It was a beautiful evening, the stars were shining, the lights from shore glowed across the water and a healthy wind was blowing. The waves were just a couple feet high and didn't seem to bother Buttercup (my golden lab) who sat near me in the cockpit. But it had not been a bowl of roses getting out here:
Today my friend asked me to take her 30 foot Santana boat out (as she was away and needing someone to check on it). So I found her boat in the dock she had told me of and I set about to find the key. That in itself was a major job - as I couldn't find it - and so kept up the search until finally I remembered one little clue she had told me and I was then able to open the hatch door. Afterwards, I set about the task of getting the jib and main sail set. It was obvious it had not been sailed in a while, so finding the sails took me a while too! The next step was to get the outboard engine turned on, and this too proved difficult! In fact - I couldn't do it. I tried every trick in my 'engine starting' book but it would not turn over. So here I would go again - sailing without an engine! One big problem though: it was a downwind slip and how to get the boat out? I began formulating a plan to kayak out to the opposite dock on the upwind side, tie a rope on the dock cleat and then kayak back, attach the boat to the line and pull the boat out. Putting up the sails, I would then let go of the lines holding the boat to the dock and sail out. And that's more or less what happened after a first try mess up - the first trouble being that I only set the jib (sailing out under jib alone works with me Columbia 22 but not on this bigger Santana 30).
So once out on the water - I was exuberant (I mean after all that work I had almost given up!). It was my first time sailing a thirty foot by myself and though there was an additional eight feet from my Columbia 22, it really did not feel that much different.
The sun was now setting and as I got half way out the harbor, I knew I needed to get the navigation lights on. So I tied down the tiller in my usual fashion* (which I will explain below) and then turned on the battery and lights. But here again I was met with resistance. For every light seemed willing to come on EXCEPT the navigation lights! The boat even had some really cool amber cockpit lights that helped maintain night vision. That was all super great but without the essentials, I felt frustrated again! Thankfully I had thought ahead and put some emergency nav. lights in my backpack and now attached these to the port and starboard side and lit my lantern for the stern light. So, armed with this, I then headed out to sea. It was peaceful to be sailing over the waves again by myself. I had not been out by myself since I lost my mast in that storm about a month or so ago. And so after a pleasant sail over the dark waves, I returned back to the harbor and coming upwind, lowered the mainsail, and then cruised back under jib alone into the boat slip.
"Nicely done!" A friendly man on another boat yelled across the water. I took that as a compliment and was encouraged for all the hard work I had done to get the boat out today!
