October sail - and damn dousing lines
Late season - most of my neighbors already took up their motorboats.
We launched around 9 a.m on the cloudy and windy Saturday.
It is first time I use rope fenders which Adrian Marduk made for me. They look beautifully and most important: they do their job fine!
Forecast was promising Westerly with gusts of 12-15m/s. So far it was still Southerly from yesterday, at least in our narrow channel.
I had no plans where to sail so decided to go North.
Lightweight Louve, with only me on board and almost no gear gets easily overpowered down the wind so I prudently put two reefs.
We launch with no issues and head out with the wind.
I rigged (again) dousing lines which I tried before.
The idea is nice: to be able to douse the sail while having it still up. For controlled dropping or just to stop while coasting.
The problem is that this damn line gets tangled all the time! One needs to be very careful to rise the sale so that this long, loose rope is on the correct sides of the canvas. As it almost always is a rushy operation - especially if one sails alone - I get it always wrong.
To the extent that the sail gets tangled and the boat drifts into harms way while I am occupied with untangling the thing!
And it happened again today…
Rosättra marina is, however, still full with boats. Among all snow-white GRP boats a classic, traditional yacht always sticks out (in plus!).
I was glad I’ve put these two reefs - violent gusts were pushing us out of Vätösund with very little drama yet fast enough for my taste.
We finally cleared the last rocks and were out, in Björköfjärden.
As if leaving Mordor - all of sudden the Sun came through the clouds and world regained its colors.
It was after eleven so time for some breakfast. We sailed closed to the land and let us be becalmed for some sandwiches.
We passed picturesque deep bay with island Mash at its North edge.
I decided to land in the wind-shadow of Mash, for a cup of tea and some sun-bathing on stones.
Life was good!
I shook off one reef, leaving just one in the sail. With wind gusts on open Björköfjärd I never take chances to deploy the whole sail.
Refreshed we sailed to the East side of Vätö, all the way to Fiskebyn. And I was damn glad I kept this reef in the sail!
It became a beautiful day. And windy enough to give us thrills when we scooped a bit of sea over a gunwale a few times.
We sailed back the same way, this time beating against the wind which managed to follow the forecast and turned into Westerly.
Passed Rosättra it died thou, shielded by high land, so I dropped the sail and continued on engine.
Back home around four, happy after seven hours of messing around with boat!