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Best day of sailing in the last three years

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lcharlot
Master Marine Consultant

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Antigua and Barbuda
1301 Posts

Initially Posted - 05/06/2012 : 12:57:27

I arrived at Folsom Lake Marina at 12:30 yesterday and they had the red flag up at the entrance station: this means Small Craft Advisory! Look at the wind speed report from Folsom Dam:

FOLSOM DAM (FLD) WIND SPEED REPORT
DATE TIME MPH
05/05/2012 12:31 14
05/05/2012 13:04 15
05/05/2012 13:33 15
05/05/2012 13:57 22
05/05/2012 14:32 20
05/05/2012 15:05 16
05/05/2012 15:29 14
05/05/2012 16:03 22
05/05/2012 16:26 19
05/05/2012 17:04 17
05/05/2012 17:33 19
05/05/2012 18:03 18
05/05/2012 18:31 21
05/05/2012 19:05 17
05/05/2012 19:34 18

It was crazy out on the lake, whitecaps with 3' wind waves, but I had the lake almost completely to myself. I saw only a handful of powerboats all day, and surprisingly only a couple of other sailboats (not counting windsurfers and kite boarders, of which there were a dozen or more). One of these other brave (or crazy?) sailors was two-time Catalina 25 National Champion "HO'Okolohe", under full jib
and mainsail with one reef. Even with the main reefed, it looked like too much sail, and I saw Skipper Scott "Death or Glory" Hefty put the rail under water at least a couple of times. Fortunately I have roller furling (which Scott doesn't), so at first I tried sailing with about half of my 135 genny deployed, but in the gusts even this was too much sail for my comfort, so for most of the next six hours I was sailing with only the main and still averaging 5 knots on a close reach! The wind direction was generally out of the north-west. The Folsom Dam report shows the wind tracking from about 320º to 360º for the six hours I was out there. This wind direction generally kept me on a SW or NE track, shuttling back and forth between Dike 8 and Peter's Point at the entrance to South Fork. For a short time around 18:30, the wind died down a little and I ran the genny out, beam reaching on a SE course, and getting boat speed in the mid 6's, with occasional bursts to 7.1 knots (GPS speed). After six hours I had had enough and headed in, arriving back at my slip at
19:30. What a day! 32.4 NM on my GPS track log in 6.5 hours - that's probably a record for me - and all of it pure sailing, except for a few minutes of motoring in the marina basin at the beginning and end of the day. The weather was perfect, bright and sunny, and not too hot or too cold, except when I got a faceful of spray off the bow wave a few times. Just cold enough to be refreshing, if you know what I mean. Life for a sailor doesn't get any better than this!

Larry Charlot
Catalina 25WK/TR Mk. IV #5857 "Quiet Time"
Folsom Lake, CA

"You might get there faster in a powerboat, but in a sailboat, you're already there"

Edited by - lcharlot on 05/06/2012 13:00:48

delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 05/06/2012 : 13:32:24

That sounds like a good day. Reminds me of simpler days on my old catamaran, just sailing for the fun of it.

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Stinkpotter
Master Marine Consultant

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Djibouti
9082 Posts

Response Posted - 05/06/2012 : 13:56:26

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by delliottg
 ...Reminds me of simpler days on my old catamaran, just sailing for the fun of it.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">You can't do that on your C-250? I will admit that my favorite pure sailing is hiked out on a planing Laser, Sunfish, Force 5, etc., in 15-20 knots of wind with a short enough fetch that I'm not submarining through the waves.

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delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 05/06/2012 : 15:15:09

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">You can't do that on your C-250? I will admit that my favorite pure sailing is hiked out on a planing Laser, Sunfish, Force 5, etc., in 15-20 knots of wind with a short enough fetch that I'm not submarining through the waves.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
I find sailing on Puget Sound, particularly Elliott Bay, somewhat stressful compared to lake sailing. I never had to dodge commercial traffic before, time my comings and goings to coincide with favorable tides and currents. Just getting to the bay can be stressful if barges are transiting the river at the same time as you. They take up about 70% of the width, so I try to not be on the same part of the river they're on, or hold in a part they can't get to, but those are very limited, so I keep an ear on 13, 14, 16 just to stay on top of what's happening before I even leave my slip. My last boat didn't even have a fixed VHF, just my handheld that sat on 16.

