Bristol-Blue Lake Michigan Sailing Adventures

  Friday the Kraken was pulled for the season.  Tower Marine did a great job spraying off the bottom and acid washing the calcium deposits off the water line.  This winter season, I'll be storing with Tower again. They have placed me in a nice little spot in back this year. Between an abandoned Catalina 30 and "Lilly Pad" a floating home. Saturday I striped down the sails and BB helped me lower the mast.  I started to tarp it off but have a bit to do still before I finally close her up for the season. Sails off. Remove lower shrouds and loosen the uppers and back stay . I pull the pin move to the back of the boat and First mate BB lowers it right into my hands easy as can be.

Today I got away for a little cruise around the lake.  Around and around I went with my freshly patched up Genoa. It was a great day.  My Genoa is getting pretty old and the luff needed some taping up at a few wear spots. This was my first chance to sail with the fix.  For my oldest sail it still pulls well.  Our little marina is becoming quite the place. This season we have had a pair of helicopters flying in and out on a fairly regular basis.  Defiantly adds flare to the place.  One came in right after I got back to the dock today.

I typically drop one or two things over a year and well that's that they are gone, but this week I dropped one of the larazet hatch covers into the lake.   I was finishing a good deck scrubbing.  Picked up the hatch and thought I'll rinse it off real quick by dipping it in the lake.  The first one no problem the second one slipped from my hand and sank out of site.  So time to go for my first swim in lake Kalamazoo.   First I had to go pick up Myles from his swim class.  That is why he looks wet in the pictures also.  The marina pool has a swim program and while Myles swims I've been working on the boat.  I also grabbed the gear I needed for the dive.   Goggles Dry bag Phone Child Life Guard I put my phone into the dry bag and activated the flash light before diving several times.  The water at my dock is 5'9" so just over my head.  The flash light was not really a great help in the merky depths of  the lake.  I'm sure the...

This weekend we had a great group of friends come down for the weekend.  We grilled, we swam, we watched fireworks go bam.  We even got in a little sailing in before everyone got there.   The Typhoon is a great fun boat but when you have a crowd over it is little.  Here are a few things I do to make things a bit more comfortable.   1st I raise the boom at the mast.  This adds a good deal of extra head room for everyone. Second get out the cushions. 3rd I close up the scuppers more than 3 people on board and we all get soggy toes. 4th I set up the cabin.  To do this I pull out the compression post and put the v berth board back in so the kids will have more room to play.  Let the party begin.

I was down at the marina the other day and a guy I know comes over and says when was the last time you had to put $365 in you sail boat.  I figured he had just put some cash down on an engine repair.  I was racking my brain $365  ???   He stopped my train of thought as I must have been drifting off. Then he told me that is what he spent at the gas dock this morning.  I laughed, we use a gallon a gas per season, maybe a gallon.  We got to talking and we realized we had not been out on Lake Michigan since the first season we owned her.  So we set up this weekend to head out. Lake Michigan is about 40 minutes from our dock.  This is the number one reason we sail in Lake Kalamazoo. The cannal is easy to navigate and we only had to slow down slightly for the chain ferry that crosses the river. We made it out to to a flat and smooth lake.  Here is a photo of another Cape Dory that slid out of the harbor just ahead of us. We rigged for light wind an...

It's been a while since my last post and it was a week one with no pictures.  So here is a mildly better one.    Boom tent update:  I worked on this a little this week. I took it down to do some fitting so I could size up the edges and get the tie down straps into place.  Things did not go super well.  Then I dropped one of the tent poles into the lake.  Grr...   This project is looking like it will move to the back burner until I get the boat out of the water in the fall. Some things are just better to wait on than push through.  This is an interior view it is quite spacious.  However I need to work on ventilation it is super muggy and hot inside.  There would be little hope of spending the entire night in here with the Stagnet air.  We worked on the the pond yacht.  Well I worked on it.  The kid played with my brace and drilled several holes in the scrap lumber. I found our flag!   We have been looking for this...

So no pictures but wow we sailed.  Started with the standard working jib the wind died down and we switched to the mast head spinnaker.  Then we went to the 150 Genoa.  The wind picked back up again and built in steadily through the afternoon.  We pulled back into the dock one exhausted crew.  Having started the morning on the T-ball field kiddo was about to fall a sleep once we tied up.  We think  he may have actually dosed off for a second laying on the seat cusions.  We filled out the day with some swimming at the pool then home. For some grilling and back yard batting practice.  One of the great things about the Typhoon is it is not all time consuming you can sail it then do other thing with your day.  Now this is sad but it is 7:30 and I'm ready to crash.