Learning Spanish

Since Lulu and I plan to spend many, many years in Mexico and Central
America, it would be silly not to try to speak the local language.
Granted that in most of the towns that cruising sailors frequent much
of the population speaks very good English, but still there will be
the occasional villages where no one speaks English. Besides, it just
seems right to be able to converse with the locals in their own
tongue. Toward this goal, we have taken quite a number of Spanish
classes over the years. Of course we both had high school or junior
high school Spanish but that was a really long time ago. I was,
however, amazed at how much of it came back to me when I first started
attending some weekly brown bag Spanish lessons at work a number of
years ago. We also attended some evening Conversational Spanish
classes put on by the community college at Silverton High School. Our
big plunge was when we celebrated our 25th anniversary (back in 2002
in case you're curious) by spending 3 weeks in La Paz, Baja California
Sur, attending a Spanish immersion school. The idea was to live with
a local family and attend class for 4 hours a day. The rest of the
day would be spent visiting with your host family (en español, por
supuesto) as well as seeing the local sights. We dutifully attended
class every morning and tried to converse with our hosts, Antonio and
Cecelia in Spanish. Trouble was, our Spanish was so bad and their
English was so good and we genuinely liked each other. So, unless we
wanted to talk endlessly about how good Cecelia's cooking was (and it
really was) or what funny guy Antonio was (and he really was), we
naturally reverted to English. Made for a great visit but we didn't
learn an awful lot of Spanish. And, I must add, this was entirely our
fault. Antonio and Cecelia (ESPECIALLY Cecelia) really tried.

So, we were really pleased when Rosemary, one of my Aquarium shift-
mates, told us about a Spanish class she was taking at the local
Centro de Ayuda (Help Center) on Thursday evenings. I stopped by the
center and talked to Jorge about joining the class. He told me that
it's a sort of "survival Spanish" class. He strives to teach us
enough to be understood and, more importantly, to understand what
we're hearing, but doesn't delve deeply into the grammar rules, etc.
We went to our second session last night and this looks like it's
going to be a very helpful class. I'm not sure when the sessions
started but we're definitely not counting, or learning our colors or
even conjugating verbs except as needed to understand what we're
reading or to get our point across when saying something. Jorge's
emphasis is on trying to train our ears to hear Spanish. If you've
ever taken a Spanish class and then tuned in to a Mexican radio
station or eavesdropped on a conversation in Spanish, you know how
hard this can be. You pick up the occasional word that you're
familiar with but the rest just seems to run together. Don't blame it
on "they speak too fast". Think about how fast you speak English.
Probably doesn't seem fast to you but try slowing it down to
the word by word speed that you want to
hear Spanish spoken in so that you can
understand it. The problem is that we're just not used to
hearing the sounds and identifying them as words. This takes
practice. Can't remember for sure what Jorge said last night but it
was something like several hundred hours of listening was required
before you start to get good at it. He sent us home with a CD full of
a bunch of stories told in Spanish and they're not all told by
Mexicans. There are also speakers from Spain, Colombia, Venezuela,
Cuba, etc. so that we can get used to the different accents. Methinks
this is going to be good. The library also carries lots of foreign
language movies. I checked out a Cuban movie called "Hello,
Hemingway" to start. I think we'll try watching it (in Spanish) with
the Spanish subtitles turned on so that we can start to associate the
sounds with the words, although that may not be the right way to go.
The CD that Jorge passed out also contains pdf files of the stories
but he advised us against printing them out yet so maybe we should
just watch the movie w/o subtitles and see how it goes.

Our inspirations that keep us going include our nephew Jaxon and our
friends Jason and Deanna. Jaxon, armed only with a little bit of high
school Spanish, spent a year of high school in Spain. He was
surrounded by non-English speakers and was expected to do all the same
stuff that the local high school kids did (homework, tests, contribute
in class, converse with his host family, etc). He has told us that
after a certain period of time (can't remember how long he said for
sure) things just sort of "clicked in" and everything he'd been taught
suddenly made sense and he began to gain fluency. Jason and Deanna
met in Texas while they were both on a mission for the LDS church.
They spent their days proselytizing to the Spanish-speaking community
in a small Texas town. The LDS church has developed some very
impressive language-teaching techniques judging from what I've seen of
some of their returned missionaries. I don't know how much Spanish
either Jason or Deanna had taken in high school. We didn't know Jason
then but we knew Deanna and I don't remember her taking much, if any,
high school Spanish. Armed with their 6 week (or so) LDS class they
hit the streets. By the time they returned they were both quite fluent.

