Category: Adventures

Monday, August 22, 2022, Kingston Yacht Club

So lots has been solved and some new problems have popped up, but I haven’t been here in Kingston since maybe August 13.  There just hasn’t been anything I need to do on Cambio and I was committed to photograph the 2022 Canada Games in Niagara.    

The lads from Kiwi (Canada) came by in my absence and dove on the boat to replace the propellor blades.   That, I believe at this writing is the only thing that is doable to make the boat safe and transportable back to Niagara.

I talked with Cody at South Shore Yachts about the furler and he will inspect it when I get it to him in Niagara on the Lake.  I have confidence that he’s the right guy after a conversation with him at the Niagara on the Lake Sailing Club during the Canada Games.

New issues which I discovered when I got back to the boat yesterday include:

• A battery drain on the windlass battery or a problem with the charging system.  It is down to 9.45V and that’s too low.  Work for tomorrow.
• There is a kybo smell in the aft quarterberth, which probably means that there is a leaky pipe near the waste tank, as there is no undue smell in the head.  Work for tomorrow. 
• The salon table is loose.  This is definitely due to the storm, but I think I only need to reseat some screws or to tighten them.  Work for tomorrow.

Now which one is the priority?  Which one has the greatest chance of success?  I’ll sleep on it and work on the smelly one first.  

The original plan was to head out on Monday for Wapoose, then through the Adolphus Reach, then along the north shore to Toronto, then cut South to Port Dalhousie.  Monday rained all day with thunder storm warnings all day.   The same is called for Tuesday morning to we’re playing it cautiously.  Wapoose is only 4 hours so that’s a good shakedown for the newly repaired Cambio.  But we’ve had enough of storms.   

Monday July 25, 2022  Kingston Yacht Club

So another storm hit last night.  I measured winds at 43knots, or 80 km/h.  Fortunately, I was at the dock in KYC but it still shook the boat enough to wake us up and check the lines.

Today Bob came back and climbed the 65’ mast again to reinstall the genoa furler. Where do such people come from.  The morning after I arrived he showed up and helped, no, led the takedown of the furler, gave information on what might be wrong with it, and went up the mast to take the furler down for inspection.  It is up now but won’t turn.  When we get the sail back, we can raise it manually but can’t furl it and it is so heavy that it will be a 2 person job on a boat with 2 man crew.  I’m thrilled that Matt is coming back for the return trip.  He was awesome crew during the storm and aftermath.  Did I say that already?

Wednesday July 20, 2022 Transit Port Dalhousie to Kingston Yacht Club

The Storm

I didn’t dream that the boat would do 14.2 knots in a 43-knot breeze, but a lightening storm caught up with us about 10:00 and pounded us for 2 hours with 43+ knot gusts and waves that built to 4 meters. 

Matt was my crew on this adventure and the short story is we survived without knowing what damage the boat took.  Special kudos to Otto the helmsmaster (Autohelm) who tirelessly steered for 24 hours and to Matt who was calm and professional the entire way. 

The storm hit quickly.  I had just asked Matt to reel in the genoa and the storm hit. He brought it in a bit and then the wind wrestled the furling line out of his hands and the genoa went full.  I was holding the genoa sheet and it was wrenched from my hand.   The genoa was hidden in the darkness and behind the main so we weren’t sure of the damage to the genoa.   The boat was still screaming downwind so it wasn’t safe for anyone to go forward and look at the genoa, and they couldn’t have really seen much anyway.   We continued downwind with a flogging genoa and a reefed main that had the last reef point ripped out so it was more of an accordion shape instead of a sail shape.

At some point towards the end of the storm, we came upon a laker.  It seemed to be coming at us from the east.  With the wind behind us we had limited options for maneuvering, and we changed course to starboard to avoid it.  Then he seemed to change course to his starboard and we were in a collision course again.  I turned the boat to Port and cut inside his arc.   While I was doing that I lost track of course in the dark.  I do remember moving from a consistent course of 63  degrees and then avoiding the tanker and ending up on a course of 311 degrees.  The darkness and lack of any reference point other than the laker confused me. Unfortunately, the track on the navigation display doesn’t show the dipsy doodle we were doing to avoid the laker and regain our course.

