Blown Away in a Laser II

9/6/2015 --

Fred, a guy I met on the dock 15 minutes before, pushed the bow away from the dock and told me I’d be just fine if I keep pointed the right direction and keep my speed down. I was leaving the boat launching dock at Bear Lake in Norther Utah and the wind was strong and the harbor had a lot of boats in it. I was afraid this was going to turn into a pinball game. Turns out it was easier than I thought and the only concern as I headed toward open water was that I would not run into the pontoon boat that was poking along in front of me!

 

It was a little breezy...

I was on my first solo sailing adventure with my little Laser 2 sailboat. I’d had the boat, named “Denali” for a few years, but Huffygirl and I had never sailed it until the month before when we took it with us on a camping trip on the opposite side of Bear Lake. There had been light winds and beautiful weather and it was peaceful and fun learning to sail our Denali. This day was different. I had taken the day off work to spend the day sailing and my friend Mike was going to join me around lunchtime. Instead of pleasant and peaceful breezes, I was told by the first 2 sailors I met at the harbor that the winds were currently 15 knots and expected to increase throughout the afternoon to 25, with gusts to 40 knots. Luckily for me, I had no idea of what that would mean to little Denali.

As my little sailboat exited the safe confines of the Bear Lake Harbor, the 15 knot wind hit the sails and it was like I hit the gas pedal. Hard. I was going perpendicular to the wind and immediately heeled over so I could sit on the windward side and lean out, just like I’d seen in pictures throughout my life. The boat shot forward and was gurgling as the self bailer sucked air and a rooster tail formed behind me. So exhilarating! I couldn’t stop smiling even while the wind tried to pull the mainsheet (the rope that controlled the sail) from my hands. I held on tight and did my best in the strong winds to keep some semblance of control as I sped toward the far shore. I had no destination and my only goal was to be able to return safely at the end of the day. So I sailed. And I tried to stay upwind of the harbor so I had to tack back forth. In the strong wind and with my sailboat’s light weight (about 170 lbs), I found that to be a difficult task, but certainly a fun one!

I sailed and I tacked and I smiled and I laughed. The waves were getting bigger and the water would spray across my bow, soaking me, and I would laugh more! As I was tacking at some point, the wind stalled my little boat and then kicked hard unexpectedly, sending the mast sideways toward the water. I was on the wrong side to be able to get my weight to the up side of the cockpit so the sail and I entered the water at about the same time. I quickly swam under the boat to get to the daggerboard but found that the mast sunk down quickly and I was now holding onto the bottom of my boat in the mi

Not me, but how I felt!

ddle of Bear Lake. Turtled! I watch my little collapsible paddle and my favorite hat riding the waves a few feet away but was not willing to let go of the boat to retrieve them. I’ll admit that I looked around on this very windy day, looking for someone to help me, but there was no one in sight. Smart boaters were waiting out the wind and the others were completely out of sight. Then I remembered that I had watched a video on how to right a sailboat, so I went into action. I climbed on top of my turtled boat and grabbed the daggerboard and leaned to the side as far as I could. Very slowly at first, I felt the boat moving. Gradually, the mast and sail popped to the surface. As that happened, I climbed on the daggerboard and my weight quickly righted the boat! I climbed back in and collected my thoughts (which included feeling sadness at the loss of my favorite hat) and found Denali was ready to get back to sailing! In another minute I was laughing again, now fully confident that I could handle anything!

When I needed to head back to the harbor to pick up Mike, I found myself downwind of the marina. Try as I might, I could not get her any closer so finally I just headed to shore and got out and pulled her about a ¼ mile to the beach where I found Mike. He was a little nervous because of the wind, which had grown stronger, but trusted me when I told him we could handle it. Silly Mike.

The little boat sailed better with the 2 of us in the boat so even though the winds increased, the extra stability helped us fly across the water laughing and whooping and hollering. The waves got bigger as well and as we flew over 3 ft. waves we sometimes dove into waves that would crash onto the bow and onto us. One time, we got caught in a bad spot and the boat started to go over. Mike was on the low side and chose the sacrifice of letting himself fall into the water, which caused the boat to get right again. I helped him get back in as we both laughed. There’s nothing like getting kicked off your trusty steed in the middle of a big blustery lake.

We finally decided to head back to the harbor in late afternoon. The wind was strong, the waves were big and we were tired. We had worked our way upwind of the harbor so were able to easily sail right in. We were looking good! We proudly glided in among the other boats parked in their slips and headed for the empty dock. All we had to do was tie up to the dock.

I steered us so we would end up at the end of one of the docks, into the wind and ready to tie up. Only the boat stopped too soon. The wind pushed us backwards and we had no control. After floundering a bit, we caught the wind again and took a second try at it. This time we were going to get it right! I steered us to the same spot and I waited to make the turn… but we were still stopped short and found ourselves pushed backwards by the wind and bumbling around trying to get control. We then drifted 80 feet to the other dock, but were never able to get close enough to tie up due to swirling winds. After about 5 minutes of looking awkward and confused (both of which we were), we drifted close enough to the ramp for me to finally jump out and walk us back to the first dock. We were really glad that there was no one to watch us fumble our way around the docks. Then we heard the laughing…

What a day! We were cold and sore and tired and just plain worn out. We had battled a wind that common sense tried to tell us to leave alone and we lived to sail another day. Both Mike and I agreed that if we wanted to sail in the future and found out the wind was going to be this strong…….. we would drop everything to be there!!!