Migration

Yes, the snowbirds have flown the coup and we're heading south to Florida.

We left about a week ago and are sitting at Cumberland Island right in the state line between GA and FL.  This will be our third day here. It has been 3 years since we stayed to enjoy the island and walk the massive beach each day.

Similarly, we spent 2 days at Charleston to enjoy the city for the first time in 3 years.  We stayed across the river at Patriot's Point.  Enjoyed the Market on Saturday and took an historic tour of the city and Fort Sumter on Sunday.  

After that it was starting to get cold at night, the weather was right, so we did an overnight sail and traveled 145 miles from Charleston to Cumberland Island.  The weather didn't turn out as predicted (what's new), but we were able to sail with the new sails for the first time and test them in all types of wind.

All I can say about the new sails is WOW.  We were doing our usual thing and sailing dead downwind with our Code 0.  Then as the 8 knots of wind speed turned onto our bow, we rolled up the Code 0 and raised the main planning on motor sailing.  That was when we noticed that we were already sailing  a couple knots just under mainsail.  We unfurled the head sail and starting making 5 knots.  This is closehauled in 8 knots of true wind speed!!  Never thought this boat would ever be a light air boat upwind.  Thank you Haarstick!

 Picture from Charleston across the Cooper River to our marina at Patriot's Point.  We were adjacent to the USS Yorktown and a submarine, the USS Clamagore (behind Carrier).

 The Citadel at the military college in town.

 They have a giant class ring at the entrance.

                                    Fort Sumter

Part of the original structure.  The start of the civil war was right here on 4/12/1861.

 The stiffness of the sails help to generate lift without spilling air over every wave.

Our sunset on our first overnight sail of the season.
     

Lagoon 410 Catamaran Mainsail and Headsail for Sale

We are replacing the sails on our 2003 Lagoon 410 S2 catamaran.  If anyone is interested in buying my current sails for spares or to replace a torn sail, please comment through blog.

The mainsail and jib are original.  Previous owner did sail our Lagoon 410 to Caribbean, but the boat was never chartered.  Sails are intact, but well used.  Mainsail comes with fiberglass battens (if wanted).  Jib needs a new UV cover.

Sails are currently in Myrtle Beach, SC, but I will be traveling south starting in October.

Lagoon 410 Mainsail 570 sq. ft.

Lagoon 410 headsail 388 sq. ft.

These specs were taken from the 2003 Lagoon 410 catamaran brochure.

2003 Lagoon 410 S2 Catamaran sails for sale.  Picture taken February 2013.

Summer is Flying By!

Spent another week on the road and then Tara, Mike and the grand kids came for a week.  We also had the pleasure of Sid and Bonnie staying with us for a couple of nights.  Having fun, but realize I better get the projects done before it is time to leave.

Have been busy with bright work.  Toe rails had to be taken down and refinished.  Extra storage and spice rack for the galley.  Kris, from Haarstick came down and measured for a new main and head sail.  Plan is to have them completed by Labor Day.  New sail cover should be done by then, and once all is fitted, we are excited to go try them out.  We hope to go up to Bald Head Island and Cape Lookout for a few weeks.  Then it will be Annapolis Boat Show time.  After the show, we will wander our way south again. 

I am going to post another entry in an effort to sell the old sails.  Our blog tends to hit first page of search engines, so bear with us.  

 Kris, from Haarstick.  Flew down from Rochester, NY to make sure the new sails would fit perfectly.  Can't beat the service from Haarstick Sailmakers.

 Talk about a Motley Crew.  We gave Tara and Mike a date night and brought the kids to the Pirate Voyage dinner and show.

                                  AAAAAAAARGH!!!!

Summer in Myrtle Beach

Yes, we are stuck like glue again.  Grandkids, business travel and boat projects have us here until Labor Day.  Better than the 6 months we spent last year.  If you can't be aboard, you can't beat living on the beach.

New Sails.  In the last blog, you will see a picture of Nati.  This is a 38' cat and the owners are from NY.  We sailed out of St. Augustine together and saw them again at Osprey.  In the picture, we are close reaching at 8 knots and Nati is passing us.  You can see she has nice new laminate sails.  Since Yammy and I do not like being passed, we decided to go for the new sails a few years earlier than planned.  The UV cover on our headsail was shredding anyway.  At least that is my excuse.

We decided to go with the Carbon Fiber laminate with a Taffeta layer, on each side, to protect against chafe. Working with Haarstick, we went through many new sail cloths and decided this would be the best for our coastal cruising and desire to make our cat perform upwind.  They will be coming here to measure the boat and plan to deliver around Labor Day.  In the meantime, we need to get a new mainsail cover and possibly a rigid vang installed.

