Ramp rage

7.00 Am on Sunday morning, and the cars and trailers are parked everywhere round the Altona Safe Harbour when Oz and I walk past on our morning inspection tour. The overflow carpark has overflowed, car trailer combos are all along the road, on the grass, everywhere.  The ramp itself seems locked solid, with boats going out and boats coming in.

This is not a good omen for the Wooden Boat Association Werribee River excursion.  I anticipate the ramp there will be equally busy, but I have said I will go and the boat is hooked up.  We arrive there about 9.15 and surprisingly get launched and find a convenient park straight away. I rig the boat tied up to the pier jetty.  Boats coming back in come speeding by every minute or so, and the wash sends my boat bouncing around.  I discover later, after I hoist the sails, that I have inserted one slug upside down, which gives the sail a nasty crease, enough to make a sail maker weep. Particularly unfortunate as today the boat will be photographed by multiple other WBA people, leaving undeniable evidence of my nautical incompetence.

Laurence from the Port Phillip Bay Dinghy Cruising group, and a sailing friend from way back, joins me, and we set off out into the bay for a while, to let the others launch and get organized.  There is not a lot of wind out there, but it is nice mooching along.  Around 10.30 we head back into the river, past the launch ramp, which has not got any quieter.

The wind, West South Westerly, picks up a bit, and we have a splendid run down the river, catching up with Campbell and his young son Duncan near the island before the cliffs.  We land, and the lad asks what is the name of the place.  I tell him it is Duncan Island.  He looks pleased.  The rest of the fleet arrive, including Penny and Jim in their Drascome Lugger, looking impeccably ship shape as they furl sail and row in.

The poor old Core Sound is full of dust from Thursday, twigs from a close encounter with the bank, various clutter and ropes, and the sails never look particularly neat when dropped and tied onto the sprits.  Hmmm, I might have to try a bit harder in the ship shape department.

Whatever, we have a nice picnic on Duncan Island.

The outing was an opportunity for some members of the recently formed face book group, Port Phillip Bay Dinghy Cruising, to meet one another for the first time.

After lunch we set off back up river.  The two Mirrors tacked their way back, I motored very slowly along behind as crash boat and potential tow if required.   When we got back to the ramp, there were scenes of utter mayhem.  The wind had kicked up, and lots of people had decided at the same time that they wanted to go home. Every space on the short jetties was occupied.  More boats were heading in, circling round like sharks watching for a queue to jump or a space to nab. After numerous circuits and getting bumped, we basically rammed the end of one jetty and Laurence managed to get a rope on.  People were still launching boats, and queue jumping to locate their trailers in the bays that you need to be in to back straight down the ramps.  But we got the boat on and out.  This was a sharp learning experience for me - I never want to get into that situation again!

Three very different days ... Monday

After the grey windy Sunday, the weather settled and the evening sky promised a good day for Monday. I wanted to go and check the beach to see if my gps might have washed up, and Steve had the day off, so I got down to the boat ramp relatively early, and launched the Core Sound. It was the nicest day for ages. Oz likes the Core Sound much more than my other boats.

We anchored off AYC, rigged and tidied up. Steve joined us and we sailed over to Point Cook, trying out the new Mizzen staysail on the way. We stopped near our landing spot of the day before, now inhabited by hundreds of feeding sanderlings or stints, had lunch and 10 minutes fruitless search for the gps, then set off for a great broad reach home.  It was a grand day out.

Three very different days ... Sunday

Despite the relatively benign BOM forecast, the weather was squally and, from the white caps when we set out, it was around 15 knots. Much credit to Jamie and Steve and Sebastian, who set out bravely despite the chop and the wind and the grey squall line of cloud on the horizon in the general direction we wanted to go. We got out on starboard tack with wind from the South West, then tacked on port past the red stick. The wind strengthened and eased and strengthened again as we went. We could sit on one long tack across to the coast line towards Point Cook. We discovered, via the centreboard depth finders, that the depth shelves quite rapidly as you approach the coast, and also that the bottom is a particularly viscous sticky muddy sand. I was in front, and managed to stick the centreboard into the mud just as I was trying to tack, resulting in the boat pivoting rapidly and Oz and I going for an unplanned swim as the boat capsized. Jamie also got in some capsize practice under similar circumstances. We decided that where we were was actually where we were going, so we walked the boats into the beach and had lunch marvelling again at how nice this bit of coast is. It was a nice spot. 

