ColumbiaRiverCatalina.org		September 2008

Commodore
By Alden Andre', C38, Fly Bye

It has been a busy summer. The CRACA rendevous this year was a blast! My hat is off to the vice commodore Jim turner and his wife Rhonda. The food was great the people were great and the entertainment was great. Fun was had by all. And thank you Larry Brandt for your excellent class on MOB procedures. It even sounded like some new members will be stepping up to the plate for some officer positions next year for the club.

What have I been doing the past two months? Well first Alex and I went to Oakland to help Jim Turner bring his new 380 up the coast. Attached are some pics of the first part of the trip.

My second ocean trip this year was helping Larry Brandt take his 36 from Portland to Port Angles Wa. We left at 11:00 am on a Thursday and motored out of Astoria headed towards the dreaded COLUMBIA RIVER BAR. Well it was very anticlimactic. It was a glassy lake, not even a ripple on the water. It was like that for 40 hrs to the entrance of the straits which we stopped at Neigh bay for the night after 40 some hours of motoring at 6.5 kts on a glassy lake that would have made some of the best water skiing conditions. I did get to see 3 whales and a bunch of dolphins though. We were 40 miles out going north the whole way dodging boats the whole time mostly in fog that made the glassy water look like quicksilver. The one great thing was I really got to learn was how to use the radar (since Larry is one of a few certified Radar instructors’ around), how to use all of the functions to track targets and lock them in. We timed the weather window just right because when we got into port angles Rouser II (J-30 that did the Oregon offshore) from Hayden bay was leaving to go south. And they ended up breaking there boom in half on the trip down!

I tried to get out Labor Day weekend had a great spinnaker run up river with our boat and Ricks 36. He was trying out a spinnaker a friend had loaned him. I had to end up coming home due to a transmission cable breaking making me sail from camas back into Hayden bay and into my slip. But it is fixed and I am ready to do the St Helens race this weekend.

Have a great month and hope to see you on the water.

Alden Andre

Vice Commodore
By Jim Turner, C30, Fat Cat

It’s been a great boating season so far!  The Rendezvous was a success, well attended, with lots of positive feedback.  Thanks to all of you who gave their time and energy to make it a success!  I also want to thank River City Sailing for bringing a new Catalina 387 to the Rendezvous for us to check out.  What a great boat!

It’s been a very busy month with the Beacon Rock trip as well, which is Rhonda’s and my favorite!  It was great relaxing in such beautiful surroundings with many friends.  For anyone that didn’t go because they may be concerned about the distance, current, or unfamiliarity with getting there, call the Cruise Director to coordinate your departure with a group of us.  The group can share local knowledge and tips on how to avoid the worst of the current, and grounding on your trip to Beacon Rock.  Don’t miss this awesome cruise next year!

As many of you may be aware Rhonda and I have been dreaming about moving up to a bigger boat for some time now.  We generally justify our dream based on needing a boat that is more “dog friendly” since our water dog, Lola, is growing up.  In July we actually followed through on our dream and purchased a 2000 Catalina 380 in Alameda, CA.  After the purchase we started sailing the boat up the coast.  To describe the voyage as a little rough would be an understatement.  We abandoned the initial effort after three days and 130 nautical miles, leaving the boat in Fort Bragg, CA.  After the crew headed home, I spent five days in Ft. Bragg preparing the boat for th e next trip up the coast (no travel lift – so transporting is not an option).  While alone in this unfamiliar port, without transportation, I was amazed at the friendliness and helpfulness of the local people.  It was nice to decompress after a challenging trip in this quant old harbor on the Noyo River surrounded by fishing boats.  After a couple days I realized that if retirement looks anything like this, hanging out in new places, on a great boat and making new friends, I can do this!  Too bad I’m not able to retire just yet, and must still wait a bit.

Since my return, along with the Rendezvous and the Beacon Rock cruise I’ve also been working on preparing for the next Pacific coast trip to bring the 380 home, and getting “FatCat” on the market.  I’ve made great progress on both fronts with a “FatCat” for sale website online and the boat advertised, check it out here…
sites.google.com/site/wild4lifejim/

And hopefully by the time you’re reading this, weather permitting, I will be back on the ocean with several friends bringing our new 380 North and home!

Here are a couple of lessons learned that are worth sharing from our initial trip north.

• Make sure you fully understand all the boats systems, don’t take owners word for anything, validate!
• Make sure you have good sea berths so that crew gets good rest and doesn’t become overly fatigued
• Have USCG Light Lists and Chart No. 1, to look up chart symbols and buoys that make no sense!
• Correct Charts for critical changes (i.e., horn buoy changed to whistle, could be upsetting in fog)
• Have a handheld GPS (especially if your Chart-plotter and position are only at the helm)
• Have paper charts, chart books lack good longitude and latitude markings, hard to plot position
• Northern California and Oregon coastal weather is maddening!
• Coastal forecasts are nearly worthless in judging when to leave!
• Do you see another weather class in my future, how about yours?

If you need to get your boat up the west coast & have any time or budgetary limitations, truck it! If I was offered a do-over, I would truck the boat!!!

