Racers need to consider currents too – a costly error

We headed toward Block Island from Newport in dense fog and low wind. Passageweather.com, our trusty guide while sailing, predicted that winds would pick up and from a favorable direction for our sail. Again, the website was correct. We slowly made our way to Block island and based on wind direction we were heading to the NE tip of the island. Since the entrance is on the western side we tacked to the east and realized that there was a strong current. By the point we were near to the tip of the island, where the depths change from deep to shallow, and we were heading into a 2 kt current. With the wind and the current there was a lot of chaos in the water. Ahead we could see a line where the water became flat, almost like a mirror. As we made the transition across this line the current disappeared. At the same time there was a sailboat race where the boats were racing parallel to the current/no current line. Because winds were relatively low at this point some boats were drifting a little to the east. If their drift crossed into the current, their race was toast as the current took them sideways.

Here we are looing back at one boat racing but caught by the current. This boat had no hope of getting back across into the low current zone. Note you can see the two looks of the water – the mirror-like low current, and further away the turbulent water in the current.  As we looked back on the race 30 minutes later we could see that there were two classes of boat – those caught by the current (they lost) and those who escaped its grip.

This shot is as we are motoring in a westerly direction through the current with a view of the "line in the water" and the race occurring for the most part in the low current water.

Friday - No Wind, No webex, No womiting

Friday was a calm foggy day. 

We had decided to stay in Newport and to sail up Narragansett Bay for half a day. We set off and there was fog, at times very dense fog. The wind was very low, only 5 kts, but we got the trusty spinnaker out a couple of times; however, when the wind dropped to 1 kt we knew that we had been defeated. We turned and motored south and got in the middle of a Rolex race.

Its incredible the speeds these boats can achieve in little wind. We got our spinnaker out again and were holding our own. We then decided to call it a day, at which point the rain poured. The skipper made a good choice and headed for home. One thing we learned in this afternoon was that it doesn’t matter how much you have paid for your boat or your sails, you can’t beat a production cruising boat (i.e. Prairie Gold) when there is no wind.   

We had four days of excellent wind - yesterday was poor and the forecast doesn't look great. Hopefully soon the wind will return.

Wind, Webex and Womit

Thursday was a series of records on Prairie Gold, but more of that later. We set off at 8:30am with the wind still at a good pace. Navigating the narrow channel around the islands was interesting to the visitors – very narrow channels and as you pass the tip of Bassett’s island, you can see the submerged sand just beneath the surface of the water as a distinct yellow zone. I wouldn’t like to come through as a novice in a storm. During our navigation through this area we saw a Hinckley sloop that, based on its speed, was a local. We were to see more of this boat.

Narrow channel

As we rounded Scraggy Neck we hoisted our sails and put on our seatbelts. We had a long one tack sail with maximum speed of 8.8kts (theoretical hull speed of 7.4). The wind was perfect as we were able to sail with full sail all the way to Newport. Our Hinckley friend sailed closer to the southern side of Buzzards Bay that allowed us to out pace them. Then they joined our heading and followed about 2 miles behind. We ended up with this relative positioning for the whole sail.

Hinckley chasing, but not catching

Normally when we vacation we turn off the computers, phones…. This time we have a lot of work going on so we decided to sail anyway (the other choice was to stay home). While on a Beam reach and with the Atlantic rollers coming in we hosted a Webex team meeting from the boat under full sail, with 6ft waves. Yolande vomited three times, once during the webex (fortunately she muted her phone). I could get into this life (not Yolande vomiting although it does happen) but the life of being at sea and remotely connecting to keep the pay check coming in.

We docked in Newport at Newport Yachting Center where the Newport boat show is held. As we docked a Hinckley docked to. Yes the same Hinckley. 

 This cat was flying

 This Swan is on the same finger pier as Prairie Gold

Across the parkway from us

Ebb or Flood that is the question

Departure from Scituate was under overcast sky and with little wind, but within 30 minutes the wind grew so that we could sail towards the canal. With time the wind turned and we were heading further out into the middle of the canal. At this time I checked the tide time in the canal and realized that I had my ebb and flood confused. The current would be against us as we arrived. We had two options – anchor near the canal and wait for the current to turn to an “ebb” current, or turn further east and head to Provincetown. We chose the second and had a wonderful sail reaching speeds of 8.5kts (theoretical hull speed in this boat is 7.4kts) under spinnaker and mainsail on a beam reach.

The forecast for the night was for continuous wind and it would turn to the north and then with time from the NE and to the E. Clearly a low pressure system was coming up the east coast. As we set of from the harbor we quickly got out the sails and had several hours of great sailing. Once we turned around the tip of P-town we hoisted the spinnaker and sailed across Cape Cod bay to the Cape Cod canal. Again, at times we reached 8 knots. We arrived at the canal by about noon which allowed us to use the last couple of hours of the ebb current. Of course it only took about an hour because our speed over ground was over 10kts.

Once we exited the canal we turned south and anchored off the tip of “Wings Neck” for a teleconference. We then weighed anchor and headed into Red Brook Harbor where we stayed at Kingman Yacht center for the night. The approach was winding and narrow to say the least – a couple of years ago we wouldn’t have tried it. But following with buoys we were fine.

I could get into the life of working in the morning, sailing, then holding telecons on the fly. Maybe this afternoon’s telecom will be done under sail power.

