Chris Tanner

Goodbye 2013

January 3, 2014 Chris Tanner

Deep in adapting to a new life here in the US, I’ve not been giving much attention to this site – but there’s been a lot going on, as usual.

We’ve now been living on board for a couple of months. It’s remarkable how it doesn’t feel like we’re “camping” in any way at all – the boat is spacious enough, with hot and cold running water, space heating courtesy of a ceramic heater from West Marine and room to store everything we brought over from the UK (which wasn’t much). A few weeks before Christmas it got pretty cold, with the nights a couple of degrees below freezing and lots of heavy frost on the decks and pontoon in the morning. Tucked up under a warm duvet with the heater on we were fine.

The skies have been amazing – almost every dawn and dusk the horizon is lit up with pinks, oranges and reds, fading into the blue (or black) sky above. As I’m getting up early to commute to work in the city, I get to see the sun rise most days, which is awesome. We’ve had a few trips over the Marin headlands which are literally a stone’s throw from where we’re moored up – with plenty of sunsets over the sea.

I really want to take the boat out around the Farallon islands for a day trip. They are about 30 nautical miles offshore, due west, so that’s a 12 hour round trip with a favourable north or south wind. The islands are supposedly one of the world’s hot spot great white shark breeding grounds … so no swimming on that trip!

Marin inuksuk — Marin headlands mini Inuksuk

We spent 4 days exploring northern coastal California and the giant redwoods, we’ve been south of the city to Half Moon bay and just a bit beyond to explore wild, empty beaches.

Beach on the Cabrillo south of SF — Empty beach on the Cabrillo highway south of SF

We’ve just come back from 4 days up at lake Tahoe with Rose’s mum, sister and Tony who are staying over with us for 2 weeks. It’s tight with 5 on board, but we’re managing! We stayed in a nice little cabin in Tahoma, in a real bed for the first time in 2 months! The snow was shockingly absent however … but we did get 2 days skiing in (snowboarding for me). They say it never snows in January – so we may be in for a wait before the next Tahoe trip; not such a bad thing since I busted my shoulder up on the first day coming off an icy quarter pipe badly. Not broken, but badly sprained and will need some good rest.

At the moment Clare and Tony are somewhere up north, following in our footsteps hunting down giant redwood trees. Of course I’ve been working loads on various boat projects, finally completing the autopilot install on New Year’s eve. Just need to get the boat hauled out to install the depth/speed/temperature transducer now, and then all the new instruments will all be up and running. We’ve been out sailing a good few times by ourselves and with buddies, including the Sausalito Lighted Boat Parade just before Christmas.

Under the Golden Gate bridge — Coming back under the Golden Gate bridge

Rose and I out in the Pacific — Out in the Pacific for the first time!

But it’s not been dry all the time … we’ve had a couple of storms when the wind has whistled through the marina, up to 48 knots at times … bringing rain and helping us find all the leaks in the boat, adding more things to the big to-do list. A number of the portlights are leaking – the seals look like they are the originals from 1985 so I’m not too surprised. The tie-down for the mast has pulled a little into the cored fibreglass deck, so I’m going to get a longer one machined and sort that out with some decent strengthening plates and epoxy. Otherwise, pretty dry. But that’s in port. Out at sea in a swell with the boat banging and flexing could well be a different story!

And then finally, we finished off the year with a trip out on the bay to see the fireworks – probably the biggest display I’ve ever seen (well, this is America), lasting for 15 minutes and blowing god knows how much gunpowder up over the city and bay bridge. There were hundreds of boats out on the water watching – quite an experience.

Giant redwoods

December 2, 2013 Chris Tanner

Without a family to visit on Thanksgiving, Rose and I decided to make the most of the 4 day holiday and head up into northern California to go and hunt down some redwood trees. We were not disappointed.

We jumped onto highway 101 to get some ground covered, skipping the local sights of Tomales bay and Point Reyes – close enough for a weekend trip later. Turned left at Petaluma to head to the coast and the famous California highway 1, joining the sea at Bodega bay, which happens to be the furthest north our current boat insurance covers us for – and we’ll definitely be heading up here again by sea! The whole coast road is amazing. Stop at any pull-over and find your way down to a deserted, wild beach.

We spent a couple of days winding our way up the coast, through Mendocino and Fort Bragg, stopping briefly to see the vastly overrated “glass beach” – supposedly one of the sights to see along the highway where local glass factories used to dump used glass, washed by the waves and sand into millions of shining glass gems … not much more than a tired old beach with too many people and not much glass if you ask me. So, back on the road to get some more miles in.

