We got the boat out for our first sail this weekend. We didn’t have much wind so it turned out to be a perfect day for getting the new motor in the water and getting started breaking it in.

The day started off normally. I got the boat ready to go while Dana and the kids did chores around the farm and packed the food and drinks. Joey helped me rig the halyards and the topping lift, he’s getting good at leading the lines through the maze of standing rigging that’s on the deck when the mast is down.

After getting the truck and the boat loaded up we headed down to Everett. As we left Monroe we fell in behind 40-ish foot boat that was being hauled by a semi, complete with a lead car and a follow car. Traffic was backed up considerably behind us, and we laughed about how the people who were passing us were going to be surprised when they found out that the sail boat was not the cause of the backup.

We made it down to the waterfront in good order and stopped at West Marine to pick up a new PFD for Dana. Her old one got damp over the winter and ended up with mildew all over it. She picked up a new pair of sun glasses too.

We headed back to the 12th street launch to rig and launch the boat. The economy is hitting the state’s recreation services pretty hard – with revenue down the state is putting as much money into the parks, so the launch fees were up, and they’ve added a parking fee to the facility as well. Last year it was $5.00 to launch and park, this year it was $11.00 to launch and park on the weekend. It’s only $8.00 on weekdays, but since I’ve only sailed on a weekday once, I’m not sure that’s going to be much benefit to me.

Once we were at the launch ramps we found out that we had hit the ramps at the bottom of a –2.6 tide. The trailer was off the end of the concrete ramp before Odyssey floated free. On the next ramp over a man was launching a 26-foot fishing boat, his truck was off the end of the ramp before the boat floated free – luckily he had 4-wheel drive and could pull himself back up the ramp. Katie helped me bend on the sails and then we headed out into the river, puttering along with the new motor.

We headed out into the river and headed upstream to give the motor some running time. Typically it takes around 15 minutes to get from the boat launch to the mouth of the river, I wanted to have the engine run for 30 minutes or so this first time so I could give it a chance to warm up and start the break-in. As we left the launch I had Joey lower the keel, he had it about 2/3 of the way down when we suddenly stopped – the water level was so low we had less then 5 feet of water under the keel. Joe cranked the keel up and I backed us out ‘til we were free, then I ran straight across the river to the channel before heading upstream again.

We drug the keel across the bottom one other time while we were motoring in the river. I’ve never run aground before, and I managed to do it twice in one day on this trip. Of course, “run aground” is a relative term on Odyssey. We draw 5 1/2 feet with the keel down, but only 18 inches with the keel up. If I hit the bottom we just crank the keel up ‘til we’re free, then head for deeper water.

And usually we don’t worry about running aground at all. Out on Possession Sound there is 75 to 100 fathoms of water under the boat most of the time. It’s only in the river that we need to worry about the depth.

Anyway, the trip out was uneventful. There was so little wind and so little traffic that the mouth of the river, normally a washing machine of chop, was almost flat. We motored out a ways and raised the sails. At first we had enough wind to move the boat along at about 3 knots, but pretty soon it fell to nothing and we were going nowhere at all.

I fired up the motor and we chugged over toward the flats off Jetty Island. Along there we found a bit of breeze and Dana sailed us a couple of miles north along the flat. When we tacked around we ran out of breeze again, so I started the motor one more time and we motored around ‘til it was time to come in.

The weather was fluky all day. There were clouds moving over head but they kept going to the east until they pushed up against the foothills. To the west it was a warm, sunny day – to the east it was dark grey and forbidding.

Around 3:00 the weather took a turn for the worse so I turned us around and started in. By the time we got into the river it was starting to rain, so I struck the sails and the halyards as we cruised up the river – by the time we were at the boat launch we were ready to go on the trailer as soon as the motor ran the fuel out of the carburetor and the rudder was out of the water.

After that we got the boat ready to head home and drove back to Monroe. The closer we got to home the worse the weather became until we ran into Monroe in a thunderstorm.

