Enoch’s Thoughts

May 3, 2010

Three Hour Tour

Filed under: Uncategorized — etblog @ 10:42 am

The Skipper and Ginger went for a sail yesterday. The sailing club had a 25-foot Catalina available, and the weather looked promising. You want wind, but not too much, and sun, but not too much.

It had been so long that I had to actually use the pre-sail checklist. Speaking of which, there’s a new book about the benefits of checklists, written by Atul Gawande. I recommend ’em highly.

As required by the marina, we motored out of the no-wake zone then hoisted the main. Turns out the previous user had left it half-reefed, which gave the sail a really funny, bellied-out shape. Since there was traffic in the Big Creek inlet, I didn’t want to float around straightening it out, so we unfurled the jib and limped on out into the main channel.

It didn’t take long to hank the bitter end of the reef line onto the leech reef point and set sail under a properly-reefed main, at least as far as my novice eye could tell. (You can always tell a novice sailor by his indiscriminate over-use of sailing terminology. But you can’t tell him much.)

The wind was consistent, if a bit gusty. No “bob-and-bake”, thank goodness.

Ginger is actually a better crew than I am a skipper. She calmly hangs on when a puff heels us over, and can even catch a nap on the leeward side mere inches away from the waves.

Since the wind was blowing directly out of the club slip area, it took us longer to get back than usual, but it was really good just to get on the water and brush up our mad tacking skillz. We’re not quite ready for the America’s Cup yet. I would say perhaps the Neighborhood Cup, but since I know how well some of my neighbors can sail, I think I will go for the Neighborhood Shot Glass (whatever that is.)

The rest of the weekend was delightful, with two music gigs, some visiting progeny and their quite qute quadrapeds, interspersed with some great meals. The afternoon tour around the lake capped it off nicely.

Now off to work to get some rest. 🙂

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