Besides our other resources, a boater we met on "A" dock loaned us a
copy of "Spanish for Cruisers". We'll definitely have to get our own
copy. You can spend a lot of time learning to speak Spanish and still
be caught short when you go to the local repair shop and have to ask
for a "packing gland" or a "glow plug" or you need repairs made on
your "working jib". Kathy Parsons has gathered all of these
specialized words together along with a bunch of essential phrases and
such into a nice little spiral-bound book that looks to me like a must-
have for sailors cruising in Latin America. We're also going to each
get a little electronic Spanish/English dictionary to carry with us.
They're cheap and small. They wouldn't be very useful for trying to
form a sentence in any kind of reasonable time, but we're hoping
they'll be useful for coming up with the occasional word that we need
to finish a thought. And they're easier to use than carrying around
an actual bound dictionary.

So, wish us luck and hasta luego.

PS: I'm also sending a copy of this to Antonio y Cecelia, so this last
part is just so they'll know who the heck this e-mail is from:

Hola Antonio y Cecelia. Es Lulu y Esteban. Esperamos a ver ustedes
en noviembre o deciembre cuando nos visitamos La Paz en nuestra yate.
Si quieren, leen nuestra blog a http://yodersafloat.blogspot.com .
Hasta la vista.

Alphabet soup

I promise to write something better than this pretty soon but for now,
this glimpse into the "simple" life of a sailor will have to do.

I got my new VHF radio the other day. The old one still worked but it
didn't have DSC. Plus, New Horizons came out with a new VHF with DSC
and AIS! Now I've been wanting AIS ever since I first heard about
it, so, considering the old VHF was getting a bit long in the tooth,
this seemed like a no-brainer. Well, when I was going through the
installation procedure, imagine my surprise when I discovered that the
VHF would communicate with my GPS via the NMEA protocol so I could see
contacts on my chart plotter. Now all I have to do is contact the FCC
to get my MMSI number, wire the whole shooting match together and I'm
good to go.

For the non-sailors or the KISS sailors out there:
DSC: Digital selective calling. This is used to call a specific boat
on the VHF radio by contacting it directly rather than just sending
out a broadcast and hoping they answer. It also contains info on my
boat so that any distress calls sent out from my radio will contain
information about me, my boat, emergency contact numbers and, once I
tie the two together, my GPS coordinates.
MMSI: Can't remember what the letters stand for but this is basically
the "phone number" of my boat which other folks with DSC would use to
call my boat specifically. This is also the identification number the
Coast Guard would use when a distress signal comes in from our boat.
AIS: Automatic Identification System. This is so cool. Basically,
ships over a certain size are now required to carry AIS transmitters
which send out a signal telling who they are, what direction they're
headed, speed, contact information, etc. Now, instead of wondering
whether or not that big old freighter on the horizon is headed for you
and whether or not he knows you're there, you can see his position,
etc. on your chart plotter. You now know who he is, where he's headed
in relation to you, how fast he's going, whether or not he's going to
hit you and if so, when, and/or how close he'll come if neither of you
change course. Very cool.
GPS: Global positioning system, but you already knew that.
NMEA: A marine electronics industry protocol which allows various
gadgets by different manufacturers to communicate with each other.
FCC: Federal; Communications Commission, but you already knew that, too.

OK, I've killed enough time at the library (Lulu's sewing on the boat
and needed me out of the way). Time to go to the Post Office and the
to the store to get the wire I need to perform the above miracles.

Meanwhile, back in Newport

Been raining like a big dog so far this week. Last Thursday, when I
went to the Aquarium to clean the otters' toys, it was raining
sideways. Didn't waste any time watching the staff feed the pinnipeds
that day. Got the toys cleaned and got back to the boat ASAP.

