore. It turned out really nice, but we didn’t have excellent ingredients laying around. Hopefully next time it’ll be less like a plain bowl of limey fish.
Some locals turn up their noses to Bonito. They’re wrong, its a beautiful fish, and its delicious.
But along came the calico bass. We were just waiting for our first white fish but didn’t know it. The opaque meat turned bright white and firmed up perfectly. Taylor gets credit for this round of ceviche turning out perfect. Although I think she learned to taste the Jalapeno before adding all of it to the dish. It was HOT. California Jalapenos seem to be more aggressive (and unpredictable).
A wonderful blend of frustrating and embarrassing.
We spent the week getting ready to leave for Mexico. It started by getting the boat organized. We shopped for Christmas presents and gathered temporary water storage buckets. Without a water maker, having enough clean water is the biggest safety issue going South.
We’re ready for Christmas and even have a boat appropriate tree!
We took Eunice to the vet and got her international certifications sorted out. Lucky for her she’s as healthy as can be!
We also were gifted a 24-hour vacation from boat life. A friend had a free hotel night that expired at the end of the year. Due to Covid, they were unable to use the perk, so he gifted us a night in a high-end hotel downtown. We also got upgraded since no one is in hotels right now. It was AMAZING. The bathroom in this place was literally larger than our boat. The shower had one of those huge rain style heads and was gigantic. So compared to the normal rarely-cleaned-marina-showers we were in heaven. In 24 hours we each took 3 showers. We loved the little vacation and it was our first night off the boat since July. Eunice had a sleepover with her biggest fan Linda. She did ok but we missed each other.
We did a bad job taking pictures of the room, but it was big. Here’s a cool rooftop pool.We spoiled ourselves and got takeout from little Italy. 10/10 would do again.Eunice was VERY happy to be back to her little kingdom.
We prepped our fishing gear. Dave Easton took us shopping, gave us a lifetime of tips & tricks for fishing Baja, and loaned us a ton of spare gear. We started the process of getting fishing licenses for Mexico.
Dave is already responsible for a majority of Scooter’s caught fish and he’s gonna deserve credit for everything caught after this week!
We also started saying goodbye to our ‘host’ family Kitsy and Chuck. They’ve taken such good care of us so a few goodbye dinners were in order.
And then reality hit. This morning, while getting our ducks in a row we reached out to the coast guard to check the status of our boat registration. Turns out this was bad timing to buy out Hannah & Joe, because we currently don’t have a valid proof of ownership document. The paperwork is grinding along mid-pandemic, we’re apparently 2.5 to 3 months out to be squared away.
This is both a devastating blow for our plans and pretty embarrassing. We knew we eventually had to push some paper around when we took ownership of both halves of the boat in September but thought our current paperwork situation was sufficient.
Either way, we’re ready for a Christmas on the boat in either country.
This is our homemade stocking of spare dock line and leftover dodger material.
The big news of the week was we got the diesel working again. After two failures at sea, we did extensive fuel system maintenance, replacing filters, flushing lines, and re-treating all of our fuel tanks. Getting the engine started again wasn’t exactly straightforward as all of the bleed points on the fuel pumps were rusted shut. After prayer and petition, and some percussive maintenance, Greg roared back to life.
Vice grips for pliers, pliers for a wrench, wrench for a hammer, hammer’s everything else. (in this case hammer and a screwdriver are a large wrench)
Also this week I played golf for the first time in over a year. Big shoutout to Dave for letting me tag along. Turns out putting is not like riding a bike and greens are fast down here year-round.
Balboa Golf Course had some amazing views of the city and the bay.
Friday, Spencer and Sarah drove in from Phoenix. Spencer and I met in Cincinnati and he was one of the first who heard the boat plan. He always supported it, so it was a treat to have them visit, and see the dreams playing out.
Friday night we feasted on fish tacos. We picked up two pounds of Yellowtail from the next door fish market. It’s gotta be the best fish taco fish in the sea. Firm, white, a little bit oily, and packed with flavor.
Saturday was the last hot rum race of the season. I didn’t really understand what that means but apparently every two weeks there’s a sailboat race, and this was the finale. I expected a dozen boats or maybe twenty, and a similar size to ours. I was wrong. Sailing is a big deal here. It was 130 boats and several were longer than 70 feet. Apparently, they take it seriously enough to fly in tacticians from around the world to plan the route.
