Holiday Vacation
I flew home for an exciting few days spent with my family before Christmas. It was great to see everyone even if it was for a short time. My brothers, Matt & Scott, and I all drove up to Bear Valley Ski Resort on Monday (Christmas Eve) and caught perfect snow conditions for the day. It has been a tradition to make this trip the day before Christmas because chair-lift lines and traffic are usually kept to a minimum. This time was no exception. It snowed for three days in the Sierra’s and the weather cleared the morning of our trip. The drive up the mountains eventually required us to install chains on the rear tires as well as some careful driving. As we crawled at a safe, yet slippery 35 mph, every vehicle with AWD and 4WD was dangerously jockeying for position as they’d speed past us each time the road straightened out.
At one point, Matt said to Scott, “Your life is in my hands and I’m controlling a 2,000 pound death machine that doesn’t want to cooperate.” Patience and caution truly paid off when we arrived at the parking lot only a few minutes behind the dare-devil drivers, and then minutes later we were snowboarding down fresh, ungroomed powder runs. Below is a post with a short video from me while I was holding my cell phone as a camera while carving through trees. Also, a few photos:
Christmas was the next day, and I appreciate everything that everyone got me. Notably, Julia knit us all beanies (Awesome), her parents gave me a special beer that was perfect after a day of snowboarding. Matt got me a serious bottle opener to mount inside A Cenoura, a much needed laundromat bag, and a gift card to West Marine (Maybe a Dehumidifier? Mainsheet Cleat riser? Anything on my growing list of boat parts?). My mom gave me a gift card to Lowes for an all-in-one power tool (which will gradually become close friends with A Cenoura) and some hand-me-down Foul Weather Gear from her sailing days (foul weather gear never goes out of style - yellow and orange).
The short trip came to an end the following morning when I woke up at dawn to pack my things and take BART into San Francisco and then fly to Los Angeles in time to finish up a half-day back at work.
I discovered something odd, however, when I dropped my luggage off at the boat before driving to work that afternoon… My cockpit appeared to be the new habitat for a small animal - I know it was small, because of the doodoo it left underneath the steering pedestal - yeah, I thought it was disgusting, too.
When I returned home from work around 700pm I put on cleaning gloves and went to clean up and de-sanitize the animals leftovers in the cockpit. I came back to my boat around 930pm, everything was pitch black as I step aboard from the dock when suddenly, “HHIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS” and scraping as a raccoon scurried to the corner of my dodger, above the companionway opening. Please note the photo posted below, “Commandeered By A Raccoon”.
There was no way I was going to fuss with the animal, especially after calling my mom for advice, and she states, “Call animal control because it could have rabies.” Redondo Beach ‘Animal Control’ came, and we accomplished scaring the raccoon to jump off A Cenoura’s starboard rail down to the dock, and then the critter ran to a few boats away and disappeared.
There’s an important lesson to this experience, that is, 'not to leave my trash bin outside, even if it’s going to make the galley smell like garbage sometimes.’ For now the dock step is moved away and my automatic solar-powered light in the cockpit is set to turn on at dusk - hopefully deterring the unwanted visitor from going back to one of the only few vessels that’s actually being tenanted - A Cenoura.