Epic sunset just north of Trinidad State Park

Some way north of Westport, route 1 turns inland to avoid the King range of mountains – deemed too difficult and expensive to build a road through. The 50 mile stretch of coast from here north to where the road comes back to the sea at Eureka is called the “Lost Coast” – an evocative name for one of the wildest stretches of coast in the USA. I really want to come back and hike it over a few days some time. As soon as the road turns inland, the moisture levels rise, you start climbing into the hills and bigger trees start to line the road. No giants yet, though…

After an obligatory tourist stop at the drive-through tree (which we couldn’t, as the van is too tall), we got back onto the busier 101 to make our way up towards Eureka. There had been hardly any other cars on route 1, and it felt like we’d been in a different world, even if only for a few hours. Not far down the highway we saw a tempting sign for “Avenue of The Giants” which took us off on a quiet side road for 32 miles through Humboldt Redwoods State park … and here we found the most incredible trees I have ever seen. They are HUGE. Photos just don’t do them any justice.

Avenue Of The Giants - spot Rose! — Avenue Of The Giants – spot Rose!

We drove gently through here in the late afternoon light, and then motored on to find a camp site for the night just south of Orick. Next day was a 5-mile hike over the hills through Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park to the coast and Fern Canyon. Being amongst the trees on foot for hours on end was truly mesmerising.

We found a sweet camp site on the coast, and headed back inland to pick up the van and drive around to a spot called Gold Bluffs campground just as the sun was going down and the evening chill was setting in. It’s definitely the middle of winter. Got a fire going, met a lass that had driven 7 hours down from Bend in Orgeon to meet her bloke who was driving 7 hours up from San Francisco for the weekend, had some beers, bread and crisps for supper, then to bed.

Gold Bluff Beach camp ground - where the Redwoods meet the Pacific — Gold Bluff Beach camp ground – where the Redwoods meet the Pacific

An early dawn start the next morning, through a magical clearing in the trees with Elk grazing peacefully in the morning mist … and then the long drive home to spend the afternoon working on the van to get all the plywood cut up and a bed put in.

Dawn at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park

Death valley

November 24, 2013 Chris Tanner

We went over to a place called “Pick n Pull” in Richmond today, to find some seatbelts for the rear bench seat in the van. A crazy place; hundreds of old wrecked cars and vans lined up, stood on upturned tyre-less wheels, awaiting scavengers like us to come along and tear off any good looking parts, like vultures on a kill.

Dawn soldier

November 22, 2013 Chris Tanner

The working day starts earlier here, with most of the rest of the world being east of us, we’ve only got a limited time during the day when the UK and US offices are both working. At the moment, the sun gets up around 7am so I get to catch the dawn each day as I head into work. It’s the best greeting you can get each morning.

FCC approved!

November 5, 2013 Chris Tanner

Paperwork for the ship’s radio licence arrived today, which means I now have an MMSI number which is needed for DSC calling, and most importantly it means that I can send instant mayday calls with the DSC distress button on the VHF radio. I’ve not yet got a GPS connected up to the radio, so we’re not quite there yet, but this is first base. It cost $160 to register with the FCC here, whereas in the UK (if I recall correctly) it’s free to get listed on the Small Ships Register. The boat is registered in California however, so I can’t use the SSR – and it’s going to be a lot easier in foreign ports if the boat papers and licences are all US rather than a mix.

Exhausted

October 30, 2013 Chris Tanner

It’s now a whole week that we’ve been in San Francisco, well technically Sausalito, which is nicely north of the city and generally sunny when the town is in fog (we’re told). We don’t quite feel like locals yet, but we’re getting there. We’ve met a bunch of people with nice American names; Chuck, Joe, Terry, Cesar, Delores, Brett. We’ve got phone numbers that start with 415. We know the difference between Mollie Stone’s and Trader Joe’s, we know what you can buy at Best Buy and Dollar Tree. We’ve had breakfast at a Mexican-American diner just around the corner. We’ve not yet had a burger though…

It’s been a hectic week, getting everything sorted out. A stack of things have been knocked off the todo list, the boat is all ship shape and running just fine on the domestic side of things, and I’m starting back at work tomorrow.

We’ve moved the boat to slip 1000, which is right next to the main walkway (inside the gated marina) – handy but not so private. It’s a good spot to meet people though, catching folk as they go by. We catch the wind, too – it’s the westernmost slip in the marina, which means the wind whistling off the Marin headlands hits us first. The other night we put our new cooker to the test on it’s gimbals; the boat was over ten degrees on the dock! They say it gets windier sometimes too. Whoopee. We might look to move to another slip at some point.

