A Kite Surfer’s dream…

When you buy a sailboat, you look forward to using the wind for propulsion.  However, there IS such a thing as too much wind… And that’s what we got recently.  Depending on wind direction, anything from 8-20 knots is great (less wind is better if it’s a headwind, more wind is great from behind).  This week brought really strong winds up to 48 knots and sustained winds over 30 knots for quite a while. 

Even though we were securely moored, the boat was shaking and the mast was vibrating which makes it kind of hard to sleep. It also made it hard to leave the boat. This video shows how much we were bouncing up and down and the distance from the transom to the dock is further than it looks.

While we were rockin and rollin on the boat, the kite surfers were in heaven (think epic powder snow day in CO).  The wind was howling and that brought out the experts.  The video below shows how jam packed the beach was with kite surfers, wind surfers, and wind foilers and you can hear the wind.  They drew quite a crowd. It was too much for us, but they were lovin’ it. They were out there all day – some even past the 7:00 pm curfew!

A few days later the wind calmed down enough for us to go out sailing again.  Leaving our berth is fairly simple but coming back into it (docking) is a lot more challenging.  You have to “reverse in” between two pilings (see picture) which are about 30 feet apart.  Moxie (left most boat) is almost 25 feet wide, which gives us a whopping 2 ½ feet clearance on either side. The goal is to motor in just past the post and then use the engines to “pivot” around the post and back in, while tossing the port (left) and starboard (right) bow lines over each post as you go by. Easy right?

NOT! Especially with any sort of wind – which is usually present.  We had 2 practice sessions with Julien, under perfect conditions, but when it was the two of us, we had a crosswind making this maneuver more difficult.  Needless to say, it was not one of our better performances. 

It’s very hard for Anthony to see the transom on the other side of the boat, so my job is to help call out the distances so he can move forward and back as necessary.  As we were pivoting to “straighten” the boat for reversing in, the wind was blowing us off line making things much harder.  I’m calling out forward…… forward …. FORWARD!! BAM!  Oh dear!  We blew out one of the bumpers protecting the boat from the pole – which is better than damaging the boat, but still a little scary. We’ve been out several times since (under better wind conditions) and managed to not damage anything else upon return.  Each time we get a little smoother, but I think I’ll be nervous most of the time…. We’re still learning….