Departure on a great adventure

Brian and I departed the Royal ona great adventure 

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Systems check with Chiheb and Brian

Norm bought me an 8 HP Johnson/ 

Saturday Brian came up from Vermont.  Chieb came helped prepare BELLUM for her big adventure.

Set up new chocks for docking lines, installed dingy towing patches and dinghy tow rigging 

Chris was lingering around and we were busy so I assigned him to install a carbon water filter for the boat tanks which he succeeded in.

Sunday we tested the new systems - sailed to the sandbars, had some steak hache and came back.  Chris showed up and we had some MMHA beer at the club.

Single Handed to Pointe Claire

On Monday afternoon I loaded the car with mast frame and other stuff to the club in the afternoon to work on the boat.  

I ended up helping Northern Sun whose Yanmar 3GMD was not turning over.  She was stuck at Dowers and ended up sailing back to her dock. The problem was a weak connector to the panel.  Quel Surprise.

I set off motoring in a West wind to the Gut, checking out the new drive chain.  She worked flawlessly.  I anchored outside the Pointe-Claire church.  BBQ my pork chop, slept and got up the next morning to sail back to the club.  I decided not to testify at Jessica's TAL hearing. She was poor at communicating about the issues in the case.  I was not clear what I was going to be witnessing. 

I got back to the dock at 10, changed the sails,  inflated the new dingy, organized the boat and locker and went out to test the dingy.

On Wednesday, I biked out to Boathouse, Home Depot and the new Addison's in Pointe-Claire to get screws, cables, fuses, clevis pin, plumbing for water filter.  I biked back to the club, intending to bring the Argon 24 bike back home, but the U-lock no longer worked.  It had been there all summer.

The Bellum splash

Bellum is splashed with a new strut and shaft at 12:30.  All systems go.  Packing adjusted. No leaks from the new transducer. Transducers work

Chiheb was going to be driving his wife to the airport and we decided to get together for a beer.  Instead, we went sailing with a south wind, we beamed to Beaconsfield and back in the dark for a two-hour cruise.

Amalia J100 - Shelby

 I had rigged Shark 2 to race with Scarlett.  Shelby walks by and he is sailing without crew so I decided to join him with Scarlett and de-rigged the shark

Nice sail with the 150, which unfortunately ripped on the way back after the race.  We came in last :(

Supper at the club. I bought a pitcher.

No race on Genisis

I had a meeting about a brochure at the Royal.  I biked there.  They wanted me to take more photos of the club facilities.

Biked to PCYC, and had a drink with Bruce and his friends.  Winds died about 5.

The race was cancelled at about 5:30.  Had a beer on Genisis.  Six boats from PCYC and Royal went out and had an informal race in nice light winds.  Pissed at RC.  

I didn't feel like racing but afterwards, I missed going out.

Had supper at the club, and bought a pitcher for the crew.

It started to drizzle and a large yellow rain system was coming in so I asked Joseph to drive me back to Monkland, leaving the bike at PCYC.

Weekend san BELLUM

No FFR for me

No FFR - decided to play pool

Sailed a shark on Saturday.  Reserved Shark 5 but it would not accept a motor.  Shark 6 came in early so I took her out for 6 hours of sailing

Went to the sandbars on Sunday with Zig-Zag

Bellum drive system

Bellum strut has been bent by catching a dinghy line.  She was hauled out Aug 12 and Shipwright has agreed to change the strut for a new one from Alquoquin 

The shaft looks scoured in spots. Investigation a new one.

JC observed the strut is obviously bent.

At least the week has been cold and wet.  

I miss you Bellum

Single Handed Pursuit Race - No Go

 missed the SHPR.  No Bellum, No Go.  Too tired from AQVA

AQVA with Scarlett

With BELLUM on the hard, we took out Shark 2 with a new genoa and registered for Spinnaker.

I biked to the club and did Yoga.

Maud had tested positive for COVID in the morning and cancelled.  

We rigged the boat and set sail at about 12:20 but did not finish the start line on time.  We started about 5 minutes late.

