Century Club: Tim Ford

Saturday was Work Party Day at PSA, when 40 - 50 club members and friends show up to spiff up the premises, pull the moorings in the mooring field and build and replace rotted floating docks. 

I spent some time on the water by jumping on both of the docks we were replacing and acting as a "tillerman" on the ride over to the ramp, whereby these heavy water-logged structures are yanked up the boat ramp, dragged uphill to where a 30-foot dumpster is stationed and then chainsaws reduce the wreakage to sizes that will fit into the dumpster. 

I called it "Life on the Mississippi" but I really didn't do much except have a pleasant ride over to the ramp, and then stay aboard to keep the things stationed where they wouldn't interfere with floating the brand NEW docks, as they are unleased and crunch down the ramp to splash in the creek. 

As always, PSA Work Parties are amazing with the sheer amount of volunteer labour members put in, not to mention the array of talents, knowledge and general DIY industriousness displayed,

FUN DAY!

The MRSA Race to the Lighthouse got cancelled and I was just planning on another kayaking stint, perhaps tossing some lures around in the rising tide.  But instead, I got seduced into going out on Mr. Floyd's Corsair 27.  (BTW, I think the Corsair 27 is one of the top five boats ever introduced into production) We didn't have a whole lot of breeze, but still saw speeds approaching 7 kts in a few of the better wind lines out there. 

In the distance, we saw boats racing and got closer to investigate. I thought it might be the GIYS Sonar fleet, but as we got closer I could see a few IODs in the mix.  And just as we had Dutch Ship Island abeam, we got to witness a five boat IOD start right off the bow (don't worry, we did not impede or influence any boat's course or breeze).

Not sure there is a prettier design out there racing these days.  Star boats are nice but these old meter boats are just flat-out gorgeous.

A quick ride out to various Brewerton Channel marks.  And there was breeze! 

After the prior Saturday's fiasco with the Harbor Cup, it was nice to see some wind on the Patapsco. We got in long before dark, which is pretty g.d. early these days.

Sort of a hectic morning.  As PRO for a CBYRA sanctioned race, I try as hard as possible to make it a 100% mistake-free exercise.  I usually fail.  In this case, look at the course board and note the RED "W" as the finish mark.  It should have been green, as we ended up, due to traffic in the fairway, achoring on the offshore side of the mark.

And there was another CF factor...another club ended their race, simultaneously, at the SAME MARK. Then it got truly weird.  The other club, out of Philadelphia, had a boat of the same color, same builder (Sabre) and very similar LOA, WITH THE SAME NAME ON THEIR TRANSOM as one of our Race to Rock Hall competitors.  I mean, WHAT ARE THE ODDS???

This lead to a certain level of confusion.

Anyway, the party was fun and we stayed way too late and somehow got back safely to the anchored Signal boat at about midnight..

Morning, devoid of hangover but still very foggy, in more than one sense, we made it back to PSA without incident.  Running AIS and iNavX on the phone meant a LOT of screen time.  Luckily, even with the ILA strike being resolved, we had very little heavy metal traffic transversing our two trips across the channels ("East" and "Craighill")

Fun weekend!