Making good way
Need to work on trimming - telltales not flying.
Port side going out langford creek
Port side going out Langford Creek
Mr. Potato head was having a difficult day!
Beautiful day - upper 60's and getting into the mid 70's before I got off the water! Winds out of the south 5-10... a few gusts and/or stronger winds later. Mostly Sunny. Got to the marina early and almost immediately set out! Actually beat the sailing school boat out of the slip - and they had been preparing before I even arrived at the marina! AIS picked up the two sailboats that had drifted past us as we anchored at Cacaway on May 7th - the seagull and another.
The wind was out of the WNW between 5 and 10 knots...and Bubbles was just chugging right along. Was really working on getting the sails adjusted correctly and I seem to do pretty well through a close reach. Still not consistant on a beam reach... and I am not even sure if the main telltales are supposed to stream when on a broad reach - something I have to check out! Was able to sail pretty close to the wind - have to get the centerboard back into action to see if I can do better... now that the wind instruments are aligned and calibrated correctly!
Got down near the buoys off of Eastern Neck Island before the wind started ti peter out a bit. Ended up doing some long tacks across the basin heading back north. Seemed to be losing ground on the starboard tacks - then had some wind shifting and the starboard tacks were working well! After 4 or 5 tacks got on a port tack to head back up the river to Langford creek - and the winds picked up... substantially - and I got to the point where I really had to reef the headsail - way too much canvas out! However, the strong winds let me sail a bit closer and I made it into the mouth of Langford creek before I had to turn on the engine for the ride back to Lankford Bay Marina. It was getting late, and I would have needed to do a bunch of tacks in a small area to have any chance of sailing back up. Gave me a chance to tie up and cover almost everything (while bubbles manned the conn) while motoring back to the marina. An educational day and a fun day!