Sloop Black Magic at the end of the weekend, Elephant Butte Lake

Etchells sloop USA 125, Black Magic, at the end of the weekend, Sunday, December 6, 2009, at Elephant Butte Lake, New Mexico.

Etchells Black Magic at Rock Canyon Marina

Black Magic went into Zorro's slip while Zorro was working on his boat and gets to serve as his "loaner boat" while Constellation is out of the water. These pictures were taken Sunday, November 22, 2009.

Etchells "Black Magic" Sailing in the Race to the Elephant

Stern view toward Marina del Sur showing Kachina (left) and Black Magic (right) approaching the rounding mark after passing to the west of Rattlesnake Island. These pictures are scans of paper prints given to the racers at the awards dinner, so the resolution is limited ... but they do capture a bit of the excitement of the race.

Close view of Black Magic and Kachina, probably near the mark rounding of buoy 9A.


Distant view of the Etchells Black Magic.


Etchells USA 125 in a puff



Black Magic with speedboat passing in background


Black Magic behind ski boat and dunked water skier.

Sloop Black Magic port view


Etchells 125, Black Magic, in the cove near the Dam Site marina and not far from the finish of the Race to the Elephant on Saturday, May 30, 2009. Photos courtesy of Mark from the Dam Site Marina.

Sailing in New Mexico; very brief update

by my standards, anyway. This Saturday we had about fifteen boats participate in the Race to the Elephant, plus support from powerboats helping with race committee and photography. I wound up single-handing Carol Anne's Etchells "Black Magic". After finishing the race behind Kachina I docked, rolled up the main and tidied up the boat, and went to the far end of the marina to watch other boats finish.

Kachina was not only first to finish, but also first on corrected time, both in the racing fleet and overall. Black Magic was second to finish and also second on corrected time (race fleet and overall). The winner of the cruising fleet and third overall was "Viento Bueno", a US 25, and the winner and "sole survivor" of the dinghies was a Capri 16.5. The racing was followed by a great steak dinner and awards banquet.

Lago Rico, the company that owns the local marinas and sponsored the regatta, also arranged for pictures of the boats racing to be printed out and on the tables for people to look and and take home, and for some really nice door prizes to be given out.

Etchells Black Magic Sailing at Elephant Butte Lake

Images of the International Etchells sloop USA 125, "Black Magic", sailing in the single-handed Joshua Slocum race at Elephant Butte Lake, May 9, 2009. Photos courtesy of Gerald R. Byrnes, 2009 (c).

Six things that went right during the Joshua Slocum race

notwithstanding the gripes below, several things did go right during our Joshua Slocum single-handed race.

(1) The powerboat was able to tow the non-motorized boats out to the race course when winds were slow to fill in.

(2) I was able to (eventually) get the spinnaker up and drawing well for the first time in 8 - 15 knots of wind.

(3) I managed to avoid spinnaker disasters and got the chute down decently.

(4) I was able to hold off a good sailor in a similar competing boat through most of the race.

(5) After the race, I had a nice solo sail in spite of building white-cap conditions.

(6) Nothing Broke! (including me) Whoopee!

Fifteen things that bugged me during last Saturday's single-hand race

Numerous dumb things bugged me during last weekend's single-handed race. Keelboat sailors don't race solo most of the time, so we're more apt to do dumb things and have weird problems when we do.

(1) I thought I'd forgotten my watch and didn't have a way to time the start and was over early by eight seconds trying to "wing it" in a sudden wind puff at the start. That night, I found the watch -- in my shirt pocket (watch band had broken). Whoops! Duh! Aaaargh!

(2) Because of wind shifts and flukiness, much of the spinnaker run wound up being a reach, instead, which is a pain when sailing a thirty-foot boat in puffy winds with a chute and no crew.

(3) The shock cord on the mast blocks has lost its stretch and needs replacing.

(4) The topping lift got caught on a button by the spinnaker pole ring and so I had to make a trip forward to free it and get the pole to lift... after figuring out what the **^%%!! was wrong.

(5) Even with a shock cord holding the tiller down, the boat tended to round up. Darned *(&%$%&* spinnaker reaches!

(6) My take down was okay, but during it a couple of sheets, the cockpit end of the topping lift, and cockpit end of the spinny sheet decided to have a knot-tying contest that had me tied up in knots instead of paying attention to the final upwind leg.

(7) I couldn't hear voice hails from the RC, which, at the time of the start, didn't have the VHF radio working because it had gotten onto an odd setting.

