What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Can you guess the boat part?

This wind is up!!!  The waves are down!!  Perfect sailing for the little Snark...so, out goes Nan.  I think, this is great, no big waves, so I won't get wet and the little boat will skim around the bay at racing speed!

Waves, no.  Fluky wind?  Yes.  Getting out was easy as there was a nice 8k breeze blowing off shore. Well, offshore...for about 2 minutes.  Then, on shore.  Then away from shore...then...who knows.  8 knots?  Yes, and suddenly 15k!  Yikes.  Suddenly no wind and becalmed.  Then not becalmed.  I have two good "rides" back and forth and then, all I can think of is getting in.  This is not fun!

Steve takes a turn.  He seems to be racing along out there...I'm hardly paying attention on shore.  Hum.  Maybe I should take a shower or something.  And then, once he's fairly far out there, surprise! No, SURPRISE...a 40k gust!??  What?  The sail disappears...I watch as he gets organized and climbs up on the centerboard to right the little boat.  Almost there.  More bobbing around.  More up and down.  Then another gust.  He's definitely over and the boat is not coming up.  No mast maybe?  The shore crew is alert to a rescue mission....and Pedro launches his boat.  (Remember, he rescued us last year when our engine lost oil, and our oarlocks broke on the motor boat....well, you might not remember, be he does and so do we!!)

Rescue mission crew

Pedro and Chris arrive on scene with the inflatable, Bill and Nick arrive in kayaks.  You can barely see Steve there on the far side trying to deal with the sailboat.

The Snark sailboat is the yellow hull on the right

Pedro has got him in tow now...where's the mast?

Final pusing service provided by Bill

The Snark without her mast....but...

As always, the beach does what the beach does best....Rescue Missions!  Give the beach folks a problem to solve and they go into warp speed at figuring things out....from boats to RV's...to engines...to transportation...to even health issues!

What could possibly go wrong today?  Yes, the sudden powerful gust dumps the boat over.  Yes, he gets it right side up once.  Then another gust!  The second round of pressure on the wooden center board, in order to right the hull, snapped the board in half!  An upside down boat, with sail still "up"...well, upside down...gusty wind, all impossible to bring around again without more hands "on deck."  Or, hands on the water!

And we had to get it all cleaned up and put away in time to head off to the movies....or was it happy hour...or maybe out to dinner...

Another adventure and another project to work on at home over the summer.

Adventure: A challenging experience that turns out well!