After Rebekah and I fixed the wiring issue on Akimbo, James and Hunter joined us for some practice docking in forward and reverse, then Hunter and I each took a turn anchoring. Wind was light when we started, but had picked up to around 10 knots and completely reversed direction by the time we came in for our final docking.
Century Club: Richard Eggert
Saturday, May 9, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
I signed up to teach the DSC Taste of Sailing class on Saturday. Although I arrived an hour early, I realized upon arrival that I had forgotten my hat, and therefore drove all the way back home to pick it up, resulting in not getting back to DSC until a few minutes before the class was supposed to start. Fortunately, Karen, the other instructor, prepared a Sonar for me, so we were able to get everything started on time.
One of my students had a last minute emergency and could not attend, but I did not receive notification of this before the class, so we went over the parts of the boat on shore while we waited. When we finally got underway, the wind was almost completely dead, so it was slow going for quite a while, which was concerned because there were scattered thunderstorms in the area. I demonstrated propelling the boat by rocking it in order to get us closer to the docks, and finally the wind picked up a bit.
It wasn't a terribly exciting sail, but I think everyone had a good time, and we were able to cover most of the basic concepts of sailing.
Friday, May 8, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
Sara, Jen, and I took a J/22 out for the Friday Night Fun Race. While rigging, we discovered a problem with the boat I originally reserved, so we had to hastily de-rig it and rig up a different boat, but we still managed to get underway before the start of the race.
Because I needed to leave early to see a show that ngiht, we did not complete the entire course, but we still had a lot of fun.
Thursday, May 7, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
I was in the pit for TNR this week, which took some acclimation since I hadn't practiced that position in over a month. Winds were relatively light but steady, though they did shift dramatically over the course of the evening. Despite some minor mishaps, we performed reasonably well. However, we didn't realize until after it was over that we forgot to turn on the GoPro.
Wednesday, May 6, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
Practicing a Quick Stop MOB
A nice, easy crosswind docking
Kelly and I took a J/22 out for the DSC Wednesday Member Sail. Winds were around 8 knots, and despite the forecast of rain, the weather stayed relatively dry. We used the opportunity to go over man overboard drills and well as coach Kelly through some docking runs.
Monday, May 4, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
Rebekah took James, Hunter, and I out on Akimbo for a cruising mentoring session after work. We practiced man overboard drills and docking. We also discovered an apparent wiring issue with the boat that prevented us from shutting off the engine, so at the end of the trip she demonstrated how to shut off the engine by blocking the air intake.
Sunday, May 3, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
I skippered a Sonar for DSC's open house during the I Love SoBo day event, with Pete A. as my crew. We took two groups out on one-hour sails around the harbor in gusty conditions. The first group was a couple that seemed a bit intimidated by the conditions but still had a good time. For our second trip, we just had one guest aboard, a woman who enjoyed the exciting conditions.
Afterwards, I took Bhavani out for some mentoring on a J/22. She brought along one of her adult sons and one of his friends. We took turns trying to scare them in the windy conditions. We also spent time time doing man overboard drills and docking practice.
Saturday, May 2, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
I volunteer skipped a Sonar for DSC's first Access-Ability Sail of 2026, with Tony S. as my crew. We took our participants out to the Canton Waterfront to watch the Kinetic Sculpture Race as the racers started to enter the water, meeting up with a few other DSC Sonars as well as one of the DSC cruisers while we were there. We watched the first 3 or 4 racers enter the water, then headed back to the dock.
Friday, May 1, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
Kelly, Jen, and I raced against 3 other J/22s for the first DSC Friday Night Fun Race of 2026. We had excellent wind around 15 knots, though the course was cut short by a car carrying ship that came past Fort McHenry just as we were approaching the last two buoys. We placed fourth and had a lot of fun.
Wednesday, April 29, 2026
Number of days:
1 day
I did my first shift of the year as Dockmaster for the DSC Wednesday Member Sail. Temperature was around 60 degrees, and the weather was initially drizzly, gradually increasing to steady rain as the evening wore on. Turnout was relatively low due to the weather, but since the cruising program was hosting a social event afterwards, we had three cruising skippers show up, which allowed us to take out three cruising boats, with 10 people divided up among them, while the rest went out on two J/22s.
Rebekah kindly offered to take me on a mentoring session on Akimbo, which I accepted, so I had a chance to practice going through the pre-departure and post-return checklists, departing from the dock, and docking, and we had some time to go out to Northwest Harbor, raise the sails, sail out to Canton and round the NH buoy, then come back to Domino Sugar before lowering/furling the sails again. Despite the SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY predicting gusts up to 20 knots, winds were very light around 4-5 knots, so it was slow going most of the way, though it did make docking quite simple.
Afterwards, a bunch of us soggy sailors trod down to Little Havana to meet up with some others for drinks and sailing stories.