Chuck and Kitsy are basically San Diego yacht club royalty. Chuck was the commodore at one point as was his dad, uncle, and grandfather. He’s always had a boat and they know everyone.
They took us out on their 28-foot zodiac again to spectate the race. We were zipping up along racing boats, yelling encouragement and taunts. It’s a pursuit race, so the boats are let out according to their speed, with the largest fastest boats leaving the start line last. This means there’s a lot of passing, strategy changes due to other boats wind shadows, near misses, and tons of excitement.
The highlight of my week was watching a 70-foot true racing sailboat (scroll to 2nd boat) screaming toward the course marker where all the boats turn left, within 100 feet of 10 other smaller sailboats. It was hectic and terrifying. The big boat slipped through the traffic and delayed their left turn to maintain a better course for optimal wind orientation.
Pyewacket, the large black main/white spinnaker approaches the crowd.Pyewacket disappearing into the crowd, skipping the left turn to maintain higher speed on a broad reach.
In the midst of our spectating, we took on a side quest to observe the dolphin break off the East coast of Point Loma. Chuck had been surfing this wave his entire life so he knew where to put the boat. But it’s still exhilarating and pretty scary to be 30 feet from a breaking wave on a boat. And not 30 feet out to sea but 30 feet horizontally where the hidden channel delays the break. We watched a few sets and enjoyed perfect examples for explaining to our guests the sizes of various swells along our journey.
The race finished and the boat we were rooting for won! As we pulled up alongside to celebrate, they flooded their engine and had to ask us to tow them in. A neat little connection to the winning crew that secured us a tour of the boat. To our surprise, it wasn’t a purebred race boat, but a cabin cruiser kinda like Scooter (albeit more capable and a heck of a lot faster).
Wani Racing: the regatta championsWani Racing under tow, while the slow schlubs in the background try to find the finish line.
The rest of the weekend included an Indian curry feast, a top tier charscooterie board, and a great day sailing around the bay. We enjoyed late night dock walks, ample bourbon, and awesome conversation.
At Santa Cruz Island, south of Santa Barbara, we made our first failed attempt at catching Spiny Lobster. In the process, we met the Russians and got to try fresh Scallops, Sheepshead, and Sea Urchin. I also learned a lot about how to prep each of them.
Andres removing the Caviar from fresh Urchin.
We did however harvest about 3 pounds of fresh California mussels. We scrubbed and scrubbed and de-bearded, and scrubbed some more, and finally had a big bowl of shiny mussels. I opted for the classic white wine cream sauce with lemon zest, served over pasta. It was perfect! we also got to try a variety of sized mussels from finger sized to palm sized. The medium ones were best.
A few days later, rounding the southern tip of Catalina Island, with my best friend Troy, we were trolling with a spoon and caught something! We reeled in what looked like a tiny tuna. We made the bold decision to keep the fish, and try to figure out what it was. Unfortunately without service, that meant texting a description to our fish expert friends, via our satellite phone. Their response was a Spanish Mackerel. We caught two more and kept the larger of the 2. We satellite texted our chef friend and got some mackerel recipes. I served the fish with a mustard sauce and fondant style fingerling potatoes and roast broccoli.
Once back in cell coverage we learned they were a cousin of the mackerel, the Bonito!
The next day, we hauled in 2 more Bonito and had a delightful lunch of fish tacos. Turns out LA doesn’t have the best tacos…Scooter does.
That night in emerald bay, on the north side of Catalina, we had my favorite ‘fancy’ dinner on a scooter; Pork Tenderloin in a brown sauce, cajun mashed potatoes, and a cucumber salad.
Cucumber salad, Cajun Mashed Potatoes, and a Pork Tenderloin in Brown Sauce #uglydelicious
We enjoyed a few bottles of wine in honor of the Catalina Wine Mixer, and I fashioned up the Bonito carcass into our crab trap as bait. Taylor confided in troy that this was a stupid idea, but since I was enthused, they’d let me.
The joke’s on them though. We finally hauled in a lobster.
