The Big Sail

07/14/2006; 25 miles; 7 hrs; The wind was out of the East 10-15 with gust of 20 knots. A big day, we had planned to go to horseshoe key. 10 miles as the crow files NE of Big Pine. We started out during high tide so we could cut across the shallow area just south of No name key, this would chop off about 4 miles total travel distance there. Tacking against the wind would add on about 1-2 miles of the 10 miles straight shot to Horseshoe.

We just had the main sail up at first because I was real nervous going through this area, because it averaged about 4ft and my center board is 3’10” all the way down. I had it half the way down and that effects how the boat sails in high winds, so I was treading in dangerous waters, figurativly and literally.

CO actually was telling me to let more wind hit the sail so we could go faster. I think the faster you go the steadier the boat, but you are heeled over more, meaning the side your sitting on is about 4 feet off the water and the other side is 6” above the water. Very nerve racking in shallow water, in high winds. So I’m doing the crazy laugh while she is telling me more, more, more. What has gotten into this girl?

We finally make the turn around No Name key and start heading NE. This means deeper water, no more tacks, just straight sailing with both sails for about 6 miles. Well, as the water got deeper the waves got bigger; when a gust of wind hits 2 sails the boat heels over faster than with just 1 sail; and with a boat heeled over all the way and a wave hits the boat at the same time…I’ll just say it’s a feeling I’ve never felt before. It’s like for a split second your mind knows something is going on, but you don’t know if your falling, stopping, turning, or crashing, it’s just complete confusion to all the senses.

So we spent the next hour hiked out as far as we can on the high side, while being pounded with waves and wind. It gave me a tiny, little picture of what sailing in the pacific must be like. Very humbling in God’s creation and the magnitude of forces behind the small things. God is AWESOME! and I was having fun. This is where I want to be.

We came across a little key on the way and it was past noon, so we decided to eat lunch and take a break. Well, it was more like let’s take a break and eat lunch while we are resting. We pulled in behind this 200ft wide island, out of the wind, and set up the tarp shelter over the boat. Very comfortable. Went for a swim and started eating hotdogs. I looked at my GPS and I forgot to mark horseshoe key, before I left the house, so I’m going to have to guess which one it is. We can see about 10 islands all around us, so I will probably pick the wrong one, but who cares, we're sailing. That’s the cool thing about sailing, the destination is only 25% of the trip.

CO read and I played with the tarp to get it just right. It rained, which was fun, because we were dry under the tarp and after it stoped we decided to get going. I figured we only have about another 2 miles to horseshoe. So we set sail. Right back into the big stuff. We felt more comfortable now with the wind and the boat heeling over. We had to make some tacks to go around an island. They were not smooth at all, but we did them. I was just being too wimpy about the whole thing. Unsure of everything it seemed.

Finally we decided to go to another island that was closer and more down wind and just call it horseshoe. We were getting tired and sloppy. We were running with the wind and hauling BUTT, it was a nice break. When we got close to the island we had a major explosion, but survived. I could tell we were both really tired now, so it was time to go home. I marked our position to check out what island it was when we got back.

We were cranking along at a good pace running with the wind. If the wind was blowing out of the 12 o’clock position we were traveling in the 4 o’clock direction. It was funny because we were sitting on the high side of the boat and the other side was “in” the water and we were talking about the long ranger and sidekicks of hero’s. We had fallen into the comfort zone of excitement. It was an interesting moment.

We made it back in 1 piece and was completely exhausted. A very good day of sailing.

I checked the map when we got back and we made it to sand fly key, about a half a mile from horseshoe, not too far off. and we took our lunch break at friend key.