End of Season Sailing

It is now early December.  My blogging fell behind as we approached the end of the season, so here's a quick update on the last few trips of the season.

My brother came out for a sail on Sept 19th.  It was a beautiful day on the water.

I had to take a day off from work on Sept 30 and quickly go out to Seas The Day and "batten down the hatches".  A major storm was approaching and ominous notes started arriving from the KYC launch captain.  Arriving at the dock the weather was calm, but when I got to the boat I noticed that a previous storm had claimed my burgee (the yacht club flag) which was tangled in the bird chaser on our dodger.  I wasn't going to give up an opportunity to get some time in so I motored about (had to charge the batteries) while securing everything below decks.

Things initially looked quite calm... except for the evidence of the previous storm.

I motored out... might as well log some hours while battening everything down.  Upon returning, I made sure all the chaff protection was in place.  (Note:  One of those leads will break off later in the season, but that's another post.)

And all the major canvas items were stowed below.

A side note to this storm was that it lasted for 3 or 4 days.  A couple of boats broke loose and a KYC member (Mike V.) who owns a tugboat company came by to retrieve a boat and also "patrol" the KYC mooring field to make sure everyone was secure.  You'll have to go to their site for the photos - I was nicely huddled up in Delaware.


Finally Vicky returned from China and we had one last beautiful (but cold) day on the water on Oct 10.  This is the first time we really sailed without the bimini & dodger in place (I had removed them for the earlier storm and was too lazy to put them up).  It allowed for a lot more sun and was quite pleasant.  I'm not sure it would work in mid-summer, but we might have to try it.