Great race against LEGACY, Mr. Taylor's FRERS 38. We exchanged leads a half dozen times, but they got us on corrected time. Great night on the water, and thanks to the BOXCAR folks for having me back on especially after my performance last month as the mixed-up, cursed bowman.
Beautiful albeit light air night on the river. I think we finished 3rd on corrected time.
Oh boy, what a great Chesapeake mid-summer's evening race.
The RC displayed the Cat in the Hat, but not for long. A system passed by to the north that generated plenty of wind to get a start sequence going. We had set the rig for 0-4 kn and of course, it was blowing 14-16 at our signal. The upwind leg went OK as well as the hoist. Downwind, the breeze died until it turned into a header. Genoa up!
And all of a sudden, we were setting up for a kite hoist after rounding and heading for the finish, 180 degrees from our previous spinnaker run of ten minutes ago. All-in-all a good set of teamwork and sail-handling to grab a 2nd in conditions that were both confounding and challenging.
A break in the rain and wind prompted a kayak quick trip with rod and reel. Is the fishing rod an excuse to paddle? Or is it the other way around? Doesn't matter. Decent sized post-storm waves kept me inside the breakwater...which is not where the fish were. A cow-nosed ray surfaced close by, and at first I thought it may have been fish. But then my dim brain kicked in and I realized the fin shape was that of a ray, not the dorsal fin of a striper.
Fun trip in waves and beat the next round of rain in by just a few minutes.
With Inc. on vacation, snared a ride on the J92 Dragonfly. Great night, especially after so many light or no air races. Thanks John A!
Torturous evening due to my own incompetence forward of the mast. Best not talked about.
Interesting bulk carrier though!
June 14 – Tues: Arrived at NEB/restive at approx. 3 pm and there was a lot to do on the boat immediately. Plus we had to get our COVID ducks in order. Spent 1st night of six on board RESTIVE.
June 15 – Wed: more boat prep and pickup our Cat 3 guy at the airport. Tons of time waiting in line at SailNewport for boat registration
June 16 – Thurs: we took at least 500 pounds of stuff off the boat and put it in a storage shed. The boat now floats a couple inches higher off the waterline forward of the mast
June 17 – Fri: the start. We were OCS which means a 30 minute penalty is assessed. Windy and very boisterous sea state. By 1800 hrs I was prostrate with sea sickness
June 18 – Sat: Up and feeling better at 0430 hrs. Took the boat off autopilot and drove for an hour before our Cat 3 person came up on the watch-change. He immediately found damage to the mast track and a half hour later we were headed back to Newport. Done. Later, on my 1400 – 1800 hrs watch, the breeze built into the 20s and conditions were ugly, pounding into a large chop with a period of 2 seconds. Retired into berth, but then up again for the 2100 – 0000 watch. This was brutal, breeze climbed into the 30’s with puffs to 38 kn. This was a real test for RESTIVE but hats off to BBY who built a wooden boat that can take a lickin’, and to the diesel too that kept on keeping on. Had the engine failed we would have been in for an uncomfortable night, but had plenty of sea-room to wait until daylight and effect a repair.
June 19 – Sunday: 0430 hrs was rousted “all hands on deck” to assist with getting RESTIVE into a slip. We were laying off NEB about a quarter mile, air temperature 50 and gusting 32. I took one step out of the companionway and turned back below for warmer clothes. We had sailed back into winter. Rest of the day’s priorities were: FOOD – highly recommend Cindy’s Country Café out on rt 114, and getting RESTIVE back to cruising trim.
June 20 – Monday: woke up at 0355 to get our crew member to TF Green for a 0555 flight. It was sad to leave RESTIVE but the boat had done well in the category of safety, especially when we learned of a fatality the previous day on the Morgan of Marietta.
Five pm looked nasty at Marine Max. We were shielded by the three giant SeaLift vessels docked on Clinton Street, but we could see it was blowing 15-20, puffs to 22 out at Key Bridge. This is not exactly BOXCAR's sweet spot and the periodic rain did help encourage us to trudge off into the river. Should I stay or should I go?
Well, we were being shamed as all the other sailboats at the dock fired up their engines and untied. We decided we should at least go out and take a look. And as our astute bowman said, "if we take a look, we're going to race."
And we did. Dillydallying around the dock for so long made us about a minute late for the start. Plus it was too windy to hear a signal from the RC boat, so we never really had clue as to where we were in the sequence.
But all-in-all? It turned out to be a really nice night. The breeze stuck to the 8 - 15 kn range for most of the evening and I think the most we ever saw was 18. We didn't score well, but it was great to be racing instead of sitting at the dock with rain dripping off our baseball caps.
And the O's won!
SATURN'S DAY:
I'd be the first to admit I'm a terrible choice to be PRO for a CBYRA level event. I can maybe handle club racing on a once a season basis. At any rate, it was with no small level of trepidation that I agreed to be PRO for our club's spring CBYRA-sanctioned race. But eveything went pretty well.
I'd gone to a lot of trouble to construct a really pretty colour-coded script file that gauranteed no screw-ups, and I printed out three copies, one for each of the crew. Of course, like a complete idiot I left them on the printer at home...
For those of you have never run a race, a script is the timing you can read out loud to the RC crew to make sure the right flag goes up at the right time and with the right sound. I find that they are pretty much full-proof, but they have to actually be on the boat, not at home on the printer.
And so it went! Luckily, the wind gods were bountyful. The predicted 0-3 kn from everywhere turned out to be a wonderful SSE 10-14 gusting 16. Perfect.
And we had the perfect RC boat, Bryan A's wonderful Tayana "Vancouver" 42, a Robert Harris design that's solid as a rock, yet quite lively to sail, when we took a breather to beam-reach over to Love Point to watch our fleet on their spinnaker runs.
We knew we had to get back to Balto Light to finish the boats, involving a sprint across the CRAiGHILL ENTRANCE CHANNEL, but the Dutch Bulk Ore carrier "SPAARNEGRACHT" had other designs and we had to lay patiently as she went by at 12 knots.
The day was so gorgeous, one of our racers decided to go for a sail after they finished. And the party at the PSA clubhouse was crankin; when we finally docked the RC boat. Thanks again to Bryan and Jamie who made the RC work fun and efficient!
SUNDAY:
Woke up after a decent night's sleep on a boat on a floating dock. Is that a day on the water? I suspect it was. It was a solid seven hours and I staggered up to the clubhouse to wash off the grit from all three quarts of sunscreen I used yesterday for the race. I'm on a scrip for possible Lyme's Disease and it makes folks fry in they are in the sun too long. I figured out why a couple of folks asked me if i "was ok?" the day before. All that zinc-oxide had turned my face an ashen gray and I looked a couple of days from Death's Door.
Back at the boat, I tried to find the wasp that kept me company all night and gave up. It's in there somewhere but apparently it didn't mind me snoring next to it and it left me alone. The giant welt on my neck is from something else.
Good times!
Spent a whole day at the club, did some fiberglass repair and made a new plywood cover for the daggerboard slot. The old one had delaminated to the point of being complete garbage. Good riddance.
Then an hour or two diving into the Oar House to inventory the RC gear for PSA's Moonlight Race on Saturday. As PRO for the race, gotta make sure all is fit and fiddle. As luck would have it, I had all 20-something flags out on the lawn and then the landscaping people showed up to cut the lawn.
Then a Board meeting for the club. It was a long day and I'm taking it as a CC Log day: boat work, race planning and club matters. I'd rather be sailing.