Pasargada is now in Ensenada awaiting some repairs. We moved to Ensenada Cruiseport Village marina yesterday which has good wifi and it’s giving us a chance to finally catch up on blogging about places we visited south of Half Moon Bay. One thing I found particularly interesting once we got close to Point Conception at the western edge of the Santa Barbara channel was seeing all the oil platforms off the Southern California coast.

We actually smelled the oil before we saw the oil platforms. Somewhere south of Morro Bay and north of the first oil platform sighting we had a late night watch change where the smell of oil was unmistakable. Nojan checked the engine room to be sure nothing was wrong with our motor and all looked good. Within 20 minutes the smell had dissipated. Another boat heading south the same time as us also reported smelling it that night.

Things I learned about oil platforms along the California coast include:

• The platforms all have names and for the most part will have names that start with the same letter along each east-west line of platforms. For example, one line in the Santa Barbara channel started with H and included three we passed immediately south of Point Arguello named “Hidalgo,” “Harvest,” and “Hermosa” and their partners further east such as “Heritage,” “Harmony,” and “Hondo.” The first platform we encountered was “Irene.” When we left Santa Barbara heading for Oxnard we got to see G’s and F’s.
• Off-shore platforms are surrounded by a safety zone circumference marked on the chart while those closer to shore (presumably not floating) do not always have a similar circumference. Each safety zone has its own reference number you can look up in the Coast Pilot (“Harmony” is SAFETY ZONE 147.1114 but “Hondo” is 147.1105 – this is interesting because often you’ll see multiple “special anchorage areas” in a bay having the same reference number for looking up details in the Coast Pilot and other Federal regulation books). It is helpful that they put the names of the platforms on the charts as if they want to scold us for getting too close to one and they can’t see our boat name they could say “sailboat approaching platform Hondo.” Yes, all boaters should have some form of paper and (or) electronic charts aboard that would help them know what these things are both for safety and navigation purposes.
• Long Beach Harbor has a series of really fascinating oil platforms that are inside the harbor and disguised by a series of structures and palm trees that make them look like maybe they host concerts or parties out there. In 1967 these oil producing islands were named after astronauts that lost their lives. One of the islands essentially serves as part of the breakwater for the marina we stayed at in Long Beach. As we went past it, we were curious if it was a park. At night there was a pretty lighting and waterfall on one side. Wow. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THUMS_Islands
• At night in October, most of the times I saw another boat on the water it was on its way to or from the various oil platforms.