My favorite island.............

Summer's coming! Now's the time to get all those projects done so you will have a trouble free and comfortable time aboard your boat in your favorite anchorage. The picture above needs no caption. I'll put Avalon (only about 25 miles off the coast of Southern California) up against any quaint anchorage in the world. Yes, it's a bit too on the commercial side in summer but it's still a huge amount of fun. Give the kids a twenty dollar bill and send them ashore. The video arcade, miniature golf, the pleasure pier and white sandy beaches will entertain them for hours. Not wanting to become a "boat potato" I make it a point to hike the loop up to the bell tower (ran into a 8 point deer at the Zane Gray hotel last time I was up there) and keep going to the top of the new zing line and then down past the new Wrigley home and back into town. Another great walk is up to the Wrigley mansion on Mt. Ada and keep going all the way to the Edison power plant and the boat yard. You better have a good heart to make these hikes cause it's all uphill. Catalina Island is a very special place to our family. My dad lived there and went to high school and my grandfather ran charter boats off the pleasure pier in the 1930's. Yes, it's time to get our boats ready for summer fun. I'm in a little log cabin in Colorado as I write these notes. It's snowing outside and what am I doing? Making my list of boat projects. Replace windows on trunk cabin, replace steering cable, caulk seam between cap rail and bulwarks, pull rig or at least go aloft and make sure I can get another season with what's there and on and on and on...........