Betsy's Maiden Voyage

It's 1 PM, we are finally on our way, in traffic, to Samuel P. Taylor State Park near Point Reyes National Sea Shore.

We have counted the stops so far, just 20 minutes from Berkeley: five stops. First stop, 2 minutes into take off  " wow, thing are flying around, forgot to put that away". Second stop: getting gas close by, luckily some of the pumps have a hangover larger than our "draft", a.k.a. height of 10.5 feet. Third stop just hundred yards from the gas station, to check on possible damage while hitting the sidewalk driving away from the station. Betsy is tough, as it turns out, no damage done! During our 4th stop, we are adjusting Tessa's seat belt, so she is more comfortable. And then, yes final stop before we are really on our way:  picking up a new house battery at Whale Point, as we let Tessa and friends play a bit too long with lights the weekend before...In the parking lot, we quickly eat some lunch in our mobile home and hit the road.

Fortunately, we are all in a good mood, the weather is gorgeous and we are happy and lucky that Tod scored us a simple no hook-up campsite for one night in a popular State Park surrounded by 200-foot redwood trees.

And it was great! We enjoyed the scenery, Tessa biked, made new friends and invited herself to neighboring tents, we cooled off in the stream. We bbq'ed and ate marsh mellows, and our cozy Betsy made for a nice rest when we needed it.  At night, the temperature cooled down a lot, so we ended up turning on our LPG heater the next morning. Note to fellow boaters: even our fridge and hot water heater run on LPG! The next morning we drove to one of the beaches of Point Reyes, and learned that Betsy has no problem with a 17% grade. What's great is that you can just quickly shower off in your home, make a lovely lunch and enjoy the view.  And to our surprise....our daughter was so wiped out on the way back that she napped for 1.5 hrs straight on the drive home ( she doesn't nap in a car, and has recently stopped napping at all).

So our maiden voyage was a success, and we can see we will have plenty of fun with Betsy. Tessa is already asking when we are going camping again.

The grass is greener...on both sides!

Living on land for the last 2 months makes you realize how relatively easy it can be. Easy in terms of comfort, no need for Tod to step over me while he goes to bed. No need to carefully watch the weather, although we went through a tornado warning in Ohio. Access to bountiful stores, where you get to pick from 20 types of apples (meet the Berkeley Bowl, where they are offering 4 types of Fiji apples alone ). Fast internet to order/watch anything to your heart's desire. Doing laundry at your place, without having to drag it to a laundromat. Hop in your car, and just drive to great state parks, and fun playgrounds. No need to watch you electricity usage or water usage as carefully (but we still do to some extent; Tessa told me the other day" mama you are wasting water" when I let the shower run for a bit to get hot water!).

But comfort and ease of living is not all what we seek. We can also thrive on challenges that cruising in your sailboat provide. We love to have open  nature as our backyard, and exploring new places and cultures. We love the ease of making new friends, when we share the luxury of no set schedules.

And here is the joy of what we are doing at this time: we have access to both ways of living, nomadic and stationary. And both ways work well for us now. We get to spend time with our family and long time friends while stationary, while in a couple of months we will fill up on our wanderlust again. So yes, the grass is green, or greener, on both sides!

this is a great backyard to enjoy too!

happy hour with life entertainment at the cheeseboard. Jackets in the summer here!

Meet Betsy, a cousin of Bliss

The Bliss crew is back in Berkeley, and has been active on the $$$ spending front. In one week we purchased 3 modes of transportation, two of them we will sell in a couple of months for likely the same price we paid for: a Honda Civic for commuter car, a BOB jogging stroller for going around town, and.....drum, drum, drum.....a 24' Tioga RV, named Betsy.

Betsy will take us on new land adventures in the US and Canada during summer/fall, while her water cousin-once-removed Bliss will be our trusty companion in Mexico for the next couple of years in the winter.

Just some pictures for now. During the next couple of months we plan to take her on some local trips, until Tod's job is finished. In the meantime, Tessa is having a blast in the hot tub, at her morning play group, and trying out the piano. And us? Enjoying the house of our friends, making new plans, and filling up the cruising kitty.

 

Patient Doug letting Tessa play

Tod likes projects, and without a boat, he tackles some house projects

From desert to the city of green

Green, every shades of green, wherever you look. The next town over is appropriately called the City of Green.  A landscape so different from the desert of Baja. The weather is different too: plenty of rain, and humidity. The change of scenery is a welcome one, makes you appreciate the differences.

a good rainstorm makes for a fun pool

plenty of room to run around in oma an opa's back yard

We arrived in Ohio 2.5 weeks ago, and we are enjoying our stay with oma and opa. They are great sports and hosts, and oma plays with Tessa for hours with what seems an endless collection of toys. With their 50th wedding anniversary we had the whole family in town, and Tessa got to meet her adorable new cousin Cayden.

Tod and I are reading up on a new form of traveling: shall we get a motorhome  Class C or a travel trailer for our road trip in the US? We have been looking at a few here to get a feel, and so far I don’t feel the same love I feel for boats. It’s so much more fun to look at sail boats, and I’m not getting that feel/vibe when we are looking at “land yachts”.  Ah well, we will keep looking during the next few months while we be working / living in Berkeley, and hope that the amazing places we plan to visit combined with no need for rough overniters on the ocean or sea will make up for the lack in vibe I feel for the mode of transportation.