I like Hammocks.

[No Idea]

For some reason, when the wind is in the right direction, it sort of funnels down the back of this line of small islands.

It makes for some really hairy sailing.

Our Captain decided it was time to play chase there...

My little one was trapeezing off the side of the boat to try to stop me tipping it over and we were charging along just about under control.

 

[No Idea]

Biggest was staring at the tell tales on the front sail and adjusting the front sail continuously to keep us going as fast as possible.

Captain was still outcornering us.

It was embarrassing that we just couldnt catch him.

He made a strange mistake and stayed on a tack a little too long and went on the wrong side of this anchored motoryacht.

Advantage to me! I needed one!

I threw mine into the turn first and went up along the nearer side of the yacht, knowing I would end up in front and able to set the next couple of turns...

Biggest was muttering Yessss....Yesss...Yesss...... under his breath..

Little one was hung flat to the water, standing on the edge of the deck with his fingers in the water....

I cut across behind the yacht..

 

[No Idea]

The air pushing across our sails was coming from the direction of the yacht.

It hadnt occurred to me that the 15 ft tall yacht would stop the wind getting to my sails.....

 

[No Idea]

...one minute, we are fighting to keep the boat upright, the next, its falling towards us - and the yacht.

Little one hit the water head first and actually hit his head on the seabed as our boat tried to roll.

Biggest and I scrambled in and fought not to be tipped off...

I turned and saw my mast raking across the top of the yacht - less than an inch from its top rail.

Leaning on that rail was this blond woman....

My mast was heading towards her head....

Oshtohshtohsht.....

 

[eel28]

wow what a cliff hanger

 

[v-ness]

Are we still waiting for No Idea to come back from taking the blond woman to be seen in A&E??...

We'll be here for a while...

Ness

 

[Robbi]

Robbi bites his finger nails in anticipation !

 

[Highbinder]

I've been wondering, does this happen in real time? What happens today you post today? Or is it a backlog? Just because it looks awful sunny in your piccys today

 

[No Idea]

No. I mix them.

Most of the boat stuff is older. We last took the boat out a month ago. You have actually seen some of the images from that trip.

I havent kept the outings in order, and I run them in between hobo and hammock adventures.

The mishap above with the yacht happened on 12/8/09.

My little one in the previous piece with the hobo stove in his hut was two days old

The trip before that with the wifes boyfriend where it was too windy and we tipped it over was 11/10/08.

The project with the bent pipe in the potato tin was 3/12/10

The snow pics were posted the same day as I took them.

The hobo stove in the woods were two days after they were taken

Im sharing what you can do with your kids, what you can do with a minimum of money, what you can experience if you believe you can, oh, and some of the how to's and pitfalls that can give people a step up from the complete ignorance I started from with some knowledge of how to sail and build things...

...as well as sharing our madcap adventures.

 

[Darkside]

It doesn't matter to me when they happen No Idea - I think they are well written, informative, entertaining and mostly downright hilarious!

 

[No Idea]

......Oshtohshtohsht.....

She ducked!

 

[No Idea]

As our boat was tipped over to the left, the hull shape forced it to go right (If you tip a bike to the left it will go left, but a boat does the opposite).

It made itself a bit of space between it and the yacht.

We were still almost on our side when we cleared the front of the yacht and the wind hit us again.

Little one was just about on the surface, Biggest was hanging off the centreboard case and I was flat in the back of the boat, just trying not to fall off.

When the wind hit us, it flicked the boat over onto the other side.

I found myself trying to crawl backwards up the deck to avoid smashing my nose into the side.

The boat turned into the wind and stopped.

Little one swung back in.

Biggest said "It wasnt me!"

Little one said "Again?!"

I still hadnt run out of Oshtohshtohsht's

 

[No Idea]

I looked back and saw the lady on th eboat watching us drifting away.

She went out of sight.

Probably decided that there must be a safer place to stand than on the top deck of her yacht.

Captain arrived and yelled across that the mast missed her by about an inch.

