Jonathan's "Kerrie Lynne II"

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I took the week off to get in as much sailing as I could.

Saturday-Sunday

High winds did stuff at home.

Monday

After putting on the bimini, transfering ice and food to the boat coolers, I was underway for Mobjack Bay by 10am.

This was the first "long" trip that Dad didn't go with me. He turned 80 this year and has decided that he isn't comfortable making these trips with me now. I certainly understand that.

But, I definitely missed having him on the trip for two big reasons.

First, it was great having the company.

Second, even though I handled most of the sailing stuff I really missed having him along to help. I cooked and he did the dishes. Also, there are tons of other things that he helped with that I took for granted. Sailing requires your full attention and most little tasks have to wait. On Monday with the wind up I didn't even have an opportunity to do snacks or lunch. I finally hove to around 2pm to wolf down a sandwich. With dad along, he would have gotten things out of the cooler and I wouldn't even have given it a second thought.

I missed you Dad!

The wind was from the south/south-east the entire trip. The tracks marked in green are when I was sailing.

The left track shows the legs to and from Mobjack Bay from Willoughby Harbor marina. The second track shows the detail of what I did on Mobjack Bay

The first day was one long broad reach.

With the fetch and the following seas you have to give steering quite a bit of attention. In those conditions the autopilot is pretty useless as it is constantly over steering.

Per GPS, the trip was 100.9 miles long.

I spent Monday night on the East River.

Tuesday

I explored the rest of the East River before heading over to the North River.

Don't these rivers on Mobjack have interesting names? When I think about it, it is surprising sinc most Virginia Rivers have indian sounding names like Potomac or Chickahominy.

Breakfast

I have been to Mobjack Bay several times before and didn't see much I hadn't seen before. The exception to this was "Woodass Creek." It is a very small and not very long creek off of the East River. When I was passing by the entrance of the creek the boats I saw made me turn around and take a closer look. I'm glad I did. That creek was a pretty little gem and the families of geese certainly thought so.

0060_20120522_0951_IMG_0017_Woodass Creek.jpg

The forecast for Thursday was for 20kt winds - which I don't do. I did not want to spend a day of my vacation at anchor so I decided to head back two nights early.
On the way back, I had the tide and the wind against me and I did the tacking battle thing for about three hours before giving up.
On leaving the mouth of Mobjack bay the captain of the sailboat "Datum" was shouting something and was waving. I figured something was wrong so I swung back around to talk with him. He just wanted me to know that he used to have a boat like mine (West Wight Potter P19) and he enjoyed reading my blog (this log). The P19 is pretty distinctive looking so I guess that's how he recognized me (that and the four inch "Kerrie Lynne II lettering on the side of my boat). When we parted I noticed that the boat was out of Portsmouth. When I used to keep my boat at the Nautical Boats marina in Portsmouth I used to go up the Western Branch of the Elizabeth to see a P19 that was docked up near the end. I wonder if that was his boat.
A quick but satisfying trip to Mobjack Bay.

Long Underwear

One of the things I learned from camping in my days as a Boy Scout leader was how much more comfortable it was to sleep wearing polypropylene long underwear. On hiking trips, even in the hottest weather this worked very well for me. Usually after a day on the water, even after a sponge bath, my skin would always feel clammy. At night the humidity is pretty high. The polypropylene is designed to wick moisture away and I always feel much cooler. This is certainly not intuitive but it works for me. On this trip I could not find my long underwear bottoms and the sleeping was not so good. One of the first things I did when I got back was to order some new ones.
Suntan Lotion

Out on the boat and in the sun sometimes I feel like a pig being roasted on a spit. One of the things I have been trying this week was instead of using sun screen on my arms and legs was to wear pants and long sleeve shirts designed to keep you cool. After a few days I think this is the way to go.

I spotted this link on CNN on the same subject: Why I don't wear sunscreen
Also, I usually don't put suntan lotion on my forehead because if I sweat I don't want the lotion to run into my eyes - that burns. But, after several days in the sun I have a suntan line on my forehead. Very unattractive on my bald head. Since I don't wear makeup, there is no go way to cover it up and even though wearing a bandanna (arrr...) would be a strong fashion statement, I will forego that option as well. Guess I'd rather have burning eyes rather than a line on my forehead (the things we men do to look good!). I am going to experiment with different brands to see if I can find one that won't run into my eyes.

Thursday

20kt winds forecast, stayed home.

Friday

I had a nice day sail up the Elizabeth River. Lots of traffic on that river.

Right off the bat things got interesting. I was planning on crossing the main shipping channel but the USS Barry DDG-52 was heading in from the bay. Usually, when anything (container ship or US Navy warship) is coming in from the bay I wait for them to pass first. When they are doing 15+ knots and I'm crossing the channel at 3+ knots they usually get there a lot faster that I can get across the wide shipping channel. But, after she got to the Hampton flats area she slowed to a stop and a helicopter hovered over top of her. I don't know what was going on - picture taking I guess. I moved to the other end of Willoughby Harbor to cross well ahead of her but there was the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower coming down the Elizabeth River with several tugs with her. I guess she was coming from Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. I monitor channel 16 but no one was saying anything. In hindsight, I wish I was also monitoring 13 as well. But, I was sailing and not motoring and the wind was pretty brisk and I was just going back and forth at the mouth of Willoughby Bay dodging the fishing boats trying to figure out what I was going to do.

Finally, the carrier was turned and was heading for piers - it takes a while for a carrier to make a 90 degree turn in a river and the Barry started moving again. I crossed behind the Barry and started to make my way up the Elizabeth.

I went past ODU where their sailing fleet was out practicing and past the Norfolk Southern coal pier at Lamberts Point. I wanted to go as far as Portside in Portsmouth. But, a squall looked like it was heading for Portsmouth and all of sudden the wind went squirrely and seemed to come from all directions. I decided I had had enough excitement on my little pleasure cruise and decided to head back. But, it was a nice outing and I enjoyed it very much.

Saturday

Day sailing in the vicinity of Willoughby Bay. What a fun day! Sailing from 11am to 4pm - wind was great. Met Dave McNew and we did circles around each other for a while. Fun day.

Dave posted this picture of me on Facebook and sent me the ones below in an email.

When the wind goes to 10 I usually put a reef in the main and let the jib in and out as needed. This is mainly to accomodate wind gusts. When these shots were taken the wind was a little slack and having the main all the way up on the down wind tacks would have been nice. But, on the closehauled tacks, the reefs were nice. I was still doing over 5 mph all the time.

On the closehauled tacks, many times the hard chines dug in with a 15 degree heel and I always felt in control.

I do love my Hyde custom 125 jib that Judy B set me up with.