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10,000 Islands adventure


Scott Dunsworth

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We got back on Sunday from a week of sailing the everglades. It was a grand time with near perfect weather,could have used a little more wind. Grahams Belhaven was a sweet cruiser for this area. I beached her several times, once when both of my girls were down below. You should have seen their eyes when I said we have run aground mates. Little did they know I intended to do so to go exploring. They climbed out to find us at a island.

She skimmed across skinny water ( less than 2 feet ) with the board up even on a beam reach. She did have a little leeward slip but not horrible.

We got to fly the staysail for hours on end. Jordyn proved she could hold a course better than me. She would hold her eyes on the compass and keep it steady. In fact I would get the sails set, tell her what heading I wanted and go up front and set on the deck next to the main. After a while everyone in the group was calling her captain. She would reply, yes I am the captain and dad is the anchor.

If I can figure out out to reduce the size of the pictures I will post a few. If not the WCTSS web site should have some in the near future.

Scott

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Scott,

Glad you enjoyed sailing in Florida.  Sorry, "Lively" and I could not make the trip.

I have a question.  When I look at the photo of your boat grounded it seems to be healing over slightly and I do not see the ""tri-pod" (three- footed) configuration mentioned in the B&B site information on the Belhaven.  Did you modify this or am I mis-interpreting the photo?

Dale

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Scott,

After sailing in Florida's shallow water and beach grounding, are you happy with your decision to deepen the keel and eliminate the "tri-pod" (three- footed) configuration?

Also, did you build the centerboard off center as designed? If so, is it flush with the bottom or sticking down on that side?  If flush, how did you deal with the increased height inside? or did you just make the board smaller?

Dale

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Dale I haven't had in problems with the extra draft. In reality she probably drafts 3 inchs more than designed. I used maranti ply over okoume. It made her about 150 pounds heaver.

As for the bilge keel I was in a hurry to get her turned back over and was not ready to mess with a lead pour yet. I do plan to cast the bilge keel in the future though not for the tri pod affect, but to level her out a bit. I have the motor and fuel tank on the port side so along with the weighted centerboard off set to the port she doesn't set in the water level. The bilge keel is made up of lead and if I remember around 60 to 80 pounds.

As you can see in one of the photos the center board is exposed about 4 inchs.

If doing again I would use the stiffer ply on the bottom, deck, cabin top and seat tops and use the lighter ply for every thing else. I could have probably saved about 75 pounds of finished weight.

Scott

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I don't know the weight. Graham says on the B&B site 1100 lbs plus ballast. So if I were guessing mine comes in around 1600 lbs dry including 350 lbs of ballast.

I'll give you an idea how much she weighted for this trip loaded. We had 2 batteries, 22 gallons of water, lawnchairs, 2 anchors with chain, a large packed cooler, port a pot, 3 large duffle bags of cloths, enough food to stock a small store, camp stove and fuel,3 12 packs of coke, case of beer,100 lbs of more stuff and 6 gallons of fuel. It was unbelievable how much stuff was in that boat. She was floating 2 inchs below the designed water line! I estimate she had about 750 lbs. of stuff and that was before the 3 of use were on board.

The good thing was she still wasn't a dog to sail. next year It will be kept much simpler and lighter.

We could have got by easy with about 1/2 the stuff. Some where I read keep it simple stupid and thats what I'll do. Beer, fuel, a battery, few good cigars and a cooler is all you need! ;)

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