There are many other projects underway as well.  The pictures, below, are of my first gelcoat work.  The aluminum latches have been a problem since we bought the boat.  Don't know why anyone would use aluminum latches in area where saltwater sprays constantly.  To accommodate the smaller round latches, I had to fill the old hole.  The gelcoat matched perfectly.  We now have the option to lock the hatches as well.  

We went with compression latches from GEM.  They had the best reviews on line.  Calling them netted me nearly a $100 in savings from their online pricing.  So far, we are very pleased.

Last year, folding props gave us 2.5 knots of sailing speed.  Hoping for at least a knot with new sails.  As always, we are working to continually lighten the ship as well.  Looking forward to sailing again this fall.

Enjoy the summer!

Never saw a dredging rig like this before.  It was about 2 miles south of the Charleston Inlet.  From a distance, we thought they were filming for the next alien movie :)





    

Back "Home"

We arrived back in Myrtle Beach, and Osprey Marina, on Friday 5/30.  We had some great sailing from St. Augustine up.

We plan to stay here for a month to do some projects and for me to travel.  Yammy will be repainting one of the condos as well.

On the way up, we saw something we have never seen before. A school of Sea Rays.  Many times you will see a single one jumping out of the water and once we saw two together.  This was a school of at least a dozen swimming just under the surface.  They were right next to the boat, but the camera only saw the reflection from the water.  The beauty of silently sailing our oceans.

Battery Update:

It has been nearly 6 months now and we have not seen any degradation of the the battery yet.  In a single summer season, on Lake Ontario, we saw degradation of our new AGM bank from Lifeline.

Out biggest load is the coffee maker.  It draws 90 amps while heating the water.  At a 90 amp draw, our battery voltage only drops to 12.5.  This is always done in the morning when we are at least 40 AH down.    We still have a steady state voltage of 13.2 with up to a 10 amp draw.  The deepest we have pulled is 80 AH, with an average of about 45 AH.  Remember, this is only a 138 AH battery.  Our solar and wind has us re-powered by noon at the latest.

One thing I forgot to mention is, when the old house bank died, the one mounted in the engine compartment was the first to go.  The heat accelerated its demise.  Since the Valence battery is so light and only a Group 27 size, you can easily find a space anywhere to mount.

          French Built Catamaran

        South African Built Catamaran

        Florida Redneck Built Catamaran.  Yes, that is a pontoon boat with sails added.  The engine is still on the back acting as his rudder.  If you look close, you can see his arm hanging out the "window".  Guess he wanted to tan the other arm when sailing.  Have to give him points for ingenuity.

Heading North

We are currently sitting in our favorite anchorage in Miami.  The wind is supposed to turn more easterly on Monday and we can continue north then.

We left Marco Island, last Saturday, and took two days to get to Marathon.  After three days there, we had a nice southerly to sail to Miami.  We made 80 miles, all under sail, on Thursday.  Definitely one of those sails to remember.  

Originally, we were going to leave Marco and spend a week going to Key West and trying some new anchorages.  But, Yammy's Dad decided he did not want any of the furniture and appliances in his new condo, and we took the offer to take it all.  We did a whirlwind trip, carrying items for our kids from VA to NY and back down again.  It was a lot of work, but worth it help out the kids.  We can do that boat trip next year.

As usual, it's Roy's Tech Time.

Everyone thinks cats can't point.  I used to as well.  When we were looking at cats, I checked the sailing polars on all of the them to see which would best suit my needs for performance.  Our cat said it can point to 40 degrees apparent, so we went for it.

We already have written about the performance gains, from last year, and are very happy with how she sails.  But, leaving Marco put the pointing ability to the real test.  We had SW winds and had to sail close hauled all the way back.  One the first day, we had huge, confused seas and 15-20 knots of wind.  Not good.  We could point to 40 degrees. But, had 10 -15 degrees of leeway.  We gave up and sailed into Everglades City inlet and anchored for the night.

The next day, we had the same winds, but no leftover slop and swell.  Now, we could point 40 degrees and had 6-8 degrees of leeway.   We sailed 70 miles that day and never changed the autopilot setting.  Another great sail.  

When looking for a cat, I wanted a dagger board model, instead of the fixed keels we bought.  My feeling was you need deep boards to help a cat point.  We could not find one that had the cabin type we wanted and the broker, sensing my disappointment, told me that you would only point a few degrees higher, than our boat and maybe a few tenths of a knot faster.  Being new to cats, I bought it.  

Over the past week, I have been doing a lot of research on the leeway issue and the reasons why.  It is true that a dagger board cat will only point a few degrees higher, but you only get a few degrees of leeway.  Similar to a mono haul (1-5 degrees).  As most of you know, this is due to lift.

