October 19,2012   Friday

Today we need to leave Chula Vista and the California Yacht Marina and move up the bay into San Diego where all of the pre-rally activities are happening.  First we need to go to the bank, drop off ANOTHER bag of clothes at the thrift shop ( just could not find space for all of Alan’s socks) and return the car.  According to my iphone, there is a thrift shop right by Enterprise and there should be a bank along the way.  Last night’s tide was really low, so I want to be heading down that narrow channel at high tide today.  Taking no chances.  High tide is at 1:00.

When was the last time you used traveler’s checks?  $300 of old traveler’s checks had surfaced during the great clean out.  Last time Alan was in Europe, he could not find any place that would cash them so he stuffed them in a drawer and forgot about them.  Time  to use them up.  Well guess what?  The sweet young teller at the first bank we tried had never heard of traveler’s checks and wanted to have him open an account in order to cash them.  Since they had been issued by Citibank, we figured they would have to cash them.  Unfortunately Citibank was in the opposite direction, the clock was ticking and the tide was running.  Of course, they too had never heard of traveler’s checks.  Supervisors were summoned.  The checks were passed around and studied in amazement.  There was much discussion of “looking up the correct procedure”  and getting authorization.  Computers were checked.  They also tried to talk us into opening an account.  I kept insisting that they were just like cashier’s checks and that we had paid for them and they needed to give us our money.  Eventually we got the cash and were on our way.

Back to the marina, a quick last shower, checked out and on our way.   It was only 2:30, the tide was still high.  The day that had started out so pretty, turned cold and windy once we were out of the marina.  Out came the warm jackets and waterproof pants.  We went past the Navy, under the Coronado Bridge, across the main bay with a brisk wind and choppy water.  Unfortunately we still have no sails so we could not hoist them.  As we rounded Shelter Island to get to our anchorage, we found ourselves in the midst of dozens of little boats.  There was a race had obviously just finished and the boats were heading for their docks and the party.  There were teenagers on small boats racing around like teenagers do, seeing how fast they could go, how quickly they could turn and how close they could get to other boats.  There were small children in sabots everywhere with instructors calling out directions and blowing whistles.  We managed to drop anchor safely in the midst of all this.  We launched the dingy, grabbed some food and headed off to our first seminar on how to use the SSB radio.

When were were talking to people about where to stay this week, one of the questions that came up was where to dock the dingy.  Surprisingly, no one had any answer.  There is no public dingy dock and very little public beach here.  It is all yacht clubs and private homes.  We finally decided to act like we belonged and pulled right up to San Diego Yacht Club and tied up.  No one looked at us twice and a short walk later and we were at Downwind Marine listening to Gorgon West tell us everything we ever wanted to know about radios.  Unfortunately, when he got to the end of the evening where he talks about how to tune in the various stations, it turned out that our old Furino radio was not on his list.  It is an excellent radio, just no longer on his list of channels.  Sure enough, when we got back to the boat and tried to practice what he told us we got nothing but static.  We have an appointment to call him on Monday and figure out how to dial in the channels we need.  Meanwhile, Alan will be studying the manuals again.  I am still fairly clueless and am planning on waiting until they get it all sorted out.  The main thing I learned was to use our VHF radio and call channel 16 if I need help.  That I can do.