Montezuma’s Revenge. Yes, you know what it is and you know what the main symptom is. I can confidently let you know that it also comes with nausea, headache and overall malaise. They say its e coli. Amazing how in the US they recall tons of stuff and maybe even have deaths from it, and here they just shrug it off. Anyway, its no fun that’s for sure. No pics needed for this post.
Here are my thoughts on the Haha.
It’s really a boat race loosely organized as a rally. There was a great emphasis on sailing the entire way and a bit of a stigma for using your engine. There were 130 or so boats participating, of which only about 8 were catamarans. Interestingly the cats were the fastest boats of the bunch, with only a few large racer-type monos competing. In heavier winds, Neko was quite fast compared to all others so long as we carried a lot of sail, but almost uncomfortably so. We are beginning our cruise and are quite heavily loaded. In light airs we were slow. The only cats consistently faster were a very well sailed Schionning 49 named Sea Level and a custom go-fast cat named Kalewa. I don’t know if the latter is on the web, but suggest you google it. Quite a boat. At the very beginning we had about 20-25 knots on a close reach. We and Sea Level easily left the pack behind doing about 11, with the Schionning slowly drawing away from us.
Leaving the fleet behind in San Diego
Pulling away
But Kalewa must have started late b/c it screamed up and passed us both. Its basically a giant beach cat. We had speeds over 15 knots surfing with the spinnaker up, along with consistent 8s, 9s, 10s and 11s in good winds. It was the lighter winds that were our downfall. 
Spinnaker flying
It’s already got me thinking of a better light air rig. Also, a cleaner rig. We have a staysail, genoa, gennaker on a sprit and symmetrical spinnaker that we fly from both hulls, all fractionally rigged. This leads to a jungle of lines coming down the side decks – spin tackline, spin sheet, gennaker sheet if rigged, dagger lines, headsail furling lines (3 of them), preventer if you rig one. We had use for both the gennaker and the spinnaker, so couldn’t really do without one. I would really like to replace both the spinnaker and gennaker with a big deep reaching sail, preferably tacked to the sprit and furling and even better flown from higher up the mast. Anyway it was fun to finally put this boat through its paces and see it perform well.
If you like group activities, you’ll love the Haha. You can participate as much or as little as you want. They’ve got parties and volleyball and chit chat galore. Some people clearly can’t get enough of that sort of thing. Some must have iron stomachs because we saw a few drunk souls the night before leaving on each leg.
Overserved…
Overall, the Haha made sailing down 800 miles of forbidding Pacific coast quite enjoyable and secure. There were sailmakers and riggers and electronics gurus etc. among the fleet, all of whom were willing to help others for only a cold beer in return. It had a good, positive overall vibe. However, now that we are finally around the bottom of the peninsula, we are ready to go at it in a smaller group. (more Haha photos)
To join or not to join (the Baja Haha), that was the question we asked ourselves as we started our adventure. Normally we aren’t “joiners”, but this trip is also about broadening ourselves, not just from the challenges of living on the boat and traveling to other countries, but to get out of our comfort zone and say yes to the the scarey, the cheesy and god forbid the small talk. So we signed up and joined in on the reindeer games. And guess what, we survived LOL.
Captain Pete
The one thing they say about the Baja Haha rally is it gets you going, and boy did it do that. It was time to stop all the putzing around and start this trip we’d been planning forever. We sailed from San Diego to Cabo San Lucas at the bottom of the Baja peninsula (about 800 miles) in 11 days, with two stops along the way. For those of you who don’t sail, that is A LOT of sailing in a short amount of time.
About 130 boats left San Diego on a foggy, rainy and chilly morning.
Start of the 2013 Baja Haha rally
Apart from the crappy weather everyone was in good spirits and ready to roll. Happily our friends Mark and Lori joined us on this adventure.
Lori & Mark, true friends and fantastic crew
We stopped in Turtle Bay and Bahia Santa Maria for some rest and aforementioned group activities 😉 Turtle Bay is a tiny dusty town in the middle of no where full of friendly folks. We arrived on Halloween and the local kids trick-or-treated by just saying “candy” and were thrilled to get candy or better yet money from the gringos.