Our first Spiny Lobster
This was a major highlight on Scooter. The water was 15 feet deep and crystal clear. After about 15 minutes we could shine the flashlight and see the trap with brown smudges all around it. I hauled it up and immediately the smudges darted away, except for 1 unlucky lobster that got caught in the net.
I opted to grill the lobster, with a simple lemon garlic pasta and my favorite roast broccoli. One thing I have to admit I am terrible at on Scooter is grilling with any fat source. Fat is flammable, and our grill is tiny. Basting lobster with butter, results in a fireball. Grilling chicken in an olive-oil based marinade results in a fireball, grilling bacon (nelson’s idea) results in a fireball that nearly sets the boat on fire 60 miles off the coast of Oregon. Advice welcome.
I don’t always want to write this blog like a diary, so instead here’s a series of Yips & Skips from Thanksgiving week. If you’re unfamiliar with Yips & Skips, have dinner with Taylor once and you’ll get the official rules.
Skip: For the first time in 6 years I didn’t get to cook a turkey. Our oven was too small and we weren’t hosting, so instead, we opted to let the Wilbur family provide the food and we contributed wine. Everything else about the day was a big yip. We had a blast. Great food, ping pong, and karaoke. What else could a Thanksgiving need?
No, dad. I did not wear the beanie to dinner. This was after when we were outside playing ping pong, I promise.
Yip: We used Thanksgiving as a reason to celebrate fall day. Fall day is our excuse to get PSLs and go on a fall hike but they don’t really have ‘fall’ here, so the vibe of Thanksgiving had to suffice, and we walked around downtown San Diego.
Skip: We caught a California Halibut on our sailing day but it was 2 inches under the legal limit so we had to throw him back.
Yip: We took Zac, Lauren, and her sister out sailing for the day. We also did a little fishing and bbq on the boat. Eunice quickly convinced the ‘non-cat-people’ how awesome she is.
Skip: Our boat key is stuck in the ignition and won’t turn. So as a last resort, we had to hotwire the boat, and then hotwire again anytime we wanted to move from one fishing spot to another. On the bright side, Tay and I have hotwiring Scooter down to a science.
Yip: Lauren’s grandfather took us fishing and showed us the tips and tricks we needed. We pulled in 20 Calico and Sand Bass. 3 were big enough (3-4 lbs) to keep so we ended up with some great bass fillets. Which turned into a fantastic Ceviche. Stay tuned for the ceviche edition of ‘Scooter’s Galley’.
Skip: Skateboarding is harder than Tay and I anticipated.
Yip: Tay capitalized on the Thanksgiving holiday & a mostly empty skatepark for some practice. She came a long way, and we got some great content.
Yip (I know, out of order don’t kill me): I made the best recipe I’ve ever made on Scooter. Salmon Cakes. I needed an appetizer for a boat ride and we had an extra salmon fillet from Sam’s visit. They were next level. Crab Cakes are a thing of the past, Salmon Cakes are forever.
Skip: The hosts weren’t big seafood people.
Skip: After taking a ‘dinghy’ ride on a real boat (with a much quieter motor than our 2 stroke) we need to upgrade our dinghy.
Yip: The boat ride around the bay was fantastic. Right at dusk we were able to pick Zac up at a pier downtown, and cover a lot more ground than either of our boats can cover in an evening. Then Chuck and Kitsy (my first cousin once removed) took us to their favorite Italian place for dinner and we had an amazing night.
An awesome boat ride but I’m a lousy photographer.
As is customary, Eunice remains a Yip and there’s always some boat skip. This week the bilge pump malfunctioned causing the boat to stink to high heaven. In case anyone ever is worried I only share the relaxing glamorous part of boat life, I spent Friday night wrist-deep in the worst water-diesel-mold slurry, and we are all sorted.
This week we’ve felt at home for the first time in a long time.
We had a duplicate visitor, so we felt like someone wanted to see ‘us’ more than ‘us and the boat’.
We reconnected with relatives I only see every decade or so.
A ‘fan’ invited us over to dinner. We were acquaintances with a distant connection before and left as friends.
Tay’s college buddies planned a trip to visit from separate hometowns to use our boat as a sort of reunion.
