August 25 – Six Months from our Wedding Day.
We went out sailing!!
Harvey’s smiling in the photo above, because we are just leaving the dock, and the wind is gentle, and there are no waves in the harbor.
We got out into the South River, and the wind was more brisk, and the waves were choppier. This was my first time out in the Flying Scot this year – the boats that belong to our sailing club. So, I was a little rusty, and it seemed like everything that could go wrong, did go wrong!! I forgot to tie stop knots in the jib sail sheets, so we lost one of them (and then I tied the stop knots!!). And, several times, we came near to capsizing (but didn’t). Harvey was looking very shaken, and I was laughing, which didn’t make Harvey feel any happier.
We got across to the other side of the river, and managed to anchor (I hadn’t tried anchoring since my instruction 3 years ago!). We had lunch, and periodically rolling waves rocked us until I remembered that pulling up the centerboard, and bringing up the rudder made us less liable to being rolled.
Lunch was restorative, and I thought we could sail up river a bit, and then cross over to the south side, and return. Well, nothing went as planned. For one thing, there were lots of motor boats out speeding up and down the river creating large wakes that disrupted our progress (and also disrupted our peace). Once we got to the other side of the river, and headed back towards the bay, I discovered that the current was pushing us up-river, so despite having good wind in our favor, the current was stronger. And, then, the mainsail sheet slipped out of my hands, ran out of the rigging, and was now much more difficult to manage. I tried to get it threaded through the pulleys, but couldn’t get a calm enough space to get it accomplished.
By this time, Harvey was beginning to get the hang of tacking, so that, as we started to tack, he would say “Are we…?”, and I would say, “Yes, we are tacking”. We kept tacking back and forth, but with the current pushing us upriver, and the wind pulling us slowly downriver, we made very slow progress. I was supposed to get home in time to take my older son back to college, and he kept calling, and I kept hoping that I could keep my promise to him. And then a boat pulled up near us, and the captain yelled out “Hey, I’ve been watching you guys for awhile, and you seem to be staying in one place. Do you want a tow? You’ve only got about an hour of daylight left!”. I thanked him, and said we were OK now (even though I was pretty exhausted).
We finally pulled into the dock at about 7pm (just as dusk was falling), and we got the rigging fixed, and the boat tucked in. We were both completely wiped out, and we found a lovely Indian restaurant on the way home (selected from Harvey’s bookmarked list in Yelp) – Jewel of India. It was absolutely delicious!!!
All in all, a lovely way to celebrate 6 months together.
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