A journey to an unknown destination

We headed out of Boston on our annual sailing vacation. We always try to let the wind decide the heading. Once we were in the inner harbor we realized we would be able to sail nicely along the main channel and out of the north channel. As we passed spectacle island we were on a broad reach and put up the spinnaker. Once in the north channel we had a snack lunch, which was followed by a wind shift. we decided to gybe and head further east. Our course was slightly north of Provincetown. But we decided to keep this course since the spinnaker was our, 11kts of apparent wind and we were barreling along at 8kts on a bean reach. However, we were heading straight to the shipping channel. We changed headsail and turned further south and managed a straight ride down to one of our favorite local ports - Scituate.

Today's destination? Waiting for wind to direct us.

 You can follow our journey by pressing the "Spot" icon underneath "Where is Prairie Gold"

Kalue – Rudy and Phil’s big adventure – April 18-19 2014

Rudy owns Kalue, a wooden ketch that was handmade in 1947. She is a beautiful old school sailboat that Rudy winters in Constitution Marina, Charlestown MA. Kalue is A German Frers sr. designed wooden ketch. Built at the Quiterrez Yard in Buenos Aires. 

On April 18^th it was time to take her back to Maine for the summer. Thought this was an exciting trip, the weather forecast was not promising in terms of temperature.

After final preparations and taking on 37gallons of diesel fuel, we headed out of the harbor towards Cape Ann at the eastern tip of MA. Winds were light so we motored, and motor sailed for over 24hours. We had decided to leave our options open so when we passed Gloucester we made the decision to head on because we were projected to have following winds overnight that would become westerly at 15 kts by daylight.

Its been a long winter in New England and out on the water the temperatures dipped to the low 30s. as the English say – it was Brass monkey. Google it and you will understand.

For the past week there have been strong easterly winds so we had large ~2 meter swells all of the way until we got into the shelter of the rivers and islands of Maine. Food consisted of simple things – cheese and meat sandwiches; salmon and pasta and peas (my favorite). Breakfast – cereal, cranberries and banana. Red bull and coffee – lots of coffee. Rudy had a cup of tea with honey. He commented it was the first time that he had to use two hands to try to squeeze the honey out of the container – the honey was that cold.

For over 24 hours we motorsailed but made steady progress. The 15 kts winds did not materialize. However as we approached to coast of Maine winds roared. One often talks about a rail dipper – this was a stanchion dipper.

As we motored up to Robinhood marine center we noticed snow and ice on the coast.

It was a great trip – although next time I will  wear 10 layers instead of 5 – with a total elapsed time of 27h 41minutes. 

2014 sailing begins.

Heading to Maine

Today, I have decided to take a few days off and sail with a friend to Maine - he needs to deliver his boat there for the summer. I will turn on SPOT to track the journey and will update with pictures. Here's hoping that it warms a little.

Each month of 2014

Each year we set small new goals for our sailing season. This year its to sail in each month of the year. On new years day we took Prairie Gold out for a spin. Today, February 2nd, we had a great day with the air temperature at 55F. We had to go out. For the first time since early November we didn't wear coats, just a few layers. For most of the time we didn't even need hat and gloves. Winds were averaging about 10kts true out of the west. We headed downwind to Castle Island and then turned around and sailed close hauled back to Constitution Marina. January - check, February - check.

The biggest ordeal with the winter sailing is undoing all of the dock lines, putting them back on again and then winterizing the engine when we get back. However, we are getting much faster at this. I have a bucket on the back of Prairie Gold which I use to collect snow or rain so that we have fresh water to flush through the external cooling system (to flush out sea water) prior to pumping through the antifreeze. It worked well.

Throughout the winter I have been monitoring engine and sea water temperature to give me an idea when we can stop winterizing after sailing. Today the sea water temperature, which dictates the engine temperature, was still in the 30s at 39F so we still have a way to go with warming before I am comfortable not to winterize.

Now back to working - I often say "I work hard during the winter and hardly work during the summer" (which is of course because I spend a lot of time on Prairie Gold.

Relation between air temperature, sea water temperature and engine temperature

As many of you know I am a scientist at heart so since this is the first year that we have left Prairie Gold on the water I wanted to track temperatures to see how the engine temperature was tracking air and sea water temperature. Beneath is our updated information. As you can see the sea water temperature is the dominant indicator - so far. Over the next couple of day its going to get mighty chilly and if I can brave the temperatures I will go out and make some more measurements.

Good news too - we have beer stored in the boat. Even though we have had excessive cold at times because the sea water temperature is dominating the cabin temperature in Prairie Gold the beer has not frozen. I might just have to go down and test an IPA or two this week with lows forecast to be 0F

January in Boston

It was our goal to attempt to sail on January 1st, and this year we did achieve the objective. It was a sunny day with air temperature of 26F. Ice had already started to accumulate within the marina. But because Prairie Gold is located on the outside we had no worries. After carefully taking off the docklines – no dropping of the lines in the water because the water temp was 32F and they would be chilly to tie up – we set sail for a 2.5 hour, 11nm sail around Spectacle Island and back. We didn’t need to worry about other boats hitting us, an advantage of sailing this time of year. However, there were some crazy kayakers. Hold on a minute, they were probably saying “there were some crazy sailors”.

It was a great sail that was followed by whiskey in hot coffee to warm up the core temperature.

The next day after a winter storm hit dumping about 15 inches of snow with temperatures dipping to 0 F. Suffice it to say we stayed indoors.

Today, January 4th, I went down to see how much snow was on Prairie Gold. The inside of the marina was covered in thick ice that extended to the inside of E dock. Fortunately, as mentioned above, we are on the outside and there was no ice there. Prairie Gold did have some ice and snow on deck of course, although inside she was quite cozy – well with three layers of clothes, thermals etc.

Some condensation had even formed an icicle stalactite. Time to head home for some coffee.