We have been getting some almost Spring-like days, in between cold fronts that sweep through and take us back to Winter. The fates aligned so that Chris and Gerard and I had a free day on one of the warm, balmy days, and we seized the opportunity to get out for a sail from Werribee South. With one thing and another, it had seemed like a long time between sails.
We were on the water by 10. The alleged Northerly has swung quite East, and was blowing close to down the Channel, so Chris and Gerard used their Torqeedos to get out to clear water. Being an incorrigible smart arse, I decided to tack out of the river, which of course had consequences.
Chris as always took some nice footage, here is a very edited view of the day. Watch closely and see if you can spot what the price of my under sail exit from the river was.
The low water is mighty low on either side of the channel, and I suspect, on one of the tacks, I must have been a bit over ambitious, and caused the rudder quick release to quick release itself. But somehow, in the excitement, I didn't notice. Well, I knew something was out of balance, and kept trying to adjust the bleater to move the centre of effort of the sail to correct the weather helm. Then I suspected I was just over powered, so I put in a reef. Which is when Mark from the WBA came up behind me on a stonking great boat and gleefully captured us with the rudder in full bounce. Dammit. At least I was sailing, they were just burning diesel.
I eventually twigged and fixed it. The helm feels wonderfully better with the rudder down.
Chris anchored past Wyndham Harbour, off one of the break water walls to the east, which should have been a bit sheltered according to the forecast but wasn't. After a huge amount of stuffing around, getting lines and fenders arranged, I was just about to fang into a much needed lunch, when it became clear we were dragging. Indeed there was a large ball of weed on the anchor when Chris retrieved it. The wind was still strong as we disentangled, got sail up and got moving, providing some good free entertainment for a person sitting on the beach. Once we started heading back to the River the wind eased right off. There was a rain storm over Geelong, and it felt a bit ominous, but we got back into the river fine, and moored up to one of the visitor moorings to enjoy a late lunch.
It was a good outing, apart from the rudder fiasco. The new Torqeedo mount is ugly as sin but it works fine and feels solid, so I will just have to avert my eyes from it. It is all learning and evolving. I got a few ideas for a few more little tweaks that I have been adding over the last few days, namely a more robust and quickly rigged arrangement for the rear mast/sail transport carrier, and some hooks and bungey to hold my oars out of the water when they are in the rowlocks. Looking forward to testing them out soon.
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