Well we saw the weather for Friday and knew that with our up coming family vacation to Disney that the month of August would be quite void of sailing. So we packed up the kids and got the Hunter 23.5 again. It is big enough for the kids and the transom ladder is nice and open making it easy for the kids to get in and out of.

We got to the boat around 10:30a and loaded the gear on the tender for the ride out. Man we packed a lot of stuff this time. We took the larger cooler packed with water and drinks for the kids. Sandwiches and lunchables. Chips and of course this time a radio and our portable XM receiver. The radio saved the day, well radio Disney helped there.

We cruised for about 3 hours, the winds were gusting in the 12's with some nice white caps so that gave us all a new sailing experience. I still need to figure out sail trim as even when I though I had the sails trimmed out far enought it still felt like there was too much resistance at the helm and the boat wanted to pull up into the wind. I let out the jib, let in the jib, mainsail and just could not get the angle I wanted to the wind and maintain speed. Oh well that's sailing!!

We then headed over to the flats, anchored and let the kids test out their new PFD's they got earlier in the week. Gabby enjoyed the water and got in and let me hold her with minimal screaming. Nick floated on his back, but still needed a hand on the ladder to feel safe. It won't be long before they are jumping off... I was surprised at how comfortable Gabby was on the boat around the water.

We had a pretty good heel in the gusts this time. We were at a comfortable 10 degrees and went up to 15 at times. I thought the kids would freak out but they did not mind, Mom and Dad were more freaked out!!!! Gladys did a great job manning the helm even in the gusts she kept her cool in the heeling and held on and held course or steered up into the wind to bring us down a bit.

Overall a wonderful day on the bay!!