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Cold front sailing! A decent cold front blew through this morning. Lately all the good fronts have been coming through at night, and we've been missing the wind.
Today I drove up to Port Aransas because I figured we would be getting good NE wind, and I wanted to see some wave sailors. Lo and behold, when I arrived it was blowing! It was also lake-flat. No waves at all! Several other sailors showed up and they decided to drive south about 15 miles, to see if the swell was better.
Before we left I was watching some boats come in through the jetty. Two shrimp boats where slowly making their way in, and as one sailor said -- if the shrimpers are coming in, it must be hairy! Also, there was a bigger cutter or yacht of some sort flying in, pounding waves and taking big splashes over the bow. They must have had someone dying on board, because they were going really fast in some decent swell about a mile offshore. I'm glad I wasn't on that boat, it would not have been a comfortable ride.
I met up with the guys again at Mustang Island, a nice beach for swimming and sunbathing. We went upwind a tad, to a jetty. The three of them rigged 5's and went out in the minimal surf. Leonard (I think), from Colorado, did a forward roll off the first wave on his first run out. All of them were overpowered and they kept coming in to yank on their downhauls. I took off after about an hour. I have all slalom gear and didn't wish to break anything in even the small surf.
I arrived at Bird about 12:15 and there were just a couple of sailors out. It was blowing pretty hard, everyone was on 3.5-4.0. John was there and he rigged his 3.7. I had trouble getting my so-far unused 4.1 rigged. At first, I couldn't find a batten. It's one of those sails that won't roll up if you don't take the foot batten out. A few weeks ago one of the battens slipped out of the sail bag and I had it laying around the car. I figured it must be this one, because I didn't see the batten in the bag, or when I took the sail out of the bag. I looked and looked, but couldn't find it. I figured I must have put it into the wrong sail bag and it must be at home with one of the two sails I leave there because I no longer use them. I dug around on my 3.5 and 4.7, looking for a batten of similar length I could use on the 4.1. Finally I found one, inserted it into the sail, grabbed it all and when to the water to rig.
I grabbed the foot of the sail and tossed it up, allowing it to unfurl. It was now nearly one o'clock (I stood around and talked for awhile, too, before deciding on what to rig), and I was in a hurry. Of course, the batten I thought I was missing comes flying out of the sail and landed in the water somewhere downwind. Not wanting to lose this batten I searched for 10 minutes before I found it. I pulled the replacement, tossed it ashore, rigged up and got on the water.
Woah! It was blowing better than 4.1! It was overpowering and the 4.1 was very, very twitchy. So, I started fiddling, as I have to do whenever I start using new gear. After an hour of moving the fin there and the mast track here and playing with downhaul, I finally got comfortable. Of course, the wind died. It was now about 5.4 weather. I stayed out and tried to sail, catching a gust here or there. I almost decided to go home, but at 4pm rigged the 5.4 instead. I took it out as it PICKS BACK UP! Of course it does. So, now I was WILDLY overpowered on the 5.4 and the only guy on the water. I don't like sailing alone, even in a safe place like Bird, and especially on the edge of destruction like I was. But, I stayed out anyway, hung on for dear life for about 15 minutes and packed it up.
It was a bit frustrating -- a dues-paying type day. Remarkably, it wasn't that cold, though it sure looked it. I was much warmer sailing that I was on the beach in my street clothes.
I guess this is cold-front sailing, and I'd better get used to it. There is 3 or 4 more months of it straight ahead.
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