What to do when you have hundreds of boats wanting to come from the mainland on a busy summer weekend? You set up the Catalina mooring system. The visiting boater is assigned a mooring, slithers in next to the already moored boats, grabs the mooring wand, pulls up and secures the bow loop. Then they follow a weighted linking line aft to the stern loop. You sure can pack a lot of boats in a small space with that system. Virtually the entire lee side of the island has these buoys, in coves, along straight coast line, hundreds of them.

The harbor shown is Avalon. Note the huge Casino built by Mr. William Wrigley of chewing gum fame in the background. This is a HUGE and fascinating building loaded with art deco murals painted right onto the concrete. The top floor has a round ballroom which must still rate as one of the largest unobstructed dance floors in the world. By the way, "Casino" has nothing to do with gambling. The original meaning of this word of Italian origin didn't have anything to do with gambling.

We did all of the Avalon things including renting some very cool electric bikes.

The only downside was finding ourselves close behind a powerboat that ran its genset every legal hour and then some. When the wind blew toward us, we were stuck with the fumes. We liked our spot close to the Casino, so didn't ask to move, hack, cough.

This was quite a switch from the remote anchorages and passages in Mexico when we sometimes didn't see another boat for days. Each has its charms.