Not a bad first sail, and I think the first time we’ve been in the water before the end of May. Looking ahead on the calendar there’s not a lot of free weekends, but I’m sure we’ll get at least one more chance to sail before we head over the Lake Chelan.

Last weekend the family was out of town so I took advantage of the missing family to do some work on Odyssey. I pulled her into the barn and started cleaning out the stuff inside. Some things, like the towels, needed to be taken out and washed. Other things, like the cushions, just needed to be dried off and they were good to go.

I pulled the sails out of the sail bags and hung them up in the garage over night to make sure that they were dry, and I used the shop vac to pull 4 or 5 gallons of water out of the bilges. All in all, however, it was remarkably clean in there.

That weekend I pulled all the miscellaneous lines off the boat. I pulled the boom vang, the main boom downhaul, the main outhaul and the earring off and took them to West Marine to replace the lines.

I’m not sure what it is about the people at West Marine, but there are two kinds of people that work there. Good-natured people who don’t know anything about boats and unpleasant arrogant people who don’t know anything about boats but treat you like the problem is you, not them.

Of course, when I went in on Saturday there was one of each.

At one point I was doing the “I’m smiling because I don’t want to tell you exactly what I think about what you’ve just said to me.” I think they might have got the picture, ‘cause they backed way off.

Anyway, the good-natured guy helped me size and purchase new lines. I picked up a tide table and actually made it out of the store for only $21.

Yes, it was too good to be true.

I stopped on the way home and picked up a spool of waxed whipping twine at the other marine shop on the Everett water front (can’t think of the name. Typical.) because I didn’t want to go back to West Marine and try to explain to them what I wanted. Saturday night while I watched TV I whipped the end of all the lines.

The lines looked good, but when I went out to put them on the boat it turned out they were all a sixteenth too big. So I put Duchess in the car and headed back on Sunday morning.

The same two guys were working. They were standing in the exact same place they had been when I got there on Saturday. Worst nightmare ever. And it cost me another $17.

This time I bought extra line for the boom vang. I wanted to try to splice an eye around the beckett on the vang’s fiddle block. On Wednesday I finally gave it a try. It took me 3 hours and two tries to put in one rather ugly splice, only saved by the long whip I put around the splice. I can have one done for me for $6. Couldn’t make a living doing that…

Anyway, I took the lines out to the boat – put the vang back on the boom and tied the outhaul and downhaul where they belong. Looks rather spiffy with the new lines.

Dana and I took Odyssey out this weekend even though the kids decided that they wanted to stay home and work on their posters and cages for the fair. It felt a little weird to take off to sail with the kids at home, but it turned out to be a nice trip for Dana and I.

Saturday morning was gray, so I wasn’t sure if we were going to have a comfortably warm day for being out on the water. We loaded up the boat with towels to use as blankets, sweatshirts, and wind breakers. Turned out once we were on the water that we didn’t need warm clothes, it was a beautiful sunny day out there.

The wind was blowing just about right – not too much to fly the genoa, but enough to make Odyssey lively. We consistently were hitting speeds of 4.5 to 5 knots over the ground most of the day. Dana and I, mostly Dana, pushed the boat harder than we have in the past. We found that we were pretty comfortable at 10 degrees of heel, and that as we got to 20 degrees things started flying across the cockpit. We mostly tried to stay under 20 degrees of heel.

The coolest part of the trip was seeing a gray whale only one or two hundred yards away. It would come to the surface, blow, then wave one pectoral fin in the air as it slipped back under water. We watched it for about half an hour as we sailed toward Port Susan. At one point we noticed we were on a slightly converging course so we tacked away. The whale looked like it was bigger than Odyssey, we didn’t want to be in its way – and that’s not including the whole marine mammals laws.

The trip from Hat Island back to the river was long and boring. It was downwind, so it was relatively calm even though we still made 3.5 to 4.5 knots over the ground most of the way. Downwind sailing isn’t the most exciting thing, and Dana took advantage of the calm to take a nap. I didn’t even have the VHF to keep me company – most of the charge was gone on the radio so I was saving it for emergencies.

