Last season we didn't really have a lot of guests aboard, as the spring was cool and we we didn't really start sailing until mid June. This year looks much more promising.
On Sunday, Hayley, Derek, Rod, Jennifer & Greg came out for a sail. It was a warm day in the city but once we made it past the Leslie St. Spit, the wind really picked up, and we had a brisk sail out to Humber Bay and back, hitting a top speed of over 7 kts.
I think we have to work on setting our sails more appropriately when the wind gets into the high teens, as I get uncomfortable when the boat heels excessively, and it's difficult to steer with too much pressure on the sails. We also start to take on water in the cockpit when the discharge from the scupper drain is underwater due to the heel, because the hoses are plumbed backwards. That's one of those bothersome things we've talked about fixing since we got the boat. Maybe this year...
Last year, we used our spinnaker for the first time while cruising. Although it's a symmetrical spinnaker which should be flown with a spinnaker pole (sounds complicated), we used it as an asymmetrical, by attaching one corner to the headsail. Over the winter, Ed acquired a real asymmetrical spinnaker - somewhat larger than the last one, and with a different colour scheme.
With a flat lake and light wind on Saturday, we thought we'd try it out. We wisely tried raising it at the dock before we left. This spinnaker came with a snuffer - a sort of sock that slides over the sail to make it easier to raise and drop the sail.
We experimented a little to find how best to fly the sail, and discovered we could easily fly it on a beam reach, and somewhat downwind, but to go far downwind, we had to drop the main. It'll be fun to take this sail along with us on our annual cruise.