The wind did not ease off over lunch, and the swell seemed to have built up. Hooting back on a broad reach I was disconcerted to see Jamie and his boat vanishing into the troughs between the waves. It was exciting. Even more exciting for Steve and Sebastian in the 125. Steve fell out of the boat when they were hit by a wave, Sebastian stalled the boat but capsized. So we all got some capsize practice today. It was a memorable adventure though.

Three very different days Saturday

Last Saturday was grey but the wind forecast suggested winds less than 15 knots easing as the afternoon progressed. After a series of Saturday race days blown out, I was keen to get the Sabre back in the water. The first of two races, i seriously fluffed the start, but had a good race with Penny who is also relatively new to Sabre sailing. I could draw ahead on the upwind leg,but she was much better down wind. I needed to give her rounding room at the bottom mark. I went wide, and gybed onto port tack, and started steering up to the finish line. She was still on the other gybe, and we collided, the bow of her boat hitting the rear port side of mine. I am still not sure who was in the wrong, but I  did a 360 on the general principle that you should never collide with anybody, and she won the race.

The next race I started better, despite getting a good whack on the side of the head from the boom while waiting for the race to start. I was keeping much closer to the two other Sabre sailers, hooting down the top reaching leg, when a fierce squall  blew through. I clocked 8.6 knots, but the nose of the boat was digging into the waves in front, and I had a vision of pitchpoling so I headed up and let the sail flap ... as did the rest of the fleet. I granny gybed round the mark, loosing some ground, and I was beating again into a lumpy sea, sheeting in hard, when the thwart, that the mainsheet connects to, ripped right out of the boat. I managed to turn towards home and run in, but it was close to a capsize for the first thirty seconds.

My heart leaps up

I took Oz out for a walk on Friday afternoon, and we got soaked in the rain. But walking home, I looked back and saw this.  It was worth getting wet for.

Dry

Tuesday was a much nice forecast.

I met a gang of sailers down at AYC, another Mirror and two 125s, with the rough plan that we would sail over to Point Cook for lunch.

We passed a dad and his two kids in a mirror powered by oars alone, out fishing past the Red Stick.  I invited them to come down next nice Sunday with their sails and mast.

The wind was flukey on the way over, and Daniel lost faith that the wind would hold, so he turned back.

Federico and his partner in their fibreglass 125 were way the fastest, and they shot over there in no time, but very patiently waited on the beach while the rest of us made our way.

We had a very pleasant lunch on the beach.  Every body was quite chuffed to actually go somewhere in their dinghy, compared to just sailing around the buoys.  Federico and partner were asking whether there were beaches round the point, and I sensed they are keen to explore further.

The wind kicked up for a rollicking good run home.  Oz slept most of the way.

My go pro decided to malfunction again ... not sure if it is on the way out. Perhaps its battery is fading. And I gouged a bit out of my hand when the wind caught the boat while launching with lots of distractions.  But it was a grand day out.

Wet

Kate could only make Monday, and Steve was keen to get on the water with his new (to him) 125, so despite ominous forecast we got out early, to avoid the predicted high winds round midday.

Kate was on the helm, and she is very good to sail with - she has been sailing since she was a kid and has a natural skill with handling the boat.  She had forgotten how small the Mirror is after sailing in the Core Sound. But we had a nice sail for about an hour, quite exhilarating with some good gusts coming through, and then a solid shower of rain.

The forecast spooked us a bit though, and every gust and cloud front made me think that the change had come early.  We came in, in time to see the wind drop off almost completely.  We could of stayed out for another hour, but then we really would have been caught as the rain came down in buckets then.

It was a nice outing, and perhaps even nicer to be back in the club house having a cup of tea watching the rain pelting down.