Angel, Ezekiel and Alan in Turtle Bay
The Haha also set up a baseball game for all the sailors and the locals (who are actually excellent at baseball) and a good time was had by all.
Peter at bat. Turtle Bay baseball game.
Lucy was THRILLED to hit terra firma and fit right in with the local dogs, just like the good old days in Belize.
Bahia Santa Maria
Next stop was beautiful Bahia Santa Maria. The opposite of Turtle Bay’s desert-like landscape, here the hills were alive and green and looked more like Ireland than the Mexican coast. There are only a few fisherman and the lighthouse keeper and his family who live here, but they were ready to host a party, complete with band (who drove 400 miles for this), food
Peter on high
and of course cerveza. We did a little exploring in the tide pools, kayaking and Peter went up the mast to repair a shackle that sent our spinnaker into the ocean during leg 2 of the sail.
Look out below
Tide pools, Bahia Santa Maria
Finally we arrived in the big city. Cabo is exactly what you think or know it is (Disney, Vegas, Fort Lauderdale and Bourbon Street rolled up into one Mexican-accented frat party.) Don’t get me wrong, the locals are extremely nice, but did we really come all this way for Señor Frogs, jets skis and 2-for-1 Coronas? (Ok, maybe the 2-for-1’s) But, we also needed to clear immigrations, check in with the port captain and wait out some bad weather before moving on. We said goodbye to our fearless crew and yes, even attended the Haha closing ceremonies where we came in 3rd in our division (more photos)
On the hook
Sha, sha, sharrrkkkk
If you have only cleared into a country through the airport, never complain about long customs lines again. The immigration office is about a 15 minute walk from the harbor, where you wait on line, pray you have the proper paper work, then walk another 10 blocks to the port captains office to let him know you are here and who is on your boat, pay a fee and blah, blah, blah. Long story short, computers were down, so credit cards didn’t work, they won’t accept cash and after 3 hours of waiting we have to go back on Monday. Ahhh, the beginning of not sweating the small stuff. We’ve got nowhere to go and plenty of time to get there.
Watch Dog
So, as I type this entry -after a long warm day of swimming, and fixing the boat – the good and the bad of this life, Peter and I settle down with a cocktail to watch yet another gorgeous sunset and to quietly reflect on the day and the trip. The ice cubes clink and the surf breaks and we hear the approaching roar of a power boat towing a giant inflatable banana and the rider’s war cry, “Cabo, bitches!!”
Cabo, bitches indeed…
Neko crew in Bahia Santa Maria
Wow, blogging is harder than I thought. Not coming up with what to say, but navigating the cruel waters of formatting the damn thing and getting sucked down the wormhole of design layout and photos. Peter has done the hard part of getting this up and running, and I am finally coming to the party.
Happy 50th mom & dad
We are in San Diego where we’ve had Neko hauled out for bottom paint and a few other odds and ends. Like always, an estimated 5 days turned into 3 weeks of work & waiting for rudder bearings that had to be shipped from France (only the finest for us 😉 ) So we’ve enjoyed exploring San Diego and taking the time for travels, including a surprise dinner celebration for my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. We had a bittersweet trip back East to see family and friends, and take Mr Kitty to my parent’s house. We love him and miss him dearly, but a sea sick cat is not a happy cat, so like all senior citizens he has decided to retire to the Sunshine State. Even Lucy misses him.
With just over a week to go before we set sail on the Baja Haha and the start of our big adventure, we are excited and somewhat in a panic that we have everything done. But I think we could putz around forever and we just need to cast off the lines and go. That is the main reason for joining the Haha. For those of you who don’t know about the Haha, it is a boat rally that sails down the Baja peninsula (San Diego to Cabo) http://www.baja-haha.com/index.html
It is the official start of the west cruising season, a way to meet other boaters, but mainly a kick in the ass to get us started on this radical sabbatical.
Holy Cow, I’ve been ignoring this blog. Well, its alright since we haven’t done much traveling and no one can access the blog yet anyway. But in a nutshell, here is what we’ve done since the last post:
Peter installing new sink
– installed new galley counter and sink
– installed several shelves in cabins
– removed locked-up rudder, sanded bearings and reinstalled rudder a la Peter Verrals
– designed and begin install of 720W solar system
– designed and begin install of permanent wifi antenna (as you might imagine, all these unfinished projects are partly why there havebeen no posts)
The Malloy family grows larger
– attended my brother’s wedding in NC, where I was pushed out of the raft 🙂 by my brother-in-law Eric in the middle of a class 4 rapid.
