An Encinal cruising party...

This weekend the EYC had its annual winter cruise-in to its own docks. The boat that travelled the shortest distance was Bastante, a Cal 29 belonging to past-club president Carol Blackburn and her husband Bill. They came about 500 yards from the club dock #1 to the guest docks. Most of the other boats came from Marina Village, about a half mile away, or from a couple of other marinas on the Oakland Estuary. The point, of course, is to spend the weekend partying at the clubhouse and then staggering down to your boat at night - it keeps us off the roads, which is a good thing.

Deborah I took friends out sailing on Saturday. My old friends Ruth and Neil came out from Long Island to visit their daughter Sarah, who's getting her Ph.D. at Berkeley, and her friend Andy. Sarah's been out with us once before on our Cal 39, but because Spindrift is still undergoing refit work, we squeezed all of us aboard Dog Days, our Islander Bahama 28.




It was great fun, and it turned out to be the sunniest and warmest day of February. So, although the winds were in their typical winter mode on the bay - very light - we had a lovely time.










We squeezed ourselves into the club guest dock at about 16:45, and welcomed Vallejo Yacht Club friends Bruce and Gail, who joined the rest of us for dinner and a special musical show at the club that night. Great fun, indeed!

Sunday morning was the cruiser's fizz party on the docks, a regular Sunday morning event at all our club cruises, and then, in anticipation of rain in the evening and on Monday, gradually all the cruisers shoved off for the arduous trips back to their respective marina slips. Bastante actually went farther than 500 yards, since Carol and Bill took her to an adjacent marina to pump out the head.

Perhaps we should have all stayed, since the storm clouds missed the bay, the rest of the day was lovely, and Monday - President's Day - turned out to be a cloudless day.

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