Day Sail

On Friday 27 December I took the boat out in the company of fellow sailor and friend Peter Austin with his wife Lynne.  We sailed to the south along the shipping channel then dropped anchor at Woodman Point for 90 minutes of lunch and relaxation.
 

Lunch Aboard Pachuca

The SW wind had been stronger than expected and we sailed with one reef in the main and perhaps a third of the headsail rolled out. We had water over the deck which brought out two things, one good and one not so good.

The good news is that after starting off with a bone dry bilge I found about one spongeful of water in the bilge when we were back at the pen, which could have been easily been caused by water loosened up during the sail.  I say that because it took me about 2 days to dry the bilge after I had discovered that two of the drain tubes between the bilge sections were still plugged up, and the water kept seeping into the bilge for 2 or 3 days after I removed  the plugs. 

The not-so-good finding is that the new you-beaut solar vent over the head cannot be removed and replaced by a plug like the old one, as far as I can tell. The water was skating along the deck then going into the vent and down into the head. This is completely untenable for heavy weather sailing and on my next visit to the boat I will have a better look at the setup.

 

Once again the boat performed very well.  However, we did discover that the boat had drifted perhaps 100 meters in spite of 30m of chain having been put out.  This was no doubt due to the sea grass on the ocean bed and has made me consider replacing the 35kg Delta anchor with the heavier 45kg Manson anchor. But this may be moot because as Brenda pointed out later, there is no need to disturb the sea grass when the club has two moorings available for its members (one of which was free during our visit).