The marina showers are hot and powerful (I’ve fixed the one on board but it doesn’t really compare), and the toilet block is clean – though the heads on board works great and we get the holding tank pumped out every other week, so no drama there. It gets a little chilly at night when the sky is clear, so we’ve ordered a new electric heater which we’ll stick on a timer to warm the boat up before we get up in the morning. The on board fridge is running just fine, if a little noisy at night, and the water heater gets a nice lot of washing water ready in a few minutes when we need it. The new cooker (thanks mum and dad!) is amazing; we’ve not yet used the oven in anger but I can see it’s going to do the trick. After wondering what to do with the old one for a few days, I left it outside the marina gate and when I got back from the shower it had gone! Job done. Hope it went to a good cause and not the land fill.

We put our bikes together and had a short pedal up the way to the coffee place next to Proof Lab surf shop. We made an epic, traffic heavy, late night trip to Ikea and Home Depot, and bought a load of stuff including a set of DeWALT power tools – Man Toys. Grr. We’ve put pictures up and taken a door down between the main cabin and the front cabin. It was just getting in the way. We’ll get a curtain up there instead. I fixed the shower pump that wasn’t working, removed all the old 1980s Decca navigation equipment, and applied for an MMSI number for the VHF radio (it’s like a boat signature, so that if, god forbid, we have to hit the emergency DSC mayday button, the coastguard know everything about the boat immediately). We sat in the Social Security office for me to get a number so I’m on the books. We opened a bank account this morning with the Bank of America – not something we’d planned to do, but I needed to cash a load of travellers cheques and they’d only do $500 at once for non account holders. Now I have one for work to pay my wages into which will be handy.

Both of us are exhausted, with everything around us being a new experience, there’s a lot to take on board every minute of the day. We just got back from a drive south to Half Moon Bay to pick up a new van (more about that later) – which left us both shattered. It’s not hard driving, just new. Eyes out on stalks all the time. Bring it on.

Seals warming themselves on the end of our dock

From here onwards they come to us every other week

Time to get dirty

October 24, 2013 Chris Tanner

One thing I’ve not really had to do much of over the past few years is build things. Somehow I’ve managed to get by with a basic set of tools, borrowing where I didn’t have what I needed, and I guess a fair bit of luck with things not breaking. And a bit of planning – buying stuff that didn’t need much fixing up.

Now, however, I have a whole new list of projects reaching out ahead of me for at least a year; working on the boat, converting a van… which needs tools! Like an excited kid at Christmas I spent an hour at Home Depot in the power tools section, figuring out the best combo. It all had to be battery powered, too – so that I can repair stuff and build things offshore. I ended up with a nice new set of DeWALT 20v tools. Just the fact that I’ve devoted an entire post to this shows how much I’m looking forward to getting my hands dirty and building / fixing stuff again. It’s been a while!

Goodbye Bristol

October 22, 2013 Chris Tanner

Bristol. What an awesome city. But it’s time to say goodbye. I’ve been here long enough. I’ve ridden enough of your trails, drunk in enough of your watering holes, visited enough of your surroundings, met enough of your people … and while there is probably a LOAD more awesomeness I could get from staying, I have a greater urge to move on than I have to stay.

Deciding to make a big move to a different country means resetting a load of dials of life. The dial that shows “amount of new experiences” is going from medium to max. The dial that shows how many of the layers of the onion we’ve peeled back on understanding our the depths and nuances of our surroundings is going from somewhere near medium, back to zero. The dial that says “sociable times with long standing buddies” is going from high to zero. On one side of the coin, that’s why we’re doing this. To shake things up a little. On the flipside, we’re going to be missing a load of good stuff. We’re going to be back at base one for a lot of things, and we’re going to be navigating our way through a lot of superficiality as we meet new people, try new things, and get under the skin of a new country and new society. But the compromises we make I think are going to be worth it. Onwards and upwards!

All packed away

October 14, 2013 Chris Tanner

Today we loaded a whole stack of boxes into storage. Everything that we’re not taking with us is now in this small wooden crate, tucked in the back of a warehouse on an industrial unit near Bristol. In fact it’s only half a crate – since we haven’t kept any furniture at all, our possessions are limited mainly to books, paintings and a few personal things. One VW Transporter load of boxes, to be exact:

We’ve managed to either sell or give away pretty much everything else. Hardly anything into landfill or the dump. Result.

