Outing #9: I have a gennaker, and I have used it!

...although I'm not sure I'd say "I know how to use it". That might suggest more knowledge than I have already.



Another day, another "face your fears" episode in the life of the sailing vessel Cathleen. Gail prompted me the last time we went out to get the spinnaker up (she'd asked at least once before that time, too), and I promised that if she got the spinnaker expert, I would finally remember to haul it out of the basement and bring it to the boat so we could give it a try. So she came up with her buddy Jim who has a 34 foot boat (C&C?) and tons of sailing experience.

So we learned a lot today. It turns out, for starters, that I don't have a spinnaker. I have a gennaker, which is an asymmetric spinnaker and is a little bit like a very large, puffy jib. "Puffy", that's a highly technical sailing term, mind you, that I just made up.

You attach the tack of the sail to the boat, and then let the clew fly out. You don't need to use a pole to hold it out. A proper spinnaker flies out on either side of the boat (I'm not sure it has a tack & clew) and the pole is used to hold out one side of the sail. It's very much like a drag chute in reverse - instead of stopping you, it's there to pull you along. They're best for running / sailing downwind. On the other hand, a gennaker is better for sailing a beam reach, and we proved that it's not very good for straight downwind. It kept trying to collapse.

I had never seen the gennaker out. It turns out that it comes with a sock (also called a snuffer) which neatly allows you to tuck the sail into the sock before putting it away. It also means that you can raise the sail but not be wrestling with it catching the wind - you can make sure your lines are all set, that you're ready to go, and then raise the sock to let the sail catch the wind. A *very* nice feature. We studied the sail and components carefully before we left the dock, because as it turns out, for all that they've sailed with spinnakers, this was the first time with a gennaker!

These large sails are a bit scary. They have such a large surface area that with little gusts of wind, they can be very powerful, and so I was quite intimidated. And we did heel over some, but we learned that you can use the main to help control the sail a little bit. We had squirrely wind by the bridge (no surprise) and it was a bit of work to get through. I'm much more comfortable dinking around with sails - relatively speaking, of course - when I'm not near the bridge. The bridge, with its massive pylons, is rather intimidating too.

We got all the way up past the bridge, until I finally cried uncle. We sailed into the wind but downriver on the way back, and didn't have to tack too much. I like sailing with three people - one to control the main, one to tack, one for the tiller. THen you don't have a fourth person in the way. A fourth can work so #3 doesn't have to dash back & forth to manage the jib sheets, but it does get tighter in the cockpit.

What a BEAUTIFUL day to be out on the water. Not burning hot, partly cloudy, pretty steady breeze. Really lovely, and wonderful company. Next weekend I'll try to get onto Jim's boat, and also get the land-locked yacht club out, too.

Here's a girl and her gennaker:



And here's my adventurous crew!


Oh, and docking? Easiest one yet! The currents have dropped so much, I can pretty much head straight into the row, and make a right turn into the slip. Much easier than earlier in the year. Gail & Jim just confirmed my turning timing and gave some feedback on the distance from the dock, but I was actually pretty comfortable. Without the current you can really get a better feeling for the boat speed w/o overcompensating.

Lesson: You can sail without having the sails set up exactly right, but it probably affects the angle that you can use the sail. Lots of lessons about the gennaker (followed up by some additional research after-the-fact). The bead necklace that we couldn't figure out what to do with is used to put the tack of the sail around a roller furling jib. We had the tack tied directly to the bow. Which worked just fine, but probably limited us to more of a broad or beam reach. Another lesson was that we could adjust the main to change some of the airflow into the sail.

Outing 8A: It doesn't count because it wasn't my boat

...and I wasn't docking.

Saturday, August 23rd, a somewhat spontaneous outing with several members of the breakfast crew (or the "land locked yacht club", as I think Mike & Mark have referred to it. Having a boat in the water makes me an associate member). Bruce said he was going out sailing today, and since he's actually leaving for his WORLD ADVENTURES in the next week, there wasn't going to be another opportunity. Well, maybe on Sunday also, but that wasn't the point. He's going to single-hand it (yikes!!!). Alberto may join him for a bit of it.

The 29' Cascade was very interesting. He named it Ruby - she just got lettered today, in brilliant, sparkling red letters. I have pictures! Because guys never get enough photographs, though Mike did take a few too! She was purchased from the sea scouts (who had it as a donated boat) and had rotted wood and even some mushrooms growing on the inside! You wouldn't know it to look at her now. New wood, new engine, new upholstery (no longer that lovely 1974 plaid). Inside she has a dinette that converts to a bed, head, galley, two quarter berths. The general layout is otherwise relatively similar, except my galley slides. A bit more headroom and space - I'll have to ask what a 29's beam is - it felt wider.

It was interesting comparing how Bruce's boat tracked compared with mine. I did feel as though I had to move the a bit tiller more / adjust more. Normal jib, normal winches. We did get to tack back & forth a bit, so there was some practice there. I steered for a little while, but I rather enjoyed being able to sit back for a change and not have to pay quite as much attention. We had the main reefed - apparently they set that up before I got there, because it's much easier to un-reef it when you're out on the water, than to reef it when the wind is high. That makes sense. And even so, we rounded up a few times - the wind was on the stronger side.

I'm rather tempted by this for my boat bottom: putting "eeeEEEEEEeee" on the bottom, below the water line, to be exposed when the boat heels, would be just brilliant!

My sock yarn is going to participate in these travels - Bruce needed some tell-tales on his rigging, and I (surprise, surprise) came up with the yarn. Luckily, I was able to find the center pull end after pulling out a little clump - worked out perfectly becuase I was able to leave him with a little bit as a spare. How many boats out there have hand-dyed superwash yarn as their tell-tales, I ask you? Not many!!

