Sailing Aug 13

Andrew, Grace, my son Will and I did a nice sail on Saturday (13).   Grace had just completed a 2 week dingy sailing class so I thought it would be nice for her to see what a big boat sailed like.

At around 11 the air seemed completely calm, but I knew that the bay in the summer is never still after noon.  By 11:30 when we headed out the wind was building to 17+ kts.

We left pier 39 and headed toward the Gate on a close haul.   Grace was a little concerned about the boat heeling.  I explained that unlike the small boats it is very hard to get a keel boat to go all the way over. 

About a mile from the gate we went to a beam reach and picked up speed.  I think we had a flood current, because when we entered Racoon Straits the GPS said we were doing 9.5 kts.  

We went around Angel and headed south to round Treasure Island.   When passed under the construction we had to share the bridge opening with a barge and the Tug pushing it.  He was heading north.

Strangely when we rounded the Island and headed north again I saw the same Tug and Barge heading south on the other side of Treasure Island.  I thought maybe he was doing a training run?

The weather was great, I never even had to put a sweat shirt on .

We finished around 3 and the Crew got to learn the joys of scrubbing the deck.

Sailing With Will

 Today, Will and I went for a nice light wind sail.   I was a little too warm with my
sweat shirt.  We motored out to  the Golden Gate Bridge and tried to do a little sailing.  The tide
was ebbing at about 1.5 kts.  We sailed / motored to Point Bonita lighthouse.  We saw some dolphins and

a harbor seal as well as the SF fire boat.  Once back under the Gate we were able to reach home. 

Sunday Sail

We went for a sail yesterday.  We sailed up to the gate on main alone as the crew doesn't like to the

 boat to heal over very much.   We reached back with the boat sailing very well.  

When we got back to the dock we discovered a seagull with a hook in its mouth and leg attached together by 6 inches of line.  I caught the bird and we managed to remove the hooks.   The bird bled a bit, but I am hopeful it will survive.

Took Rogers family to Angel Island

We had a nice sail to Angel.  Started out later than expected, we had 2 teen girls along.   My family decided not to go so they went with Sue and Alex to the Tech.  I had Roger, his Mom and Sister and bother, Sues sister her daughter and Matti, 8 in all including me.   We left Pier 39 around 11:30 and got to Angel about 1.  We were fighting a strong tide.   The wind was strong.  Even when we left it was already blowing at 17 kts.  We barely managed to get a spot to dock.  I had to kind of cut in front of some poky sail boats.   We ate lunch on the boat, I was surprised that all 8 of us fit in the galley.  The girls took a nap after lunch.  On the sail back we saw winds in the mid 20's.  When the wind started getting too strong for comfort  tried to roll in the main.   Unfortunately the furling unit slipped off the roller on the mast and I had to go forward to re hook it up.


Good sail, first in about 6 weeks.

January sailing.

I hadn't sailed in a long time and since the weather looked bad
I decided to drag Bryan out for a sail. When we arrived at the
marina it started to rain and Bryan stared to get cold feet (wimp). 
I talked him into going and we sailed out in the rain.   The wind
was good, 10 -15 knots from the North.  We reached up to the
golden gate bridge and turned east to pass north of Alcatraz.  
We saw a couple of other crazy sailors, and a large number of
seals.   The weather cleared up as soon as we got back to Pier 39. 
I decided to pump the head and discovered that my boat has a
much deeper draft than the water in front of the pumping station.
We had to make several attempts to get close enough and  we
ended up backing in and stretching the hose to the max length.


It was good to get out of the office on a Friday for a couple
of hours none the less.

Sunday sail

Becky, Will, Tom and myself went for a Sunday sail.   We got to Pier 39 and I expected we wouldn't have much wind, but it actually gusted up to 25 kts.   We sailed up to the gate and back.   Will took the wheel for awhile.

We had a small problem rolling up the Jib, it got loose and twisted up.   I had to go forward to untangle it.

The seals have started invading our side of the marina.   I hope they don't get too agressive.

A warm Wednesday sail on SF bay.

Took off at about 11:30 from work to go sailing.   It looked a little discouraging as it was hot, still and humid with high clouds.  We got to the boat and discovered one of my dock lines was almost completely severed.  The swell at pier 39 is incredible!   I had some guests stay overnight on the boat and they got somewhat sea sick in the dock!   We shoved off at about 12:30 with little to no wind.   Out on the bay the wind was better about 7 knots.   We raised that main and jib and Bryan noticed that the Head of the Jib didn't unfurl correctly (I have a roller furling main).   We tried a number of things to fix this: rolled it in and out,  fractionally lowered the main and such.   Nothing seemed to untwist it.   So I brought the main all the way down.  Even on deck I had to use channel locks to untwist it.   The fabric was twisted and 2 folds couldn't fit through the slot, but eventually working it back and forth I was able to straighten it out.   We then started raising the sail and of course the wind then increased to about 15 knots.   We had to turn on the motor and turn the boat into the wind to be able to  raise it.   We had a lot of difficulty as the bolt rope kept coming out of the groove. 

After it was up we sailed to the gate.  The wind at the gate was 24 knots.   I recently had the rigging re-done and the boat felt more balanced then it ever had before.  We turned around under the gate and reached back to pier 39. 

We heard a call on the radio about a Santana 27 on the rocks near the Berkeley marina.   He was calling Vessel assist.  The asked if he was in danger.   Some idiot also on channel 16 was trying to get a guest slip at pier 39 and kept answering that he wasn't in danger and just wanted a slip.   Eventually Vessel Assist got the message that he was in danger and the Coast guard immediately cut in and said they would take care of it.  

The wind died again near Pier 39 but it was a great 2 1/2 hour sail.