– removed old washer and install new combo washer/dryer
– replaced most running rigging
– got totally bummed out by surprise LA county $8000 tax bill for the privilege of parking our boat here for 8 months (see California’s Burning by Dave Alvin)
– designed and begin install of all new electronics
Electric avenue
– got new master mattress made and installed
– two trips to Catalina for a vacation from our permanent vacation
– designed and had fabricated steel work for rails, bbq, solar, and various other
The glamorous life
– replaced sump pumps in both heads (relatively easy but nasty job)
– had all 4 forward lockers prepped and painted (no more paint chips on everything)
– caulked the toe rail and rebedded various hatch hinges
Notice the complete absence of kitesurfing sessions. The kitebeach is 45 minutes away and 1.5 hours return due to rush hour traffic. Plus its so light here that often I go and get skunked and just drive back anyway. So kitesurfing looks like it is on the back burner until we get out of here. Speaking of which, I am getting a little antsy to get moving. We’ll head down to San Diego in August after Mark and I finish the electronics install.
I flew to Oakland to grab the bike the other day. I had always wanted to ride down the coast highway (Route 1 or PCH or whatever you want to call it). I had done this trip north to near the Oregon border, but hadn’t gone farther south than Half Moon Bay or so. So I decided to make the most of this delivery trip. Sunshine Travel booked a room for me in San Simeon and after thanking Anne for storing the bike I took off. It took about 6 hours to get to San Simeon – a lot longer than I expected and I was exhausted. The next morning I took a quick tour of Hearst Castle and was off again. I am not quite sure what to make of Hearst Castle. He built something truly extraordinary and preserved some fantastic European art there. But at the same time there is something ersatz about his castle since most of it was created in the early 20th century to look 500 years old. And thinking of him wining and dining pampered Hollywood celebrities there while pissing away the great wealth his father built up in mining and other hard pursuits makes you lose a little respect for the man. I am sure I am missing something redeeming, but despite the tour speaking of him in only glowing terms, this is the impression I came away with. Pondering that I jumped on the bike for the remaining 5 hour ride to LA. The coast here is absolutely gobsmacking spectacular all the way (except when you get close to LA). Big Sur reminded me very much of Northern California with fog, big redwoods and woods dwellers – those particular kind of people I had thought indigenous only to Mendocino and its environs, many of whom dabble in a certain kind of farming. This ride was a prelude for the big Arctic to Tierra del Fuego ride that Mal and I are going to do in a few years. It is certain we are going to do it. Mal has staked his manhood on it. He could never back out now. Anyway, it showed that a lot of practice is needed, or at least a much more comfortable seat. This ride was very tiring since it consisted about 75% of twisty mountain roads. You’re sometimes cold in the fog, hot in traffic, wrists sore from holding yourself up, torso tired from the constant flapping of whatever you are wearing, ears ringing from the wind roar, knees aching from being bent up for hours on end and worst of all your butt is aching from that hard motorcycle seat. And to top it all off, just when I could barely stand it anymore, I arrived in LA and smack into, what else, bumper to bumper traffic. Well, the bike’s now here and for sale and I’ve got some things to think about for the big bike trip.
We went for a little daysail up to Santa Monica bay and back. It was good to get out after all the unexpected hard work being done. The sail was great and it was gratifying to pass all the mono’s out on the bay, other than a very big Deerfoot. I think it was because Mr. Kitty was driving.
If its not raining its pouring, and on a boat that means something that shouldn’t be getting wet is. Finally able to enjoy a hot shower, and we have a pretty spacious one for a boat,
I noticed a bit of water trickling into the bilge from the shower floorpan. Upon inspection it turns out some of the caulk is giving way. Ok, no big deal I think. But it seems the PO (“previous owner” or putz originale in this case) had seen the issue and used silicone to try to stop up the leaks. Silicone on a boat is a general no-no. Once you put it on something it makes that thing so slick that nothing else will stick to it, even more silicone caulk when the leak comes back. The only way to remove the old silicone is to scrub, scrub, scrub, and scrub it again with nasty chemicals that help lift it up. Even when you can’t see it, these chemicals pull more of it out of the surface somehow. So after pulling strings of all the old stuff out and scrubbing like mad, I caulked it up anew with better boat goo and closed it all back up. Who would have thought it would have been a whole Manhattan Project to get to the point of being able to shower in this boat?
