Thursday, August 9, 2012

Calamity Jane and the River Part Two: Rudder Failure

Okay, let's get the whining over with. Turns out there are some things more painful than a bruised ego and one of them is bruised ribs. Only hurts when I breath.

Must have happened as I was dragging my beaten body back into the boat after pulling myself out of the river.  Also might explain the bruises on my shins. But I'm getting ahead of my story. 

After a few months hiatus due to a knee injury, I finally returned to the river. I hadn't rigged a Sunfish since last summer but after a quick sail on Saturday, sailing-fever struck again and by 
Monday afternoon I was ready. Or so I thought.

The process of rigging a Sunfish makes me almost as happy as sailing one. It's incredibly physical. Hauling a 120 lb boat via a trailer into the water. Lugging the mast, the sail, the rudder onto the beach and then putting it all together.  All the lifting, fitting, pulling and tying the lines makes me feel that I've earned it.  It's an amazing feeling of accomplishment to be out there on the water in a boat that I rigged. Controlling-okay, attempting to control something so small amid currents and wind is exhilarating and awesome.  And this time it was all that and more! 

And by more, I mean mayhem. 
Pure, white knuckling, jaw clenching mayhem.

It was my good fortune to meet Marcus and his 10 yr old son Carlos 
(not their real names) on the beach that afternoon before I set sail.  As it turns out, meeting me was not so fortunate for them since they spent the rest of their the afternoon rescuing me.

The fun began when Carlos who was sailing due east of me called out,"You lost your rudder!!" Squinting my eyes and scouring the river, I  suppressed a smile.  "What poor fool could have lost their rudder?" I wondered. 

I stopped smiling when I realized who the fool was.  Ugh. My tiller was no longer controlling the boat and my rudder  was dangling precariously from the stern.  What had I done? This was bad. Thankfully, I positioned  the tiller under the traveler. Without that line both the rudder and the tiller would have come undone and sank to the bottom of the river.  


Carlos tacked and headed back to the beach while I tried not to come as undone as my rudder. I  prayed that he was going for help.

I then remembered something I'd learned in the Sunfish class.  The instructors explained that by allowing the sail to luff (flap in the wind) the boat would stop. Which
essentially stalls the boat. 

I let go of the main sheet and waited. Mercifully, I had not stalled in the channel. I was close though and the motor boats whizzing by were creating enough wake to make the boom swing around and occasionally bounce off the back of my head. 

I crawled back to the stern to re-attach my rudder,  but I knew  it was futile. After all, I had failed to rig it on dry land and the rudder is mostly underwater when you're sailing. Or in my case, waiting for the Coast Guard. I wrestled with the rudder for what seemed like forever until Carlos sailed toward me, this time with his dad on board. My prayers were answered when Marcus boarded my boat, lay down belly first and took all of twenty seconds to attach my rudder. 

Little Carlos was on his little sailboat passing the time doing figure eights. Cute kid.

His dad and I sailed to the pier, he at the rudder and I at the sail and I thanked him for rescuing me almost as many times as he gently criticized my sailing skills.  As he stepped onto the pier, he asked me if I was sure I was comfortable sailing today, "Considering...... ah, the weather." 

I may have been humiliated but I was not defeated! I assured Marcus that I would be fine  and I left him on the pier and sailed downriver.

Wouldn't that make a great ending? Me sailing off into the sunset? Ending the day with a triumph over rudders and rivers and wind? (Sigh!) But, of course, the day turned out slightly different than my imaginary ending. 

Okay, a lot different. 

And I had to ask myself. How many times can a person be wrong in one day?

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