It was pretty windy on the way down so we were prepared to reef the main and use the blade. We weren't prepared for the thunder though . . . luckily it stayed away after a few rumbles over toward the foothills, so after about 20 minutes of watching which way the storm was headed, we went ahead and motored out on the lake. Falcor and Wyde Lode were out, Nauti Nymph too, so we decided to raise the sail and see how things went.. I'm really glad I reinstalled the jiffy reefing before we went to the San Juans - reefing is just a matter of pulling 2 lines now.
Zach wanted to steer and manage the main so we decided to skip the Beer Can race (they were about 20 minutes late starting anyway). He hasn't sailed a boat that much and not by himself since I had the laser, so we left the jib below and headed down the lake.
As expected, the further south we got, the stronger the wind got. Once we were in the center the wind was howling and whitecaps were building. Verboten and Zach handled it well with the reefed main. Next week maybe we'll add the jib to the mix.
We made several runs up & down the lake, eventually ending over by Leakin' Lena. The wind was really whipping there, and instead of tacking south of Lena we ended up running back on the north side because I was concerned we'd get pushed up against a lee potty! At some point we maxed out at 6.14 knots on a broad reach - pretty good with a reefed main and no jib!
The Beer Can crowd looked to be having a good run too once they finally got started.
The run back to the dock was pretty uneventful, Zach steered while I dropped and flaked the main, then he brought us in to the dock. There was a cool red rainbow over the lake and the sunset wasn't bad either.
After docking we walked around to the day use park so we could rescue someone's windsock that we'd seen floating on the way out. We hung it on the gate to D dock and then headed home around 9:00.
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