Desert Sea - New Mexico and Southwestern Sailing

More Bristol Cup Boats at the Butte, October 24

Boats explore the starting area before the beginning of the first race of the Bristol Cup regatta at Elephant Butte Lake.

J/24 passing in front of two Etchells

J/24 Hot Flash between two Etchells.

Labels: Bristol Cup, Elephant Butte Lake, sailboats, sailing, yacht Caliente, yacht Constellation, yacht Hot Flash

Sunday, October 25 at the Butte

Constellation eases by the fleet. Sunday's winds were light, averaging about 2 knots. On the Beaufort wind scale, which grades wind forces from 0 for nothing to 10 for a hurricane, that would be a Force 1. Sometimes the breeze faded away to the barely discernible, and sometimes it freshened a bit to 3 or 4 knots, but mostly it made for a mellow day on the water.

Constellation in front of committee boat, the J/24 Hot Flash.

Committee boat; J/24 reflections

Labels: Bristol Cup, Elephant Butte Lake, sailing, yacht Constellation, yacht Hot Flash

Etchells Constellation and Caliente Sailing at Elephant Butte

International Etchells USA 38, "Constellation", with Zorro at the helm enjoying spirited sailing conditions on Elephant Butte Lake.

International Etchells USA 438 "Caliente" with "Penzance" at the helm during the Joshua Slocum single-handed race, May 9, 2009.

Labels: Elephant Butte Lake, Etchells, Joshua Slocum race, yacht Caliente, yacht Constellation

Joshua Slocum single-handed race, Saturday May 9, 2009 at the Butte

J/24 "Oso" before the start of the Joshua Slocum single-handed regatta at Elephant Butte Lake.

Constellation next to capsized MC Scow. A little later, the sailing club's motorboat and race committee crew helped the scow skipper recover.

For me, the race had its ups and downs and oddities. Before the start of the regatta I managed to bonk a port-tacker I didn't see coming. Just before the start, a big puff of wind made things a little too exciting and confusing, and hoisting the spinnaker in the puffy conditions for the downwind leg was "educational".

Labels: Elephant Butte Lake, Joshua Slocum race, yacht Constellation, yacht MC Scow, yacht Oso

Sailing at Elephant Butte Lake, Sunday, January 25, 2009

Etchells Constellation. After some comic-opera mis-communications, Zorro wound up with Blondie and a boyfriend on board, both of whom were unprepared for conditions on the water when the winds picked up.

Fickle winds made trimming the chute a frustrating exercise for a while during Cornhusker's solo sail on Sunday. Later on the winds came up even stronger than on Saturday, gusting into the 25-mph range with steady winds exceeding 20 mph.

Look ma, we can even sail dead downwind backwards!

We sailed around the lake for a while with Cornhusker and Zorro, then sailed to the courtesy dock near Marina del Sur. We dumped sails a bit too soon and fell short of the dock (which is still much better than ramming it because of going way too fast). The winds were too strong to let us scull or paddle to the dock, so we raised the jib and used it to sail to the courtesy dock. Then we had to wait quite a while for the winds to settle down; there was just too much wind to try to put our non-motorized thirty-foot keelboat on a trailer. So, we returned to Rock Canyon Marina, where Husker had returned with her boat, and visited with the marina staff, Ron, Lance, and marina co-owner Neal. I took a kayak out into the choppy water and whitecaps for a bit of exercise and play time while waiting for Constellation to return to the marina, which it eventually did with a soggy, chilled crew. Then we had lunch with Zorro, Blondie, and Matt. Returning to the ramp area, we found that the winds had moderated, so Carol Anne and I were able to retrieve the boat. We faced one additional challenge, however; the lot truck we used to haul Black Magic to the mast-up lot had no headlights.

Labels: diary, Elephant Butte Lake, yacht Constellation, yacht Free and Clear IV

Sailing at Elephant Butte Lake, Friday, January 23, 2009

Etchells USA 38 Constellation in winter sun at Elephant Butte Lake, New Mexico

Constellation ahead.

Friday, January 23, 2009, Seventh Day:
After Thursday's sail, I'd hitched a Jeep ride with Dumbledore to the Saturn, driven north all the way back to Albuquerque, and taken Carol Anne to work. After picking her up at the Montoya Campus after her class ended at 9:20 and stopping by home, it was nearly midnight by the time we got to our motel room in Truth or Consequences.

Thus, we were slow getting going on Friday and didn't check out until late morning. Zorro helped us re-attach the traveler control lines in spite of a few challenges before he went out. But, before long we had a bit of wind waiting at the marina, so off we went to catch up with Zorro and his boat, Constellation. Cornhusker and Bassmaster came out on her Freedom 21, Free and Clear 4, so we enjoyed lots of sailing. We did some rough tuning with Zorro, which consisted mostly of following him around some navigation buoys that we used as turning marks. We also got in some a bit of downwind spinnaker work early on, but then settled in for lots of windward-leeward work. All in all, this was yet another one of a surprisingly large number of good sailing days we'd enjoyed in January.

Constellation and mountain scenery

Constellation turning at a navigation buoy

Freedom 21, Free and Clear IV with nearby mountain scenery.

Free and Clear IV with Kettletop Mesa in distance

As we passed to windward of Free and Clear, our shadow passed over her in the mid-afternoon winter light.

Freedom 21 Free and Clear IV and Etchells 22 Constellation

Free and Clear IV and Constellation

Part of a lines drawing for the Etchells class sailboat that is said to be one of the last drawings Skip Etchells made for the boats.

Labels: Elephant Butte Lake, yacht Constellation, yacht Free and Clear IV

Sailing at Elephant Butte Lake, Jan. 9, 2009

Sunshine over the bow.

On Friday, we (Batgal, Tad, and I) got to the lake in time for a great sail with "Zorro" on Constellation. Winds were pretty brisk, though not as strong as the previous Sunday, so we did some sailing in the race course area and then headed north past Long Point Island and Kettletop Mesa. We got about as far as Barney's Cove and near the south Monticello boat ramp before heading south, again enjoying nice spinnaker runs and reaches. The wind let up a bit, but not too much, and we wound up sailing in dusk and twilight, then under the rising moon, which was very near full. Coming into the marina, we were slow to get the mainsail down and came in a bit "hot".

That evening we left Tad at Dino and Sister Rosebia's cabin at Hot Springs Landing and drove back to Albuquerque, with plans to return south later in the weekend. Gerald got to learn some practical lessons about managing rental properties with Dino in our absence.