Pacific Mariners Yacht Club, Marina del Rey

We arrived back in Marina del Rey Monday afternoon and once again found a very warm welcome.  We ended up in the club by around three and stayed for their Monday Night Football dinner.  The club is completely volunteer run so whoever is available goes behind the bar and pours the drinks.  Sparky, the dockmaster, made sure that we had everything we needed and Bob took care of all the paperwork to keep us legal.  We spent Tuesday in Santa Monica playing tourist.  We hadn’t been for around 10 years and had a great time wandering around.  We ad lunch at a place called the Broadway Deli.  A bit pricey but a great people watching place.  We walked the Santa Monica Pier, strolled around the pedestrian only streets and generally tried to keep our hands in our pockets.  Basically we had a relaxing day and managed to get a few things that we had been looking for, namely a funnel, and some material to finish the edging on the new floor mats.  I guess Cathy will tackle that when I go to London in a week and a half.  We were sitting around the club Tuesday afternoon and one of the regulars (Al) kindly offered us the use of his car the next day to run around and get propane, groceries etc.  Wednesday we took him up on his offer and managed to get everything done in about an hour and a half.  It would have taken us most of the day to do it without the car.  We continue to find people that just want to help out in any way they can.  They are generally interested in the life that Cathy and I have chosen and we are extraordinarily grateful for the generosity we have been shown.  Last night was again an example of the type of people we are running into.  We went across the street to a bar/restaurant called the Chart House for happy hour (they have a really cheap happy hour food menu).  We walked in and Cathy recognized a woman she had spoken to briefly on the dock that afternoon.  We her partner and a friend asked us to join them.  They had spent some time living in Vancouver and sailing the same areas we had.  We talked for a couple of hours.  Really great people and hopefully we will keep in touch via email (get the hint Richard!).  We got up early this morning for this morning and took advantage of the showers before we left at 05:45.  We were heading for Anacapa Island or maybe Santa Cruz, but wind and tide were against us so we came into Channel Islands Harbour for the night.  We spent the day under motor with the main up.  At some point we will get to sail again, maybe in the next few days as we explore the anchorages on Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa Islands.  We plan to be in Santa Barbara by next Wednesday as I have to fly out Saturday.