Having said that, I think that it would probably be OK to take her to Maine as-is and have her hauled there for the work. I am thinking of Front Street Shipyard<\/a>, as they are well regarded and could certainly solve the problem.\u00a0 Additionally, they could address some of the scratches in the hull along with other items.<\/p>\n Even if I can work with the yard here on the rudder, I’d prefer not to tackle such a big job as it’s a bit overwhelming and frankly, “I’m not in the mood”.<\/p>\n One of the reasons for the delay is that I really love springtime here in CT and I’ll admit to being distracted by gardening and keeping the lawn looking great.\u00a0 The lawn is actually the best that it has ever been and reminds me of a comment from a fellow cruiser wh0 visited us a few years ago, commenting “this doesn’t look like a cruiser’s lawn”.\u00a0 If he came here now, he’d be even more impressed.<\/p>\n Sadly, Pandora is just about the only boat still covered at the marina, save a few that have for-sale signs.\u00a0 On the hard or now, I’m actively plotting cruising plans for this summer and the next winter season.<\/p>\n I believe I mentioned in my last post that I’ll be heading to Maine as the leader of the Salty Dawg Down East Rally and from there, the Chesapeake and onto Hampton VA prior to heading south to Antigua in November.<\/p>\n There’s even a possibility that we will be heading to Greece, by plane, not by boat, to spend 10 days with friends Tom and Sarah on their Oyster.\u00a0 We’ve been talking to them about taking Pandora to the Med and it would be fun to get a taste of what that area has to offer.\u00a0 As that region has great personal interest for Brenda, it seems like a nice way to combine our interests, hers for history and mine for sailing.\u00a0 Not to suggest that I am totally one-dimensional, I like history too.<\/p>\n The lawn isn’t the only reason that I am running behind on things as I also, rather abruptly, took on the role of (acting) Rally Director for the Salty Dawg Sailing Association, and that is in addition to my work organizing the arrival activities for the fall rally in Antigua as Port Officer.<\/p>\n The role of Rally Director rather suddenly became open about a month ago and I felt compelled to help out as the group was right in the middle of the spring rally home from the Caribbean and I wanted to do what I could to help the rest of the volunteers to keep everything running smoothly.<\/p>\n That rally, a run home to Hampton VA from St John USVI, had a fairly small number of boats, only about a dozen, much less than in “normal” years.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the weather was very challenging with the fleet running into some very nasty weather south of Cape Hatteras.\u00a0 A few slowed down to avoid the worst weather and others hove too just south of the front.\u00a0 Unfortunately, one boat, that had a roller furling main suffered a broken furling block and their sail jammed, I think partially furled, and left them with too much sail up in deteriorating conditions.<\/p>\n After some back and forth with the Salty Dawg support team on shore and the US Coast Guard, they ended up accepting a tow from the Richard Snyder<\/a>, a 154′ long Coast Guard cutter designed for offshore SAR work.\u00a0 She’s an impressive ship, capable of launching a highspeed RIB (ships’ tender) while moving at speed and she’s very fast, able to make more than 30kts.\u00a0 \u00a0I’ll bet she’s quite a spectacle when the going gets rough.\u00a0 They ended up bringing the boat to Beaufort Inlet where a local commercial towboat took the boat the rest of the way to a marina.\u00a0 \u00a0I don’t have much information about what sort of condition the boat is in but have heard that it sustained considerable damage from the stresses of the tow.<\/p>\n The standard when taking a boat in tow is to run the line from the bow and around the mast and not to just rely on the cleats to take the strain.\u00a0 In this case, the huge forces of wind, sea and waves bent the mast, pulled out cleats and damaged the bow pulpit along with a number of stanchions.\u00a0 There was also reportedly considerable water damage down below plus other issues.\u00a0 Being out in rough conditions myself, I am always amazed that somehow water finds itself down below in spite of my constant diligence in keeping things tight.<\/p>\n It is a relief that the crew were unharmed and made it to shore safely but it’s sad that the boat was damaged.<\/p>\n You never know what can happen on when making long passages and while things tend to go well, most of the time, there is always the question of what can break and the best way to resolve the problem.<\/p>\n To that point, a few years ago I over-torqued my main halyard and pulled the headboard off of the top of the sail.\u00a0 In conditions that were not terrible but plenty “sporty” I went up the mast and retrieved the halyard.\u00a0 It was a terrifying experience that I’d prefer not to repeat.\u00a0 Check out this post<\/a> about what was involved in fixing the problem.<\/p>\n On a related subject, my friend Alex took delivery of a new catamaran in France a few weeks ago and while he was planning to spend time cruising the Med this summer, the restrictions brought on by Covid-19 lead him to change plans and run the boat home so he could spend the summer cruising New England before heading to Antigua in the fall with the rally.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/1200px-USCGC_Richard_Snyder_WPC-1127.jpg\")
The Richard Snyder rendezvoused with the stricken boat in some nasty conditions a few hundred miles south of Cape Hatteras, with waves of 20′ or so.\u00a0 After taking the crew aboard and the boat in tow, they headed for Beaufort, NC.\u00a0 This screen shot, not from that date of the rescue when conditions were much worse, shows where they took her in tow.\u00a0 You can see where they drifted around for quite a while.\u00a0 See the red arrow.\u00a0 ![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/spring-SDSA-a.png\")
Unfortunately, the tow bridle broke and it was too rough to reattach so they stood by until things calmed down somewhat before reattaching the tow.\u00a0 \u00a0I recall following the process on the boat’s tracker and at one point showed that with the boat in tow, they were making nearly 10kts over the bottom against wind and the Gulf Stream current.\u00a0 I can only imagine the strain on the tow.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/alex-5.jpg\")
Conditions haven’t been all that easy for Alex as the weather has been constantly changing, with wind direction shifting regularly in both strength and direction.\u00a0 \u00a0 It is this changeable weather when compared to the run to the Caribbean in the fall that is known as offering much more predictable conditions that makes a run to the south, later in the season, much more appealing to cruisers.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/alex-6a.jpg\")
I am not following the forecast as Alex surely is, and as of today he says that they are facing at least one more front between them an Newport which is, 690 miles away as the crow\/seagull flies.\u00a0 And, we all know that boat’s don’t fly and when things are unpleasant, it seems like they crawl.\u00a0 And usually so slowly it’s like watching grass grow.<\/p>\n