Setting up and tearing down were almost trouble-free. We had a little trouble putting the mast up, one of the stays got stuck under the edge of a portlight and wouldn’t come free. Then once the mast was up it turned out the bolt we normally use to keep the forestay on was missing. We had to set the mast down and dig a replacement out of the cabin.

One the way in we were having trouble getting Odyssey onto the trailer. We needed it to move away from the pier, but every time I kicked the bow out the stern would swing in to the pier, and when Dana kicked the stern out it would pivot the other way. We couldn’t get the boat to move sideways through the water at all – until I realized that I hadn’t retracted the keel into the boat before we tried to put it on the trailer. Once I cranked the keel up we were fine.

The whole day was great, and Dana and I had a good time. I’m looking forward to more “adults only” trips out on the Sound.

We went for the first sail of the year today. The wind was a little strong, but it was a great day on the water.

Katie and Joey helped me set up the boat, Joey is strong enough (and big enough) to help me lift the mast into position. Between the two of them Dana didn’t have to do anything but walk the dog. On this trip we did a lot more to get the boat ready before we put it in the water – bent on the sails, attached lines, etc. Once we were in we didn’t have to spend a lot of time on the dock getting ready

I had a brief scare when I put the boat into the water – I tried to lower the keel but there was a wrap around the outside of the winch drum and the keel wouldn’t go down. I put Odyssey back on the trailer and tried again to remove the wrap, this time it worked. I backed Odyssey back down the ramp and away we went.

The wind was strong enough that I didn’t put the jib up, we just sailed on the mainsail for the whole day. The kids steered us down the river and took the tiller while I put the sails up, but then I got to be the helmsman for most of the day. Dana would normally have done more, but Duchess wasn’t comfortable on the boat and spent the day on Dana’s lap.

On the way back we sailed up the channel, some of the best sailing of the day. We had a little trouble getting the sail down, there isn’t much room to turn into the wind when you’re in the river, but fortunately the keel got stuck in the bottom so we stopped drifting and I was able to get the sail down.

After I had the sail down I cranked the keel up off the bottom and we motored into the dock. We tore down and headed home.

Hauled all the gear out of the barn rafters and loaded it up on Odyssey tonight. Since she's tucked into the barn it went pretty fast, didn't need to walk across the property or anything like that.

Spread the sails out on the front lawn, they're still OK -- not great, the jib is 30 years old after all, but servicable for the coming year. For some reason the outhaul wasn't attached to the main sail, even though there was a loop still tied in it. Strange, that. I tied the old outhaul back on, but I think I'm going to buy a new one for this season. It's only 3 feet or so long, that shouldn't break the piggy bank.

Only a couple, three more things to do: attach the new anchor chain and rode to the new anchor, mix up some fuel for the outboard, and test the outboard to make sure that it works this year. Won't be sailing this weekend (need to go to Eastern Washington for my brother's 40th birthday party) but maybe the weekend after.

Trying to get Odyssey ready to go this weekend so I can go sailing next weekend. Usually I try to get ready on Saturday and sail on Sunday. It's usually too much.

I tried to finish the new hatch, but I can't get my epoxy to go off, and I'm about out of ideas. Instead I just bolted all the clean teak on and slid to original hatch down into the slides.

After everything was bolted back together and the dirt was all swept out, I hauled her over to the other side of the place to spend some quality time with a hose and a scrub brush. Earlier this year I heard about a product called "Purple Power" that's supposed to do a good job of cleaning the fiberglass. It does. It didn't get rid of the water and marks and streaks, but it did get the everything else. Dana says it's the cleanest that she's ever seen Odyssey.

I slid her back into the barn at the end of the day, next I need to load the gear aboard, rig my new anchor chain and rode, and re-rig the mast. It's not much more than half a day's work, so I'm betting I actually get out next weekend, weather permitting.