Yesterday, on a suggestion from our friends Rod & Jennifer Hill, we
went to the Newport Library to see if we could get library cards.
They have a 3-month visitor card that costs $5.00 or, since we are
paying for a slip at the marina and are, therefore, residents, we are
eligible for a regular card. Libraries have changed a lot. Sure they
still have books. But you should see the collection of DVDs they
have. Movies, TV shows, travelogues, how-to videos, etc. They also
have books-on-CD as well as a fair collection of music CDs. So I
guess we'll save our collection of DVDs and books for when we're away
from here and use the Newport Public Library's collection in the
meantime. Ben Franklin had a great idea when he came up with free
libraries. I'm continually amazed that they exist.

A new item in my keeping busy arsenal: tomorrow I'm going to spend the
day at the Aquarium helping to tear down the traveling exhibit (Odd
Water). The animals are being shipped to other aquariums and we'll
soon be stripping the whole exhibit down and rebuilding to house the
new Swamplands exhibit scheduled to open in May. Meanwhile, Lulu
starts her stint of volunteering at the Hatfield Marine Science Center
next week. Not sure how all these crossword puzzles are going to get
done with us running around doing other stuff. Guess we'll just have
to work twice as hard at them. Or not.

We've added a plexiglass insert to our companionway to brighten things
up down below. We already have plexiglass drop boards so now, we just
slide the hatch all the way open, lay the new plexiglass panel over
the opening and we're pretty protected from the weather while still
getting all the natural light afforded by a seemingly fully-open
companionway. Woo-hoo!

Route planning

It's a new year and, just so I don't lose track of our goal to set sail for warmer climes this summer, I decided to do a little bit of route planning the other day.  Here at the marina, our high sped internet connection is in the laundry room.  So, since I was actually up there doing laundry anyway, it seemed like a good time to work on some of the details of our planned trip.

There are several schools of thought on sailing down the Oregon and California coasts.  The first is the express route.  In this one the idea is to go out 60 miles or so and then aim straight for San Francisco or San Diego and skip everything in between.  The advantage is that you get to your destination fairly quickly and, if the weather kicks up you have lots of sea room to play with.  Some say that the ride is much nicer out there since the swells are more regular (though probably larger) and the seas aren't so confused by bouncing off the land.  You're also far enough out that you are less likely to feel the effects of places like the dreaded Cape Mendocino.  You may also be far enough out to avoid running into crab pots and fishing nets as well as other coastal boat traffic.  The downside is that, if the weather kicks up, you're a long way from a potential safe harbor.  The watchkeeping required for a 2-person crew can also be quite tiring on a trip like this.

Another approach is to travel 5-20 miles off shore and visit the more prominent ports every few days.  The advantage is that you're probably close enough to duck into a harbor if the weather turns on you and you get to visit a few ports along the way where you can catch up on your sleep.  The disadvantage is that you need to watch your weather closer since you're always fairly near to a potential lee shore. Also, even a couple days of 4 hours on, 4 hours off watchkeeping can get pretty tiring.  And you're right where the fishermen and crabbers are working and need to keep a good lookout for them as well as other boats and ships traveling the coast.

The final approach is called "keeping one foot on land" and basically consists of harbor-hopping down the coast usually no more than 5-10 miles offshore.  The downside to this approach is that you need to keep a really close eye on weather because you have virtually no sea room to play with.   You might luck out and be inside much of the fishing and crabbing areas but you might also be smack dab in the middle of them.  You need to keep a sharp lookout for shoals and rocks as well since you may be close enough to encounter some of these. On the other hand, you might get to sleep at anchor or at a marina every night and you only need to get a weather window that's large enough for you to make it to the next port safely.  This plan will definitely take you the longest amount of time of the three.

So, what to do?  Well, in our case we want to leave Newport as early in July as we can find a decent weather window.  No particular reason other than just to get this show on the road.  However, we don't want to reach Mexico until the end of the hurricane season, November 1st.  That leaves us potentially 4 months of travel time.   We could walk to Mexico in less time than that.  So, since we want to leave early and take a long time to get where we're going, the "one foot on land" approach seems to fit the bill.  We hadn't really considered this until we started following a blog of some folks we met here.  Mark  and Vicki (Sailing with Mark and Vicki) are from Corvallis and have been meandering down the coast since last August.  Following their blog has been a real education since I don't think I've ever read any other blog where they did as much harbor-hopping as these two.  Since we're looking for a slow trip down the coast, we're going to pretty much follow in their wake.  They also sound like they've been having the most fun of many of the cruising blogs I read.