I was shaking so badly that I struggled getting the boat moving again.

I headed for the nearest island and beached the boat.

I sat and waited for the shaking to stop.

The kids went exploring - ccompletely unfazed.

 

[No Idea]

Capain arrived and parked his boat a lot neater than I had.

A few minutes later, the yacht motored past.

Looks like they decided to go park somewhere less dangerous.

Captain checked our boat and found that the deck around our forestay fitting had cracked.

The mast is held up by three wires, one either side and one that goes down to the front of the boat.

The one that goes down to the front of the boat usually has the front sail fixed to it.

Where it is fixed to the front of the boat is the forestay. The thing its fixed to is the forestay fitting.

No Idea where all these names for stuff came from, but I know they really confuse me.

I had to ask....

"and if that thing falls off, its bad?"

Captain looked at me as if he didnt already know how thick I am when it comes to boats...

"Er.... your mast will fall on you, possibly kill you and you wont be able to sail withoug it."

Seems like its bad then.

The kids started yelling as one of them managed to hit the other with a chunk of sandstone...

Somehow, Ive got to sail this thing 4 miles to the slip like this....

 

[Highbinder]

It doesn't matter to me when they happen No Idea - I think they are well written, informative, entertaining and mostly downright hilarious!

I agree entirely. I was just curious incase that was the weather down your way (inwhich case I woulda been very jealous LOL)

 

[No Idea]

Nah its freezing!

 

[No Idea]

Hi eel28

Hi V- Ness

Hi Friend Robbi hope the fingers are ok!

Thank you Darkside

Thank you Highbinder

 

[No Idea]

I had a chunk of rope with me and used it to tie the forestay to the nose of the boat.

Not very nice, but would make it a bit stronger for a while.

Little Idea climbed on Captains boat and we limped carefully back to the slip.

Half way across, this ferry arrived.

I had right of way as I was under sail and he wasnt, but he virtually drove over the nose of our boat and the waves he made had our boat rocking and teh mast clunking backwards and forwards. I actually saw the deck crack as the fitting pulled part way through. The only thing holding the mast was the extra piece of rope - and that was slippping.

Captain yelled across "Try not to sneeze!"

Sneeze? I was too scared to breathe, let alone sneeze.

We were going downwind as we headed back to the slip for most of the way, which took most of the load off the forestay.

I had the front sail wound up to make sure that didnt give it any more load.

Biggest was singing life on the ocean wave and jigging about.

I would have thrown something at him, but couldnt risk the rocking.

 

[No Idea]

I yelled at Captain to move out a bit before I turned to reach for the slipway.

It was bad enough that our boat was probably written off, let alon then having to fix his because mine had fell on it.

He moved.

Im trying sooo hard not to put any load on the mast.

So everything keeps thumping it.

BIg Idea slipped and kicked it.

The ropes got caught up and gave it another yank.

The front sail managed to unwind itself and started fluttering.

The thing to wind up the front sail jammed, so Big Idea ended up crawling out onto the shattered front deck to try to free it.

I didnt think it was ever going make it.

I was running with a really dry mouth from all the osht, osht, oshts Id been muttering.

Not far to go....

Just round the corner and we would be there...

A crash.......

Major panic.

The centreboard thing had hit the bottom.

It does it every time, but somehow when you are waiting for the mast to fall off......

It sounded like an explosion.

I jumped in and planted thed anchor.

We got the trailer and carefully loaded the boat and pulled it out.

The mast was still up.

I tied the front rope to the trailer winch so it couldnt fall over.

Getting the mast down was a complete pig.

Did it.

Towed it home and parked it up.

That was enough for a few days.

When I can look at it without shaking, I will think about trying to fix it.

Basically....

That was too pigging close.

 

[No Idea]

The front rope or forestay fixes on to one of the three holes in the top of the steel plate.

The steel pin is supposed to be burried at least 6mm below the surface of the deck.

There is a second one further back, but with the deck broken badly enough that one had actually come out, the chances were the other wasnt far behind.