Leaderboard

We had an unexpectedly great sail yesterday, one of those moments that feel like a true blessing from God! Winds were forecasted from the southeast, an unusual direction from here, and supposed to be very light, 4 to 5 knots throughout the day. We set out from our usual launch on the east arm of Grand Traverse Bay. Because of the unusual wind direction we were able to head Southwest, not a direction we normally go. To our delight, when we got away from the shore there was a much stronger breeze than forecasted. It was incredibly consistent, and the waters were flat. The late Summer sunshine was perfect. What a great day sailing and connecting with my older two boys! When we got back, a friend texted me with a picture and asked “is that your boat out there?“. He had been on shore at a friends house and took a photo of us while sailing. We ended the day eating with the rest of the family on a Lakeside deck. EDIT: Sorry for the bad grammar the first time around, my phone autocorrect is horrendous!

I returned from our 4-week vacation in June: a resort week in Palm Springs (kinda hot… but a DRY heat ) and a couple weeks in our resort 3,000 feet above Carson Valley and Lake Tahoe. Hiking is our primary activity. Just below our resort was the starting / ending line of the Tahoe 200 ultramarathon… 200 miles in but a few days… astounding. (We saw some racers passing us on the trails.) We drove “Route 66” out there (parts of the original highway), the Pacific Highway 1 to San Francisco, and finally a three-day 2,000 mile route back home… almost an “oil change” distance of driving during our trip. OK, today I was finally able to return to the Two Paw project to glue the three-piece gunwales to the top of the sides. The boat is only wired still, but the installed gunwales give it some stiffness. I always feel grimy after a bunch of epoxy work… a shower helps me feel better. Not an exciting job today but it will let me start epoxy-tacking the joints in preparation for the next epoxy work… filleting and taping all the inside joints. I don’t want the grandkids dealing with epoxy but I might be able to get them here to cut strips of fiberglass tape to fit. If one of my boys comes up, we could fillet and tape the joints fairly quickly. I do enjoy the idea of building a boat in the basement, like LeRoy Gibbs. Actually, I built an 8’ Glen L 3-point hydroplane in my basement during my 8th grade year and managed to get it up the stairs that led straight to the back door. Clearances were rather close and it was a bit of a squeeze.

I forgot—we practiced a man overboard drill. Mainly because son 2 wanted to jump in. But I was impressed how easily the boat maneuvered. IMG_2838.mov