Day 1 Recap – We’re Off

Aloha! Well, an “interesting” first day for sure. Not typical, but not surprising, given the forecast. The start wasn’t quite what we hoped for, but I don’t think it really mattered. By the time we set off the breeze in the Bay was blowing 25-30. We knew it would be lighter out in the ocean

Ti leaves to see us to Hawaii

We attached the Ti leaves to the bow today – we received them in our skipper’s bag and were told that they are from Hawaii, and they’ll find their way home.  It’s a nice thought. I did some more looking since I was interested in finding out more about the plant – they’re not technically

Sat Phone Test Post

Just checking one more time to make sure our Sat Phone is working to post to our blog.

Cookies and competition (oh wow)

Earlier today, we received a very special delivery. Wayne and Linda on the Nordic Tug “Buoy Toy” were friendly neighbors to us out on E-dock here at Richmond Yacht Club for the past 2 months. We were the lucky recipients of the most amazing gift from them…24 homemade chocolate chip and walnut cookies. The squeeze

Follow us during the race!

We are just a little over 24 hours from our start at 12:10pm (Pacific time) on Tuesday. A few boats started yesterday. Sixteen boats start today, eighteen start on Tuesday, and then the fastest crewed boats start Thursday and Friday.  There will be 55 boats in all.  We will try to make daily blog updates to svshearwater.com,

A last minute project – SOS rudder install

We’ve been busy these past few days here at the Richmond Yacht Club, working on list items and meeting other sailors.  Last week, Justin arrived ahead of me and started working on the mounting brackets for the Scanmar SOS rudder that we had bought used from a sailing friend he knew online.  Although we were originally

A stylin’ official number

In the past few months, we’ve been making our way through our own project lists and reconciling them with requirements for Pacific Cup.  One of the items that we discovered we were lacking was the correct USCG official number permanently affixed to our boat.  So, we called on the skills of my dad and his wife

Golden Gate fly by!

Over Memorial Day Weekend we went for a leisurely sail out to El Pacifico.  The idea was to do some downwind practice with the autopilot in some swells.  We got in some good, fast rides, but not exactly what we expected.  We made a short video of the tour of the Bay and beyond. Video

Memorial Day is Inspection Day

Straight off a flight back from 12 days in Europe for work we spent the long weekend on Shearwater getting ready for Pac Cup.  One of the big activities was going up the mast to fix a wonky deck light, tape up the spreader tips better, tape over the steaming light a little to make

A boatyard in San Francisco

…and finally, Shearwater arrived safe and sound (late in April).  There were no issues during her transport, but the weather gods tried us while we worked to get her back into the water.  We were subjected to one torrential downpour after another that kept us soaked and freezing cold.  We managed, though, helped by the workers

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