Lake Michigan: last year’s triangle
Lake Michigan: last year’s triangle
Monday, July 9
Lake Michigan
0800 left slip. Sunny. A breath of land breeze. Raised mainsail and cut Torqeedo a few hundred yards outside breakwater. A cigarette boat came out, roared into motion, abruptly stopped and turned at slow speed back inside.
I unfurled the jib and we sailed northeast at a couple of knots with a slight wind from the southeast.
I tried to get the new Simrad autopilot to steer. It only made wild movements back and forth. In the owner’s manual I found how to reduce gain; but that did not improve matters. I finally found a section that says the internal flux-gate compass must be calibrated by turning slow circles in both directions. I already had the Torqeedo out of the water, so that will wait. I brought the Autohelm up and it is now steering.
The wind has just picked up a bit from the NNE and our boat speed above 4, water gurgling past hull, but our course converging with the shore around Racine, still far ahead.
A little after 8 p.m. last evening I was sitting on deck listening to music. One piece ended and there was brief silence before the next began. I was enjoying the music, but realized I preferred the silence and turned my iTouch off. No one else was in sight, but I could hear people talking a couple of docks away. Then a man in shorts appeared with a fishing rod---
Wind suddenly increased. GANNET went over on her ear and I had to close the forward hatch and go on deck and partially furl the jib. The furling line which came with the Facnor is small diameter and hard on my hands.
We’re making 4.6 knots to the northwest, closing with land. Will have to tack after a while.
Back to last evening. The man cast a couple of times. I asked what he would catch. He said, “There’s a two foot bass not far from you.” I could not see the fish. Wished him well and went below.
A lovely night. No wind, but cool enough for sleeping comfortably with the hatches open.
When I woke this morning, I dabbed my right eye with a tissue, as I always do, and was startled to find blood. I crawled from the v-berth and looked at myself in the compact mirror I have aboard and found dried blood around the eye. I thought, “Not again. I’m ready to go sailing and my eye blows up.” But the eye itself didn’t look or feel any different and there was no burning or irritation when I put the steroid eye-drop in, and I can’t see out of it anyway; so it will have to tough it out.
1300 The wind quickly built far beyond the less than 10 knots predicted. Now about 20 and gusting a bit higher. Even with the jib partially furled--and it is only 110% to begin with--GANNET had her lee rail buried and deck half awash and was making only four knots. Often at sea when beating against gales, I’ve eased off briefly to put in a reef and felt the world of difference the change of wind angle makes. A promised land I had to harden back up and abandon. Today my purpose wasn’t to get any where in particular, but to have a good sail. So I turned GANNET east, eased sheets and we began to dash toward Michigan.
Difficult to find a comfortable position where my body is not under strain when GANNET is heeled over too far. Best is here on the cabin floor boards, on a Sportaseat facing aft, with a floatation cushion wedged on the leeward side, presently starboard.
In the cockpit I have found that two flotation cushions fill the cockpit sole. One alone continually slides down. I need to buy another as a back rest. There are a lot of hard edges on this little boat.
GANNET’S non-skid deck coating is more skid than non. Also have to find a secure place for the iPad. I’m writing this on my old MacBook Air, which I stow in a waterproof Pelican case I’ve had for a long time. Just using the iPad as a chartplotter. I don’t like the allegedly waterproof case I bought for the iPad. Perhaps another Pelican case for it.
I broke the Lewmar line clutch that secures the main and spinnaker halyards by running the main halyard to the port side winch to try to get a little more tension on the luff--the jib sheet was on the starboard winch. A dumb idea. The clutch was never designed for stress from that angle and the side has pulled away. The clutch is still holding, but I also tied the halyard to a cleat.