We had access to a car and could run errands!
We have a REALLY nice shower at this marina and it doesn’t charge by the minute.Plus we have no immediate plans of leaving and San Diego is beautiful.
We found a slip in San Diego’s Americas Cup Harbor with not a minute to spare. We set to work doing laundry, showering, cleaning the boat, and getting ready for Hailey & Kyle. They finagled a work trip to San Diego to visit us for a few days. We had an amazing 3 days of great food, decent sailing, and lousy surfing.
After Hailey and Kyle had to get on their flight, we were invited to have dinner with Taylor’s Brother’s Girlfriend’s Grandparents. Linda & Dave have been following our trip and wanted to feed us and welcome us to the city. It was a lovely evening of bluefin sashimi, a delicious fall roast, and a lot of fishing information.
The real reason they invited us over, however, was to meet Eunice. They’re Captain Eunice’s biggest fans. And they’re knowledgable cat people so they knew she needed some room to run in a big house, and more stimulation than our 32 foot home can provide, at least for one night.
She was shy for a while but when she warmed up she was so happy. A couple months ago I didn’t even want to get a cat and now I want to buy my cat a house. ugh.
They more than exceeded the stereotype for grandparents, by leaving us at the end of the night with full stomachs, leftover roast, and a gift basket full of homemade marmalade, boysenberry jam, and 3 pounds of fresh Bluefin Tuna!!!
The next night, my Mom’s cousin had a little get together and invited us, with the intent of finally getting us in the room with some very seasoned sailors. Their other dinner guests were accomplished America’s cup racers, had several trans-pac’s on their resume and had a race in the bay the following day. We learned a lot about sailing and had a great night. At the end of the evening, they offered us their spare Car!!! We haven’t driven since August and forgot how much you can see when you have access to land.
The next morning we washed the boat again (our never-ending battle) and gathered some provisions. Tay’s track teammates from college, Sam & Christie, landed and the adventure started over again. We enjoyed a dinghy ride, as is customary, and then got to work on the most fun dinner on Scooter to date. One of the provisioning runs was to a Japanese Grocery store, and we had all the fixings to make a Sushi smorgasbord. Sam flew in with fresh Salmon from Alaska, and we had a bunch of Bluefin Tuna from our gift basket from Dave & Linda.
Unfortunately, sushi night was too much fun, very few sushi-night-pictures were taken
Sushi Rolls will be a new staple on Scooter.
We made a good effort to fish and sail but only had luck with the latter. It was the busiest water we’ve ever spent time on, and it was so much fun. We were under full sail dodging the 1000 other sailboats, pretending we were in some regatta, not on a slow condo.
Once the 1000 other sailboats came out, we were too busy to get photos, but trust me, it was packed.
The next day we were able to drive to a beach and make another effort to learn to surf. Progress is slow but we’re getting there. We wrapped up the adventure with a bonfire on the beach, and a salmon dinner.
D1 athletes are the best people to hang with on a beach because they always want to be doing something…they don’t like to lounge and look at the sunset, they want to do all the activities…competitively.
San Diego might be our home for a while for a few reasons:
Apparently, people want to visit us in warm climates.
Mooring is cheaper than expected
We’ve been invited to Thanksgiving here!
We still have to improve our Spanish (and diesel reliability) before heading south into Mexico.
So if you’ve ever wanted to spend a few days on Scooter, we’re currently taking reservations for December 🙂
Living like locals where we could never afford to live.
A week ago we left Marina Del Rey, sailed along the “marine layer” (aka smog) of LA toward Long Beach. My Great Great Great Grandfather Phineas Banning was the go-getter who put together funding to dredge Long Beach harbor and build break walls. He got wealthy had a great big estate, it was turned into a museum, and a century later the museum was closed from a plague and I took a picture by the gate.
Long Beach was awesome. $1.50 fish tacos topped the list. The Queen Mary was cool (also closed though), we got a lot of walking in, and figured out another city bus system.
Newport is a massive bay filled with yachts and mansions. This made for great dinghy rides. We spent hours on Scootie exploring the nooks and crannies of Newport. It’s also apparently the home of Duffy electric boats, my future competitor when I release my own custom cocktail-cruise-dinghy. There are 9,000 boats in Newport and I’m convinced 8,000 of them are duffy’s. We also put forth another attempt at surfing.