So, with this general plan in mind, the next step was to start laying out a route.  First I'd go to Mark & Vicki's site to find out where they'd stopped and then I'd go to Google Earth to get a picture of what the harbor and its approaches actually look like.  Google Earth is so cool.  It's great to actually be able to follow our proposed route and be able to zoom in and out at will.  The feature that allows you to calculate the miles between waypoints also helps a lot in route planning.  So, here's what we're looking at for our first major leg of the trip: Newport to San Francisco.

We're planning stops in:

Winchester Bay, OR (maybe)

Charleston Harbor (Coos Bay), OR

Port Orford, OR

Brooking, OR

Crescent City, CA (maybe)

Trinidad, CA (mark & Vicki warn of lots of kelp flies but it still seems like a logical stopping point for us)

Eureka, CA

Shelter Cove, CA

Fort Bragg, CA

Bodega Bay, CA

Drake's Bay, CA

San Francisco Bay, CA

Once in SF Bay, we plan visits to various places such as Sausalito, Alameda, etc.  Also planning to venture at least part way up the Sacramento River.  We may try to go all the way to Sacramento but I haven't studied things enough to know whether or not that's a viable trip.  We have friends in various places in the Bay Area and the Northern California Westsail Owners' Rendezvous is being held in Alameda in early October so we'll try to make that. 

Putting together the list above afforded me the opportunity to pull out my Coast Pilot (#7) to make sure I was listing the stops in the right order.  As I followed the route I see many anchorages along the way that afford protection in certain wind conditions, but not in others.  We may take advantage of some of these along the way.

Once we get started on our SF to San Diego route planning, I will also be using some information that was in an issue of Latitude 38 magazine last fall.  They answered a reader's query about inexpensive cruising along the central and southern California coast.  We'll use their answer as another tool in our route-planning toolbox.

Anyway, the whole route planning thing is an enjoyable way to get started on the cruise before the weather allows the actual slipping of the mooring lines.  We have Google Earth, electronic charts in our Garmin GPS, paper charts, the Coast Pilot, maps, cruising guides, etc. to help us plan things out.  Hopefully you all will stick with the blog long enough to see the trip actually start to unfold.  In the meantime, get out your Oregon and California maps or log on to Google Earth and take a virtual cruise along with us.

Ratlin' up to the yard

Just so you don't think that ALL I do is go to the store and sit around doing crossword puzzles, here's a picture of what I did yesterday.  I installed ratlines on the starboard lower shrouds.   The mast steps are great for climbing all the way up to the top of the mast but if the mainsail is up it's a little more difficult.  Besides, one has to be all harnessed up when using them.  Enter, the ratlines.  Made from well-varnished white oak, they're about 1-3/4" thick to be semi-friendly to bare feet.  They're very easy to climb and, because they cant inboard, they feel quite safe.  Just the ticket for working on the spreaders or, more often, for "ratlin' up" to get a better view when navigating shoal waters or looking for coral heads to avoid.  Most boats that have ratlines only seem to have them on one side of the mast.  But I plan to put them on both sides so that there is always a clear view regardless of which tack we happen to be on.  People without ratlines are always yappin' about windage and weight aloft, but I have a feeling we're going to love them regardless of what the detractors say.

BTW: they have been Lulu-tested and declared "Safe-feeling" and "fun".  So there.

Going to have to fire the watermaker back up

We'd put the RO watermaker to bed a couple months ago.  After satisfying ourselves that it worked as advertised, it seemed pointless to keep using it when perfectly good water was available right at the dock.  So we went through the "picklng" process which has to be done anytime the unit isn't used within 5 or 6 days of the last time.  Pickling consists of pumping a biocide (in this case RV water system antifreeze) into the system so that any biological stuff that is stuck on the RO membrane can't proliferate and foul the (expensive) membrane.  Hadn't planned to fire the system up again until just before launch time next summer.  Then winter hit.  We've been experiencing nights in the 20s and days in the 30s most of the week.  Naturally, the water pipes on the dock froze and broke.  We've been assured that the water will be turned on as soon as the weather eases and they can get everything repaired.  Pretty sure we'll be out of water before that happens.  So, it's either schlepp the water from somewhere (not sure where) or use the watermaker.  And, since we bought it so we wouldn't have to schlepp water, the choice is obvious.  You know what the worst part is?  On Friday I told myself that I should probably fill the water tank just in case they decided to turn the water off.  Oops.  But you know what's probably even worse?  I bet that on Friday, the maintenance crew told themselves that they should probably turn the water off just in case it gets as cold as predicted.  Oops, again.  At least my oops didn't result in as much work as their oops did.

