A Delightful End to the Work Week

Met up with Ben and Kelly for an after-work sail on Central Air 2 -- our 2nd sail on my new boat. On leaving the dock, I was again reminded of my need for practice on leaving the dock. Yep, gotta work on my 'dismount.' (Thanks, Ben, for saving the day!) Gotta work on my ability to not freak out over every little thing involved with the operation of the outboard too. (Note to self: Obtain and add bottle of Xanax to boat bag.)

Once we got out there on the lake, though.... SUH-WEET!!!! Ben raised the main and we sailed under main alone for a little while while I grew accustomed to the nice little breeze from the N (or thereabouts.) After struggling with indecision for a moment, I decided that we'd tack our way up towards the bridge at the north end of our Alum Creek sailing universe and then sail downhill to get home. Kelly unfurled the jib using CA2's rockin' roller-furling, and we picked up some additional speed (~3.8 kts, per the handheld GPS!) with only a slight increase in our degree of heeling. We were moving along at such a nice clip that it seemed that we were tacking quite often (which was a total blast -- like 'spinning on a dime' in a breeze like that!) In between tacks, Kelly served dinner: veggies, cheese, and dill dip, served in a fine Tupperware container purchased from my favorite former Tupperware lady, Annie Carlisle.

Kelly took me up on my offer for some tiller-time -- girl power! -- and I took advantage of the opportunity to clamber up to the bow for some quality 'I'm king of the world!' time. Fabulousness! We were still moving at a pretty nice clip, and the view was amazing! It was a somewhat busy evening on the lake (%*&@ jet-skiers!!), and the ride up front got a little wild - and FUN - when a stinkpotter and a couple jet-skis flew by fairly close to us.

Before flailing my way back to the cockpit (one hand for the boat, one hand for Christy), I snapped a lovely photo of the Shremshocks. See?

Here's one final bit of photographic-type fun -- a short little movie that Kelly shot with my digital camera. Check out how fast we were going!!