I’ve moved during the afternoon back and forth from cabin to deck. Deck is more pleasant, with a cooling wind, but too much sun. To protect my skin I changed at noon from shorts and t-shirt to Levis and long sleeved shirt. With the forward hatch closed, the cabin is hot. It must have been incredibly hot during the three 100º+ days last week. A chocolate bar was liquid when I arrived yesterday, a day after the heat had broken. And the screen of the Velocitek shows the rainbow effect of extreme heat. The numbers can still be read. Hopefully it will return to normal.
The wind continually veered this afternoon and I continued to change our course to keep us on a close reach.
I plan to continue east until I can see lights on the Michigan shore or the iPad says I’m five miles off. That might be ten or eleven p.m. or later. I’ll then gybe and sail for downtown Chicago.
The Autohelm is groaning. Water splashing against the hull. I leaned over earlier when we were deeply heeled and saw GANNET’s nice clean white keel. I’m getting too hot. Back to the deck.
2000 After a 40’ sailboat with a dark blue hull flying a spinnaker heading south came over to check out GANNET around noon, I’ve had the lake to myself. I’ve just been standing in the companionway, which with a floatation cushion at my hip is rather comfortable. All control lines are in arm’s reach: main and jib sheets and halyards, boom vang, furling line. Leaning over I can see the sails and the horizon. I feel I am wearing the boat. The new sails set well.
2130 Lights on the Michigan shore became visible with the setting of the sun. I’m still twelve miles off, but decided to gybe with the very last twilight, and we are now on the second side of the triangle I planned to sail last year, with the wind just aft of the beam, Chicago about fifty-five miles ahead. And I just have discovered that the Velocitek doesn’t have night lighting. At least none that I can figure out. It never occurred to me that it wouldn’t have. With the Autohelm steering, our course is known and I have a pretty good idea from sound and feel how fast we are going. But still.
Tuesday, July 10
Monroe Harbor, Chicago
I picked up a mooring at Chicago’s Monroe Harbor at 8:30. I could have been here an hour earlier, but when I telephoned the Harbormaster on my cell phone, there was a recorded message that the office didn’t open until 8. I seldom use a cell phone and doing so on a boat seems quite odd. On the chart there is a designated anchorage in another part of Chicago Harbor, but I didn’t see any boats there and didn’t want to take the chance that I couldn’t stay overnight. The wind is gusting 24 according to the VHF weather report.
I got a few hours of broken sleep last night.
The pipe berths are unexpectedly comfortable. They need lee cloths. But we weren’t heeled so far that I couldn’t remain on the windward one. In GANNET’s usual configuration they are used for stowage: mostly sails; a duffle bag of clothes; a sack of paper towels--still left from removing VC!7; life jackets; foul wether gear; and I’ve never tried to sleep on them.
Extending into GANNET’S Great Cabin, they are easier to get in and out of than THE HAWKE OF TUONELA’s, a definite advantage because I was up and down frequently, though at no set intervals. I saw a blood red half moon rise before midnight, a starrier sky than in the city, and had to dodge two ships, whose running lights were lost in long bands of white lights illuminating their decks. One passed close enough so that I turned GANNET back into the wind to give her room. I was under mainsail alone, having furled the jib to try to delay my arrival. For a couple of hours the wind picked up during the night and we were rushing along at 7+ knots. GANNET’s running lights were on, but they are so close to the water that I don’t know that they can be seen. Or maybe whoever was commanding the ship was just confident that I’d give way.
I’ve noted before that sounds seem louder on GANNET than other boats I’ve owned. Perhaps because of her size, but I think more likely because her interior is a hollow drum that magnifies sound. Last night her roaring bow wave and the groaning Autohelm.
I also saw a blood red sun rise and then the sunlight hit the glass walls of Chicago skyscrapers.
Not wanting to wait until the last moment and find I had a serious problem, I used a screwdriver to disengage the gripping mechanism of the broken main halyard clutch and lowered main, proceeding the last few miles under deeply furled jib to lose speed and delay arrival.
I’ve never sailed into Chicago Harbor before. It is big and simple. A couple of miles off I passed a red and white striped structure that is one of the intakes for Chicago drinking water.
