Practice makes perfect

It was my Friday off today , (wahooo) . The weather was warm in the high 80's, winds 15-20 mph. perfect for a sail. So I did just that. It was great! Steady wind, moderate waves. Did a few miles just for fun. Almost got run over by a tug boat !! Other than that it was perfect. :-)

I practiced my man overboard drills a few times. Since I have part two of my ASA classes coming up next month. The drills went fairly well. I was able to grab the "man" on the first try two of 4 times on the 2nd try twice. Not bad. "he" would have been pulled along a couple of times, but...at least I got "him"
Also practiced, well tried sailing with no tiller, steering by sails only. Did fairly well, but could not come about, I need to figure out that one. Also did a bit of jib reefing. Just to see how the roller jib part way out behaved.

I was thinking today how nice it is to be able to sail in a few mintues of prep. not having to load and unload an outboard into a lazzeret like my old boat . What a hassle that was !!

Tomorrow, we have a couple going out with us for a lunch sail. We are heading back to Benicia. It should be fun, our first couple passengers, we do not have a lot of couple friends... well one really, my sister -n- brother inlaw. I was dissapointed they could not come over this year. So this will be different, kind of exciting. Since Lady Zen and I are both Leo's with like to do the host thing. Let's see how this goes...