Engine Tribulations

Our little 4hp, 4 stroke Yamaha has conked out on us once again. We already brought it to the shop twice and they "fixed" it well enough to get it running for 3 or 4 outings before we are back at square one. I'm just about ready to chuck the thing in a dumpster and get a new outboard, but my partner in crime is somehow motivated to give it one last try. We are done bothering with the (apparently) marginally incompetent repair shop, so we loaded the engine in his truck and he is going to try and fix it at home. Failing that, we are looking at getting a new outboard, an option I would almost prefer at this point.

Some pics of the bluenose

Here are some pics of the boat. Yes, the hull of the Bluenose is inexplicably painted red. We intend to remedy that, soon.



This is the cockpit. It is a large cockpit as it is more designed as a racing boat with only a storage cabin.



This is a picture as we approached Morro Rock under sail. The sailing gets very tricky here, because the wind gets blocked and can also be swirly here.



This is the boat in the slip next to ours. This boat has an interesting history. It was built in, I believe, the 1950's in the Amazon rainforest using crude hand tools and indigenous wood. A man and his son sailed it down the Amazon and into the Atlantic, all the way up to Florida (I don't know how it made it to the other side of the continent, but I'll assume it was towed across). We spoke with the daughter or granddaughter, I forget which, who I think keeps it there mostly for nostalgia's sake.


A common sight in Morro Bay are sea otters floating on their backs and enjoying VERY fresh crab. Sorry for the poor quality of the pic, but all these were done with my i-phone.

Santa Barbara and Channel Islands

I should mention that we had a great sail in Santa Barbara with a 32' Catalina. The first day was a bit foggy, but we had decent, steady wind all the way across to Santa Cruz Island. We anchored in an area called "Prisoner's Cove". This wasn't really our first choice, but some of the other coves had boats in them and since this was our first attempt at anchoring overnight, we were a little skittish. The anchoring went fine. For the record, the Channel Islands have some pretty good swells, even in the coves, so if you anchor there, expect an up and down, "where the f&&k did I put the dramamine" kind of night.
On the way back the next day, the sky was clear and the wind was strong. We had to reef down the sail for most of the ride across and still rarely went below 5 to 6 knots. We were thankful for the experience of reefing on the Bluenose the previous week, as it gave us a little more confidence and less reluctance about reefing the sails on the Catalina.
All in all, it was a great experience, but I think we both agreed that future sailing in Santa Barbara would probably not include an overnight in the Channel Islands.

Reefing

We took the boat out this week for a little warmup before we charter a 32 foot catalina this weekend in Santa Barbara. We had gotten a manual bilge pump and cleared out a lot of water from the hull, so the boat has been heeling a bit more and feels lighter. When we got out into the channel and raised the sails, we really had our ass handed to us. We couldn't really get much control of the boat. The wind was probably up near the 20 knot range, which we haven't seen before. We pulled down the sail, pulled ourselves together and gave it another go with a reefed sail. For a few tacks, we left the jib down and when we felt we were ready, raised the jib. Wow! We were really heeling and the boat almost looks like it's underwater when the rails go under. This was some rather intense sailing in a the narrow channel, moving quickly with a little bit of traffic in the channel and fast tacking. We had joked on previous sails that we were never going to reef the sail, and it is good that we had this experience before we got out on open water. It is good to be humbled once again.

Genoa

We've been sailing her with a little jib and decided that we were ready to pull out the genoa. It was a light wind day and the genoa sail had a couple of frozen clips which we jerry-rigged with some halyard clamps. This certainly lowered our visibility. I don't think you could singlehand it with the genoa because you need someone up front telling you what's going on. I now see the value of those sails with the little window.
We have been working on our sailing skills and cutting back and forth amongst the moorings, which is much more difficult when you can't see what's in front of you. We still managed to swing by a our favorite boat for sale (which will remain anonymous for now) and continue our coveting.
Once again, we approached the mouth of the harbor and started to nudge onto open water, but the swells are just a bit much. We will have to wait for a particularly calm day. The Bluenose is not really an open water boat. Her bow is low in the water, and it really rides on the swells. Compounding this is the fact that the boat appears to have a bit of water build-up and we are waiting on a maual bilge pump to clear it out.
The winds were really too light to give a full assessment of the genoa. We'll probably try it again next time in brisker winds.

Sailing the Bluenose

So it took almost no time to get the Bluenose sailing. The guy we bought it from had everything we needed for a mainsheet, but never attached it. It took us 10 minutes to get that attached. On the other side of the boom, we created what I guess you would call a down haul to keep the boom from raising too far up. At this point we don't have boomvang and I expect we'll be vangless for quite some time.
Charlie and I quickly discovered that our sailing skills hadn't really been tested in the forgiving waters of Santa Barbara's harbor, where we puttered around on nice big catalina sloops. There are rarely any currents, the tides are minimal, there is plenty of room to get in and out and most of the sailing is done on open ocean. We would only change direction when we were bored.
Morro Bay is a horse of a different color. The tides vary greatly and can get down below 3 or 4 feet at low tide in the little marina (our draft is 3' 10"). You have to follow a very skinny channel that has several zig zags just to get to the main part of the harbor and if you go even a few feet in either direction, you can run aground (I won't tell you how I know that - but take my word for it!). It took us awhile to figure out the little 4 hp outboard engine, but it seems to be a steady performer now. Then there is the current. When the tide comes in, so do some 3 or 4 knot currents and a wind heading pretty much straight in your face. Thus, we have learned to tack back and forth in this little channel (cheating on occasion through the moorings). If it is not efficient, we make no ground on the current. We could, of course, motor through all this to get to the ocean, but for now we are learning the boat and working on our skills before we venture out. This is also a much rougher sea than you find in Santa Barbara. The mouth of the Harbor (near Morro Rock) is small and if we get caught in a good current out there, we could potentially be drifting down to Avila Bay or beyond. Add to that the frequent appearance of pea soup fog in Morro Bay and you can see why we are proceeding with a certain amount of caution.
The boat sails pretty well. It has a fractional jib (not all the way up the mainsail). The steerage is alright unless we are going slowly, in which case it can be hard to get some steerage, which we learned the hard way. The hull is probably dragging a bit of a barnacle beard, but we haven't had a look yet. Generally, it handles well. The speed is fair, but I think would be better if we scraped and painted it, a project for this winter, most likely.
Meanwhile, we are learning to sail...