After the storm there remained big waves and wind all night making it unsafe to go forward.  In the morning we found that the genoa had been ripped, a giant hole about 8×8 feet, and the reefed main looked like an accordion that clearly would not be going upwind.  However, it was downwind all the way to Kingston. And the closest port was Coburg to the north of us, which was not reachable by reaching under sail.   After Cobourg were a few ports on the north shore, but in the circumstances they were all wired for failure because they contained some degree of upwind sailing, which we could not do with a messed up genoa and main sail. It would also box us into a lee short against Prince Edward County. The only option was to take the south route around Prince Edward County and in it’s lee, make for Kingston.  Kingston has a big sailing culture and a robust Canadian Coast Guard where I didn’t think Cobourg and East to the County had.

Somewhere in the night a slam gybe happened and the boom became slightly crooked and the starboard traveler car block was smashed.  The traveller block has now been replaced (7/23).  The gooseneck looks ok so the boom goes far down on the to do list.  

The trek around the County was interesting.  Matt had to do a controlled gybe and executed it perfectly.  We didn’t know if the main was damaged or if it would survive the gybe.  It seems to have survived the gybe. The genoa continued to flog and twist and tear and my greatest fear would be that the tightly wrapped genoa might unravel and give us more unwanted speed.   It did not, thankfully.  We were doing about 8 knots with the tiny inefficient main.

When daylight came it was still 20-25 knots downwind with up to 2 meter waves and still unsafe for anyone to go forward and try to fix anything.  Matt or myself could not have fixed the genoa.  We were sure of that.  And in the downwind direction we could go the main was pushing us towards Kingston at 8-9 knots.  This was just great luck.

The Aftermath

• Calling the Coast Guard and Brooke

Since we landed in Kingston Yacht Club we’ve met some amazing people.  Bob, the head of a very robust junior sailing program pitched right in and led the recovery of the genoa and went up the mast to bring down the forestay and furler.  He has offered us the club workshop to work on the furler which is very welcome.  

We took the sail up to JC at Kingston Yacht Sails and he looked it over and was just shy of condemning the sail but agreed to fix it for next Friday.   His quote was an amazing $500 which I think is low but I’m not a sailmaker.

The first thing tomorrow morning I must call around to find a mechanic to fix the accelerator and gear shift linkages.  We want it done right but Jeff and I will try to play with it this afternoon (7/25) but I still want a mechanic to bless this boat.

The genoa furler is f*cked.  It won’t turn very well and we can’t get some Phillips head screws off and an Allen screw.  These need to come off to assess the damage.    We took the manual to the local Marine Outfitters but the Harken furler dates from 2007 and all he could do was suggest to call Harken which we’ll do Monday AM (7/25).  If we need a new lower end of the furler, so be it.  I hope I don’t need a new foil.

List of known damage

• Ripped genoa, about 8’ x 10’ (see photos)
• Deflated dinghy front inflated part
• Broken Furling system
• Broken Mainsheet traveller
• Broken lazy jacks starboard side.
• Broken reef lines on main
• Broken furling line
• Worn Genoa sheets
• Consequent Costs
• Kingston Yacht Club dock rental
• Slanted boom
•  
• And more to come.  I’m very tired and will fill this in later.

Friday, July 8, 2022  Port Dalhousie

I’m still doing the perp walk from the boat to office to get any Wi-Fi at all.  That’s my bitch today. 

I haven’t heard if my water pump arrived yet.  If it does, that will be my job tomorrow.  If it doesn’t, I want to dismantle a few bars on the pushpit so I can access the dinghy and I should sort the anchors out.  But the weather is supposed to be outstanding so my plans may get waylaid by an afternoon sail.  I need to get at Canadian Tire:

• Plumbing tape
• A large wide slot headed screwdriver
• 25’ of dock line

My plans to go south in September are at risk.  My doctor says I’m a prime candidate for both knees to be replaced and I have the same osteoarthritis in my L4 and L5 spine.   My original plan was to make the decision on August 1.  If the boat was ready, and I was ready, then September 1 I head to Oswego.  The boat will be ready; the boat came to me almost ready, but I wonder if my knees will make single handing a serious problem.   This is depressing but several things can happen.