The underwater foils, keel and rudder, generate lift.  Just like your sails and airplane wings.  However, they do not generate lift until there is some sideways motion to get it started.  It is a combination of the forward motion and sideways drift (leeway), that creates the lift.  The reason fixed keel cats have so much leeway is the limited surface area of the shallow keels and rudder.  Mono hauls have deep keels and rudders and generate more lift, minimizing leeway.  Dagger board cats can draft as much as 9' with the boards down.  That is what is needed to help stop the leeway we saw.

All that said, we would not be able to sail in the keys with a 9' draft, so we may have still had a leeway issue as the boards would not be able to be dropped down all of the way.

There is a new cat, that utilizes fixed keels and an adjustable foil on the trailing edge of the keel.  Kind of like a second rudder.  The idea is to create lift without having to slide sideways first.  I am waiting for actual reports on how well they work.

There are noise and sticking problems (due to marine growth) with dagger boards.  That is why Gunboat (very fast cat) has just switched to swing keels.  But, they had problems with those as well.

Now when everyone says that cats can't point, they are wrong.  You just have to evaluate the amount of leeway potential.  But, most designers will never admit to it being as bad as it is.

I hear a lot of people saying that every cat they see is motoring.  This I can believe upwind.  If we turned on our leeward motor, we dropped the leeway to under 5 degrees.  But, when there is that much wind, I don't motor.  So that is why we ducked in and tried it again the next day.    

Not sure if we would ever trade up to a different cat, but the design criteria will be a sticking point I am sure.

 Just in case you forgot what she looked Like.  Yasmine Ann pointing high!

                  Typical fixed keel cat

 Dagger Board protruding through the deck

Dagger Board boat with boards down.
         

West Coast of Florida

Since our last blog, we have gone back to Marco Island and had the damage repaired from the accident at Ft. Meyer's Beach mooring field.  It was just cosmetic and the owner of Dragon's Lair gave us a check for the repairs.  Very admirable.

While we were in Marco Island, we stayed at the Esplanade Marina.  Yammy's sister, Laurie, came and stayed with Yammy while I traveled to TX, MS and Alabama.  Yammy's father and step-mom also came down and bought a condo on the island.  Beautiful high rise on the best corner of the island.  Our love for this island is contagious.

From there we traveled to Cayo Cost and the state park. Nice anchorage and walks on a natural beach.  Then to another state park in Tampa Bay, Desoto Point.  We stayed here to finish up our taxes then sailed to the St. Petersburg mooring field.  We came here to visit with my father and Nancy.  They just bought a house in Ruskin and were just 30 minutes from where we moored.  They have a gorgeous, spacious home in a gated community.

Seems like, after the winter the whole country had, everyone is looking at Florida again.  

On our fist night in St. Petersburg, Yammy and I realized we had been here once before.  Four years ago, after our cross country driving tour, we were looking for a place to spend the rest of winter.  We called a few places and nothing was available.  That is when we wound up in Myrtle Beach.  We recognized the area due to the gelato shop.  The little things you remember.

One word of advice, the Vinoy mooring field is exposed to any wind that has an E in it.  When that occurs, the waves come in and bounce off the cement walls in the harbor.  You end up in a giant bathtub getting rocked from all directions.

Also, after only a week in Tampa Bay, we have a slime on our hull that did not wash off while sailing.  First time since we painted in November.  If it doesn't come off, we may need to scrub it off.

We enjoyed our time on the west coast, but do not think we will venture north of Marco Island again.  The winds switchs from a land breeze to a shore breeze, nearly everyday.  The problem is the 2-4 hours will little or no wind during that change.  We also experienced the swarms of love bugs.  They hit as we arrived at Cayo Costa and stayed until we returned south of that location.  During one of the wind changes, our cockpit became engulfed with thousands of them.  We had to use a hose to wash them all away.  Last, but not least, is the shallows.  We have run aground 4 times in the past 2 weeks.  Once in the middle of an inlet trying to get to Sarasota.  We wound up having to skip that city all together.  We only draft 4' of water.  This brings to mind a statement, made by a friend of Sid and Bonni's, who said he gave up sailing and switched to power boating on this coast.  He said it is just too shallow.

There are areas of great sailing.  Tampa Bay being one of them.  But, the accessible anchorages are greatly limited.  For our good friend Kent, this distinction is when sailing offshore, not on the GIWW.  The only positive thing I can say about going aground, is we cleaned the barnacles off the bottom of our keels.:)

  Funky ring around the sun the day after lunar eclipse

 Sunshine Skyway Bridge over Tampa Bay.  On this day, we found the wind to be NE on the East side and NW on the West side (after a mile of no wind).  Reminds me a lot of sailing on lake Ontario.  

 An osprey catching dinner at an anchorage at Anna Maria Island

Sailing wing and wing with the code 0 and headsail.  No poles!!!  Sometimes you have to love a wide stable platform.

 Dolphins swimming in our bow wave to welcome us back to Marco Island.

Back to our favorite sunset.  End of another day in paradise!