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...