As I prepared to pick up the mooring, for which I knew I had to supply my own bridle, I realized that I don’t have a boat hook aboard. GANNET has so little freeboard that I’m not sure I’ll ever buy one. I simply powered into a gusty wind until the mooring was alongside, reached over and grabbed it with one hand and threaded a line through with the other.
Monroe Harbor is in the heart of downtown and surrounded by Chicago’s skyline, but surprisingly quiet on the mooring. I’m looking forward to watching the lights come on tonight.
July 11
Monroe Harbor, Chicago
This is a great city. Beautiful sitting on deck last evening watching the sun set and the skyscrapers illuminate. For $25 a night I have one of the best views in the city.
I slept well. In fact I feel asleep while reading on the v-berth in the afternoon and then slept all night to make up for the night before.
Early joggers, dog walkers, bicyclists along the waterfront park this morning. Later I saw ten figures standing bolt upright, seeming a moving line of fence posts, until I realized they were on Segways.
I’ve learned a lot about living aboard GANNET, both underway and on the mooring. While sailing the v-berth became a chaotic jumble. But some things are starting to have their places. Underway or not, it is a fact of her interior that I often have to move five things to get to the one I want. I shaved aboard for the first time this morning. Awkwardly. GANNET may become one of the few--only?--Moore 24s with a fixed mirror. She already has a paper towel rack.
I had bought a one gallon folding water container, not knowing that the top has a zip lock closure--a very dumb idea--you can fill the thing through the spout--and a minor disaster on a boat. When I picked it up this morning, the zip unzipped and the cabin and bilge got an unplanned rinse. The container went directly into the bag of trash to be taken ashore.
Another failed experiment is a portable LED nav light made by Navisafe. The light itself is a well made puck divided into red, green, and white running lights. I also bought a rail mount. When it came I realized there would be a problem. The light connects to the mount by a magnetized bottom. It’s a strong magnet, but not strong enough for sailing. They do provide a secondary lanyard to keep it from being lost if it falls off, which should make anyone suspicious. I tried it anyway Monday night, mounted on the bow, knowing that part of the arc of the white stern light would be blocked by the jib. Navisafe claims the lights are visible for five nautical miles, and mounted on the pulpit it is almost twice as high as the deck mounted lights. GANNET averages about 24” of freeboard, a bit higher in the bow, lower in the stern. The light is very bright, so much so that the aft facing white at the bow reduced my already reduced night vision, so I reverted to the normal running lights, which didn’t deplete the battery significantly. I did not remove the Navilight from the bow and during the night the jib knocked it off. Dawn revealed it dangling by the lanyard.
I could solve this by epoxying it to the mount and buying another to use as a stern light. When first turned on all three sectors of the light are lit, press again and only the white, again and the red and green, again and only the red, again and only green, again and all off. With three AAA batteries, the claimed burn time is 24 hours with all lights; 60 for white only; 38 for red and green; 70 red or green only. However a masthead LED would be better and easier.
I’ve mastered the Jetboil, which really does boil two cups of water in less than a minute. Freeze dry stroganoff while sailing Monday; freeze dry spaghetti marinara last night. Coffee in the morning. And my shaving water far too hot in only a few seconds.
Carol’s office is not far away, but she is up in Lake Forest today. She was going to come down this evening, but we leaned that “Taste of Chicago”, one of the big summer events, started today at Grant Park, which is just across Lake Shore Boulevard from Monroe Harbor, and streets have already been blocked off, so she isn’t going to try.
There is tender service here, included in full season rental, but $4.50 a ride for transients. I rode in at noon and walked through Millennium Park, north of Grant Park, where an orchestra was having a rehearsal in the Getty designed Pavilion, and crowds were around the Bean and the fountain, which I’ve photographed before.
