You know that feeling that you get when you and your lover are prancing towards each other across a sun-kissed meadow, only to discover that you’re both running on treadmills? We experience this sensation in our dinghy sometimes when wind and current develop against us. We can see our destination, and we’d really like to get there… but our tiny electric trolling motor isn’t up to the task. Sometimes our destination is another boat, with a friend waiting patiently on deck to greet us. And waiting. And… waiting. We call this situation: The Long Hello.

As we continued south we started to consider purchasing a more powerful motor for the dinghy. And south we went, to Central California!

Central California was the perfect California. Not too crowded, full of laid back beach towns with moderate weather, and lots of protected places for us to drop our anchor for free. We stopped in Halfmoon Bay, Santa Cruz, and Morro Bay. In retrospect we wish we had spent more time in this area.

I’ve been fascinated by the Santa Cruz boardwalk, without realizing where it was, ever since watching the movie The Lost Boys as a kid. My childhood hometown would host a rickety travelling carnival for one glorious week every year, but these Californian kids had a full beachside amusement park year round? What opulence! It was really fun taking the kids to enjoy it firsthand.

Halfmoon Bay is home to the legendary Mavericks surf break, which was flat as a pond during our stay there. We found some used wetsuits and boogie boards there and imagined what it must be like in a big winter storm swell.

Our next stop, Morro Bay, most famous of them all, is home to three stacks, a rock, and a guy named Reid.

I’ve been watching a YouTube channel called Salt & Tar for several years chronicling a couple named Ruth and Garret as they built a sailboat from scratch. They recently published an episode visiting their hometown of Morro Bay, which I watched the day we arrived there. This episode very briefly featured Garrets brother, Reid.

By coincidence, the very next day, Reid stopped by our boat and introduced himself. It turns out he used to have a boat similar to ours. I was maybe a little too excited to see him. “Reid! Hi! You’re famous, I was just watching you on YouTube!”

Note to self: this is an awkward way to start a conversation. Do not do that again. Reid really knew his boats, and although he had to go, I invited him to come to dinner later.

“You invited that guy to dinner way too fast!” says Sarah, “He must think you’re nuts!” She was clearly jealous that I’d met a celebrity.

“We don’t have time to make friends slowly Sarah, it’s now or never.” He came to dinner and we had a fun night and it turns out he had an old 4 horsepower outboard engine which he sold us for cheap.

Aesthetics are important in the yachting world, so we were happy that the duct tape our new outboard matched the colour of the duct tape on our dinghy. We can now dinghy a lot further and in more weather conditions which has proven quite valuable. And we’ve said goodbye to the Long Hello!

To say goodbye to Central California we’ll next have to round Point Conception. The very last of the intimidating capes of the US coast. Off we go!