#14

It was just to nice out not to sail a little bit.  The wind was very light.  The water surface only riffled in patches and the current was still coming in.  I figured even if I just sat there for a while at least I will have come out and done all the business of leaving the slip and motoring out of the marina and raising sail, as well as the return and reverse of it all.  After all, it is the working of a sailboat that is enjoyable to me, and even though I love being on a long tack and just feeling the wind on my face, it is actually all the pulling of lines, setting of sail that is interesting and part of the game of figuring out how to trick the wind into taking me where I want to go.
As it turned out I was able to sail, and even make distance to windward and against the tide.  I forget that this boat is much more slippery because of the underbody.  It has so much less wetted surface area than I am used to having on my boats.
With all the sail up that we could muster, the genny and the full main, we coaxed a gurgle out of the wake that the boat cut.  Kind of hard for me to believe really.  On the leg, upwind and across the current we kept the sails just filled but the illusion was as if there was no wind at all.  Still, we made our distance.
I sheeted in the genny just about as far as I could and then before I sheeted in the main I took a line and used it as a cunningham to tighten up the luff and pull out some of the belly of the very blown out sail.  This seemed to work very well and actually gave a pretty good shape.  The telltales on the jib were streaming out horizontally, like they were painted on and the sound of the wake picked up a note.  Pretty good for a 44 year old boat with a used, old, and mis sized mainsail.
Even though it was only an hour or so of sailing it was quite pleasant to not have to wear foulies and gloves and I even took to the shadow of the sail a few times to avoid the sunshine.  That was unfamiliar and made me smile.
We are down to $35 a sail now and the quality of each sail seems to be on the increase!
The marina is starting to get active.  The power boaters have begun to return.  Why do they always seem to have such mundane, jejune, names on their boats?  Anyway, soon my time in the slip will be up and it will be just as well as I will start to be unhappy when going to the marina at the thought of the people who will be showing up in increasing number.
I suppose I should go over the trailer soon and make sure it made it thru the winter alright.