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SF Bay Sunday 10/18

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
Anyone get caught in the slot last Sunday afternoon? Whew! That wasn't in the forecast! Took an good friend's family out for the day. Hiked Angel Island, lunch on the boat in the cove, and an afternoon sail. We left Ayala Cove about 3 is my guess and headed up Racoon toward Sausalito. I think the J80 fleet was racing in that direction. Fell off on a broad reach across the front of Angel with full main and head sail. Fog was rolling in at the gate and winds went quickly to 20-25 on a huge ebb. That's not suppose to happen in October! Glad I had another hand aboard that knew what she was doing. She kept the boat on her feet with a lot of quick counter-steering while barely carrying on a converstation with one of our guests. Knot meter hit 9s and a couple of quick visits to 10. Not sure how accurate it is - but it didn't matter. Alcatraz was a blur and I mostly remember seeing boats scramble south for Alameda to the calm waters of the Bay Bridge. When I took over driving we were half way to TI and winds were around 23. I decided to follow a few other boat ducking behind the Treasure Island where we tacked and put in a reef. Could not help but think about those lucky cowards heading for the shelter of the South Bay as I had to go back into the wind crossing the slot to get back to Richmond. Beaming almost all the way there at 8 knots, our gusts never had a clue. What a day. Anyone else have a story about Sunday? Anyone? I saw several Ericsons on the water prior to the cranage.
 

Milagros

Member II
I think we were out there--if it's the day I'm thinking of we hid out between Tiburon and Richmond most of the day but then the trip through Raccoon straight back home was half sailing/half river rafting. Yahoo!
 

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
Sounds about right Ian. I was on the other side of Angel island from you. On my way back to Richmond, we saw a line of young racers (6-8 Optimis with sails up) being feverishly towed by a RIB back to the Corinthian yacht club in the carnage. What a story those kids must have had.
 

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
Ian, i'm in Richmond, Marina Bay for the winter. Let me know when you are going out and where. We can try to meet up of at least and drive-by wave. There are so many Ericsons on the bay.
 

Sailingfun

Member III
I'm at the estuary and my 27 will be ready for a sea trial in December. Eventually we will go to Richmond marina for a weekend ;)
 

dofthesea

Member I
I'd be up for meeting other Ericson owners as well. I'm in the middle of a refit on my 27' I'm at Brickyard Cove Marina.
 

Milagros

Member II
Sounds like we might need to organize an Angel Island meet up! I'm stuck in the marina for the month due to dredging so will be anxious to get back out once Dec rolls around.
 

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
An Angel Island meet up sounds great if we can do it and remain social distant responsible. Which is really hard to do if we gather on a dock or marina. I love meeting other boaters and looking and talking. It's experiences that makes owning a sailboat truly special. But... If the virus is peaking this winter as predicted, maybe it's not a great idea. I think what would be safe and responsible is (depending on conditions) a group sail or motor? We could introduce ourselves and our boats from the latter (from our boats). All we need to start is a date and a location. After introductions we could spend the rest of the time sailing as groups of larger and smaller Ericson models. Could be kind of fun! I would like to initially propose Sunday, Noon, December 6th, Lee side of Angel Island (Pt. Blunt). Just to put it out there. The location is pretty central to most Bay Area home ports. Your thoughts?
 

K2MSmith

Sustaining Member
A similar sort of thing happened today around 4 pm when we were out Sausalito - Alcatraz and back (about 22 knots)... We were doing about 6 kn on jib alone for a while which I never tried. Surprised how stable the boat was.
 

Milagros

Member II
A similar sort of thing happened today around 4 pm when we were out Sausalito - Alcatraz and back (about 22 knots)... We were doing about 6 kn on jib alone for a while which I never tried. Surprised how stable the boat was.
I think we might have exchanged waves out there near the Harding Rock buoy. It was an interesting day wind-wise, fairly light SW for much of the day then strengthening quickly and clocking around to NW in the late afternoon/early evening as the cold front approached. We had a very sporty downhill reach/run from about the south tower of the GGB back to Sausalito pushed along by the 3-4' ocean swell that was starting to stand up in the ebb. My crew for the day races big boats so it was cool to show him that my little fiberglass tub could handle the heavier weather and there is plenty of fun to be had, even at 6-7 knots of boat speed. Other highlights of the day included playing among the kiters who were busting some BIG aerials (one must have gone at least 25' high), a tanker that surprised me by taking the regular eastbound channel instead of the deepwater (I imagine the reason was a very large outbound container ship that appeared in the deepwater channel a few minutes later), and the well-timed failure of the admittedly inadequate shackle attaching the sheets to my jib just as we were striking sail for the day.

