First Solo Sail
Just got the sails up and took a picture to document it.
Did my first solo sail this past weekend and I lived to tell about it. There has been a lot going on and I have not been great at getting it posted but wanted to post this and then try to fill in the blanks a bit.
Being a long weekend this past Friday, I ran a bunch of errands and ended up at the boat in the later afternoon to meet with a contact who I had been talking to about doing some repairs on the trailer. I forgot my keys so it was a climb up the trailer ladder to get on the boat. I met with Paul to talk about working on the trailer and we made a plan for him to work on it this week. This meant I had to launch the boat so he could work on the trailer. As I had been in the UK the last week and half for work I was a bit jet lagged and after meeting with Paul I just headed home.
The last two weeks I have been going over launching the boat by myself in my mind and I have the launching part playing through very well. The pulling the boat out not so much yet but I figure I can handle it if needed. I am also determined to do more sailing and since I am not exactly attracting a crowd for crew I have pretty much decided that means solo sailing and the sooner I come to grips with that the better. while I was in the UK I met up with a work colleague who is quite an accomplished solo and short-handed sailor and I was feeling quite inspired. So my plan was to launch the boat on Saturday and go for a sail and then to leave the boat in the water for a couple days while the trailer gets worked on. To be honest on one hand I was determined to do this but on the other hand it was a bit daunting.
Saturday morning dawned, a bit early due to the jet lag, but after enough sleep. I made up my mind to head to the marina with a stop for a good breakfast and a stop at Svendsen’s for some stuff. More to come on that in some other post. I headed out to my current favorite breakfast place, Apple Fritter, and had a good breakfast. Got to Svendsen’s just after they opened got my stuff and headed to the boat. I got there late enough that the early morning rush on the lift had passed as I felt I might be a bit slow launching. As part of the movie I had played in my mind there were a couple things I needed to change in my routine to make it all work. First thing was to move the backstay over to the starboard side of the boat so that the crane would clear it on the port side. That would save a couple trips up and down the ramp from the crane to the dock and remove one possible complication. A single shackle and that was accomplished. The other thing was to use my long bow and stern lines and tie them together leaving a bit of a tail on them so the lines formed a bridle with a tail. This would mean I could control the boat in the air with one hand and tie it off from the crane without having to run down to the dock. I’ll have to take a picture for this all to make sense but it is all about being able to control the boat while it is on the crane without having to run around from the dock to the platform where the crane is and the trailer you launch from is.
Okay, I have convinced myself to explain it a bit more. The crane is on a concrete platform that is about 20 feet above the water. You back the boat as far back over the edge of this platform as you can and so that the pick up point is where the crane can reach it. The crane is basically a large post with a swinging boom with a chain and hook at the end of the boom. The chain and hook are controlled by a remote control while the boom swing is controlled by a large wheel that you turn which is geared to swing the boom. The size of my boat is such that when the hook is at its highest point my boat is about 6 inches above my trailer which is just enough. The boat has a single large eye hook that screws into the keel of the boat and then has a loop of strong rope that comes up just outside the hatch which I attach to the hook. I also have 4 other lines that attach from the hook to the sides of the boat. The idea is that these keep things from swinging front to back and side to side to too much. Once you have the boat lifted off the trailer I use the bow and stern lines to keep it from swinging around too much while I then swing the crane out over the water which is about 20 feet down and lower it down into the water. All the while keeping it from swinging around. Where the boat drops into the water there is a dock at water level and to get there you walk around the side of the platform, down a ramp and back around to the front. The launching platform is about the size of 2 tennis courts. So once the boat is in the water it is still on the hook and therefore not going anywhere. I lower the hook enough to be slack so I can remove it but before I do that I use the lines to secure the boat. Once the boat is off the hook I can move the boat forward and out of the way. This is where the backstay becomes important as I can just slide the boat forward without having to go up again and move the crane. What I actually did was to kick the boat way out and then slide it backwards around the crane before bringing it back in and tying it up. Then the last step is to go back up, move the crane back out of the way and to put the now empty trailer back in the parking spot. Fun thing is that they have two small electric tractor like things for moving boats around. They look like airport luggage trailer tractors but are smaller. I have discovered the best way of driving the boat and trailer around the marina is to connect the hitch at the front of the tractor and push the boat around backwards. That is the boat and trailer are moving backwards but the tractor is moving forward. Means you are sitting looking at what is going on instead of having to turn around to look behind you. It is a bit odd driving as you have to do all your steering in reverse but it works much better. Okay, so that was a long diversion.
Got the boat in and loaded my day gear and then futzed around with my sails. The idea was that while I was at the dock was a much better time to futz around that after I launched. I also played around with my auto-tiller for the first time and figured out the basics of how it works since it would be important for sailing by myself. While I was futzing around a group of students from the local sailing school came in for lunch. They were all impressed that I was going to go sailing by myself in a boat that was considerably bigger than their boat. I admit I got some confidence from this. And then after all my excuses had evaporated and I had nothing more to futz around with off I went.