(8) One of the floorboards was warped and drifting around loose, creating a footing hazard.

(9) Jibsheet cam cleats are angled for crew use, no good place to put jibsheets for single-handing.

(10) Spouse wouldn't let me use the better mainsail, maybe she was afraid I'd abuse it.

(11) Bumped my boat into the fleet captain's boat before (he was on port tack and distracted talking to people in another boat, I was on starboard reach but didn't seem him coming)

(12) I had to beg very nicely to get a tow out to the race course before the winds filled in and made life more fun

(13) I couldn't find a GPS receiver to borrow so as to be able to update buoy locations for our lake map.

(14) Turnout for the regatta was fairly low, limiting our fun.

(15) Turnout for the raft-up / floating pot luck was really horrible, forcing us to postpone until next month.

The luck of the thirteenth sail of the year

Torn tiller. Interestingly, when the winds rose, the tiller didn't break at the connection to the tiller extension, where holes had been drilled that might have weakened it. Instead, the tiller first broke at the front end several inches in front of the tiller extension connection. Then, several minutes later, the tiller broke near the rudder stock. Controlling the boat without a tiller in the whitecaps was an interesting exercise, with crew weight and sail steering inadequate in tight quarters. But, we were able to sail the boat to the courtesy dock and make a precision landing in spite of conditions. The boat the tiller came from had been exposed to a fire; possibly exposure to the heat of the fire, combined with regular stresses from using the tiller, combined to weaken the laminated surfaces of the wood strips that the tiller comprised.

Superstitious sailors might be interested to know that although sailing on Friday the 13th proved to be no problem, Monday's sail was my 13th sail of the year. The Saturday sail also had an interesting conclusion; as Carol Anne and her crew returned to the dock, they faced a jammed halyard and a mainsail that refused to come down the mast.

Vise pliers clamped to the rudder stock.

And then there were 12

...days of sailing so far this year. Today's plan was for us to borrow a swaging tool (ours was back in Albuquerque) to re-swage the main halyard to its shackle and replace the damaged mainsail with a heeavier-weight main. We also caught up with people at the marina and I discussed plans for the Anniversary Cup, a bigger-than-usual regatta that we'll host on May 30th of this year.

Eventually I wound up on Black Magic as Carol Anne lowered the boat and trailer on the drop line and I then paddled the boat to the courtesy dock and got the boat ready to sail. Carol Anne parked the trailer and Expedition and hopped on Zorro's Echells.

Winds were extremely light when we met out on the lake just a few hundred feet from the marina, and didn't improve much in the next half hour. Gradually, though, the breeze built up to something tolerable and we crossed the lake and got in some generally good sailing in breezes of 2 to 6 knots, flying spinnakers for a bit and doing various maneuvers. The skies were becoming dark and cloudy by the time we sailed the boats back into the slips at Rock Canyon Marina and we just had enough light to put the two Etchells away for the night.

Tomorrow is a holiday for some people in the United States (Presidents Day). The wind forecast is quite decent with maximum sustained winds from the south at 5 to 10 mph in the morning and from the SSW at 10 to mph in the afternoon (possible gusts to 25 mph).

Weather history for Presidents Day weekend 2009 at Elephant Butte Lake
Sunday (KCTS Sierra Co. airport, about 6 miles from lake)
time wind
1353 variable dir., 5 mph max. winds
1453 variable dir., 5 mph max. winds
1553 from South, 5 mph max. winds
1653 calm
1753 from Southeast, 3 mph max. winds

Saturday
1153 SE 8 mph
1253 SW 10 gust 20 mph
1353 W 18 gust 28 mph
1453 W 17 gust 23 mph
1553 W 23 gust 31 mph
1653 SW 20 gust 26 mph
1753 W 13 mph

from http://www.spa.usace.army.mil/wc/adbb/basinrpt.asp
Rio Grande at San Marcial floodway, 644 cubic feet per second
Elephant Butte Reservoir, 4353.29 feet elev. over benchmark, 681,460 acre feet, 5 cfs outflow, 2100 February 15, 2009


Snow pack -- snow water equivalents
Colorado
Upper Rio Grande, 22% above average
San Miguel/San Juan basin, 17% above average
New Mexico
Rio Chama basin, 36% above average
Upper Rio Grande, 20% above average
Sangre de Cristo, 23% above average
Gila Basin, 54% of average
from ftp://ftp.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/data/snow/update/nm.txt

Commodore's Cup; A Quiet Day for Sailing at Elephant Butte Lake, New Mexico

International Etchells Black Magic (USA 125)

Colgate 26

Kachina in front of Kettletop

Black Magic crew

Commodore's Cup 2008 -- Yet even more of A Quiet Sailing Day on the Water at Elephant Butte Lake, New Mexico

Etchells Black Magic and part of the fleet make a slow parade during our attempt to host the Commodore's Cup Regatta on November 15, 2008. Very light winds tempted and teased us for a while, but ultimately disappeared.

