One of the fine folks at Puget Sound Sailing Group (Sherri, I'm guessing?) took some pics of me docking a couple weeks back. Since I've been doing fuckall on the blogging front while school tenderizes the life out of me, I thought I'd throw these up here.
On approach.
Pulling in.
"What do you mean the engine QUIT?"
"Hey, what didya kill the engine for?"
"Shaddup."
awwww....
Saturday was another outing with the Puget Sound Sailing Group, this time out of Shilshole in Ballard. Our flotilla consisted of a posh Elite 32 and 2 J24's. Ken W. skippered the schmancy Elite 32 with her furnace, galley, couches and berths while Ken V. and I each skippered an extremely bare - and in Ken's sake, partially functioning - J24.
The winds were, lessee... big. Really big. The 32 registered a high of 27 knots apparent wind. That's almost twice the previous max speed I'd ever sailed in. We left the main up and piled the jib on the bow for most of the day.
Ken V. had the same idea, but apparently the J24 they were on - Slicker Than Snot - wasn't particularly slick raising the main in gonzo wind. After a frustrating hour of doing "crazy ivans" trying to stay into the wind to get the main raised, they pulled the boat around and headed in to shore for a spot of bar sailing.
Christy and Cathy, her friend from her racing days in Cleveland, got our main hoisted and we flew out into the wind on a close haul heading south around Magnolia. We got bounced around a bit and soaked but it was wicked fun. Christy and Cathy were both super comfortable and really helpful teaching me things like how to surf the boat down a wave to keep the bow from slapping. We made it down to the Elliot Bay Marina before turning around for a broad reach downwind.
On coming back into Shilshole Bay, we circled by the sea lions to say hey. They were unimpressed and a few of them were right pissed off. Eesh, cranky. Since we were the last to arrive and everyone was hanging out on the 32 when we pulled in, I got to dock the boat with EVERYONE watching. I can't begin to tell you how much fun I wasn't having when the engine quit on me about thirty feet from the end of the slip.
Ken W., Mat, Tammy, Katherine and Nancy hanging out in the first class accomodations aboard "Quintessence".
Cathy, Christy and Sherri hanging in the steerage accomodations aboard "Slicker than Snot". You saw Titanic, us po' folk have better parties.
Skipper Ken keeps a weather eye.
Christy at the helm.
Cathy at the ready.
I asked Christy to get some shots with my camera as water came up over the bow. This is the last picture I have that doesn't have a big blob of water on the lens. Huh, didn't see that coming.
Fun.
More water onto the lens. At this point, the camera is now turning itself on and off and operating the zoom sans operator input. I think something in the water re-animated my camera. Just like in Pet Cemetary only with digital cameras, not creepy children. Stupid zombie camera.
This is the part where I'd really like to not gybe.
The reason I'd like to not gybe is that Cathy prefers the contents of her skull to stay in her skull. She can be such a princess.
Contemplating the Nalgene bottles on board full of handmade margaritas.
Cathy steering us this way and that.
"27 knots? Meh."
Christy and I went sailing with the Puget Sound Sailing Group out of the Island Sailing Club in Kirkland this weekend. After a game of musical outboards, we took out one of their Capri 22's, skippered by the ever-capable Mat (with one T, not two).
Much to Christy's disappointment, we had no spinnaker to fly and go zipping by everyone on the lake. However, we had lots of decent wind to sail in and kept the rails of the boat in the water enough that everyone went home happy.
Ken helping out with swapping out the outboards on one of the Capri's. This would have been a great pic if they had actually dropped the motor in the water. However, this was an entirely uneventful exchange. Sad.
Christy and Mat working hard.
Mat looking nautical.
Me hanging out in my bulletproof life jacket.
(I'm completely running out of clever ideas for blog post titles. This is a sad indicator of the depth of my clever reservoir. Got suggestions? Leave 'em in the comments and I'll be happy to take credit.)