Dana Point was the most expensive marina in the world. Apparently, every boater has also read the same book I’m reading (Two Years Before The Mast, by Richard Henry Dana Jr.) and needs to stop and see the cove named after the famous sailor. Fortunately, we were able to anchor for free. It was just ok, but we were distracted by a diesel failure on the sail in. Greg, our engine, died off the coast of Dana Point. Luckily we had our sails up so Taylor sailed and I spent 3 hours troubleshooting. Eventually, we got up and running again. I’ve always enjoyed being an amateur mechanic, but it’s 100% more fun in a stationary garage. I was sick, frustrated, and covered in diesel which made it very gratifying to not have to call the towboat.
Greg has been amazing. Ole Reliable. Honestly one of Scooter’s best features.
Oceanside was nice. We had a long walk to the grocery store. Tay bought a “top-shelf liquor” for the first time in her life: a friend sponsored a nice bottle of scotch for an early Christmas present. I handed over the reins to the galley and Taylor cooked a bomb dinner. Polenta, pork tenderloin in a pan sauce, and roasted carrots. She also found a new appreciation for the timing required to serve 3 hot dishes with a 1.5 burner stove.
Mission Bay is a great big bay with tons of waterfront but Scooter is too tall to access most of it due to a bridge overhead. So we anchored just outside and explored via dinghy. Scootie has been carrying a heavy load this week, keeping us entertained.
The plan is to make San Diego tomorrow, and then it’s visitors and family for a few weeks before the next step, whatever that is.
If you’ve ever wondered what we eat on Scooter, here goes. It’s a 12 square foot kitchen and my favorite place to be. Here marks the start of a (perhaps) weekly series called Scooter’s Galley. Now that we’re in California, and are catching more of our own food I’d like to share how we eat and also hopefully encourage visitors to come see us for a cheap vacation.
I love to cook. I think if I could get paid to do anything for the rest of my life it would be to cook…buuuut cooking for money is a whole different game and I think it’d ruin the fun.
It’s been a fun challenge to adapt to cooking in the smallest kitchen but Tay and I (and hopefully some guests) can attest that it’s gone well.
Local Fare: Cooking what’s free
In the PNW we had ample access to blackberries. We picked and preserved as much as we could before we left. Blackberry Jam has been a staple on yoghurt, pancakes, Oatmeal and PB&Js. We’re finally on the dregs of the last jar, and need to find a new abundant fruit.
We were terrible at fishing in the PNW, and are only slightly better in California. To date, Scooter has hauled a meager 10 fish aboard in 2 years of fishing nearly every day. Of those 10, 4 have been big enough and legal to eat. But, they’ve been many days of delicious food.
Crabs have been on the up & up for us. We pulled 3 crabs up in the puget sound in 2 summers and things have been much better since. We’ve pulled crabs up in Oregon, and California and finally have our system down, which leads me to…
Budget Bites. (things we eat when we don’t have visitors)
I always bought chicken thighs and breasts. Kroger has them for 1.99/lb so it’s the cheapest meat by far, so I thought. Until I realized a chicken carcass makes the best Crab Bait. So killing 2 birds with one stone, we’ve started buying whole chickens, parting them out, and enjoying the 2 for 1 value. And in a short time, I’d like to think I’ve mastered the grilled chicken quarter.
For life on a budget, we eat a lot of oatmeal, PB&J’s and Ramen. Fortunately, 15 cent ramen with a couple soft boiled eggs, sundried tomatoes, and green onions feels pretty gourmet for under a dollar. We also got into the sailor classic of canned sardines. A little hot sauce and served with crackers, it’s actually a really good lunch. (see below image).
Preserved Provisions
Canned goods were vital. They say to estimate the worst-case scenario for how long a passage might take and provision for double. I’ve gotten pretty handy with a canned beet salad or spicing up beans and rice. Also, you can make a pretty bomb stir fry with canned chicken. Fortunately, I was always able to make something better than canned soup so the Progresso remains in the bilge. Canned beets, feta, and cucumbers never go bad as far as I’m concerned. Eunice appreciates canned fish as much as we do.
