Every year, my family friends have held their “November Party” at a roving location. For a while it was their home in Oakland, then a city up the coast, and so on. This year, they decided to host it at the Sausalito Yacht Club. As the crow flies, that is not too far from Berkeley, but the driving route there is pretty time-consuming.

So, while other people were planning their designated driver for the night, we were planning our sail to bring our crash pad – Duende!

The party was on Saturday, and the tides worked out perfect for a leisurely sail on a light ebb, arriving right around slack at the gate. We offered my dad a ride, but he planned to drive and then just sleep on the boat.

We motored out of Berkeley, then killed the engine and sailed, tacking up into the westerly wind, right up the slot between Alcatraz and Angel Island.  We sailed right up to the Gate, then turned the engine back on to help us navigate the unfamiliar Sausalito Yacht Club docks.

Even at a normal tide height, the marina there is very shallow. Like, we could not take an end tie because we would have been sitting in mud. And the docks are in a state of serious disrepair. It has the most spectacular view of the Golden Gate Bridge, though.

We had called ahead to let us know that we were coming, but there was absolutely nobody on site. We were told that the bartenders at the event would have keys to the dock, so we got ready and headed up to the party.

Unfortunately, that turned out to not be true. Nobody had keys for us, and when we went back to survey the docks there was nobody there either. The party was great, with a catered taco truck and a good group of people. When it wound down, we had a few people come back to the boat, but had to use some pretty creative climbing to get Charles around the gate. At least nobody had to swim?

We had about 8 people on the boat, our sweet little 28 foot boat, and I think they were all very surprised with how small (but cozy!) the living space we share is.

Due to tides on Sunday, plus our schedule at home, morning was the only practical time to leave. So at 6 a.m. we kicked my dad off to drive home, and had a very light-winded downwind run home.