UPDATE: after haulout here is the damage to her keel:
Wind was on the nose to Toronto Island, so we just motored along at just under 6 knots. After making the turn to PCYC, we hoisted the sails and a close reach at 7.5 knots.
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| Sailing to Port Credit |
When docking on the wall at PCYC, the transmission made an AWFUL sound when going into reverse; no more forward or reverse gears. We got docked safely, got registered, had some dinner, and sailed off the dock to the start. Without a transmission, we couldn't lock the folding prop so that it would close. Nothing that set of vice grips on the prop shaft couldn't solve: CLASSIC COUG!
We had a great start, and sailed the rum line to Burlington with a 10 knot SW wind.
About half way there, the Carson noticed the bungee chord holding the man over board pole was completely done. We went to replace it, and lost the pole overboard. We had to go back and get it, as if we won a flag, we probably would be inspected by the safety committee. Without a man overboard pole, we would have been disqualified. It didn't cost us too much time. We joked that we were going so well that we could afford to do a man overboard drill DURING the race!
After rounding the Burlington Mark, the wind had shifted to the south meaning we couldn't fly spinnaker towards Niagara. Winds picked up and swung further to the west, so we dropped the #1 and flew the spinnaker. WOW 8.5 knots constant with surges to 9.2! Wind had AGAIN swung to the south, so back to the #1.
About two miles from the Niagara Mark, we sailed into a wind hole with three other boats. No boat speed for about 45 minutes. It was frustrating because we saw dozens of boats pass us about a half mile south of us with PLENTY of wind.
After the Niagara mark, #1 back toward Port Credit. Wind was just forward of the beam; we decided to try a spinnaker, When we hoisted, we discovered we had blew an entire panel out of our best spinnaker last night. Hoisting another spinnaker we found that it wasn't any faster and difficult to fly.
About 8 miles out, winds were dying, so we hoisted a spinnaker and headed up west of the finish following a wind line. We followed pockets of wind getting our boat speed between 3 and 5 knots, while most of the fleet were dead in the water about a mile east of us.
We kept our speed on apparent wind until 1.6 miles from the finish. With little to no boat speed and it took us another 2 1/2 hours to finish! There was a cluster of about 50 boat about 1/2 mile behind us that we all gave time to because of our lower handicap. This wind hole at PCYC really compressed the fleet.
We sailed into a slip on the outer pier and arranged to leave Coug there for the week.
We ended up 4th of 6 boats in our class, 64th of 67 boats in the fleet. Our sailing performance was excellent, but being stationary for over 3 hours meant most of the other boats beat us on corrected time.
Tired, sore, beat up, but happy; another big boat experience on Coug.
Thanks Michael, Kris, Carson, Jenn, Leon, Mark, and Chuck!
UPDATE: The problem wasn't the transmission but the prop shaft flange that connects the prop shaft to the V drive had lost 5 of 6 bolts and the final bolt had sheared off leaving us without propulsion!
Trip Odometer: 98.8 miles
Moving Average: 6.1 knots
Moving Time: 16:05:00
Google Earth Track: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/12535935/Still%20Time/2013/20130601.kmz
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