Best Time of the Year to do Qualifying Sail from SF Bay

[bizirka]

Hi gang!

I wasn't able to make ready for the longpac - so here I am getting ready to plan my qualifier - should be ready as early as end of January. Two parts:

1) In GENERAL, what is the best time of the year to do this? I am mostly concerned about weather (it can stink out there at times) and obviously leaving enough time to fix anything that may go wrong before the transpac.

2) More specifically, as I have my date dialed plus/minus a week what weather/tidal window should I be looking for to adjust my departure plus/minus several days/hours(?)/

thanks you kindly!

Jiri

[brianb]

Spring can be rough. The best time is probably fall, late summer, but that is moot. In my opinion your best shot now is to find a hole in the weather patterns and do the qual between now and mid March. The water is warmer now of course. Exit on a late flood at the gate so that you are over the bar and past the light ship at slack or just after slack. This will let you avoid the rough conditions when the NW breeze fights the ebb and the bar pushes up the ebb, all combining forces to make for a very bone jarring ride until you get a few miles past the light ship. More learned opinions may follow.
Brian

[bizirka]

Thank you, Brian. Very helpful - hopefully others will chime in.

I have noticed a lot of the qualifications that leave the Bay end up there journey down south of the bay. Is this typical due to the prevailing winds/swells?

Jiri

[mike cunningham]

biz,

If you are interested in company I would like to do an additional long distance offshore sail before the main event. I will be in the yard for most of Feb but should be out in March and ready to trial the boat.

With regard to winding up South of the Bay, my experience in LongPac (as a newbie) was that you try to stay as high as you can but with the light winds on the way out I wound up at 37 N at turnaround, a wee bit north of Santa Cruz. This forced a pretty uncomfortable course back with swell and wind waves on the beam. I had to hand steer the last 100 NM and boy did I want to fall off. Had I done so I would have wound up in Santa Barbara. I was tempted a few times. Santa Barbara was sounding pretty freaking good!

[DaveH]

Jiri -
Domino & I did our initial qualifier in may 2014 for the 2014 SHTP.
write up and the thread are here... http://sfbaysss.org/forum/showthread.php?1281-Domino-bound-for-sea

apart from my time frame [May is WAY late] I concur with Brian; leaving on a late ebb got me out to the stinky rocks and from there was able to pick up enough breeze to keep powered up... if conditions allow, the option of tacking northwards early on will set you up better if the weather turns.
best, DH

[bizirka]

Thanks everyone.

Weather gods and work willing, I will be leaving April 5th around 10AM to catch the 11am(ish) high. I wanted to get the qualifier in earlier, but a 3 week delay at the yard has set me back.

Anyone still want to join?

Jiri

[The Smokester]

I am interested since I need to qualify, too. Looks like there may be a break coming in early April and swell may be down a bit...too early to tell. My boat is slow so we wouldnt be together long but we could collaborate on when is a good weather window to start.

[dhusselman]

Thanks everyone.

Weather gods and work willing, I will be leaving April 5th around 10AM to catch the 11am(ish) high. I wanted to get the qualifier in earlier, but a 3 week delay at the yard has set me back.

Anyone still want to join?

Jiri

April 5th could work for me....


Dirk "TIJD" First 30JK

[bizirka]

Great - I am keeping an eye on the weather using PredictWind...I will share my observations here, perhaps we can bring our heads together to get a handle of the weather. What are you using for weather?

[bizirka]

Work has been figured out (have to push a day) now just waiting on weather. Hoping to leave on the late flood Wednesday morning (April 6th). As of now, the two models in PredictWind are not in agreement, one is forecasting 30+ 50 miles offshore while the other a more pleasant 10-15. The forecast only goes out to Tuesday at this point, I will be keeping a very close eye on it.