Nasty Habits - The Rolling Stones Tribute Band

On Saturday, I biked to the club for Yoga and a sail to Village des Ecluse at Pointe des Cascades.

The weather looked bad.  First time I received an Orange Alert.  But the weather looked like it missed Dorval and the lake and was going to hit Montreal hard.  

Looked clear to the West.  I held my breath and took off with Natalie at 2PM.  The winds were from the West, in my nose.  

After the gut, I ran a little north so I could beat it to the Wind Mill channel entrance.  I was able to sail for about 30 minutes.

We arrived at Pointe des Cascade at 5PM, and I was about to set the anchor when I saw the block was available, so we took it.  There was another boat, a Tanzer named Intrepid, which was tied to two different blocks.

We had a beer aboard and went to find the event.  We thought it might be cancelled due to the weather.  We persisted and found the venue.  We shared a large Nachos with Taco meat, which was delicious. Nat had a strawberry beer, and I had a West Coast IPA.

We closed the event and wandered around trying to find where the dinghy was parked.  We eventually found it, and I crashed, being very tired.  

To the East

To the West

The next morning, Nat was up at 4:30, but she was used to that! I slept to 8:30 and only woke up because my watch sent me a reminder for medications.

We made a zero-carbon departure from the dock at 9:15, sailing on a broad reach/run, taking my shortcut to bypass the Zig Zag channel.  This lets us stay in a broad reach.

Dock just before noon.  Not bad.

Story of my handrails

In May 2025, I was doing the Chambly locks.  As I usually do, I tied my fenders to the teak handrails with a clove hitch.  One fender got caught on the lock hinge and pulled out the starboard handrail.

Jason, who was following my trip, suggested building new ones from IPE, a South American hardwood commonly known as Iron Wood for its density and strength.  I picked up two IPE planks at Langevin & Forest. Jason had an impressive set of woodworking tools and carved the planks into new hand rails

\

And today, I had Shipwright install them.  We decided to screw them in from underneath instead of from above, giving better strength and easier installation.

 

Watched GNS and Anchored Sandbars across BYC

I biked to the club and departed at 5PM.  Motored to the first mark and tacked to the Gut and sailed to the GNS race course.  Took some photos and anchored at the sandbars across from BYC.  I could not see Bruce, who said he was going to race, but he did not show up.

Just Now, Ad Lib, Tocade, Bete-Noir, Smoke on the Water and others were there.  Winds were light and then died.  The race finished very late.

I fixed the Raspberry PI, which I rewired to the fridge circuit rather than the DC panel.  It had been down for a few days.  Maybe something broke when I rewired my bilge blower.

Snacked on some ribs and garlic.  Slept early, but again, I was not sleeping well aboard.  

The next morning, I got up early, had some breakfast, and motored up to charge the batteries and haul the anchor.  Tacked back to the club through the gut and back to the club.  Again, the winds were in my face!

I rewired the AC charging circuit to eliminate the offending trailer connectors from the charging circuit.  The supply to the monitoring box was still using trailer connectors. The result was much improved charging of the Telecom batteries.

I cleaned some of the stainless steel in the cockpit, removing residual rust spots from the trip to the Bahamas.  A squall came in, and I sat it out in the clubhouse until 3PM, when I tried to take the bus but decided to bike to Boathouse, Addison and PRG.  Supper and groceries at T&T. The weather was nice.  The ride was nice.

Sail Past

I got back to the club, washed the deck and dressed the ship.

Eve and Sylvie came.  We sailed through Valois Bay to the Gut and around, meeting the fleet, with Just Now and Air Mobile blocking us from the Compromise.

The Blue Shit

We got back to the club, had some blue shit and got my 20-year pin

Andre invited me to sushi and dessert aboard Ballade. 

Sunday was going to be wet, so I decided to bike home.  Made it just before the rain.

Pointe Claire Yacht Club

On Thursday, I tried to get to the club by bike, but my backpack was too heavy, and I locked the bike at Ville St. Pierre and took the BMW to the club.

I took off for PCYC to pick up the Thursday GNS race, which was cancelled due to lack of winds.  We had a crew supper of roast chicken with Natalie and Maud.

I gave a donation to the club and had a good chat with Alex.

Spent the night at the dock.  The next morning, there was a squall warning, and I was comfortable at PCYC.  It was very pleasant at the club.  I took a nap in the afternoon. 

Shawn, Johnny and Natalie went out for a good sail in 15-22 knots of wind.  Lots of swearing!

We missed the windward mark and did the gybe mark by mistake and we decided to abandon the race.  

We saw few boat out there.

I spent another night, and at 8 in the morning, I sailed back to the club for a sail past.

FFR with Alex and Johnny

There were almost no winds.  Natalie was invited to cancel, and she did.

Shawn and Alex were there, and Johnny was looking for a boat, so he joined us.  Pierre had not agreed to crew with Shawn on Espresso, but it seemed Pierre was single-handed, so Shawn chose to go with Pierre.  

There was almost no wind.  We put our head sail up before the gut and sailed past the gut and then drifted back through the gut.

The race was cancelled, we had a beer and then motored back to the club.  I noticed the fridge was not working.  It turns out I had pulled the connector off the circuit breaker while I was working on the bilge blower earlier in the day.

We got our 15 points.

Bilge Blower - replacement

The old bilge blower started complaining and eventually failed about two years ago.

I finally decided to change it.  Although it is not necessary for a diesel, I figured I should fix it since I had all the parts that I bought in Florida on my way back from the Bahamas.  I got a new SeaFlow blower and some new 3-inch hoses.

The old blower was under the starboard gunwale and not accessible. I installed the new one under the port gunnel and reversed the direction of the blow.

Now it was time to wire it up, and this should have been an easy job.  It took 6 hours.  The wiring behind the main DC panel had not been seen for a couple of years, and my memory of it was poor.  

It was wired with a Manual/Auto switch, with Auto using a thermostat to cool the engine and providing feedback if the engine compartment was hot.

I could not figure out why the thermostat circuit was not working.  Eventually, I determined the DPDT switch was broken.  I found a replacement in the storage locker, fixed it, closed the DC panel, and replaced the trim just before the FFR.  

After the race, I noticed the fridge was off.  I accidentally pulled the spade from the fridge circuit breaker.  Fixed it after the race and gave the boat a good soaping to try to get all the shad fly cadavers off.  The fourth time I washed her since Sunday's episode.