• The wait list for knee replacements is 2 years.  Why don’t I go and come back for the operation?
• I may find a travelling partner which would give us 4 legs to work the boat.  I’d like that. 
• I may settle in to for the winter here and look forward to the spring and a whole new plan.  
• What else?

The next 6 weeks are important to this planning and stay tuned.  It’s a beautiful boat and I plan many miles below the keel.  Having the August 1 decision date means I don’t sweat the decision until that day.  No worrying.  Simply preparing and planning.   It would be painful to worry every day about what to do.  I’ll worry on August 1 and not before.

The pump did not arrive today.  So I’m waterless for the weekend and don’t have that to install.

Friday June 3, 2022  Port Dalhousie –> Toronto

The squall hit about 3:30. More later.  😊

Left the dock at about 11 with Rob.   I didn’t account for the light wind and especially the prop walk to the right when reversing and  leaving the dock was a clusterfuck with squealing fenders and bouncy boat.  

But the light wind became darned near no wind and for a couple of hours we drifted at about 1 knot from port Dalhousie. Finally we fired up the engine and started towards Toronto.  The wind picked up and we got to 5 knots under sail alone and this felt great.    Two squalls sitting under thunderclouds were off to the Northeast and it looked like we were going to miss them both.  This is good.  

We were wrong.  The small one hit quickly and it was moving fast so when it hit we let our sails out to flog and rounded up under control of sorts and rode out the squall.  I guess that it brought winds of about 30 knots but we could only watch the instruments after the worst had died down and the instrument said 22.5 knots of wind.  As soon as the wind died down Rob brought in the genoa and we let the main drive the boat the last few miles into Toronto Harbour.  This was the first time in the harbour with this boat and was rather intimidating. 

I’ve been in Toronto Harbour many times after crossing with the Shark but this boat is a whole other navigation hazard.

First I violated Department of Transport rules by motoring inside the (one) buoy that marks Billy Bishop safety zones.  I knew the safety buoys were there and did my best not to go inside them but sure enough there was one lone buoy on my Port that I had missed.   I got out of there PDQ.  

The ferry in the Western Gap was good enough to not cross while I was passing through into the chaos of the harbour. 

We got into the harbour and I called the Marina Four number to arrange dockage. The west wind meant I should dock on the wall with the bow facing west and with fenders on the starboard side.  “Rob, could you please put the fenders on the starboard side?”   He did.  We went in to the dock and the hull scraped against the dock.  My horror was complete when I realized that he had tied the fenders too high for the dock.  The dockmaster was valiant by pushing the boat off the dock but there is a long scar there on the hull that will require significant buffing.

We were both exhausted and settled down in the cockpit processing what had happened this day.

Should I have specified dock level fenders?  Ultimately the captain is responsible for ‘it all’ so yes.  Rob had only been sailing 5 times and had done well all the other times. So I have to take responsibility and am quite certain that he’ll remember that incident and be fantastic with the fenders in future.    

Another thing I plan to do with the fenders is to create a quick release and quick attach system because it leaves deck hands puffed out to untie and retrieve the fenders and then to tie them on again after a great sail.  This will take some thought. 

During the squall, the main sail flogged and worked the topping lift shackle pin out and the shackle went overboard.  This is the second time and I had fixed it once with a smaller shackle but didn’t have seizing wire to secure the pin.  I even had the heavy duty pins on board and had planned to replace it on Monday.    We’ll fix it tomorrow before we leave, but without seizing wire I’ll use pliers to keep it tight.

I’m very tired.  Lots of esoteric things to mull over about the responsibilities of captain and crew as well as a fantastic sail, 90% quiet enjoyment and 10% stress and terror.

Tomorrow the weather back to Port Dalhousie forecasts 15-25 km/h from the West so it should be a lively and fun beam reach to Niagara.   No squalls are forecast.