Now, hopefully, back to our regularly scheduled programming.
This is a fairly technical post, so if you only want to read about lifestyle stuff, skip on ahead. This boat came to us wired for European electricity. That means 220V, but more problematic, 50hz systems. The boat works by having a bank of huge batteries that most stuff runs off of. The batteries are charged by (i) plugging into shore power (big electric outlets at a dock), (ii) running the engines or generator or (iii) solar. A 220V cannot plug into US (or Mexican) shore power. So while the boat was in Mexico, we relied on the solar panels to keep the batteries topped up. It worked because we weren’t there and there was almost nothing using power. Once we got it back to the US, we would have to do something about it. That’s where mad electrical scientist Mark Yerex comes in.
Neko’s patron saint
Mark flew down to SF from Seattle and over the course of a weekend, he and I wired the boat to handle 120V power of the type found in the US and many other places. This involved a new shore power inlet. 
120V wiring up to a new charger/inverter (this is a device that charges batteries and converts DC battery power to AC power to run appliances) and wiring out to new 120V AC outlets (just like in your house) throughout the boat to go with the European outlets already there (the ones with two round prongs).
Sounds a lot simpler than it was, but now we could plug into a dock like a normal American boat and keep the batteries charged up and run the various appliances on the boat (lights, refrigerators, stereo, outlets for computers, etc.). Things were getting closer to normal. However, two issues remained: 1) the laundry could only run on the old 220V system. That is not a big deal so we left it as is. We’ll just run the generator whenever we want to do laundry. 2) We couldn’t make hot water with our newly introduced shore power. (I am finally getting around to what this post was supposed to be about). This was a problem since showering involved walking up the dock to the communal showers – not to mention not having hot water to wash dishes, etc.
Our water heaters (we have one in each hull) made hot water when the engines (we have one of those in each hull too) were running or when 220V electricity was available (from a European dock or the generator). They were not wired to accept 120V electricity even after the aforementioned total rewire. Don’t ask why, its just the way it was. Sooooo, re-enter Master Yerex advising by telephone. With his tutelage, I created a new switch box with two 3-way rotary switches. I led a new 120V wire from the inverted to a breaker and then to this new box and installed the box in spare space in a cabinet. The rotary switches have positions for 120V, 220V and off. There is one for each water heater. Then with a few tweaks to the water heaters and double checking and testing all the wiring, we were ready to go. Fire it up and give it several hours for the tanks to heat up, and voila!
Trust me, it is HOT!
Holy cow, what a couple of weeks! Right on schedule, the Economous
Park City ski gang
and the Prince clan along with old standby Chad Markle showed up in Park City for our annual ski weekend. Even though snow was scarce in Park City, we had a fabulous time. The kids are such good skiers and boarders now that the old folks are relegated to just trying to keep up. The very same day everyone left, Mary and I packed up the house and animals and embarked on the 2-day trip back to SF. We had sold our house while in Park City, so we had one week to get back to SF, get rid of a lot of stuff and pack the rest for storage or transport to the boat. Once we got back home a frenzy of giving stuff away, selling a few things and packing the rest began. We filled a 24 foot truck with stuff and jammed it into a small storage unit in Sacramento, where it will live for the foreseeable future. 
Edward and Anne graciously agreed to store my motorcycle until I could pick it up. Mary and I packed the car and truck to the gills with stuff we would have to find a way to store on the boat. (LA is so car-centric that even a boat slip comes with two parking spots). She drove the car and took Mr. Kitty and I drove the truck and took Lucy. After a grueling drive, we unpacked into the night. Our remaining earthly belongings were scattered about outside on the deck of our boat. We couldn’t go any farther and crashed for the night. Lots left to do, but we had made the transition. Let the new life begin!
Sailing on Neko 