I was as excited as  a kid in a candy store to get up and actually sail this week. So, I worked through lunch on Thursday and left the office at 4 to see if I might catch a ride or two. The sky over Truckee was filled with big thunder-bumpers, so I wasn’t particularly optimistic about sailing. But, when I got to the lake, it was mostly clear, so I set about zip-tying all of the turnbuckles and taking care of the odds and ends that I hadn’t finished on my last visit. A delicate breeze came up around 6 p.m., so I motored out to the wind line and hoisted sail. To my chagrin, I had forgotten to attach the reefing lines, so there were two long ropes hanging off the back end of the boom, and all I could think of was what a mess that would be if it got gusty and I had to take in sail. So, I put her in irons, dropped the sail, and attached everything properly.

About four boats were out, dancing around a bit on the broad sheet of blue between the massive clouds to the north and also to the south of the lake. I decided to head south to visit my new friends at the Big Blue Tahoe Yacht Club, which is comprised mostly of sailors who put in and out at Obexer’s Marina. The wind picked up to where I was heading due south at 5.8 knots, so I just slathered on some sunscreen and enjoyed the relaxing sail. Splendido performed like a champ, and for a while I forgot about the depth meter whose transducer went out and the anemometer whose cups wouldn’t spin. I could tell it was blowing 10-15 mph and I knew the depth was in the hundreds of feet…Tahoe is so clear, you can see rocks way before you’d be on top of them.

I got down within a hundred yards of Cheeseburger in Paradise and Grand Cru, both sitting pretty out in front of Obexer’s, then decided to tack back north, as the sun was about to dip behind the mountains by Homewood.

About half way back, I decided to fire up the Perkins to charge the batteries, as I’d noticed #1 was almost in the yellow zone on the meter. As the boat made its way north, I did a quick check of the bilge, and noticed more water than usual flowing in. I checked the auto bilge pump, and it was working fine; now to source the leak. After poking around a bit, I found it: I hadn’t tighted the hose clamps enough on the 15 feet of new exhaust hose that I’d replaced a couple of weeks ago, and so the water in the hose was leaking out onto the hull and running down into the bilge. A few sweaty turns of the 5/16th socket wrench, and the mini deluge abated. Whew! Nothing gets your attention more than a leak on a boat. Who needs meditation when you’ve got stuff like that going on?

I kept a close eye on things once I was on the hook, leaving the engine on to continue to charge the batteries while I fluffed and buffed the boat and put everything to bed. The leaking seemed to have stopped completely, the batteries were charging, and the Perkins was humming gentlly as I went above decks and began to swing the boat port-to-starboard, to get the water into the bilge and out from under the floorboards (we’re not talking a lot of water here; less than a gallon all told. But still.). Satisfied that everything seemed OK, I buttoned up the cabin and rowed back to the beach, exhilarated after a nice sail and happy that I could find the problem and fix it. (Yay!) My wish is to get everything dialed in and ready so I can do a single-handed circumnavigation of Tahoe in late June or July. Every day on the water is another shot at working out the kinks!

Fair winds and smooth sailing! DB