I think part of my problem is I've never actually single handed SL, where before, I almost always did on my other two boats. I need to just go out and figure it out. I've got an autopilot to keep me on course when raising/lowering sails, I just never have. I plan to, but I've also been planning to for several years.

If the wind has piped up a bit, I have to add in the fear factor for Rita which adds to the stress. When we go sailing, I hope for winds below about 8 knots now. If it were just me, I'd be fine cracking along in 20 knots I think.

Once I'm out of Elliott Bay, the sound opens up quite a bit, but you're almost immediately in the VTS between Seattle & Tacoma, so you have to get across that (and at this point you're about 90 minutes into your sail). You get a stretch in between the marker for Duwamish Head and Alki Point that's relatively traffic free as long as you stay to the far north along Magnolia or far south along Alki Beach, in between are constant ferries, and commercial traffic transiting in and out of Port of Seattle. That includes barges under tow, fishing vessels, cruise ships, freighters, tour boats (the worst, no offense) and harbor patrol buzzing around all of them. Stressful. Your head's on a constant swivel making sure someone isn't sneaking up on you.

Lake sailing had almost none of that, even Lake Washington was comparively pretty sedate, just go out and sail till you got tired, then go back to your slip.

Edited by - on

GaryB
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
4306 Posts

Response Posted - 05/06/2012 : 15:17:06

Glad you had one of those perfect sailing days Larry!

When I came in yesterday afternoon it was 90 degrees with approx 80% humidity. I was about to pass out by the time I got the boat cleaned up.

My favorite days were on Canyon Lake back in the '70s flying a hull on my Hobie 16.

Edited by - on

JimGo
Admiral

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USA
962 Posts

Response Posted - 05/06/2012 : 19:35:39

Sounds like the perfect "get your mind off of work" day! Glad you were able to enjoy it!

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John Russell
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
3444 Posts

Response Posted - 05/07/2012 : 08:25:43

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by delliottg
 That sounds like a good day. Reminds me of simpler days on my old catamaran, just sailing for the fun of it.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">There's no other reason to hoist the main.

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PCP777
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
1225 Posts

Response Posted - 05/07/2012 : 09:35:15

This weekend was nice. Slept on the boat on Friday night. Was going to go sailing but a storm blew through so I chilled with my power boat friends. Saturday was glorious, went sailing with my friends on the C-27. Saturday late afternoon took my boat out and dropped the hook at Red Barn Cove. There I met some friends in a C-310 and we tied up and road out a pretty tough wind tied together with boat anchors out, didn't drag an inch.

You can get the idea of the wind from this pic.

Sunday morning, sailed to Gloria's at the harbor, had migas with mimosas and then went sailing. Terrific day. At one point it got cloudy and the wind stiffened so I just rolled up some head sail to keep it relaxed for the family. Towards the end of the day did some trolling off the stern and caught and released three sand bass in less than a half hour.

Yeah I am glad I don't have to dodge commercial traffic, we just have to be aware of the drunks in big power boats.

Edited by - on

JohnP
Master Marine Consultant

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1520 Posts

Response Posted - 05/07/2012 : 14:22:36

ÜFantastic that you had such a good day!

I took a long weekend to go sailing and saw amazing lightning on Thursday night when storms passed to the north and simultaneously to the south of my anchorage. Friday gave me no wind, but I scrubbed the decks, emptied the holding tank, cleaned off the through-deck connector pins for the mast lights, and had a gorgeous moonrise over the Chesapeake.

Saturday, there was 5 knots of wind in the morning and 10 knots in the afternoon. When coming back home, I was passed by the topsail schooner Sultana out of Chestertown, MD.

The Sultana is a reproduction of an old ship and is used for [url="http://www.schoonersultana.com/schoonersultana.htm"]educational cruises[/url] of various sorts on the Bay.

It was a peaceful time out on the water.

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OLarryR
Master Marine Consultant

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USA
3468 Posts

Response Posted - 05/07/2012 : 19:37:09

John - I think you need to bring a cannon with you next time in case they try to board you.

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sailing2
Deckhand

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USA
23 Posts

Response Posted - 05/30/2012 : 14:19:12

Larry, thanks for the nice write-up. Yes we had a 150 and reefed main, and averaged 6.5 knots with some long spurts in the 7 plus range. That turned out to be our last sail as owner's of Ho'Okolohe, which we had owned for a quarter of a century. The following week she was purchased by one of the sailors we had aboard.

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