Grandma and Grandpa go sailing ("What about Dad?")

We had an excellent family sail with the Anderson Grandparents on Friday (June 23). They were visiting from New Mexico, and haven't sailed much. In fact, I'm pretty sure the only other times they have sailed was with us. They couldn't have picked a better weekend to visit. The weather was perfect.

All aboard.

We arranged to leave about noon which means we were underway more like 12:30pm. It always takes a bit of time to get loaded and checked out. We had a northerly wind so we tried sailing out of the harbor, but the currents were too strong. The tide was just coming in. This should have been a sign, a shot across the bow so to speak, but we didn't clue in completely. The currents were going to come back to haunt us.

Our ultimate goal was Anthony's restaurant in Tacoma. We'd never been there so it would be an adventure to find the guest moorage and restaurant. We realized we needed to compensate for some current so we kept our course slightly north of our destination.

Almost immediately after turning of the motor and getting under full sail we had our first overboard. No no. Not a person overboard, but a life jacket. This was better than a drill because it was so unexpected. I'm not sure how exact I was to the method, but I was able to stop the boat right next to the jacket. A successful rescue!!!! But not the last.

A tasty dinner at Anthony's on Ruston Way near Tacoma.

By this time we were commenting on the current but not fully realizing our situation. We had drifted south towards the bridge. When looking at landmarks from the water, it takes quite a distance before one can perceive motion past it. We had drifted further past Point Defiance than we thought. Still, we had the motor so we weren't worried. Then another rescue.

Again, not a person, but an item. One daughter carelessly tossed another's hat to her and it went sailing overboard. Things went smoothly again and we rescued the hat.

The all too familiar act of motoring.

At this point, the wind was calm and we were clear back on the peninsula side of the sound again. We .

decided to motor and that's when we began to realize what the current was doing. It took us forever to get up and around the point. Once around the point we hoisted the sails and continued on, but by the time we got there, it had been 5 hours

We had a lovely dinner at Anthony's and a brisk sail back to the harbor after that. It took less than an hour to get back. On the way home we passed the large freighter that's holding the new bridge sections. It was very impressive.

All in all, a great sail.

Woody

My first sail in "Wee Blow"

I finally did it. I took the plunge, but I didn't take a plunge. I finally took the little sailing dinghy I built on it's maiden sailing voyage. I was suprised at how challenging it turned out to be. Not just getting it to the water, but all the associated mental hurdles.

First I had to buy a trailer. Since I hadn't planned on needing to use a trailer I wanted to spend as little money as possible on something that would work. I found what I needed at Harbor Freight; a folding trailer that you put together yourself. Compared to other trailers it was cheap, but like I said, I didn't want to buy a trailer in the first place so I had some anxiety about putting down the money. And then I had to put it together.

Thank goodness for pictures because some companies cannot produce useful instructions using English. At one point, the instructions told me to tighten a bolt "smugly". I only had to hope I wouldn't ruin the trailer because I wasn't feeling smug. I managed to get it all together with only 5-10 spare pieces. Not bad.

That was the easy part. The hard part was finding a way to pull the trailer. I am getting a hitch put on our car soon, but I don't have it yet. My neighbor offered to let me use his truck. I don't like borrowing other peoples cars. It's too risky in my opinion. On top of that, I've never owned or pulled a trailer. And, on top of that, I've never launched a boat.

So, without any experience, I was going to take someone elses truck, with my new trailer attached, back it down a boat ramp, unload the boat, and get the truck back up the ramp all by myself. Maybe I'm a wimp, but there it is. I had anxiety. I did a lot of pacing around the kitchen before finally driving off and doing it.

What can I say. It went well. Loading and unloading the boat posed little problem. I was glad there wasn't a lot of activity. That helped a lot.

Now to the sailing. The boat really zips along. IT was a lot of fun. I had a stiff breeze and clear skys which made me comfortable. At one point the rudder came off which was a bit of a fiasco, but I made it back to the dock with the oars and got it back on. At another point, the boom fell off (the lower boom) because one of my knots came loose. Again, I was able to recover. The leeboard and rudder needed extra tightening. Overall, I was very pleased. It was able to sail the various points of sail. I was able to go where I needed to go.

Now I need to get the hitch on so I can go when I want.