So I was right when I wrote in my last entry "I think that's it for the year."

Building the house, moving, and the fair took a lot of time, and Odyssey didn't make it into the water last year at all. That's the bad side, the good side is that's why I have a trailerable sailboat, a whole year of sitting around didn't cost me a dime in slip fees.

This summer I not only cleaned Odyssey up but I took out for a day on the water. Unfortunately not a sail, but a day on the water.

Spring was very late in the Puget Sound region this year, it stayed wet and raining into late June. I managed to get out on a couple of the nice days to wash Odyssey down and drain the water from the bilges, but that was all for the early part of the year. Getting the green off was a big win, but this year I was determined to sail, so we started looking for a day.

Late in June (the weekend of the 21st) it looked like we'd have a chance, so I sent Dana out to get the license for the boat and trailer renewed. But because it was still the 2007 sticker year, if she bought the $25.00 license sticker it would only have been good until the 30th, and then I would need a 2008 sticker. We decided to put off the first sail into July.

The first weekend in July we were on vacation (Hawaii!), so that meant sailing was off until the second weekend. And gosh darn it I was going to go out.

Saturday I did chores around the house so that I would have Sunday to sail. Then Sunday early I started loading up the boat with all required gear: anchor, sails, lines, cushions, towels, it just goes on and on. However, the motor started, I found new flares at the local hardware store, the brake lights worked after a little fiddling, and the trailer tires weren't too flat. We were off.

The drive to the launch ramp in Everett was a bit scary, the boat and trailer seemed to be a bit squirly. Turned out I'd forgotten to strap the back of the boat down, so Odyssey was bouncing on the trailer a bit. But we got safely to the launch ramp and putting the mast up went smoothly, even though I'd also forgotten my new mast-raising stick. Faster than we thought possible we were in the water and motoring away from the dock into a fairly fresh, and welcome, sailing breeze.

It was a fairly standard run down to the mouth of the Snohomish -- lots of boats, dodging the Jetty Island ferry, etc. Joey was at the helm with Dana giving him lessons in steering. Katie and I did the foredeck work getting the genoa ready to go. So far, so good.

And then, we hit the first of our two major snags of the day.

I'd forgotten to lower the swing keel. Usually I do that first thing coming out of the launch but I'd been distracted by avoiding a wind surfer and the ferry. I remembered, though, just before we hit the washing machine at the mouth of the river, so I went below to lower the keel.

It wouldn't go down.

So I hit it with a winch handle to knock the rust loose.

The whole winch gave a good impression of disintegrating. But the keel stayed up. Which is a good thing at this point.

Sailing was out of the question, so we decided to run up the river for a while and back. We had a lovely motor (except for a couple of idjits on PWCs that were kicking up wakes in a no-wake zone) up the river to the I-5 bridge.

That's when we hit the second snag of the day.

Katie asked "Why do those PWCs have those jets of water shooting up into the air?"

"To show that cooling water is getting to the motor," I replied. "Ours has one too, it just points down. See?"

Only I didn't see. No cooling water jet. No cooling water in the motor. Trouble.

We turned and headed for home, and with the exception of one other power boat cutting our bow and tossing us around with his wake, we made it back to the dock with no problems. I spent the entire time thinking "if the motor fails here, I'll be able to get to there." I didn't need any of those plans, but I was ready. Later when I told Dana she said she was wondering what I'd do if there was a problem with the motor.

It seemed like bringing the boat out was a lot quicker than usual too. Maybe that's just 'cause it's been so long.

Anyway, now it's off to the forums to find a vendor for a keel winch for Odyssey. This may be our only trip this year. But at least we made it out onto the water once.

Sometime in June, 2006¹

Headed out for a day sail with Dana and the kids.

Seemed like it was easy to get started, but it still took an hour to get off the dock.

Once we were out in the river we had a small problem with the keel winch: it refused to roll down. I ended up crawling under the cockpit to spin it down by hand. The winch is pretty rusted up; it needs some TLC.