I walked up the new ramp from the park to the Art Institute, from which you get fine views, then a couple of blocks to a bakery where I had a turkey, avocado and bacon sandwich that may have been enough to make dinner unnecessary. From there up to and back along the Chicago River to the lake front. A beautiful day, summery crowds everywhere.
It is a pleasure being on a mooring again. I’ve often given my reasons for preferring them or being at anchor to marinas. I thought about keeping GANNET here this summer, but decided to remain at North Point because of the work I needed to do. Now that is completed, I’d rather be here. If GANNET weren’t going west, she would have been on a Monroe Harbor mooring next year.
A pleasant breeze blowing through the open hatches, thanks to GANNET swinging on the mooring.
I’ll leave early tomorrow. If they have the forecast right, the wind will be east, making the forty miles to North Point a beam reach. I’ve never seen Evanston from the water.
Thursday, July 12
Lake Michigan, Winthrop Harbor, Evanston
0700 Dropped mooring. Torqeedoed through the half empty mooring field to the center channel. A young woman was rowing an inflatable. No tender service this early. I think she was going to work.
There are multiple breakwaters in Chicago Harbor. Just beyond the one protecting Monroe Harbor, I found some wind from the southeast, set sail, cut the Torqeedo, and hand steered GANNET for the main breakwater entrance, turning north when I was outside.
Sitting on deck last evening, I enjoyed the city lights again and fire works from Navy Pier. I missed cheese. if I’d thought of it I could have found some somewhere during my walk. I had wine and crackers, but no cheese.
1200 The shore falls away north of downtown Chicago slightly to the NNW and to keep the sails full I had to sail slightly to the NNE, so at 0815 I gybed in order to sail close to Evanston. I came in exactly at South Beach, where I gybed again. I couldn’t see our condo. All the buildings except those right on the waterfront are hidden by the trees.
Earlier I experimented unsuccessfully with sheet to tiller self-steering which I used on both EGREGIOUS at times and always on CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE. I’m not sure why it didn’t work on GANNET. It did briefly, but then we were all over the place. I may need to install a cleat on the tiller, which I’d rather not do. It is a very small tiller and already has a tiller extension and a tiller pilot connection. I’ll try again.
Off Evanston, I set the asymmetrical for the first time. This, too, did not go well. I don’t have a point of attachment for the tack at the bow, so hooked the Facnor drum into the forward slot in the deck rail. This just isn’t good enough, and the sail remained blanketed by the main. The sail did furl well with the Facnor gear the first time. But the second the continuous line jammed at where it was spliced together. The rigger left a noticeable lump there. I had hoped it would run smoothly, but it doesn’t. It’s going to have to be redone.
I don’t want to put a permanent sprit on GANNET. There is an expensive solution. This, too, requires more thought.
Asymmetrical furled and lowered, I considered setting the regular spinnaker. But the day was hot. I was sweating, some of which had run into my right eye. And I had run out of ambition. So I unfurled the jib, and GANNET happily reached her way north at mostly six knots and sometimes seven, under a sunny blue sky.
1700 Back in my slip at 1430.
A Coast Guard inflatable followed me all the way in. I tried to ignore them, but after I had tied up, they hovered just off my stern, I assumed preparatory to a routine inspection. However, one of the three uniformed men aboard asked, “Is that a Torqeedo?” He’d only read of them wanted to know how I liked it.
I straightened up GANNET. Then sat on deck with a warm Heineken and the last of a box of Cheese-Its. I’d put a couple of hundred miles on the little boat. Had some fine sailing. Learned a lot. Had some things to think about. Some new problems to solve.
A young duck swam over. I’d had enough Cheese-Its and broke my rule about not feeding begging birds. Ducks like Cheese-Its.
8:00 p.m. Evanston. I turned on my iPad on the ride home to see if it could get GPS positions on the moving train. It could. I came south considerably faster than I went north. iNavX showed a maxium SOG of 59 knots.
Friday, July 13, 2012