le weekend

After supper with Romy and company the night before, I got to the club early Saturday to help take Drumroll mast down and clean Bellum in the relatively cool weather.

Allan R was very eager and I called Peter and Norm to come help.  While waiting, I took down the mast head wind instruments. Mike and Robin showed up to help.  We wrapped the crane strap on the mast with a pull-down line. The mast came off very smoothly.

I then climbed Ghost Owl to fix a cotter pin and inspect the masthead.

Then I spent six hours with a toothbrush on Bellum Deck.  Tired out about 8 PM I BBQ some chickon and slept at the dock.  The next morning, I invited Louise to come sailing and continued to scrub the cockpit for another two hours.  The boat really looked great.

I tried to bleed Elixar without success, but so Julie called Robert who better bleed her - mostly at the injector pump.  Julie lost some of her crew, so she invited Robert sailing.

We sailed out about noon in quirky winds.  Occasionally it got cool.  On the way back the winds were good but directly from the East so we motored from Pointe-Claire back to the club.  Nice sailing.  Tara II, Chaos, Elixar were out too.

Louise 

Ghost Owl Mast

 Earned a beer for climbing a mast

Photo by Kelly

Single handed sail - Valois Bay

I biked to the boat, installed the PI and went sailing. 

There was not much wind but I did motor out towards the Gut in very light western winds.  I decided to anchor at Valois Bay near Venture Sailing Club.  Winds were supposed to go south and then east so Valois was a good compromise.

Nice evening, a great sunset, very relaxing, and great sleep.  Got up at 3 when then anchor alarm came on as winds shifted south.  Halyards were noisy.  Got up at 7:30 to find some bugs on the deck. 

I sailed passed the Gut towards Ile Perrot and back to the club as winds backed towards the east but still southerly. I sailed back to the club as winds were picking up and there was a risk of a thunderstorm and strong winds.


Norm and Allan were not at the club but David was walking down the dock and helped me to dock.

 

Louise sailing

I came to the club fully loaded with summer boat stuff to load up the boat. I service the two halyard winches and the spinnaker winches.  Put all the tools and lubricants on Flow Control for Chris.

Louise came out Sunday at 1 and we sailed out in very quirky winds.  We tacked to the Gut and then did very wide tacks in continually shifting winds.  Eventually, the winds stabilized but still varied in speed.  

Several boats were on the lake. The sky consisted of puffy clouds. 

We got back about 5 and had a glass of wine as Chris arrives to do his winches.

Nice day of quirky sailing.

Shake out sail with Darla

I got to the boat early to clean up the boat and prepare for the first sailing of the season.

I was surprised how clean she was because the deck was full of lignin from the tree due to the early removal of the winter tarp in early March.

I installed the missing battens and tack shackle on the main.

Darla showed at 4 up with pork chops and Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning and salad.  This was a full moon and a risk of a thunderstorm.  

We motored to the gut, sailed close haul to Dowkers. Darla got the hang of steering the boat after 15 minutes of coaching and corrections.  I never had to tell her much more to keep the boat trimmed.  I decided to anchor at the sandbars so we could get back should the storm come up.  

The shad flys were terrible.  Sunset as so-so.  The sky looked bad so we pulled the anchor to have the BBQ at the dock.

We enjoyed a Glenlivit and decided it was too late for supper and Darla went home and I slept aboard.

A nice beginning, boat kinks were resolved, and the boat is ready to race. 

Cover incomplete

The weather was nice, COVID closed us down.  I took down the cover on the weekend

 I've been working on my new cover when on April 7 and found the club was closed.  Cover is delayed until November 

building new boat cover April 2020

Club closed April 7 2020

Finishing new cover November 2020

Prizegiving

Maybe we did not do so badly.