Back at the Boat and Out on the Water
29 September 2013 | Bayland Marina, Baytown, TX
Jill
We did go back to Baytown this weekend. Jamie got home early Friday (a small miracle in itself) and we were at the boat by about 8:30 PM. It was quite breezy and in the lower 80’s and it felt like the Bahamas; so nice.
Saturday morning there was still a breeze. The weather forecast said the wind would be 10 miles per hour or less. Bud and I decided to take the boat out for the postponed second trial of the propeller. Our new friends Scott and Tamera were at their boat and they were planning to go out and try their newly installed Monitor wind vane. I hoped they’d have enough wind to do it. We got Fuzzy fed and walked and managed to leave the dock a bit after 10 AM. There was a bit more wind than we anticipated. It was right on the nose as we sat at the dock, so we had no trouble pulling out, but as the boat reversed the wind caught the bow and pushed it towards the piling at the end of our dock. Bud had to reverse quite hard to pull out quickly enough to keep the bow clear. Now he was going backwards between the rows of boats with a crosswind. The boat was a bit hard to control like that so he tried to turn around. He managed about a 10-point turn, coming close first to one side, then to the other. I was running up and down to boat to make sure we didn’t hit. Bud called it ugly, but we never hit anything and he got the boat turned around and out into the marina and then into the channel. When we had a chance to look we saw the wind was closer to 20 knots than 10, no wonder it was dicey!
Once in the Houston Ship Channel we turned towards the bay (outbound) and began our trial. Bud set the engine to 2000 RPM, let the speed get steady and I recorded the speed. We then tried it at 2400, 2600, 2800, 3000, and 3200 RPM and then at wide open throttle (WOT). When he and Gary had tried the prop it never got above 3000 RPM and at WOT there was a lot of black smoke. This time WOT produced 3400 PRM and no black smoke. Our top speed was only 6.9 knots, not only against the wind, but also when we turned and went with the wind. We think this is because the bottom of the boat is probably covered with nasty growth. Our bottom paint is ablative paint. It keeps growth off by gradually wearing away, but it only really works if the boat is moving. Sitting still for 5 months can’t be good. We had just called a diver to come and clean it, but he won’t be there until this coming week, so we were no doubt dragging a lot of organisms along with us.
That aside, it was a great trial. The propeller worked. And we were out in the water. The Houston Ship Channel is not the most scenic place, but it is interesting. When we turned to redo the readings in the other direction we were behind the boat in the photo above. I tried to get a picture to show how busy it is. I put one in the album where you can see two ships, three tugs and a barge in front of us. If you turned to the stern there were two or three shrimp boats nearby and a couple of other ships in the distance.
As we were coming on our downwind leg of the propeller trial our friends Scott and Tamera went by the other way on Kooky Dance. We finished the trial and turned again to head out the channel. We debated following them to where they were going to sail. We were close to a mile behind them, though, and had heard so much about obstructions and old oil platforms in the bay that we decided not to try. Outside the channel the bay is less than 15 feet deep. We sailed in a lot of skinny water in the Bahamas, but not water where you can’t see the bottom and the junk that might be just under the surface. So this time we stayed in the channel. We did see dolphins following the shrimp boats. The shrimpers were dragging their nets and we figured the dolphins were after anything that got stirred up. I tried to get a picture of them, but couldn’t. I did get a picture of a row of pelicans along for the ride on the stern of a shrimp boat. They, too, were no doubt looking for a meal. You can see the other pictures I took in the Baytown album.
The wind was still blowing at above 15 knots when we came back into the marina. Bud had no trouble putting her into the slip and in no time we were secured. Fuzzy slept through the whole thing. I’m not sure he even knew we left the dock! Once we got back I checked back and confirmed that it had been 16 months since I’d been out on Earendil. We still haven’t set a sail, but at least the routines of leaving and returning to the dock, checking the engine and all the things I routinely did when we were cruising came back. It felt so good.
In the evening we went over and visited with Scott and Tamera on Kooky Dance. They had a good trial with the Monitor. They only put out their jib, but the boat was balanced enough to use the wind vane easily on a reach. It was less precise downwind, but that is to be expected. They told us we should have come along. The area where they went had no obstructions, so we’d have no problems there. Now that we know where that area is, I think we may be ready to try sailing in the bay. We are certainly going to miss Kooky Dance when Scott and Tamera set off for their cruise.