A Really Nice Late August Weekend

This weekend we tried to squeeze some sailing in and amongst Vickys work duties.  She worked all night Thursday and most of the day on Friday, so when she fell asleep around 4:00 PM (just as I was finished working), I opted to let her sleep.  

(She woke up around 10:00 PM and then asked for "some alcohol" to help her sleep more.  I gave her what I was having - a double of Widow Jane bourbon, 58 proof, which ensured she slept the night.  I'm sorry for your hangover, my dear.)

We drove down Saturday morning and had a wonderful day on the water.  Winds were 7 to 10 kts and Seas The Day sailed beautifully.  There was a bit of a swell, which I guess was leftover from the previous days winds, so I was glad we had no seasick-prone guests.

The photos tell most of the story.  I've added a few captions below some photos.

Blogger is still having trouble with iPhone videos, so you'll have to click here and here to see ours.

She's upset because I said I couldn't buy this one for her - it's a 197ft yacht.

The modern lights lack the charm of the old ones.

I practiced different points of sail and even got "wing on wing" for a bit, but with a self tacking jib, holding it is difficult.

This preying mantis was our guest for most of the day.  He got a miffed when I gybed and flew off.

We slowly made our way around the bay.  After the first hour or so, Vicky went below to sleep.  She had a big training session Saturday evening.  As I got back to the #3 buoy, I decided to spend some time just tacking back and forth.  I love sailing with the self tacking jib... you just press two buttons on the autopilot and Seas The Day handles the rest... no lines to switch, etc.  It just steers to the new course and the jib follows along.  See this video for a quick demo.

After we returned, I swabbed the deck and Vicky made some dumplings for dinner.

After dinner, I filled the water tanks.  While filling the tanks, I became aware of an incredible quality of light all around me, after turning around I saw this scene and ran around the corner of the dock to capture this photo.

Vicky had her training session Saturday night which spawned a whole bunch of follow-up activity through all of Sunday morning.  As she finished, we decided to just do a quick pump-out run so Seas The Day was fully ready for us next weekend, and then we headed back.

My view Sunday morning