Big questions

October 10, 2013 Chris Tanner

Most people go through periods of questioning their purpose and goals. It can be quite tough. “What am I here to do?”. Some people have found their purpose in research, teaching, learning, business, family or religion. I’m just coming to the end of a period where I’ve had an unwavering sense of purpose to grow a business, but that phase is passing and I don’t truly feel that I know what’s next. I want to feel like I am achieving something. I want to have fun. I want to share and inspire. I want to be inspired. I want to contribute to a greater good, whether that’s social, economic, environmental or something else – I’m not yet sure. Probably a mix of all the above.

My “sense of purpose” whiskers are twitching, looking for the next goal … I have a feeling I know what it is, but in the meantime I’m doing some inner exploring to figure out a few things. I’m super excited to be moving to a new country, with new experiences, new people, new everything… but I know that there will be some tough times that will need strength of spirit to get through. “Why am I doing this?” … “Am I getting closer to my goals?” … “What are my goals?”

While I figure those bug ‘uns out – and it may take a looong time – there are a few foundational building blocks that need to be cemented down first. A few ground rules on which everything else is built. Here are a few quotes that capture the spirit of some of these building blocks – l’essence de vie – and how I interpret them.

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” – Howard Thurman

Live to buzz. Live to make others buzz. Enthusiasm is infectious. Positive thinking is motivating for me and others around me. Banish negative thoughts to the realms of self reflection and conversations with those close to me. Making other people happy gives me a kick. Do more of it.

“Unless you have tried to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.” – Ronald E Osborn

Do new things every day. I won’t let fear stop me from taking a step into the unknown. I love learning. I won’t be afraid to move on when I feel that the pace of learning has slowed, or routine is setting in. Maybe when I’m older I will give routine a place to stay, but right now it’s not welcome at the door.

“He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still.” – Lao Tzu

Hmmn – not quite so sure about this one. It comes across with an air of superiority – life’s not about being better than other people, or controlling others – but I can see what Lao is getting at. It’s about being introspective and understanding oneself. I will question everything. But not to the point where I’m just thrashing around in an internal mess of cross examination. That would be silly.

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” – Henry David Thoreau

The woods are great. Wild open spaces are great. I love getting out into the great outdoors – the back country, the ocean, the wilderness. Why? Partly because of the physical activity – to get to the top of a hill you have to climb it – and partly because there are fewer people, and partly because I’m always amazed by nature. There are no crass consumers out in the wilderness, wanting bigger TVs and flashier phones. The folks you meet are generally like minded and down to earth. You are forced to simplify. To eat, to walk, to sleep, to talk, to look, to listen.

“What is money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do.” – Bob Dylan

Right on. Whilst a certain amount of money is certainly needed to get by, there really no need to keep working purely for money’s sake. Ideally, money would be a by product of doing what I love doing, so that I can spend on the things that keep my spirit nourished with everything from good, healthy food to time away from it all.

“As is a tale, so is life; not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.” – Seneca

Well, I think old Seneca here is getting at the fact that it’s all about the quality. I’d be just fine if life was long as well as good, but if you have to place your chips on one or the other, I’d definitely punt for quality.

“Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside of us while we live.” – Norman Cousins

If nothing else, I think this is just a sharp reminder to keep checking back against what I strive for. Keep a tight hold on the good things and don’t let them die away – they can often be very hard to get back once cynicism and disillusionment has set in.

“Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is to not stop questioning.” – Albert Einstein

“Why?” is a great question. My favourite question of all time. So often we skip over the real true essence of a feeling or shared experience, assuming that the person we are talking to already understands. But when you dig into the detail you discover so much more. Explore the inner depths of a conversation. Explore the workings of a machine. Question your motives so that when you achieve, you really feel it.

“Live simply”

Simple living is something I believe strongly in. We don’t need to cram our lives with possessions. We don’t have to live like hermits, but we do need to make use of what we own, and we need to consider experiences more valuable than stuff. It’s not just about things though, it’s also about the impact we have on the people and the world around us. I want to buy products that aren’t wrapped in a gazillion layers of plastic – easier said than done, these days. I want to be a giver, not a taker, when it comes to society at large. I’m thinking about how we can go “off the grid” when we move aboard Rafiki in a couple of weeks’ time.

So, yeah, a load of stuff there to think about. Intimidating, exciting, motivating. It’s time to get out there. To explore. To discover. To learn.