Canned beets, feta, and cucumbers never go bad as far as I’m concerned.Eunice appreciates canned fish as much as we do
Rice is key. We had 20 lbs of rice on board. Which might have been dumb to assume in a situation where we’re desperate enough, we’d still be able to cook rice…but whatever. We are still eating ample rice and stretching calories to maintain the budget. Also side note, one of the best meals of my life was plain rice… 36 hours into a pounding sea outside the Strait of Juan De Fuca, unflavored calories were a Godsend.
Local Fare Revisited.
We got a free tuna fillet in Half Moon Bay. Fresh Albacore is amazing. When it’s not canned, it isn’t horribly dry. It might be my favorite fish from this journey. We made Ceviche first which was glorious despite it being cold food on a cold night. Then the tuna steaks were as good as anything I’ve had in a restaurant, and the tuna tacos were a great way to finish the fish which at this point was like 6 days old so I wanted to make sure it was cooked.
Food safety might have been lost on this guy, but hey, free tuna amiright!
Clams were a blast. We haven’t found any in Cali yet, but the horse clams, and weekly batches of homemade clam chowder will be one of my highlights from the Sound.
Finally, we found out lemon trees are common in people’s yards and sometimes they are free for the snagging, dangling over sidewalks, or even left out in tidy piles for passers-by to have. So we made a batch of limoncello and got some little jars. We’ve been looking for something to give other sailors because people have been so generous to us!
Thanks for indulging me. Scooter’s kitchen gets more exciting every day, so follow along or come visit and get a taste.
Sunny Los Angeles lived up to the hype even though we never got more than a mile from the ocean. Venice Beach, Santa Monica, Marina Del Rey, and Malibu were plenty to keep us entertained.
My best man Troy flew in from DC for a week-long adventure. And a cherry on top was our friend Cynthia came in from Seattle for the first weekend. The last time Scooter saw Cynthia we were trapped on the hard in Gig Harbor. And the last time Troy set foot on board we lost our steering, the first time. So we had a lot of catching up to do. It took a substantial dinghy ride to cover the former largest small craft harbor in the world, but we were up to the task. Also, it was Halloween so the people in the electric booze cruise boats were in full regalia, and the people on the $400,000/week charter yachts were to the 9s and presumably drunk.
Eunice was unimpressed by the grandeur of Marina Del Rey.
A fresh day gave us a chance for an 11-mile walk to the Santa Monica pier. The highlight of the day was the Venice Beach skatepark. It was like watching a Disney movie. An 8-year-old was the main event, shredding, talking trash with the adults, and capturing the attention of the eclectically dressed skaters and spectators alike.
I suspect a fashion student could do a Ph.D Thesis on the outfits seen here in an hour, but I didn’t take those photos. Sorry fans.
Taylor’s mind was racing. Between her desire to do anything dangerous, her passion to teach all kids the athleticism and motor skills life requires, and her love of anything inspiring that could be a Disney film, she was in heaven. We’ll have to come back (Spoiler, we did), and we definitely need to budget to buy her a skateboard.
We also had a weeklong mission to have the best taco’s in LA, per a Letterkenny bit, but that turns into a tall order without a car. Still, we made a pretty solid effort. Given our budget, we often had to split tacos, or quickly get home for an actual dinner. In any case here’s the research.
Taco Libre was good but mostly because we were starving. (5/10)
Teddy’s Red Tacos was the LA experience we needed, beef tacos dipped in beef consume (9/10).
Valle, a recommendation of Tay’s Malibu cousin might actually be the best taco I’ve had in my life. Pork Belly perfection. (9.5/10)
Teddy’s Red Tacos…Tay gets embarrassed if I take taco pictures in fancy places, so no formal documentation of the others.
Off to Catalina! We spent one night in Avalon. The mooring field was nearly empty (15 boats) but was still hard to navigate in our sluggish boat. I can’t imagine trying to catch the mooring ball on a busy summer Saturday (200+ boats). Avalon lit up at night, and seemed cool but wasn’t for us. We shoved off around Catalina’s southern tip in search of some empty beaches. We caught 3 Bonito but didn’t know what they were without cell service. We had to send a detailed description via sat phone to our fish experts. Once confirmed they were edible and legal, we texted our chef friends for recipes. They turned out great, so thank you to our remote research team.