It was an odd day for the bay as I motored out of the marina area the wind was coming from the North which is the opposite of the usual wind direction. It was light but steady which was perfect for my first solo sail. I got out into the entrance channel put the auto pilot on, put the motor into a slow idle and point into the wind to raise the main sail. That went surprisingly well with basically no drama at all. Once I had that settled down and I was sailing, I did it all again and raised the jib. And, off I went in a lovely breeze across the bay towards Angel island. About halfway across I realized I hadn’t turned on any tracking on my instruments or notified anyone I was doing this so while everything was going well I turned on my tracking and let my daughter know I was out sailing. I was heading a bit down from Angel island but with the wind and current (an ebb tide running out the bay), I thought this might be the day I go around Angel Island. With the wind direction I decided to come into Angel island tack up across Raccoon straight and then turn to go down the straight. Getting back once I got out there I figured I would deal with once I got there. I saw other boats ahead of me doing the same thing and was quite stoked about it as this is a big goal for me right now. I was debating how close to get to Angel Island before I did my tack to get me to the straight. As I was debating the wind shut down. And now close to Angel island that ebb tide was generating a pretty strong current going the opposite way to what I wanted to go. I was not now drifting backwards with very little wind. Hmmmm! Time for a rethink of my plans.
At this point the wind had started up again but now was coming from the usual Southwest direction and I was in the lee wind shadow of Angel island in a pretty wicked current taking me the wrong way. So after taking a bit of time to get my bearing I knew I needed to get aware from the island to get back into some steady breeze. The Southwest wind never quite filled in but I managed to get myself away from the island and the worst of the current and then headed back for the marina. It was getting late in the afternoon and my progress in the light breeze wasn’t great. I was having a good time and enjoying myself so I wasn’t worried. I had plenty of fuel in case I needed to motor back but for now it was a lovely late afternoon on the bay. During this time I even saw a porpoise come up to the boat. No pictures because it was over so quickly.
Sunset glow over downtown San Francisco
I made it back to the channel entrance as the sun went down and the wind completely shut down. I put the auto-tiller on while I took the sails down. With no wind though the auto-tiller got itself all confused and was driving me around in circles. Around this time a ferry went by too so the boat was rolling around in the wake from that. I did look and the Richmond fire boat was out doing some sort of display with their hoses. I guess they must have got the notice that I had just solo sailed. After taking a quick picture of them going by, I got the sails down, got the motor started and set off into the marina. I ran around the boat getting my dock lines and fenders ready while trying to keep the boat on a reasonable course. Made it back to the marina, lined up on the slip I had been assigned, shut off the motor and smoothly glided into the slip, stepped off the boat and secured my dock lines. It was almost magical and I felt pretty good about myself. I had just solo sailed my boat safely on SF bay.
Richmond fire boat out celebrating Lorne’s first solo sail
I got the boat tidied up a bit had some snacks for dinner and pretty much just went to bed. I was thinking about sailing again on Sunday and as I drifted off to sleep was playing through that movie in my mind. I was awoken a couple times during the night by strange noises and bumps around the boat. At one point I adjusted some of my dock lines so the boat was moving around slightly differently. I had a good night’s sleep and woke up in the morning well rested but also exhausted at the same time. I figure the mental stress of the previous day along with jet lag was catching up to me. I puttered around the boat for a while and had some breakfast bars. I noticed that a couple of my stanchions had developed rather large cracks in them and that they were rather unsafe. At this point that was the decision point that I decided to just pack the boat up and head home. It took me a while to put away the sails. Sounds easy but imagine trying to neatly roll up a sail that is 33 long and 12 feet on its foot while on a boat that is only 8 feet wide next to a dock that is only about 4 feet wide by yourself. I can tell you it wasn’t easy and the rolled up sail that ended up going into the sail bag was not the prettiest or neatest roll but I got it done and into the boat.
With the boat packed up I headed home for an afternoon or researching replacement stanchions for the boat. After some research and contacting a couple contacts. I discovered that the current stanchions are the original ones from when the boat was built in 1983 and that the company that made them is still in business and still makes them albeit with a couple improvements to make them stronger. Since two of the stanchions have cracks in them and they are all 40 years old I figure the others are probably not far from having problems so a new set of six is in order. There is a new set of stanchions ordered up which will take a couple weeks which is fine as I will be away over Thanksgiving anyway.
Today, Monday, I got some good news on the trailer. After grinding on it there is less repairs needed that we initially thought. So, only a couple metal bits cut off and being replaced. Hopefully they can get that done tomorrow before the rain expected this week comes. So, may need to drive up and pull the boat tomorrow evening. Ahh, boat ownership such fun.