1st sail of '13

You see that?! That’s from Saturday, January 5th. It was about 65 degrees, warm sun, and 5-10mph winds. I set out solo at around 1pm and sailed up to the Manhattan Beach pier, headed straight for it (which is when this picture was taken) and then down south to Torrance Beach/Palos Verdes cliffs. The wind actually picked up and I was trimming my sails alongside another Catalina 30, trying to go faster than him. The main point was to sail alone, make sure I can do everything, and get a better feel for A Cenoura. 

When I used to sail a catamaran, I read a couple catamaran-specific sailing books, and the way you adjust the sails and the direction the boat goes fastest is different than on monohulls like A Cenoura. This is due to the physics of sail shape, having two pontoons on a catamaran design, and much less surface-area friction. So, basically, I’m getting used to the monohull thing again. The picture above is going dead-downwind, you can place the sails to opposing sides and grab the most air, it’s called “wing-and-wing”.

I feel confident sailing alone. I have an autopilot on the boat, so when I need to adjust something out of reach or want to relax, the boat can steer itself. For tacking, I could just hit the (+/-10) degrees buttons as many times as I need for the boat to turn itself into a new tack. For example, if I want to be going 90 degrees in the other direction, I just push the button 9 times and then move forward and handle the jib sheets and main throughout the tack. It’s pretty simple. I am going to try it without autopilot next time.

I mentioned last week that I stepped on, and broke, a little block. Here’s the shiny new one for $37. That line runs forward to the roller-furling unit. Unfortunately its at just the spot that I step on. I’ve seen other boats mount the line up higher on the stanchions, which seems better, but then I $aw the extra part$ that $uch a $etup involve$ and decided not to make change$.

Saturday was pretty awesome for other reasons. Before going sailing, I walked over to the Redondo break wall, a jetty that usually has really fun left-handed waves when there is enough swell energy. I caught several head-high or larger speedy waves until my feet and hands were too cold to bare. I’m going to get more Go-Pro footage soon and add those photos and videos here as well.