Impressionistic view of Colgate 26 and J/24 Kachina

View from the backstay


Renovatio and Kachina

Boat symmetry

Soling, Etchells, and 3 MC Scows in front of Kettletop Mesa.

Flotsam and jetsam of Friday and Saturday.

This weekend featured a mix of the usual: sailing and working on boats.

Friday we were late getting off to the lake because we had to get "Tadpole" off on a camping trip with his troop. Tad was a bit disorganized because he'd had a bunch of homework to do after Thursday's string bass lesson and sailing club social, but we were still among the first to arrive at the Scout hut. There, Tad unlocked the hut and brought out gear needed for the trip and helped one of the assistant scoutmasters retrieve the troop trailer and load it. We also brought a couple of crates of food, because Tad was grubmaster for the campout. Then, while the Scouts were sorting themselves out, I made an exceptionally quick trip to Costco -- only 23 minutes round trip -- to buy some fresh muffins and cinnamon rolls and buy a "chicken bake" for Tad's dinner.

Finally, I was able to return home to pick up Carol Anne and the cats. We drive the Expedition, "Babe," south, towing our utility trailer with a Sunfish sailing dinghy and its gear on board. We unloaded the Sunfish at New Mexico Tech, stashing it behind "Seattle"'s apartment so it could be used as a display at today's "Club Fair" for the New Mexico Tech sailing club. Of course, Carol Anne also got her growler filled with a half gallon of ale at Socorro Springs.

Arriving at the apartment in Truth or Consequences, we unloaded the Expedition and unhitched the utility trailer. I called for takeout pizza, but the guy at the other end of our phone conversation couldn't process my coupon. Eventually, because of the problem with the coupon, we wound up being "upgraded" or "super sliced" and got half again as much pizza and twice as many breadsticks and cinnamon snack sticks for the coupon price. Fortunately, the apartment had a large fridge for leftovers.

In the meantime, Tad and the older scouts in a Jeep Cherokee, and another group in a mini-van, drove to Grants, NM, stopping at a Subway for dinner (2nd dinner for Tad) and then at their hotel. The troop all wound up swimming in the pool and lounging in the hot tub until 10 p.m. Friday.

Saturday morning we woke slowly. Eventually we bought some housewares at the Family Dollar store in Truth or Consequences, and went by the Lakeshore True Value, which carries stainless steel hardware, to look for boat parts. We found some stainless steel eyebolts, nuts, and washers that might help us re-assemble Black Magic's boom with its new endplate, which lacked a fitting to attach the end block at the end of the outhaul, which is placed inside the forward end of the boom. Then we visited a friend and crew member (Cornhusker), then left Foghorns and fliers at Morgan Marine, and headed for the Rock Canyon marina, where we planned only a brief visit to retrieve the spinnaker pole from Carol Anne's boat and to leave some "Foghorn" newsletters and sailing club fliers at the marina office.

There we found Zorro recently arrived; he said he'd forgotten Carol Anne's cell number and mis-dialed when trying to announce his arrival. With him and ready to sail on Constellation were "Seymour" and his five-year-old, "Seymour Junior". Zorro hadn't planned on sailing with a small fry, since the Etchells is not suited to small children, but apparently Seymour's condition of release from home was taking Junior along. While Zorro and crew were preparing to cast off, I in the meantime had uncovered Black Magic and was furiously stroking away with a portable bilge pump, necessarily because of recent wet winter storms and a tear in the diaphragm of the permanent bilge pump. Black Magic was still missing her boom, so Zorro invited us on board Constellation.

