First Catalina Trip

Mille Onde made her first trip (of many) to Catalina over the past weekend. On board were Chris and Amy Olsen (Captain Stephen's daughter and son-in-law) and Gary Muller a very good long term friend, in addition to Captains Risa and Stephen.

We left Long Beach a little later than planned on Friday after loading up on fuel (totally unnecessary) in case we had to motor most of the way over and back. On the run over on Friday, we had great winds (18-23 knots) that moved enough north over the afternoon that we were able to make Avalon on the same tack that we left Alamitos Bay on. Since the C&C's are a solid build we were able to keep her pushed hard and averaged between 6.5 and 7 knots for the entire run over to Avalon. We made it in and were able to find our mooring and get settled in before dark. Due to the traffic we had to moor on the north side of the Casino which gave us the thrill of listening to a bunch of drunk wedding goers toasting the bride and groom into the night Friday night.

Saturday was a day spent exploring the island and even going on a 11.5 mile hike from the Airport in the Sky back to Avalon (Captain Stephen's idea of a nature walk) which left us all tired and thirsty enough to share a couple of cold beers upon our return to Avalon. We found a nice place to watch the baseball game (Lobster Pot) only to find out after we settled in that it had been rained out. Oh well, we still enjoyed the good food and drink and our waitress certainly added to the evening with her fun attitude. Nice to have visit a spot where folks are enjoying their jobs.

The trip back from Avalon on Sunday was a motor all the way as the wind didn't show up until after lunch and we had to get Amy and Chris back to the airport so they could get home to their kids (four legged kind) in the Phoenix area.