Once we were out on the Sound we had a great time chasing the wind. Dana tried reading the wind fly but couldn't seem to get the hang of it. After a while she gave the tiller; I actually got to sail my boat this time.

The wind was fairly strong all day, although a couple of times it did manage to blow out at the least opportune moment, usually just as a big powerboat went across our bow. Why -- with all that ocean out there -- they have to cross right of our bow I'll never know.

Dana, Katie, and Joey ended up sleeping below for most of the day while I single-handed.

By 6-ish everyone was cold and tired, so we headed in. We tied up in the dock at 12th street for an hour or so to eat dinner. It was quite cozy in the cabin -- we enjoyed the protection from the wind.

¹Not sure of the date on this. It's in a log file called "Odyssey-606" which means it was written in June of 2006, but the actual date on the entry is March 1, 2006, which is clearly wrong. It was probably after the 11th, considering the last entry was made on that date, but I'm not sure when.

Here's the summary of the 2005 sailing season. The whole sailing season.

In June I went out with my family on a blustery, cold, rough day. They didn't want to go out again.

In September I went out with Rich and his son Geoff. We had a grand time on a great day for sailing.

And that's it for 2005.

We decided to go somewhere different for our first sail of the year, since we splurged on a new trailer over the winter expressly so we could go to different places. For this trip, we decided to sail in Lake Washington, launching at Sandpoint in Magnusen Park.

The new trailer towed like a dream, occasionally I would look into my rear-view mirror and be surprised that I had a boat tagging along behind me. Having a trailer that tows so nice turned out to be a good thing, since I got a little lost heading to the park and ended up pulling the boat through the narrow streets of a Lake City neighborhood.

Once I found park I took the time to walk from the prep area to the launch to make sure there were no low hanging wires or tree limbs that would interfere with the mast while we moved. Once I was sure there was anything between us and the water, Dana and I made pretty short work of rigging the boat for launch.

Once we got the boat in, we headed out into the lake to hunt up some wind. There wasn't much to be found, so we decided to head across the lake to Kirkland so the kids could get out of the boat and swim. The crossing was OK, but quite rough considering there was very little wind to pick up the waves.

We found an opening at the end of the Kirkland public dock and did a touch and go, stopping long enough to drop off the Dana and the kids. I took Odyssey and headed off the dock a quarter of a mile or so, then waited for Dana to call me when the kids were done swimming.

While I was heading out, I noticed that I'd lost one of my fenders over the side. I turned around and went back in, where I saw the fender floating in the lake with a couple of boats circling around. One boat, a bow rider with three kids in the front picked up the float, and then the dad threw it over to me. He threw it like a football, and made a perfect toss to Odyssey's cockpit.

I spent an uncomfortable hour bobbing about in Odyssey while the kids swam. The lake was rough, and other boaters seemed oblivious to their wakes as they sped past, sometimes only yards away. I was only too happy to head in and pick up Dana and the kids and get away from the Kirkland waterfront.

The wind finally came up after the family was back on board, and we spent an enjoyable couple of hours chasing the fluky breezes around. At one point we sat with our sails slatting while 50 yards away a Catalina 22 rolled past with her sails full. Later, we managed to find a breeze and sailed past a J-24 on the opposite tack with no wind in her sails.

A thundercloud forming in the late afternoon chased us, and apparently everybody else, off the lake. We circled for half an hour or so waiting for our chance to get to the launch and get out. Once we had our chance, the dock assistant and the other people waiting to launch hurried us to get onto the trailer and out of the way.

That's when I made my big mistake and allowed the pressure of getting out of the way to overcome my good sense. I pulled the boat out of the water with the rudder still down, and broke the rudder into three pieces when it dragged on the ground.

Dana and I quickly picked up the pieces and got out of Dodge so the people pointing and laughing weren't pointing and laughing at us anymore. We took the rig down and headed for home, where I started looking for a replacement for the rudder.