Boat Ownership Eve
It is Thursday July 13th evening and I am in a hotel in San Diego on the eve of owning an Hawaii boat. It is both exciting and terrifying at the same time. I am comfortably half way through my buying the boat list. I am also a bit exhausted and I am trying to stay awake late enough that I can get a decent night’s sleep - hence writing of the blog post now.
With everything falling into place this past week I checked everything was in place again this week. Yup, all good. The plan was to pick up the Sylvinator in Berkley at 7pm on Wednesday. The drive over there after work was great and I arrived early enough to stop at Trader Joe’s to grab something to eat for dinner. Without a detailed plan in place we headed out. I explained the lack of detail in the plan and why it was a problem to the Sylvinator as we headed down 580. We both agreed that a hotel was a waste of money for only a couple hours and so we began to do some mental calculations. If we pulled over somewhere to rest we would both wake up when the sun rises which right now is about 5:30am. Since we needed to be in San Diego for the inspection at 9:15 with time for a stop for gas and pee break we were looking for a place to stop that was about 3 1/2 hours drive from San Diego in the morning. So, we had to account for morning traffic going through LA and into San Diego. This calculation and checking Waze did help make the time pass as we drove through the central valley in the darkness. Our calculations were pointing us to pulling over somewhere going through the Grapevine. As we pulled closer I had a plan to stop at the rest area at Lebec. As we got closer I was more convinced that would be a good spot. I was a bit concerned about how busy the rest area would be and if we would be able to sleep for a couple hours. The plan was for me to get in the back of the truck and for the Sylvinator to sleep across the back seat.
As we neared that rest area I blinked and missed the pull in so we kept driving. I was a bit concerned but felt that there should be another option before we get to Santa Clarita. At the Pyramid Lake exit I decided to take the exit and we found a large parking area that had a couple trucks parked in it. It looked totally sketchy but also totally fine for our purposes. I pulled in, found a reasonably level spot away from the trucks but not too far away. Within a couple minutes we were settled and it was 11:30pm which meant I could potentially get about 6 hours of sleep which isn’t too bad. As I settled in the highway noise was a bit loud but I quickly got used to it and ended up having a reasonable night’s sleep. I woke up like clock work about 2 minutes before my alarm was scheduled to go off. The Sylvinator woke at about the same time and we both got ourselves in our seats and off we drove.
The drive through LA was great as we were early enough that we didn’t hit any traffic till we got to Orange County and even then it wasn’t bad at all. I stopped for gas and the next traffic was coming into San Diego as we had hit the morning rush. While were were driving we booked a hotel for Thursday night. We decided on a boutique place near the Yacht Club using credit card points to soften the blow of expensive hotel prices. We were both a bit tired as we arrived at the Yacht Club. I managed to talk my way past the security guard, find the boat in the yard and park the truck close-by and out of the way.
The Sylvinator set herself up in the back of the truck to snooze and hang out. They wanted as little to do with the survey as possible which I was fine with. Shortly thereafter the owner’s representative showed up and then the surveyor. We got started. The morning was quite warm so when the three of us ended up inside the boat it was very warm. Didn’t help that I had a heavy work shirt on. The survey went well and the surveyor gave me his impressions which were that the boat didn’t appear to have any major issues. I tried to get as much advice out of him as I could before he finished up and headed out.
So after several hours almost the last hurdle to buying this boat was out of the way. I had got my confirmation of insurance by e-mail from the insurer on Wednesday and had talked to the marina as well so everything is falling into place. Only a couple more things before I am a boat owner.
Since it wasn’t quite lunch time when we wrapped up I decided to go the bank and with the survey done to get a cashier’s check for the balance owing on the boat. That was surprisingly simple considering it involved a physical visit to a branch of my bank. The Sylvinator and I then went for lunch. It has been their choice of places this trip and we ended up at a very nice Thai place for lunch. After lunch we went down to the waterfront where I proceeded to try to nap in a sun heated vehicle while the Sylvinator wandered around and took some product placement pictures for her online business (look-up GobWorm on Etsy if you are interested). Rather bored, hot and annoyed but being bored and hot we decided to head to the hotel to see if we could check in prior to the official 3pm check-in time. Luckily they had a room available and we lounged the remainder of the afternoon away in air conditioned comfort.
Well, that is not entirely true. On the way to the hotel I saw a chart store and made a mental note of that. It was a 2 minute walk from our hotel so at one point in the afternoon I went for a walk over there and surprise surprise bought some charts. So, since I am on the precipice of boat ownership it makes sense that I should own some charts. I now have a chart for the approach to the SF bay and a detailed chart of the middle bay. I also have a chart book of most of the central California coast as well.
During our boredom the Sylvinator had picked out a place for dinner already so after our afternoon snack had worn off we were sitting in the hotel room counting the minutes till we felt it would be late enough to go for dinner. We ended up at Japanese Ezakaya in Little Italy near downtown. Traffic and parking were bad but at this point I was in no hurry so just enjoyed watching planes and boats as I made my way downtown. The restaurant (the yasai by rakiraki) was really good. The stress and the tiredness of the day melted away and we enjoyed a really nice dinner. As I was sitting at dinner the weight of the day hit me a bit. This was now boat ownership eve. Phase I of Project Hawaii is almost done.
The next two days are potentially very busy days. Tomorrow we do the actual sale in the morning. I have to do all the registration of that as well at DMV. Then I am going over the boat with the owner and packing it up for as much time as we need. Then depending on the time we head out for the drive home which will likely bleed well into Saturday. There are heat warnings this weekend and the central valley where the freeway goes up can get very hot. I am thinking I want to potentially do as much of that drive at night as possible. So Friday could end up being a very long day. If I can get the boat most of the way up to SF during the cooler night hours that would make me feel a lot better. That way I could get it up to Richmond and the marina with lots of time get situated. Before falling over in exhaustion. I think the weight both literally and figuratively will keep me very alert and safe.
Sorry for the long unorganized post but I am tired and just wanted to get my thoughts down right now.