PDRacer.com     Cheap, Creative, and Having Fun On The Water

Her first and second time sailing

The duck from Maine has touched the water twice! Me and my little brother took is out for the first time a couple weeks ago. The voyage went well with no leaks and zero issues with the hull. When we got to the lake there was plenty of wind and we took some time to get the sail and rigging set up. We got in the water and started to sail. We made a couple of tacks and the wind just about died. There were some issues and tweaking I needed to make and it started raining so we decided to call it a day.

Over the next few days I made the tweaks and got her ready for her second voyage. I hadn't laced the sail to the mast correctly so I decided to use zip ties and see how I liked them (turned out well so far) I also added a cleat to the mast that I had forgotten to put on (for tensioning the boom). The second day turned out extremely well weather wise. The wind was really constant and from the same direction which is usually unheard of on our lake due to the surrounding mountains. It was a perfect day to really test her out. She sailed superbly and I took my brother and one of our neighbors who used to do a lot of sailing for a ride. The neighbor was really impressed with the boat and how it handled. I'm looking forward to a summer full of sailing. I also acquired a Star Dancer board boat (a sunfish clone) for free that I'm going to fix up so it should be a great summer to hone my sailing skills!

Thanks to Shorty for a great site and everyone who provides great articles. I love reading them!