Lastly, CRACA officer elections are in November aren’t they?  Please consider volunteering for a club officer position!  It’s your club, only through our combined efforts, participation and contributions does CRACA stand out as a fun group to join!  

-Jim

Secretary/Treasurer
By John Kerrigan, C30, Magewind

<No Submission>

Communications Officer
By Justin Albano, C22, Velitas

Hello Craca members!
We all had a fantastic time at the CRACA Rendevouz, as eveident by the pics below. Thankyou to everyone who worked hard to make our annual party a success.

Safety Focal
By Larry Brandt, C36, High Flight

Crew Overboard-- Part 1--------- Points of Sail

As a follow-up to the Crew Overboard seminar I gave at the CRACA Rendezvous, I thought I would write a narrative of the COB procedure I taught there.  This would allow any interested brains to chew over the concepts, with the hoped-for result being a willingness on the part of you, the reader, to try out this great COB procedure on the water. The benefits for doing so will include, 1) having an important safety tool in your arsenal, and 2) a better familiarity with your boat under sail.

The “Figure 8” Crew Overboard is the basic COB procedure taught by the American Sailing Association in the very first sailing class you take.  A narrative of the procedure consumes space, so this discussion will proceed in two or three installments.

Crew Overboard recovery under sail has a lot to recommend it.  Returning to a person who has fallen overboard can be considerably faster under sail than if the skipper were to douse the sails, start the motor, deploy a LifeSling and do the necessary maneuvering that this requires.  It can also be safer to do a COB under sail, as the engine is not used, and so the possibility of propeller injury is entirely absent. 

ASA uses the “Figure 8” in the basic sailing course because it is simple, repeatable, and safer than other COB maneuvers for neophyte sailors because it does not require a jibe.  Thus, it eliminates a jibe’s attendant personnel injury and equipment damage risks.  But the Figure 8 COB does require a thorough knowledge of Points of Sail…that is, the helmsman’s knowledge of how your boat performs at various angles to the wind.

The illustration to the left is a “helicopter view” of water and wind, showing the “angle” of your boat to the wind.  That’s all we’re talking about when we say “Points-of-Sail.”  But each of the “Points” has a particular characteristic that it’s important to know.

For a Points-of-Sail discussion, we select only a few directions, or angles to the wind, as discussion representatives.  Can a boat sail any direction in between the points illustrated?  Any of 360 degrees? Sure.  But let’s simplify the topic and consider only the above examples:  Head-to-Wind, Close Haul, Close Reach, Beam Reach, Broad Reach, and Run.  Those Points-of-Sail on one tack will be mirrored on the opposite tack.  That’s it; there isn’t that much to remember.

Head-to Wind, of course, is when the boat points so much toward the wind that the sails cannot generate energy.  We call this large section of the pie the “No-Go Zone”.

Close Haul is next, and that’s the point-of-sail that defines the edge of the No-Go Zone.  If you’re sailing a Close Haul, then you are sailing as close to the wind as you can.  If the wind shifts ever so slightly, you might not even be sailing anymore, as the wind might have left you stranded in the No-Go Zone.

Close Reach is an extremely important P-o-S to remember.  What’s its characteristic?  Let’s call it “the Most Controllable” point-of-sail, as it is the ONLY P-o-S that allows the sails to 1) generate energy, and 2) not generate energy.  Like the accelerator pedal in your car…sheet in, the sails generate energy and the boat goes forward; sheet out, the sails luff, and the boat stops.  This is the point-of-sail you would use as your “final approach” to a mooring buoy, or to a person in the water.

Beam Reach, we say, is the fastest point of sail. 

Broad Reach, I like to describe as “the Most Glorious” point-of-sail.  To go to Hawaii on a broad reach would be the most pleasurable way to do that.

Finally, the Run is the “most potentially hazardous” point-of-sail, because of its potential for accidental jibe.

There is a mirror image of these on the opposite tack.  Next time, we’ll talk about sewing these points-of-sail together into a classic COB maneuver called “the Figure 8”.  Then we can go out and practice, and perhaps save a life when the time comes.

-Larry Brandt

Historian
By Alex Andre', C38, Fly Bye

<No Submission>

Rear Commodore
By Eric Rouzee, C36, Legacy

<no Submission>

<No Submission>

Catalina Newsletters of the Northwest

Checkout these links to Northwest Catalina newsletters and local racing:

Catalina 22 Fleet 20 of Portland www.c22pdx.org Sail Portland www.sailpdx.com Oregon Women's Sailing Assoc. www.owsa.net

Catalina Assoc.  of Tacoma and South Sound home.earthlink.net/~catss/CATSS Web Page.htm Catalina Association of Puget Sound capsfleet1.com/News Letters.htm Small Yacht Sailing club of Oregon (SYSCO) www.sailpdx.com/sysco.htm

September

• No Meeting
• 6th - 7nd, Cruise: McCuddy's Landing
• 20th - 21st, Cruise: Hadley's Landing
• 26th - Sail For The Cure

October

• 2nd - 3rd, Cruise to McCuddy's Landing
• 25th - 26th, Cruise: Government Island -East Dock
• TBD, General Meeting & 2009 Board Election

November

See the calendar