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As I have said many times, we try to avoid making specific plans when we travel to the coast because they are so often modified or cancelled completely. For instance, this weekend was supposed to be a little cruise over to South River with Richard and Frances. Instead it turned in to quite a different experience.

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Saturday April 29, 2006
After arriving late on Friday night, we found the wind was much stronger than we had anticipated. It was blowing about 20 knots and there was no sign of diminishing. I had asked Richard if I could borrow his "Top Climber" to go up the mast and do a little maintenance. A "Top Climber" is a device that looks much like a bosun's chair but allows the user to safely climb up the mast on his own power not relying on the kindness of strangers (or the first mate) to crank him up using the ship's winch. I had never been up the mast of Southern Star (or any other sailboat) and I figured the experience would do me good. After some expert instruction from Richard, I started up the mast. It took a while because the device requires you to climb much like an inch worm crawls. I am happy to report that it works really well and I ascended and descended without incident. While I was up there, I repaired the steaming light, and installed a block (pulley) for a flag halyard. All proper yachts have a flag halyard and now Southern Star has one.

There was a slim crowd at the dock this weekend. I suspect most of our dock mates actually believed the weather man instead of ignoring him as we did. I sure am glad I decided to put the cabin heater in the car at the last minute or there could have been a couple of Sailor-Sicles aboard Southern Star early Saturday morning. Since the high winds and cold conditions made a sail to south river a not-so-pleasant prospect, we consulted with Richard, Frances (and Nikki the wonder dog) and decided to visit Beaufort NC. It was a great day for a ferry ride. Judy and Frances shopped and Richard and I walked the waterfront. We all had lunch in a sidewalk restaurant and generally enjoyed the visit. It was a bit crowded because of a wine tasting event that we didn't know about. We drove back to the boats and had a relaxing rest of the day. The Very First Mate made a killer Chef Salad for dinner and we stayed below in the warmth for the night.

Sunday April 30, 2006
We have decided to invest in roller furling for the boat. A roller furler works a bit like an old fashioned window shade. It is installed on the headstay, and allows you to control the size of the jib or head sail from the cockpit by simply rolling it up on the stay. This eliminates the need for an old guy (read Cptn Lane) to go out on the foredeck on a 30 knot wind to deal with reducing sail. My Sunday plan included going all the way to the top of the mast to accurately measure the headstay. I learned two things. First, it's a lot further up there looking down than it is down here looking up. Second, the further you go up the mast, the more amplified the movement of the boat. The steady 20 to 25 knot winds did not allow me to venture further than about half way up. I did not get the headstay measured, maybe next time. We cleaned up, packed up and headed for home. We stopped for lunch and made the trip in about the usual 5 hours without incident.

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