Sailing

My cousin and his wife and I and my wife all sailed out next to the Queen Mary, The Dome and next to a large Cruiseliner in Long Beach, California. His normal slip was being repaired and rebuilt further south in another area so he and many other people now had his 25 foot sailboat further north for awhile until the docks were rebuilt.

It was a great day for sailing, likely the best in years. The wind was mostly out of the north at around 12 miles per hour and then slowly built into white caps to 18 miles per hour. So, he was able to reach hull speed which was 7.5 knots (which I believe is 9 or 10 miles per hour). But, if you have ever reached hull speed on your sailboat it is pretty exciting with the boat healed over on one side with water almost coming in the side of the boat and whenever you crest a roller going by it sort of feels like you are going to turn over. In some ways it was more exciting than I preferred but for my wife and for my cousin it was one of the best sailing days ever. Then we went out past the breakwater into the open ocean where the white caps and rollers were even bigger.

My cousin had to adjust the sails because there was just too much wind for both the Jenny and the mainsail to be up and fully taking the wind. So, he let the mainsail out pretty far so it wouldn't pull over the boat to far to one side. The wind kept getting stronger so he decided to take it down on the lee side of one of the islands so it might block the wind and make it safer to do that. However, someone who maintains the boat from him must have adjusted the rope that holds up the boom to the mainsail so when he climbed up and the boat shifted and he had to put all his weight on the boom not to fall off the boat the boom dropped which he had never experienced before. So, his wife and I held the boom until he brought the sail completely down on the mainsail so the wind didn't knock us out or knock our teeth out.

And then strangely enough, the wind died completely, just as it had been 12 to 18 mph a few moments before. My cousin said, "I've never seen it do this before so quickly." As we motored back to the marina on the 10 horsepower outboard. It turned out that we got a Santana wind which overpowered the prevailing winds. So we had a wonderful time in the 70s Farhenheit with full sun on
the sail with lots of sailing excitement from reaching hull speed and heeling over and going as fast as you can with a sail boat by reaching it's hull speed which is the maximum designed speed for that hull through the water. So, all in all it was a really great day sailing for all of us.

Note: Later: Here's the thing. As an intuitive at a certain point in our sail I knew something wasn't quite right and that there was some danger. But, not being as experienced a sailor over the years like my cousin became and my wife was from growing up a heavy weather sailor. I sensed something was wrong the way she said, "This is a pretty intense weather helm".

At the time this did not sound good and I noticed that my cousins wife really looked worried. Likely because my cousin is 72 and I'm 67 and not falling off the boat in heavy seas like we were in with white caps is harder at our age than younger if you are messing with the sails while the sailboat is going every which ways from the wind and seas with 18 mph winds blowing across. So, every peak of a roller it sort of felt like we were going to tip over (even though I knew there was a lot of weight in the keel so this likely wasn't going to happen under these conditions. However,  I did get pretty wet from spray but then again the sun was out and it was in the 70s even though windy at 18 knots of wind.

So, that night after we were safely ashore and okay my wife told me we had almost broken the rudder because of the conditions we were in. The other problem is we had too much sail up (the Jenny and the Mainsail) in that condition and my cousin needed to bring in some of the sails to make it safe for us. But, when he went forward towards the mast to do this the boat lurched which caused the Boom to drop because someone who had worked on the boat hadn't tied off the boom right and so it slipped down 3 feet. But, at least he stayed on the boat because of grabbing the boom at the right time which is very important. So, my cousin's wife and I held the boom so it wouldn't knock anyone out (or their teeth) in the cockpit as he released the sail enough. Then finally we went onto the lee side of an island so we could work on the sails without all the wind. Then we brought the sails all the way down and corrected the dropped boom by tightening up the rope that hadn't been secured right by someone who had worked on the boat.

Then the wind completely died (which at that point) was very unusual but was a very good thing.

So, we had our great adventure and survived it and the rudder didn't break and nobody got hit by the boom and no one fell overboard. So, what is an adventure anyway?

IT is an adverse situation well handled which was what we had. So, we have another story to tell which is good and everyone is fine.

Also, she told me there would have been a way to fix the situation even if the rudder had broken which was to start up the 10 horse power engine and use that as the rudder instead of the rudder. And she said even if the rudder breaks and the engine won't start there are ways to steer the boat just with the sails that she knows of too. So, between my cousin and my wife we likely would have been okay even if someone had gone overboard or we had lost both the rudder and the engine.