Definitely a few lessons learned. I grew up sailing among the very busy shipping lanes of the Chesapeake and have a healthy respect for large commercial traffic--I was never in any conflict with the tanker but despite monitoring VTS on channel 14 it did sneak up on me a little faster than I expected. I knew the container ship was getting ready to depart Oakland but figured one would wait for the other (ships are prohibited from passing one another in the DW channel). As it passed the tanker was riding high in the water--so it was probably empty and so had sufficient draft to use the regular traffic lane. Just goes to show even though you think you might know where they are going, its best just to stay the heck out of the channels when there are large ships moving about! As for the shackle--I'm not sure of the correct term for the type but I've attached an image below--when the sail was luffing as it was being lowered my best guess is that the shackle must have struck something that caused the two sides to compress together and release the pin. Obviously this could have been a bad situation if it had not happened with such impeccable timing, and the thought of that shackle whacking something with enough force to permanently deform itself has me seriously considering upgrading to soft shackles for my jib.

Anyway--I mostly opened the forum to say that yes, I am interested in a meetup/anchor out on the 6th :) More fun to debrief the weekend's adventures than to start my work I suppose. Cheers, Ian

1604941687585.png
 

K2MSmith

Sustaining Member
Yes , I think I remember you . We saw two container ships, one eastbound and one west. They move fast . We planned on going out for a quick sail at 3-4:30 I knew the wind was building and it was just my wife and I ( she is new to sailing ) . We have a powerful main , so I thought why not just tighten the backstay and sail just the jib ?. We ended up sailing all way to Alcatraz. It really picked up around 4:30 in the slot on return about 22-25 where we were. The boat was getting overpowered on the jib alone ( and unbalanced) , so we headed downwind towards angel island and reduced sail, did our best to go back upwind towards Sausalito and finally motored in . Being relatively new to higher wind sailing im gaining an appreciation for the non-linear effect of windspeed on sail power.
 

Christian Williams

E381 - Los Angeles
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
Obviously this could have been a bad situation

I suggest a captive-pin screw-in halyard shackle. For offshore, the pin can be seized. Any typical quick-release "halyard shackle" can come undone halfway down the mast, which happened to me, and which presents an interesting recovery problem.

Shackles---Standard-Dee.png

Video will go direct to topic:

 
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K2MSmith

Sustaining Member
An Angel Island meet up sounds great if we can do it and remain social distant responsible. Which is really hard to do if we gather on a dock or marina. I love meeting other boaters and looking and talking. It's experiences that makes owning a sailboat truly special. But... If the virus is peaking this winter as predicted, maybe it's not a great idea. I think what would be safe and responsible is (depending on conditions) a group sail or motor? We could introduce ourselves and our boats from the latter (from our boats). All we need to start is a date and a location. After introductions we could spend the rest of the time sailing as groups of larger and smaller Ericson models. Could be kind of fun! I would like to initially propose Sunday, Noon, December 6th, Lee side of Angel Island (Pt. Blunt). Just to put it out there. The location is pretty central to most Bay Area home ports. Your thoughts?
That sounds like fun (weather permitting) and very close to us, but has of yet I have no ground tackle...(just anchor and rope) and no dingy - so maybe I need to start thinking about some chain.
 

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
Well, That 3 boat interested in a sailing meet up on the 6th ***Sunday, Noon, December 6th, Lee side of Angel Island (Pt. Blunt)***. Remember it will be more of a sail/motor by for introductions (VHS?) and a sail the bay directly after. I may put it out there on the Olson 911 Facebook page as there are quite a few in the bay. I know that most will be involved with midwinter races but who knows. Lets hope there are other interested locals and you may want to join in. So pass the word it you see any Ericsons in your marina. I am planning on putting a card out on Ericsons in my marina. There is real nice 27 a few slips away and it think an older 32 behind me. I will try to keep this link visible by posting now and then. Feel free to keep sharing you sailing on the Bay experiences here!

Note:
For those of you that don't know. Give Pt. Blunt a wide berth don't sail between the point and the green marker. I have seen it done but most race notices do not allow it.
 

G Kiba

Sustaining Member
That sounds like fun and very close to us, but has of yet I have no ground tackle...(just anchor and rope) and no dingy - so maybe I need to start thinking about some chain.
It is not an anchor out. The plan is to pass by each other and introduce yourself and your boat!. Then we can sail as a pack of vikings? Bear with me. This idea came out of now where but I like it. I will post more details as the date nears and I think about it. Please feel free to post any additional suggestions about protocol or whatever you think would be fun. Remember that social distance, fun, and sailing are the goals.
 

K2MSmith

Sustaining Member
. Remember it will be more of a sail/motor by for introductions (VHS?) and a sail the bay directly after.
OK that makes it less important that I get a solid anchor setup. worse comes to worse we can hover around on motor until everyone shows up.
 
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