Last night we had some great winds and we were sailing
along between 7 and 8 knots for a good length of time. We have a 1 to 1.5 knot current helping us
along so that really helps with the SOG (Speed Over Ground)Winds at some point
got up to 20 knots perhaps even higher.
I had the 3:30 AM to 7:30 AM shift and once the sun came up I took the
reef out of the main sail to increase our speed as the wind was
decreasing. Later in the morning the
winds dropped to below 3 knots and we were drifting in the current with little
or no help from the sails. We motored
for 1/7 hours which gave the Admiral time to run the fridge without taking too
much juice from the batteries. I've come
to learn that power management on a boat is a constant worry for the captain of
the boat. At least on this boat... I think it applies to most boats. We got back into winds and up went the sails
and we have been sailing ever since. We
got the usual pickup of wind speed at 7:15 PM local time. We had reefed the main for the night as there
were some black clouds on the horizon.
For you non sailors out there...the saying is "Reef early and Reef
often" What you are asking is
reef... Reef is when you reduced the amount of sail. On most boats you have a pair of lines that
go through grommets in the main sail and you lower the sail and crank in the
reef lines to keep the sail tight. Most
main sails have 2 reef points which allow you to reduce the amount of sail some
and then a bunch more. Lots of boats now have 3 reefing points on the main
sail. On Maggie we have a main sail that
rolls into the boom.(In boom furling)
This way we have an infinite number of reef points depending on how much
sail you roll into the boom. Lots of
boats have the main sail roll (furl) into the mast which also gives you
infinite reef points. A great system unless
for some reason it doesn't work properly or at all. The more complex a system the more points for
failure. You can also reef the head sail
as well. On Maggie like most boats these
days the head sail furls around the wire (shroud) at the front of the
boat. So it rolls up. So once agin you
have an infinite number of reef points on the head sail. On Maggie we have a Genoa and a stay sail
which both roll up or furl.
We normally reef the main so the admiral is more
comfortable during her shift.
OK OK you are saying get back to your story. So the winds
picked up like normal and we were flying along at 7.6 knots. Earlier in the day we were up to 8.8 knots of
speed. I was looking for 9. As I mentioned earlier we have p to 1.5 knots
of current so 9 knots should be easy to accomplish.
Just looked up.. we are at 19.7 knots of wind
and we hit 7.6 knots of speed.
Enough for today except to say. Check out the tracker by clicking to the
right. also check out Carol's blog. I'm sure it will give you a completely
different perspective to the trip.
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