We stopped in Little harbor and surfed and swam at Shark Cove. It was mostly deserted so we got to surf poorly without being judged.
I can’t imagine it’s common to have two adjacent coves, one calm enough to anchor, one exposed enough to surf. Catalina has it all.We also took the opportunity to try surfing behind the dinghy…with limited success.
Then it was a quick jaunt up to Cat Harbor for the night and respite from the swell.
The next day, the swell prediction was stronger so we devised a plan to save Troy from turning green. He hiked the 6 miles across the island, and Tay and I sailed the 18 miles around to the other side. We met up with him at Emerald Bay, after he snapped some perfect shots of Scooter from above, and we hauled in another Bonito for lunch (fish tacos, 10/10). Scooter is officially the place to go for Tacos in LA.
As the sun set, I stuffed the bonito guts into the bait bag and the crab pot went over the side. Taylor talked a little trash to Troy about how feeble my attempt was, but she would soon come to eat those words, literally.
The water was so clear, with a flashlight we could see 15 dark smudges around the net, and when we pulled it up the spiny lobsters exploded and flapped their tails away, except for two that got tangled in the net. They’re freaky. Locals call them bugs which feels very appropriate. They rub their antennae against their skull like a guiro. They have no claws, just all sorts of legs, and antennae longer than Scooter’s radio antenna.
We arose with the sun, and motored back to LA hoping to beat the brewing Gale.
Our high energy crew on the crossing from Catalina.
We saw Humpback whales, a mom and calf feeding, which kept our streak alive of guests seeing whales and brought Scooter’s whale-count to 42. Back in the marina, we feasted on lobster tails.
For Troy’s last day in town, we hit the skatepark (as spectators), ate at the aforementioned taco joints, and were inspired to watch skate documentaries.
This was an unbelievable week. For those interested, stay tuned (sign up) cause this Thursday I’m going to dive into my favorite part of Scooter: The Galley!
Earlier this week we anchored at Santa Cruz Island. As we pulled into the cove, another sailboat motored in right before us, so we patiently waited while they set their hook. Eventually, we asked if they were going to stern anchor and he couldn’t hear us over his outboard but signaled “I’ll be back in 5 minutes”. He dropped his diver and came to chat. He said he doesn’t like stern anchors. He likes to spin around. He said they’re diving lobster but there’s enough sea life on the island no one will be hungry.
Inspired, we hopped in Scootie looking for spiny lobster.
Exploring the caves on the Island…Next time we need to bring a flashlight.The water was glowing and the caves were full of life. Crabs, fish, mussels, and plenty of mysterious animals.
We didn’t find any lobsters but eventually, the other anchorage residents motored up to us to check-in. He said, “We’d like to have you over for happy hour but we’re already 20 minutes late! Come over when you can!”
Approaching Santa Cruz Island
We went over with a bottle of wine expecting nothing. What we received was fantastic, and felt a bit like a culmination of our cruising experience.
The boat belonged to two Russian friends, sailing and diving. They spearfished, collected shellfish, and enjoyed what the ocean had to offer.
One was a doctor, avid SCUBA diver, and spearfisherman. He competed for the Soviet National Team in the Decathalon. The other traveled to America to explore, got temp work, flipped a house and put the profit into Apple at $1/share, and hasn’t worked since. It took him a while to get citizenship but luckily he doesn’t need to work anymore.
They shared conversation, advice, sailing stories, fishing details, and so so so so many seafood recipes.
We had sashimi scallops, fried scallops, sheepshead, and fresh sea urchin caviar.
Not too many wine bottles were opened, only 1 beer was cracked all night, and no one had a cocktail. But…we did drink an entire liter of vodka. Every 10 minutes, they filled the little brass glasses and we toasted. It was amazing. The best part was each toast was serious and heartfelt, such as, “Cheers… to the happiness of our souls!”.
That night might be a peak of our sailing adventure. It also doesn’t hurt that we collected 5 pounds of mussels and were able to have a mussel feast the following night.
The next adventure is another round of friend visits! Stay tuned for LA updates.
