Happiness comes the way the wind blows- M Lermentov
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Sail report
Sunday, August 1, 2021
Lk St Clair
This is what it looks like to spend 6 hours sailing on Lk St Clair in near perfect conditions.
After a quick temporary fix to seal up the hole in the deck where the starboard side dorade box used to be, we had a quick lunch on the boat, and then headed out onto the water. It was so nice to have other sailors in the club smile and wave to us and say hi to Feather as we passed. I'm really enjoying the camaraderie of the NSSC. There was a little rain and possible thunderstorms rumbling around the area, but Chuck thought we could get a couple of hours of sailing in before they hit.
The lake was hazy as we sailed out, but we had a little company anyway. This kind of weather dissuades a lot of power boaters, but the wind is hard for sailors to resist.
We started with a single reef point on the main, but quickly decided we needed a second one, and we didn't have it set up, so Chuck went forward to rig.
Finally, we were scooting right along at hull speed with 2 reefs on the main and less than half a Genny.
We caught the edge of this band of rain with the serious weather passing to the south of us.
We watched as the rain sheeted down on the Lake .
You know what is a good thing when it's raining on a sailboat? Windows. Windows are a good thing.
This is what Windfinder predicted for our sail.
This is what the NWS reported for conditions.
I don't think either were accurate to the conditions we were seeing in the middle of the lake. Chuck estimated sustained winds of 20 to 30 over the course of the sail with gusts to 40.
We returned to NSSC in clear skies with a strong wind (that made music take two passes to dock the boat.
It was a good day on the Lake. For us... Others didn't have such a good day.
MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY!
We were monitoring Channel 16 on the marine radio and we listened to several reports of vessels in distress. One was a sailboat struggling near Erie in Canada (a possible/likely) waterspout was reported off Sarnia (https://twitter.com/dave_sills/status/866616362340405248/photo/1). This situation was later reported as resolved by the Canadian Coast Guard.
In another series of calls, someone reported a sinking boat adrift with no sign of people aboard (possibly in the water, which was bad). We listened intently as the Coast Guards (both Canadian and American) responded on marine radio. After a tense 20 minutes or so, another boater reported that the passengers aboard that sinking boat had been picked up and taken to Brownies in St Clair Shores. As far as we could tell, the boat still sank but at least there was no loss of life.
This caller did everything right. He spoke calmly and clearly, reporting everything he saw (and nothing extra), responding to Coast Guard questions, and staying on the radio. He gave clear descriptions with GPS coordinates (we're sure the CG scrambled a chopper right away). For me and Chuck, this led to a great discussion/review of what to do in case of an emergency on our boat. Just like our practice with Feather Overboard drills, it's important to talk through what you will do in case of emergency, before you need to use it.
July 23, 2021 Lk St Clair So far we've been incredibly lucky with Feather aboard...in that she's actually stayed aboard. The few times (including tonight before we launched) that she's ended up in the water, it has been from the dock. The statistics for a Man Overboard are pretty grim: ( https://www.great-lakes-sailing.com/man_overboard.html ) With years of kayaking experience between us, Chuck and I are fairly certain that we can stay calm in the case that one of us goes overboard, and we're very good about being appropriately geared up. Even more importantly, we regularly talk about what we will do if.... For the sake if this discussion, we should consider Feather a non -swimmer, at least for now. So far, when she has fallen off the dock, she has stayed on top of the water, but mostly it seems she's trying to climb on top of the water, more than that she is comfortably swimming in it. Just like the practice that I'm writing about now, we o...
June 14, 2021 Presque Isle Presque Isle has two lighthouses, the old and the new, but it's not what you might think. The first one we saw coming into the harbor, towering over the trees is the "New" lighthouse, built in 1870. We didn't have the opportunity to see this one up close and personal. The Old Lighthouse, though, built in 1840, was a short hike from the harbor, and a short hike was exactly what Feather needed after we docked and had dinner (chili with cornbread, cooked while underway). I'm so grateful to the people who have worked so hard to preserve bits and pieces of the past so that we can not only read about, but also experience (in a small way), how things were done, so that we can imagine how things may be done. People to whom history is not disposable. From the keepers of the lighthouse: to the keepers of the light, those who collect the bits and pieces of lives long past, and preserve them for us to learn how places and things are connected: an...
August 1-10, 2022 Twice in two weeks, Twoflower has come upon a search for a missing boater, both with unhappy endings. The first, on August 1, brought an amazing day sailing to a very somber close. After a gorgeous high wind day on the lake, winds in the mid to high 20s, gusting to the low 30s, Twoflower sailed into the middle (literally) of a Coast Guard (CG) search. Huron Point and the mouth of the Clinton River are home to Twoflower (North Star Sail Club, NSSC) and is an area where the CG often do drills. I'd noticed the Macomb Sheriff boat lights near Metro Beach, but again, on the weekend this is all too common. We are usually tuned in to channel 16 on the radio, and we hadn't heard anything, so we thought little of either the Sheriff presence or the CG. At the time, I was at the helm, and it's quite likely that I was driving like a drunken sailor (although we never drink under sail). We actually joked that they were coming to investigate my driving. ...
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