Relaxing day on the water

We took it easy on Tuesday. There were 2 must-do things: free the mainsail out of the jam and ensure that Sasha can tune into the Zoom meeting for his student's thesis defense.

Turns out, unjamming the mainsail when the boat is not rolling on the waves is much easier! Sasha winched me up and within 5 minutes the sail was free. We rolled it in tightly, so it was ready for use in the afternoon.

Late morning was spent swimming, jumping off the boat and simply relaxing. We tried to inflate the kayak, but it has a hole on the seam. Maybe we'll try to repair it. But if that doesn't work, the 8-year old toy will have to be thrown away.

While Sasha's student was defending, we played the board game Crew. For whatever reason, nobody was eager to go ashore. Makes it easier: no need to unfold the dingy which would require folding it before we take off for whatever today's destination will be.

The southern wind in the afternoon was nice. Not too stiff, and more than enough to sail. We cleaned up the boat and went out to get some practice sailing not too far from the salt pond entrance. Unlike Monday, the waves were minimal, so nobody was getting seasick!

The fun of the program was pull an inflatable behind the boat. At 6-7 knots the feeling of the inflatable jumping is quite exhilarating. Mabry went first. All was going well until she scared us a bit. The leading edge of the inflatable dug into the water with Mabry hanging on to it. It only lasted a few seconds before she let go, but the immediate reaction was to heave to and slow the boat down. Later Mabry said: "All I saw was a lot of bubbles in the water, and I thought that Salty Ginger can move fast!" The incident did not deter her from continuing. We let out more line which makes it a lot easier to catch the person while doing a circle around the person and 15-20 minutes later we heaved to in order to collect her. It was a good time to do so: she said her hands were clenched and she couldn't let go. Her major complaint: it was lonely. Luckily the board supports 2 people, so maybe the girls could do it together today.

Mabry a hundred feet behind the boat hanging on.

Mark on the wheel while Mabry is bouncing off the waves.

Mark followed Mabry to jump on the waves. He bounced for a while, and then got back aboard once the tube took a dive and he let go.

While we were bouncing people on the waves Margot started doing prep for dinner. She cut up onions and tomatoes all while the boat was heeling going upwind. I guess she is ready to be a cook!

When I was sailing with the Hudson River Community Sailing one of my friends said that it's never boring to sail with me: spinnaker up, spinnaker down, never an idle moment. Why should it be different on Salty Ginger?

I am clearly a bit rusty with sail handling. Yes we got the spinnaker up, but I swapped the clew and tack and didn't pay attention to how the halyard was running so it was wrapped around the forestay. Luckily there wasn't much wind, so fixing the minor issues was not too hard. Just some running on the deck. I continue to be amazed how easy it is to handle the spinnaker with the sock. The sail area is over 100 meters squared and yet we can fly it with inexperienced crew!

As we tried to jibe, we shot way past the pond entrance so my plan of beam reaching with the spinnaker had to be changed to close-hauled sail. The wind died down a bit so we weren't healing that much, making it easy for Mark, Mabry and Margot

to finish cooking dinner. Vegetarian soup which looks a bit like chili. Once the anchor was dropped, we set the table and had a lovely dinner followed by singing songs till 11.

One of the things that I like about anchoring at Block Island is on the water services. Coffee boat in the morning, kids picking up garbage for $1/bag. There used to be a catch of the day boat too, but either we missed it yesterday or maybe there was no catch of the day. In any case, it gives a special fun atmosphere without having to disembark.

Off to having coffee with pastries...