See How the Main Sail Sets

Okay, we got the mainsail up the other day and I forgot to mention it. We went by the previous owner's place and picked up the manuals for the little 4 hp outboard engine and he told us how to rig up the mainsheet. He had already bought the blocks for it and we put the mainsheet together in about 10 minutes. Then we basically tied the boom down to the bottom of the mast, leaving a little slack for the boom to rise under wind. We don't have a boomvang, so this I think would be better termed a downhaul. In any case, we thought it was good enough to head out and try.
The sail came up without much difficulty. Unfortunately, the wind died on us and we were going against a pretty strong current, but we were able to move slowly through the bay. Hopefully, there will be better wind next time around, but it felt good under sail, considering. I'm still working on getting some pictures. My camera needed a new battery charger.

Took a look at the mast/boom

We decided to drop by and take a look at the boat, to figure out what we need to do to get the mainsail up and running. Charlie was intent on getting out on the water, so we detoured from our mission and headed out back on the bay. A guy from a neighboring slip came by and gave us an old sailing magazine that had a story about the Bluenose Sloops. He was a nice guy who has a similar sized boat and comes out to sail on days when he isn't getting dialysis. I think we were trying a little too hard to impress him, so I motored the boat out too quickly (it is idling too fast) and Charlie had to do a save as we headed toward another boat. Once we got past that, though, we were back in the channel and heading into the main harbor. The current was a bit stronger and there was a pretty good wind, but we were still stuck jib-sailing. Still good fun, but it is sure hard to close-haul with a jib.
We got back in and still has a bit of time to look at the mast/boom. The boom is resting at the bottom of the mast and needs to be brought up about a foot and a half. This will be our first order of business. I think it will take a trip to Home Depot to find some hardware that will allow the boom connector to sit up higher on the mast. I won't be around for the holiday weekend, so it will be sometime next week before we start on that. Then we will need to figure out how to rig the boomvang, cunningham and mainsheet. We only have a couple of small pictures of working Bluenose sloops to go by, so we will have to be creative when getting this together.

Maiden Voyage

We took out the Bluenose for a test run under motor. We didn't know what to expect, since the previous owner had never taken it out in the year that he owned it. It has a 4hp outboard motor, which took awhile to get started, only due to a lever that was switched off. It runs well, although it idled a bit high, making things a bit frantic when we were backing out of the slip. There is a very circuitous and narrow set of buoys to the main harbor, which we managed to traverse. Morro Bay is a tricky area for sailing and we will definitely need a chart before we go back out. After awhile, we were comfortable with the boat's operation and decided to turn back around and sail it home. The mainsail is not really ready for operation, needing a cunningham and a few pulleys rigged onto it, but we put up the jib and jib-sailed it back. It sailed pretty well in the light winds with just a jib. We tried to take a bit of a short cut and got caught up in some grass, but motored the boat out of it and sailed it all the way back the rest of the way on the jib. We've been used to chartered cruisers, so it was nice to be able to manhandle this boat a bit and just pull it into our slip. We noticed on a neighboring slip, a beautiful old boat from '62 getting pulled in by the Harbor Master after it's diesel engine died (and the couple who own it apparently don't know how to sail yet), so we felt pretty good about sailing ours in. The boat could use a little scrape and paint, but I think it is in good enough shape that we can sail it through the summer. This is actually looking like a pretty good purchase. Sorry for the lack of a picture, but my camera battery was dead, so probably next time.

Oops, we bought a boat

This is the soon-to-be saga of our Bluenose sloop. My friend Charlie and I have been eyeing sailboats since taking a sailing course last year in Santa Barbara. We can get down there occasionally to charter boats, but we thought it would be nice to have something closer to where we live (on the Central Coast). Morro Bay has a harbor and we looked at a couple of boats here. The deal is that most of the boats for sale are really about getting the slip or mooring. There is a waiting list for both, right now. We stumbled across a Craig's list ad for a "1968 McVay Bluenose Sloop," selling for a good price, and comes with a slip. The most recent owner had it for a year and never sailed it. It needs a little work, but I think could be in sailable condition in not too much time. It is a 23.5 ' boat with a fiberglass hull, designed in Nova Scotia and, from what I can gather on the internet, a bit of a rarity, particularly on this coast. Eventually, it will need a scrape and paint, but we are going to try to get out on it as it is. The cabin is only for storage and I believe this was mostly designed as a racer. The open water can be a bit rough out this way, so our intention is to sail it mostly in the harbor (and possibly get a trailer to take it on one of the local lakes). The marina lies in an area where the water drops to 4 feet at low tide, so it seemed a boat with less than a 4 foot drag would be a natural. The outboard motor is in reasonbly good condition, so our plan is to motor it out tomorrow on a maiden voyage, sans sails, and see if it is seaworthy. Then we will start working on the sails. I'll try to get a picture of it tomorrow if I remember to bring the camera.