Eureka!

Eureka, California, USA

It took a while, but we suddenly realized that we had been here before.  Just a year ago (check out the November 13th, 2009 entry in this blog) we stayed in Eureka overnight on our driving tour of this coast.  Things sure look different when you approach them from the sea.

Looking across the channel from the boat, we can see the same building that we took pictures of last year, just from a different perspective.  We took a walk over to the town, across a very scary bridge - no provision for pedestrians, and high-speed two-lane traffic - we walked along the guardrail on the very narrow shoulder.  From the town side of the channel, things looked much more familiar and we probably walked much the same route as a year ago, touring the old town district.  This time however, we went a little further in search of the supposed fuel dock at the Englund marine outlet.  We found it, but are a little intimidated by the 12-foot high docks with no-where to tie on.  They assured us it is simpler than it looks.  As it is, we have little choice but to use it as I don't think we have enough left to get us all the way to San Francisco if we have to motor most of the way (which is a distinct possibility based on our previous experience).

Irish imports come from the strangest places.

A note about the marinas on this coast.  They cater mostly to the fishing fleet but always seem happy to see transient cruisers.  The moorage rates seem incredibly cheap to us, which is a nice feature when we don't really have any anchorage choices.  In Oregon, the going rate for a 46' boat has been about $22/day.  Here in Eureka, the rate is only $20/day or $86 per week, including power and very nice facilities.  I'm told that the public marina, closer to the town, is even cheaper (35 cents a foot), but the facilities don't look near a nice.  The disadvantage of the Woodley island marina, where we currently are, is that the only restaurant we can get to, without going over the scary bridge, is the one here at the marina.  The food is good but the prices are a bit higher than we are used to.  Oh well, we may have to actually cook for ourselves again if we stay here very long.

As far as how long we are going to be here, we are not sure.  The current weather pattern is shaping up to give some stronger south winds and bigger seas, which we would just as leave like to avoid.  And at the moorage rates here, we can afford to wait as long as we want.  We are still in no particular hurry to get any where - we always assumed it would take us up to 2 months to get to San Diego.  At this point, we are still on schedule.

A neat statue of a fisherman found at the end of Woodley island.  Right next to the obligatory memorial to the many fishermen lost at sea.

Looks like we have found some low water.

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