A day in the life

I've had a couple of requests from people who actually read this blog
for a new entry or two. Seems I've been remiss. But frankly, not
that much is going on. However, when I read over some of the blogs
that I follow, I find that I don't really care whether or not
something earth-shattering is happening, I just like to follow their
day-to-day lives. So, maybe you're like that too. I guess you always
have the option of not reading the blog if it's too mundane for you.
Warning: what follows might be construed as BORING, so proceed with
caution. Of course, you're probably reading this on company time
anyway, so what do you care how boring it is? Beats working.

It occurs to me that some of you might be interested in what it is we
do on a day-to-day basis, living on a 28 foot boat without a car.
What follows is fairly typical. May give you a little insight into
whether or not you want to retire.

Typical day:

The day often starts around 4 or 5 AM when one or the other of us wake
up to use the head and then can't fall immediately back to sleep. At
this point it's time to turn on our individual reading lamps after
quietly whispering "I'm going to have to read awhile." If the other
is fast asleep, nothing much happens. But, more often than not, we're
enough awake to murmur an "OK" and then turn over so we're facing away
from the light. Anyway, this reading usually lasts an hour or so,
after which time the eyes are scratchy and the various idiotic
thoughts that had been keeping us awake are sufficiently displaced by
whatever we're reading to allow sleep. Then it's back to zonkerville
until it's the "normal" time to wake up.

For me, "normal" wake up happens between 7:00 and 8:30. For some
reason it now seems uncivilized to rise before 7:00. Anytime after
that is OK. I get up to (at this time of year) a cold boat. I pull
the curtain separating the v-berth from the rest of the cabin. This
is largely for my own mental comfort as it really does nothing to stop
the noises that I make from traveling to the "bedroom" with virtually
no diminishment in volume. I try to be very quiet but noise happens.
Fortunately, Lulu can handle it. I fire up the heater which consists
of plugging it in and turning it on. No more building a fire in the
woodstove for me. Then I have to venture out into the cockpit to turn
the propane on. Many people are wary of propane on a boat because,
being heavier than air, any leakage can accumulate in the bilge until
there's enough to completely ruin your day at the first strike of a
match. So, to be safe, we always turn the gas off and on at the
bottle. So, gas on, I light the stove and start the coffee water.
Recently I started using two coffee-making methods every morning. I
set up a drip pot which makes enough to fill the thermos so it's ready
when Lulu gets up. Then I also use a Melita funnel and #2 filter to
make a large commuter cup for my immediate needs. I get dressed while
the coffee's brewing and usually work on a crossword puzzle and eat an
apple while I'm waiting. Once the joe's done, I grab the laptop and
head to the marina's laundry room to do my interwebbing and to leave
the boat nice and quiet so Lulu can sleep as long as she likes.

My internet routine consists of reading and writing e-mails and then
visiting several blogs, a couple of discussion groups, a weather site
or two, a site following the boatbuilding progress of a fellow we met
in Texas who's building a George Beuhler-designed Diesel Duck 44, our
mail forwarding service site, and our bank site to see if we still
have any money left. By the time my coffee's gone I'm usually done
and head back down to the boat. This could be anytime from 8:30 to
10:00, depending on when I got up. By this time, Lulu's up and
working on a crossword and drinking her coffee. Usually she's already
eaten breakfast. This is where her and I part ways. For Lulu, the
perfect everyday breakfast is granola with a banana and coffee. For
me, the perfect breakfast is hot and salty. That could be anything
from a breakfast burrito made with eggs, chilies and cheese, to last
night's dinner reheated. So, Lulu continues to work on her puzzle
while I make my breakfast. We're usually figuring out what we're
going to do with the day during this time. I work on my crossword
while eating and generally for a little while afterwards. We don't
like to rush in to things. If I have a project, Lulu will do the
breakfast dishes but, if I don't, I usually do them since I'm the one
that made the bigger mess. We're usually ready to get on with the
business of the day about 11:30 or so.

