Prepping for the Baja Ha-Ha

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San Diego

Lennie and I flew in to town and headed straight to the yard. Boatyards are an exciting place. You spend a year making your haul out list. The list starts right after your last haul out. You see….boats break. It’s a daily thing. As I am writing this I am finishing the Baja Ha-Ha Rally. Today was a light wind day so we began to review our list of broken items. Three hours later we had worked on the AIS, fixed the chain counter and replaced the water pump. Tomorrow…who knows? The point is that problems are constant and if you get into the groove it’s part of the fun. We had been waiting for this haul out for 15 months and the list has grown. Leaking hatches, paint the bottom, service and swap the props, recaulk the windows, take down the main sail and jib and have them sewn, serviced and cleaned. Redo the main halyard, jackline etc. etc. It’s important to give the boatyard all the info up front and work out a time table. Since we are only in town for a week, we need all hands on deck to get our haul out in and out in 5 days. Most haul outs last 2-3 weeks. That doesn’t work for us commuter cruisers so we stay in the yard all day and help where we can. Calling vendors, running for parts and lots of back patting of the craftsman. We have done many haul outs and are quite good at it now. The first one went so bad we had to haul again in a week.

Making the most of it

Some people stay on the boat in the boatyard. Not our idea of a fun place to hang out so we got a room at the swanky Pendry Hotel in the Gaslamp district. It was an awesome place to walk around and choose a restaurant and then a bar, and another, and another. We walked in the hotel each evening looking like we had been working in a junk yard. I don’t think the bellman recognized us when we would come back down in our “go out” clothes.

Offshore is serious business

Usually our boat is ready to sail. After all we have been on the move for over 2 years, but this haul out had a twist. We were preparing the boat for a 2-week sail down the coast of Baja with no services between San Diego and Cabo. So for 10 days and 800 miles you are on your own. This takes a special level of planning. We needed to make sure our engines, navigation, sailing gear and safety plan was all in working order and tested for the trip. We also had to plan our fuel consumption and contingencies for everything. Offshore sailing is not a game of golf, or as the brochure for the rally says “You could suffer serious injury or even death!” Death? I better triple check my checklist.

Please enjoy the video of our preparations for the Baja Ha-Ha rally!

8 Responses

  1. Lindsay

    Glad you had a great trip! See you soon. Lots of love, Lindsay & Tyler

  2. Rick Jones

    Randy, Lennie-
    Great to have met you two during the HaHa. It is inspiring to see such a compatible couple. I crewed on Eric’s (and Ana) boat, Dances With Winds. I flew out of Cabo Sat., back to Los Angeles and am very happy to be back home with my own family.

    Your webpage is fantastic ! I look forward to following your future postings.

    Rick Jones

    • happytogether

      Hi Rick, the pleasure was ours! Thanks so much for checking out our website and hope you enjoy the videos. We are home in Florida now and getting back into the groove. The awards ceremony was a lot of fun and you can see it on a future video.

      Thanks Randy

  3. Glenn Wakefield

    Sad to see you guys aren’t exploring the Sea of Cortez!?!

    And really… 5200? You couldn’t just caulk it shut, you had to weld it shut? ?

    • happytogether

      What…..of course we are! We are headed to La Paz at Xmas and plan to spend two trips there at least. Probably stay in mexico until september. Yes the factory demanded we use 5200 and gave us new stickers and manual inserts. They don’t install hatches anymore and stopping the leaking is a dream come true. Look forward to meeting in the Sea! Randy

  4. Angelique Bollum

    Hi Randy and Lennie ?
    Our family met you in San Fran during your meet and greet! So awesome 🙂 Our kids Evelyn and Andrew like to watch the video they are in with you and feel like rockstars! We enjoyed learning about Warrior Sailing Program. Our good friend Frank Degnan (who heads the sailing and SCUBA program at CSU Monterey Bay and literally wrote a book on teaching SCUBA to people with disabilities) also does this on a more informal basis. He headed a SCUBA agency (like PADI, but called NIADD -National Instructors Association for Disabled Diving) and still takes disabled people diving on occasion. Jon was involved for a long time and became an instructor. He has taught or assisted with quads, paras, people with CP, even a set of blind people. Having kids sort of pulled Jon away from teaching but it’s still one of his favorite things.
    Anyway, the kids are DYING to know when the next sailing video is coming out! We are watching reruns and eagerly waiting to watch you at the Baja Haha rally.
    Hope the holidays were good to you and your family!
    ~the Bollums – Jon, Angelique, Evelyn& Andrew

    • happytogether

      Hello Angelique! Thanks so much for your note. That is fantastic about Jon teaching with Frank. Wonderful to help people like that. Tell my little Rock Stars that the new video was launched last night and its called Baja Haha Leg 1 and I cant wait for them to watch it. Hi to the Bollums and especially Evelyn and Andrew! Randy & Lennie