9 miles race, lasting about 3 glorious hours of great sailing.  Incidents - I dropped my sunglasses at the dock.  The boom hit me in the head and caught the lazy sheet around my food during a tack at a mark. Lots of fun.

We tried, but could not pass Tara II. We were behind Tara II.

When we finished, we sailed back to the club and were having so much fun, we sailed back to Pointe Claire and back to the club.  Lots of fun.

Supper started with gin and tonic / martini, wine and Jameson apres.  We sobered up at the club, Scarlett drove me home, and I had a hangover the next morning.

Shark sailing with Scarlett

Maud could not make it. Scarlett got to the club at about 5:50.

We tried but could not get to the race course in time for the race.  We tried motoring, but it took too much energy, and I didn't think we could make it. Only on channel 78 once we got close.

We did not race. We took the spinnaker back to the club.

Bellum Hauled Out - Sailing on Genisis - Cheheb and Rob

Bellum got hauled out for Y-valve, deck recore, depth transducer, dingy-tow installation and shaft packing.  It turned out that the strut is bent

Nice sail on Genisis with Rob and Cheheb

Redline return

Saturday was a sewing day for the new Bimini and other stuff.

On Saturday evening MLM was to drive me to Galop to help Norm bring Redline back to Montreal so that he could handle the flood from Hurricane Debbie.  The club had a tree that fell on the power lines to Forbe.

Just before leaving, I realized that Shipwright would not have power when they were starting work, so I rapidly moved Bellum to the service dock before leaving for Gallop.

The trip was uneventful.  It was cold.  We anchored at Coteau Landing, a first for Norm.  We raced back through Beaharnois locks Monday morning to get back for 3PM.

Shipwright had started removing the wet core

I stayed at the club to do a maintenance class with Ricard.

For some reason, the dry locker had filled with an inch of rotten water.  I cleaned the locker.

Wet sail with Catherine

Catherine messaged me asking to race on Thursday evening. I was not planning to race without crew and some rain.  I was going to be 50 mm of rain tomorrow. Since I was at the club and Eric had asked to sail I agreed.  We agreed to meet at 4PM.

Daniel asked if we needed crew, but he could not make it at 4PM.

Catherine had met with Helene last night and took Matchmaker out with Gerrard.  I was supposed to help but Gerrard was available so I was relieved.  She loved the boat and agreed to buy it, next year since she was going to be travelling for most of the next seven weeks and the estate was not settled.

The winds were picking up during the afternoon but were supposed to calm down so I took the chance to leave the 150 headsail on.  

We put up the main as we left the club and sailed out to the main lake and unfurled the headsail in furled mode. Catherine had problems holding a course and stopping the boat from turning when we were aiming for where we wanted to head to. She eventually got it but she could not helm the race.

Winds picked up to about 20 knots at the start and went up to 25 knots as we were starting and I abandoned the race but I had to cross the start line to get around the RC to head back.  We gybed and furled the head sail 70 % and sailed back in a fair amount of rain.  We got back to the club without incident.

The forecast was supposed to be calm with a small percentage of rain in the later evening.

I tidied up the boat and drove home in the rain. 

The race was cancelled about 30 minutes into the race.

Eric, granny and family

At 8:30, Eric sent me a message about sailing after two weeks of influenza.  

Catherine had also texted me asking to race

I was going to work on the bimini but decided to take them out since I was going to be gone the next week and granny would be back to England by then.

He arrived at 10 and I gave the dinghy tow and transducer to Shipwright and we sailed with an east wind to the gut and tacked around in great winds.  We returned through the gut, dropped the anchor swam and returned to the club where I installed the primary anchors for the bimini and rechecked the bimini fittings.  Put the bimini back in the locker as it was supposed to rain 50mm tomorrow.

Two days with Brian and one day with Jessica

Brian came up from Vermont to get to know each other.  

Brian was an enthusiastic candidate for helping me take BELLUM to the Bahamas.  He had limited sailing experience and was an active hobbyist boat builder building a foldable dinghy and a 29-foot catamaran at home.

