While Captain Doug Lombard was talking to some cruising friends, the topic of the famous Baja Haha cruising rally came up. Too bad there wasn’t a rally to get to the rally, they all agreed. It wasn’t too long before the name Coho Hoho emerged and stuck and an event born. The new rally is having a humbled but successful first year, with nine boats and their crews headed south. There’s a good blog going here. The Facebook page is here.
The boats and their skippers:
Unleashed, Paul Bailey and Carol Dabdub
Journey, Robert Sievertson
Non Sequitor, Rachelle Jacobsen
Dawn Treader, James Lussier
Sand Dollar, Shawn and J.C. Walgren
Moments, Adam Hughes
Ohana, Jake and Danielle Haines
French Leave, James Muri
Golden Eye, John Calvin
With support from sailing industry stalwarts like Swiftsure Yachts, North Sails, Flagship Maritime and Dockside Solutions, the small flotilla headed out August 12 and are well on their way to San Francisco. Following are photos some excerpts from their emails and posts (so far):
Shawna, J.C., Nate, Kaley and Easton Walgren of Sand Dollar
Unleashed
Sand Dollar
Robert Sievertson of Journey
Ohana
Doug Lombard
Karl Christopher
Paul Bailey and Carol Dabdub of Unleashed
Moments
James Lussier of Dawn Treader
Adam Hughes and Rachel Harper of Moments
Jake, Daneille, Kately and Hannah Haines of Ohana
French Leave
Dawn Treader
August 17 from Unleashed
Hi everyone
We are in Eureka, CA. There is a storm building so we don’t know when we will continuing onto San Francisco.
The Coho has asked that we check in at 9a so that is when you should get our checkin message. I will continue to place a tracking point with Delorme every 6 hours or so which you can access below.
August 18 from Karl Christopher, shore support
Locations as I know them August 18
sv Journey – in Eureka, hooked up with sv Unleashed
sv Non Sequitur – Departed Newport this morning
sv Dawn Treader – Leavning Newport his morning. Crew from French Leave – Ron and Joyce – have joined the boat
sv Unleashed – in Eureka, watching weather
sv Moments – (last heard they were in westport leaving south on monday)
sv Ohana – in Newport. Tacked in from 70 nm offshore
sv French Leave – reported in Tachoma
and now, Brads Weather Brief:
From Brad Baker, Swiftsure Yachts
Because of the variability up and down the coast I’ve broken up the areas a bit more.The forecast from yesterday seems to be verifying and there are no real changes today. I suppose the most significant difference is that the National Weather Service text forecast has upped the wind strengths for the offshore waters south of Cape Blanco and have issued a Gale warning through at least Tuesday. My forecast from yesterday already included winds to 35 knots which they are now forecasting. There will be higher gusts and it is possible sustained winds could reach 40 at the peak in these areas. The models continue to show the gradients loosening up starting Wednesday evening and it looks as though there will be a good weather window in the second half of the week, with brisk but hopefully not too brisk Northerly winds. I’m beginning to buy in to this scenario as I see consistency from run to run in the models.
Strait of Juan de Fuca
Light to moderate onshore flow through Thursday. Expect a diurnal cycle of lighter winds early morning to early afternoon building in the late afternoon and peaking in the evening. Wind speeds will range from 5 to 20 (perhaps 25 on Monday night)
Cape Flattery to Newport Oregon
Light Southerlies to 10 knots today, transitioning to N – NW winds over the nighttime hours to 15 knots (stronger northerly the further south you are)
Mon – Wed Diurnal cycle to the winds with the strongest winds being evening beforemidnight. Speeds will vary from 5 knots to 25 knots with the cycle. Winds will be strongest in the southern portion of this forecast area.
Sea state West to NW swell 5 to 6 feet. Look for the wind waves to get as high as 4 feet in peak winds. and be more from the NW to N direction.
Newport Oregon to Cape Blanco
National Weather service has issued small craft warnings through at least Tuesday (I suspect they will extend into Wednesday). Winds are likely to be diurnal in nature here as well.
Today N to NW winds to 15 morning and early afternoon rising to as high as 30 knots this evening.
Mon-Tues N to NW winds 15 to 30
Wednesday N to NW winds 10 to 20
Sea state the underlying swell should be light at up to 5 feet the real story are the wind waves which will reach as high as 7 feet and will be confused with short wave periods.
Cape Blanco South
Gale warnings in effect through Tuesday for waters beyond 10 miles out. Diurnal winds. Winds are also forecast to be lighter if you stay within 10 miles of the coast. Figure about 10 knots less than the numbers below.
Today N to NW winds 20-30 with higher gusts
Mon – Tuesday N to NW winds 20-35 with higher gusts
Wednesday N to NW winds 20-30 easing to 10-20 through the day
Longer term Thursday and beyond it appears the winds will still be out of the North but perhaps peaking at 20 knots as opposed to 35.
Sea State Full on washing machine action with steep and at times breaking waves to 11 feet through Wednesday.
August 20 from Karl Christopher
Locations as I know them August 20 – since most of the boats are still holed up in port waiting for a weather window before proceeding, i’ve had fewer location updates. I’ll update on the blogsite as get more responses: http://cohohoho.blogspot.com
sv Journey – in Eureka watching weather
sv Non Sequitur – in Coos Bay, watching weather
sv Dawn Treader – in Coos Bay: “…Yesterdays run from Newport to Coos Bay was a good day. Sailed from buoy to buoy. All conditions, light to heavy winds. Sailed mostly wing on wing poled out headsail. Speeds from 2 – 6.8 knots with winds up to 15 knots. Seas were not too bad sometimes very flat, 2′ less, to 5 – 6′ combined.
Life is good on a boat.”
sv Unleashed – in Eureka watching weather
sv Moments – reported in Westport day-before yesterday
sv Ohana – in Newport waiting weather window