More often than not, we'll have a need to go to town. This is usually
to get some groceries. Since we have to carry everything on our
backs, we can't just make one big trip every two weeks. Instead we
need to make small trips every few days. But, y'know, what else do we
have to do? If we can manage to work it out, we'll catch the Newport
City Loop Bus (aka "the shuttle") to town. This is more important
when the weather is really nasty. Don't really want to be walking
across the bridge when the wind is blowing 40 mph+ . And, if it's
raining? Well we have good raingear but let's be real. The trouble
with the shuttle is that it's just one bus running the whole route.
One circuit takes almost 2 hours. They run 6 full circuits a day.
One of the morning and one of the afternoon circuits take an extra 20
minutes to allow for a break for the driver and the mid-day circuit
takes an additional hour so the driver can have lunch. Consequently,
it's often much faster if we just walk at least one way. But, if we
have a heavy load, that's no fun at all. So, a trip to town is going
to consume a minimum of 2 hours whether we ride the bus or walk. If
we have any running around to do, it could take much longer.
Yesterday, I had to hit 6 different stores. I biked over and from
store to store. My last stop was for groceries. We were low on some
of the canned stuff (mostly chili and soup; the kind of stuff I eat
when Lulu's not here). Between the canned goods, a half-gallon of
milk, some apples and bananas, plus all the stuff I'd already gotten,
I had a REALLY HEAVY pack. It was so heavy that I didn't feel safe
riding the bike. I was way too top-heavy. Fortunately, the shuttle
is set up to carry up to two bicycles. So I went across the street,
waited about 10 minutes and caught the shuttle home. However, the
place I caught it was more or less at the start of the loop relative
to the marina. So, even though I was aboard at 3:34, I didn't get
back to the marina until 5:03. My trip to town took a total of 7
hours. Is it any wonder that on some days we don't get much done
beyond "going to the store"?

So we get back to the boat either by shuttle or foot. Before we've
been back very long, it's time to start dinner. Lulu's willing to
cook anything. She just doesn't like to have to think of what to
cook. So, if I can come up with something it makes her very happy.
My rule is that, if she cooks, I clean up, and so I do. Afterwards,
we usually work on those ubiquitous crossword puzzles some more and
then, long about 8:00, pop a DVD in the lap top and watch a couple of
TV shows until we're ready for bed. Bedtime can be anytime from 10:30
to 1:00. When we were working it was always 10:00. Period. Except on
weekends when it would be extended all the way to 11:00.

Now, not every day is exactly like that. They all start about the
same but sometimes we have projects to do instead of going to town.
Other days, I help out at the Aquarium. I currently do volunteer
interpretation every Sunday afternoon. In addition, every other
Thursday I spend a little over 2 hours cleaning the otters' toys. Ya
see, the otters are very intelligent and inquisitive. They also get
bored easily. So, the aquarium staff has amassed a huge pile of
"toys" for them to play with. These include traffic cones, lots of
rubber and/or plastic balls of varying sizes, strips of fire hose, a
disassembled Playskool playhouse, a beer keg, etc, etc. They use an
Excel spreadsheet to randomly choose which toys to toss in each day.
Well, all the toys need to be washed off and disinfected every week
and they recruit volunteers to do it, and I'm one of those
volunteers. The payback is that, if you get done in time (which is
pretty easy), they let you stand inside the exhibit while they feed
the pinnipeds. The seals are fairly boring but the sea lions have to
perform various stunts to get their grits. It's quite a show and you
get to be right up close to the action. Other days we might do some
laundry. Some days Lulu cleans "house". And other days we just goof
off. Good thing we're both easily amused.

Just to give you a taste, here's my actual to-do list for tomorrow.
Keep in mind that Lulu stayed at Cody's an extra week following
Thanksgiving and will becoming back tomorrow.

___ wrap Lulu's Xmas gifts
___ straighten up the boat
___ pick up prescription at Rite-Aid
___ pick up "marine fact sheets" I had spiral-bound at Staples
___ get Lulu some granola (since I'm pretty sure she's out of the
stuff she made and she'll need something for breakfast until she makes
more)
___ check the used DVDs at the thrift shop to see if there's anything
worth buying
___ call Lucas and wish him a happy 30th birthday
___ take a shower
___ meet Lulu at the bus depot in the afternoon

Geez! I don't know how much longer I can maintain this pace.