My Dreamboat!

I'm living on water again!  After being a land lubber for about two weeks, (once I sold Layla) I bought another boat.  This one is the one I've been dreaming about for years and years, it is a Pogo 40.  I went sailing on this boat (and made videos) twice over the past few years, and I really liked it.  So the first thing that I did is modify it...  I added an arch over the stern to hold the Dinghy up, and so now I have a dinghy that sits just above the water while sailing and is partly balanced on a small swim step on the back of the boat.  It works out quite well, actually.  I was able to deploy the dinghy while sailing at about 3 knots without any trouble, and also to lift it again without slowing down.  Here's a picture of it while heeled over in some wind.

Abe came down and we went on a trip out to Catalina Island and Santa Barbara Island, and we found a Jaeger,

And here's Aquila (the pogo's name) anchored out.  I've added solar panels on top of the dinghy rack.  Also I've got the Staysail, the jib and the code 0 (a spinnaker) set up at the same time.  Its nice having a few options to roll out.

We zipped around Santa Barbara Island and found some young Sea Lions, and they were curious, so came close.  This picture shows the weird eye membrane (is it nictitating?)  that covers their eyes.

Another, and here the eye is very different, but still no easily discernable pupil.

Here's Aquila anchored out again

And some cacti we came across on the island

On these islands there is this kind of small tree that I really like, but I don't know the type, and here they look like they are walking up the hill.

And here is a horned lark

A shot under sail.  Because the dinghy is so easy to deploy, I just popped out on it while sailing (abe was still on the boat) to do some photos and video.  

And a look up, surrounded by sails.

So this is the dream boat of mine.  I'm trying to build it into a fast cruiser, and do lots of big voyages aboard.  I'm still in the testing phase and there are a lot of things I'll be working on and changing, of course, but I've got a start.  Its great to be living on water again.