LESSON: Need to learn to reef the sail and plan to do it in advance to be ready for higher winds.

LESSON: You never know when yarn is going to be useful :-)

The crew (a couple photos) and Ruby!


Note, my sock yarn is in the photo, too, right in front of Bruce's face:




Mark messed around with the pole when we were wing on wing:


And of course, the most adorable ducklings!

Outing #8: OWSA rules!

So, Saturday the 15th, Gail from OWSA and I went out for a nice afternoon sail. My boating neighbors were up working on their boat but they were not taking her out. Apparently they drive up from Salem for such events! Yikes! We left around 2:45 or so - the boat was pretty much ready to go, since I arrived a bit early, and off we went. I still struggle a little bit with backing the boat out. I think this needs a bit of practice next time. Perhaps having a line on the dock and a person at the bow holding the line will help keep the bow lined up. Gail did have to push off Kim's boat, but no damage was done, and away we went. The entrance to the slough is getting very shallow - down to under 9 feet. I'm wondering if I need to hug the shore more, because my normal course of travel seems to be shallower than I like.

We were on a broad reach or a beam reach the whole time! There was no jibing, no tacking required. Kind of bizarre, actually. It was like driving an automatic rather than a stick shift - easier to get a bit complacent. Gail wants to get her friend Jim on my boat, and then we can try to get a spinnaker up. I have a homework assignment to read up on them a bit before we try that. She's such a firecracker! She was telling her buddy Jim about me & the boat, and estimated my age to be around 27 or so. And then she asked how old I am! I would guess Jim, when I finally meet him, is going to be a bit surprised that I've worked for Intel for 12 years, eh? But Gail didn't know that, and now I'm under instructions not to tell Jim since she doesn't want him to think that he's being set up.

The sun did come out for a bit, and we had a wonderful breeze (but not too strong). We got up to about 3.7 knots as our top speed, which is pretty good.

LESSON: experiment with picking up speed with puffs by pointing downwind to accelerate and then resume course.

LESSON: Being on portside when docking works too. And it is possible to come into the dock further from the boats for an easier turn in, especially now that the current is lower. But the current was so low, I hardly was pushed back when I turned towards the row - I got impatient waiting and did some more steering and giving the boat more thrust.

Again - no shaking knees!!!! AWESOME!!! I am so going to help with the class next year. I've learned so much, and if you think about doing something 6 times to "get over it" it doesn't sound like all that much, think about doing something that terrifies you...6 times. It feels like it's been an enormous journey to get here. I guess overcoming fear will do that for you.

Here's the skipper and her fearless crew!!!


(Oh, and I did remember to bungee the oven door shut this time. We didn't really heel over, but that's because we were prepared!).

Also note - one of the keel bolts seems to have some water around it. I dried it off - I need to open up that hatch and really dry things off, and then see if it still is getting wet. And I need to check the diesel levels, get the anti-corrosion stuff on the keel bolts, and check battery #1.

Getting my knitting on! Maybe a little ceramics, too.

It's been far too long since I talked about something crafty here, and the Sock Summit in Portland has given me a strong kick-start into getting back into my sock knitting. Buying 5 gorgeous skeins of hand-dyed yarn will do that to a soul. What happens is you realize that (ahem) you never cast on for any of the yarn you bought at OFFF last year and that not one (not ONE) pair of socks had been completed this year! Horrors! The Anne Shaeffer yarn that pooled and stopped the sock-knitting-mojo in its tracks was transformed into a baktus scarf found on Ravelry that I finally completed after a mini-Buffy marathon. I need to get some nice modeling shots of that scarf, but it rained this evening!

With that guilt-inducing project out of the way, I finally kicked off a pair of blue, white, and seafoam green socks that I crossed my fingers and dove in on. I've been rewarded! They're not pooling! (whew!). And it's moving pretty quickly - funny how just a few more episodes of Buffy can do that for you.

I'm also getting ready for a February Lady Sweater. I have the yarn - it's gorgeous Lorna's Laces Worsted, in "Dusk", which is a greyish-lavender. If I can only finish my Pohjan Neito sweater that is still in progress. I'm stuck on the shoulders - it's been long enough that I have forgotten what decreases I've been using. And whether it's an every row decrease or not (I think it is). Garrrrh. Next time I pick it up, I need to just push through and finish the darn thing. Of course, the complicated collar is also next...Need to figure that one out.

Knitting projects:
socks, pohjan neito, february lady sweater, maybe clapotis out of some of that cashmerino? legwarmers. hat (make a couple). fingerless gloves.

So, a lot of knitting going on, eh? Too bad I'd planned to use August to ramp up my ceramics again... I have made progress on restoring the studio to something workable. The wreath, for example, was taken to the dump, along with a bunch of clay that was too dry, other construction-type debris from the yard. Generally a good cleansing - the floor of the studio is pretty much unobstructed. I need to just clear a work area, pick up some clay, and start a project. I'll need to document my progress here. For now, a clear studio is a good start.

Ceramics projects:
buttons
kimono plate?
yarn bowl (prefer with lid
long bathroom tray
little goblin heads for the yard
mugs for Heidi (I can take a hint, eventually)
apple tree planters
trays for orchids
tile for garden
something to replace the mailbox?

Edited to add a few photos...
I kinneared the Yarn Harlot. She probably appeared in about 13,467 photos during the sock summit. But who am I to miss out on an internet knitting phenomena? Not me!


I also finally got a photo of the batkus scarf I finished (and the latest haircut, styled correctly...it won't look this good again until the next time I get a trim):