Learning to Sail Catalina Island Style
We shoved off from Coronado in very wet conditions…I believe we made up for the annual low rainfall totals that day! It was Friday Nov 30, 2007, I was accompanied by two sailing classmates and our ASA instructor headed to Catalina Island for a weekend sailing course.
The Catalina trip is a combined ASA 103 and 104 course offered by Seaforth Sailing Club that certifies sailors for coastal cruising and bareboat chartering on up to a 50 ft yacht. I had just purchased foul weather gear from West Marine and I looked like I came straight out of the catalog. Whatever the gear cost, it was worth it! We spent the next 14 hours head into the wind and rain on our way to Catalina. On the way, there were lots of dolphins, birds and an occasional clearing in the sky. This was a great experience in heavy weather, navigation at night , and reefing the main sail while underway in heavy weather.
Catalina is a beautiful island. We moored in Avalon and they’ve got a great off season deal…stay 2 nights, get 5 nights free! It’s a great time to visit Catalina if you want a quiet vacation. After drying off and having a buffalo burger on shore, we called it a night and took the shore boat back to the ship.
The next day, the winds were quite strong, 15-20 knots with gusts to over 25 knots. We hit a gust of wind on the reefed sail and it ripped the sail at the reef grommet. More great experience performing sail repair in heavy weather! As is usually the case, gear will fail in heavy weather, not at wine-and-cheese speed! We stayed in Avalon that night and then headed to Oceanside harbor the next day. This was a great leg, unfortunately there wasn’t much wind, but plenty of sun and wildlife. When we were about 5 miles outside of Oceanside at night, I saw dolphins swimming around the boat that were lit up by the phosphorescense in the water. It was great to be sailing at night!
On Monday morning, we had all passed the ASA certification and headed back to Coronado. It was a great trip. I highly recommend sailing to Catalina. I would prefer to depart from Long Beach or somewhere north of Dana Point so we can do a bit more sailing with the wind on our beam!