I was late because I had some last-minute insurance questionnaire to fill in the morning, and the construction people were pumping out an outhouse outside our garage entrance. I rushed to do some groceries at Arkavan and called the club to let Brian in.

I got to the club and had lunch with Brian and at about 2:30, I was eager to set sail.  We sailed to the Gut, and had great conversations, Brian is quite chattative. He learnt and handled the boat well, more than adequate for the canals.  He basically wants to get the boat to Chasepeake/Deleware.

We decided to do the Tuesday race. We did reasonably.

Did a zero-emission anchoring at Dowkers, had a BBQ in the dark.  Chatted to 1:30.

Got up the next morning, chatted, coffee and cereal.  

Since the winds were light I asked Jessica to meet at PCYC so we did not have to go back to the Royal, 

Jessica lost her husband last year and needed help with getting her C&C 25.  I had helped her winterize it last year. We tried to get together several times in the previous 14 months and finally got together.

We sailed in a slow run to PCYC and arrived at 12:30 and Jessica also arrived early and met us on the patio. 

We set sail and went through a similar day as with Brian the previous day but in light winds.

We got back to the club at about 4,  We tested and fitted the bimini with three persons and put the slit for the backstay.

Brian and I drove Jessica to pick up her car at PCYC and we returned to the Royal.  Chatted until the Mercier traffic cleared out and he departed.

I spent the night at the dock. Zig Zag went out for a sunset sail and returned.  Sylvie was at the club with the kids.  Had a shower at the club and some whisky with Mikey and went to bed.

Natalia

I did Yoga and tested the Dinghy Tow on the boat.  

The single-handed race was postponed until after the AQVA.

Natalia came sailing with pork chops and we sailed in pretty good winds to Dowkers.  I chose Dowkers for the protection.  

There were no winds Sunday, so we motored back

Tested the Bimini fitting with Natalia.  

Drove to Kingston to bring MLM and CP back the next day.  I took the bus from St. Anne back home.

FFR - NOT

The FFR was cancelled.  

Most crew had cancelled and I was a bit raced out.

Luc was out before the race.  I went out single-handed intending to stay overnight.  I made the radio call for the race cancellation and Luc called me on cell to ask me why.  There was reasonably good winds.

I sailed to BYC and sailed back and decided to return to the club to listen to Peter K and Richard F play.

Went to bed 

Etchell !

 I had an eye doctor appointment at 4:15.  I biked to the club to drop my luggage and to Dubuc just in time for my appointment.  We were in a heat wave.

After the appointment, I met up with Joseph and Traven(sp) and we briefed, rigged and raced.  Start was almost a minute late.  We were not to gybe the SPI, but we did many times.

Boat had some rigging issues due to the new mast.

It could be a fun boat.

Darla, Shedon and Jade

Darla called me, telling me the weather was nice.  She wanted to take her son and GF sailing.

I had to deliver cheques to Leslie, so on a hot day I picked up my bike from Rachel, and rode to Rona to return plumbing hardware, I was going to take the EXO, but I decided to bike the 25 KM to Leslie in 40 degree with humidex.  

Came back to the club at 5 and there was no wind, so we motored to the sandbars and swam and had a 7-layer dip and Ranch dip with chips and double lime Buds.

After some swimming and the wind picked up at sunset, we hauled anchor and had a nice sail back.

The race was cancelled due to lack of wind.

Sailing with Andreanne - cancelled

We were supposed to take Andreanne and her parents out. We cancelled Monday due to lack of wind.  We tried again on the weekend, but it just wasn't meant to be.

Sunday SH to Dowkers and anchor at Sandbars

sunset

sunrise

Sunday I set sail after Kobus and Marcelle sailing at 4 and had a nice sail one one tack to Dowkers and then anchored at the Sandbars.  Kelley and Mike were sailing too.

The winds forecast for the night and Monday was dead. Monday morning was windlass so I cancelled with Andreanne and came back to the club, delivered the delayed tax papers to Leslie, did Boathouse, Access got a new fuse holder for the DC-DC converter that overheated.

Biked to Rachel for supper and pick up Honda.