Five people -- even, or especially with one of them a small person -- on an Etchells is rather a crowd, especially on a boat that's often single-handed, and at first my only thought was to stay out of the way as best as I could. The first useful thing I was able to do is help fend off the pier and the prop of a boat's outboard motor as Constellation sailed out of her dock; then I graduated to lee-side rail meat in the light conditions. Eventually Zorro graduated me to bowman, which was rather awkward since that's not my usual position and I was a bit of a klutz, prompting Junior to say something like, "Pat doesn't know much about boats. I guess he's never been on one." Five-year-olds are not generally known for tact. It may also be a generational issue that I cannot get used to the notion of a small child calling me by my first name.

We sailed around the basin near the DamSite marina, then turned north, hoisted the spinnaker, then got fouled by a swirling headwind coming off the Elephant -- an "elephant fart" as we call it. We headed north as far as Horse Island, then returned in variable conditions, then sailed back and forth for a while. As the sun sank, we all got a bit cooler. Because Carol Anne and I hadn't known that Zorro would be at the marina, and hadn't planned to sail, we didn't have our sailing gear; no sailing gloves, jackets, etc. So Carol Anne borrowed a jacket from Zorro. Still, we also had the issue of Junior's limited attention span -- even if it was decent for a five year old, and now Zorro didn't have a jacket. Also, Seymour was a bit distracted by the need to pay attention to his offspring, which meant that the jib sheets didn't get their normal attention. So, we returned to the marina before sunset.

Zorro joined us at the apartment in another attack upon the mountain of pizza. En route we had a casualty; a bottle of merlot fell on its side and its cork popped out, spilling almost the whole bottle in the back of our Expedition. After dinner, Zorro looked at Black Magic's boom and discussed our ideas for attching the new fitting for the gooseneck attachment. We had four options: (1) insert small eyebolts, with the eyes inside the boom and nuts securing them on the outside of the boom end plate; (2) use a vise to squeeze an eyestrap so it would fit within the endplate; (3) cut a new screw hole and cut the end off of a padeye so it would fit in the eyestrap; or (4) drill new holes near the end of the boom and insert a bolt transversely through the boom. Each method had its disadvantages or obstacles to being achieved, especially with the limited sorts of tools we had available.

After discussing the methods with us, and other issues such as committee boat volunteers for our regattas, Zorro headed for El Paso. Zorro planned to call on Sunday, but with light to variable conditions in the forecast, we didn't really expect him to return for another day of sailing, so it would be imperative for us to get Black Magic back in commission. Meanwhile, I was sent off to Cornhusker's home to borrow a vacuum cleaner; there I learned more tales of Bassmaster's fishing adventures and their experience with making their son into a landlord when he went to college in Michigan. After I returned, Carol Anne and I eventually collapsed.

Meanwhile, Tad's Saturday morning was rather different from the usual. After breakfast at the motel, the troop members zigzagged up First, Roosevelt, and Shadow Canyon roads out of Grants to drive up Mount Taylor, there to join the Klondike Derby. Originally, the local scout district had planned a Klondike campout and skills event for Februrary, but that plan had been scrapped, with the scouts instead joining another district for a Klondike on January 27th. Because this was somewhat of a last-minute change, Tad's troop didn't get the information sheet about the event until the evening before, and found that they didn't have all the required equipment and had to do some improvising.

Nontheless, they did well in at least some of the events, getting blue ribbons in a couple of categories. Tad even tried to get extra credit at the knot-tying station by tying a bowline one-handed while blindfolded. They also did well with shelter building, and did well on their lashings, even though they had to disassemble their sled to have poles to lash and weren't asked to demonstrate one of the lashing knots.

The Klondike was generally well organized, although at one point, late in the day, the troop had been given bearings and directions that would have taken them out of bounds onto private land. Also, a late-arriving group had talked the organizers into being allowed to participate, with the result that the awards ceremony was delayed by an hour, leaving a few hundred boys and leaders standing around with little to do but try to keep warm.

A couple of issues surfaced before the day's end, however. Some of the scouts weren't well prepared for the event, having forgotten some necessary items, and a couple of the boys had planned to do other things on Sunday. One boy complained of being tired and cold after having worn his wool socks during the week and then not having them available for the campout; the same boy didn't have waterproof clothing, but flopped down and rolled around in the snow several times. So, even though Tad and the adults wanted to camp out for the night, they were outvoted and the troop returned to Albuquerque. Tad didn't call, so we went to bed Saturday night thinking he was still up on the mountain.

Meanwhile, we were reasonably satisfied; we'd made a wee bit of progress on boat work and had been sailing for a few hours. And, we still had some pizza in the fridge, though by now Carol Anne's growler was empty.

to be continued....