Choppy sea
After weeks of heavy wind - or my lack of time - the sailing window finally arrived for me and Louve.
It was blowing from North so I decided to sail South, to Norrtäljeviken and attempt rounding the whole island.
I noticed that it is far easier to overpower my boat when sailing down-wind than when beating. Yard must not extend beyond mast line because the boat starts to pitch and yaw rapidly and feels like on the verge of broaching. So in a blow it is a bad idea to loosen the sail, the only way which works is to get into the wind.
Or be prudent and carry less sail.
So for the downwind leg I put up one reef and we carried on nicely.
Down in Norrtäljeviken we started beating East as the wind was approaching us at 40 degrees. Louve is not exactly high-to-wind sailing boat, to say the least.
I passed Flaten, with initial idea to stop there for lunch, if I see any friends´boats. There were none so we carried on into wide Björköfjärden.
Here conditions were much worse. The wind was, again, from North but it is so wide here that I believed we can tack us all the way to Northern entrance to Vätösund.
But it was not that easy. Heavy chop and confused sea, probably after weeks of heavy wind, was slowing us and bigger waves were stalling Louve all-together.
It seemed we need more power to get through this chop.
I rounded Louve to the wind and dropped the sail, as usually dipping also a part of it in the drink.
I have to make these dousing lines working like Tim Cook did…
While I was shaking the reef Louve aligned herself parallel to waves. I lifted centerboard to minimize draft but still the boat jumped and pitched uncomfortably on waves, making working on bow very uncomfortable.
I may, next time, rig a bucket on a rope and drop it from bow as a simple drift anchor. It should align the hull more steep to the wind and waves.
We rose the sail and tried beating again.
It went better but still way too slow to even hope of rounding Vätö before evening. I think additional 80kg of gear or crew would make us more successful. With only me and few sandwiches the boat is just too light to plunge through such waves.
It’s never too late to give up. After passing Långholmen, at the height of Länsmansfrun I decided to turn back. With full sail and now with waves it went very fast - back to Flaten and into Norrtäljeviken again.
At the South entrance to Vätösund we faced strong, directly-in-the-face North wind. I did not feel like fighting it in so narrow channel - and it was getting late already.
We dropped the sail and Iron-menace woke to life.
We motored all the way to our home harbor.
Retrieval went well but precise timing between brutal wake from motorboats was essential.
No worries, in a few weeks summer guests will be gone…