Camp And Sail Part 5: If You Go Where You Wish, What More Is There?

The winds were mild. Sometimes dropping to nothing. Occasionally picking up and sending my boat charging ahead. Not that I’m complaining that I had motive power, but I never got the hang of intermittent wind. I couldn’t completely relax when the air was dead. It seemed the very instant my attention faded would be the instant when she started another run. I dunno’ if that’s a thing I’ll eventually gain through experience or what?

I meant the boat to operate in light breezes and chose the sail plan with that in mind. It lived up to that design specification. A breeze that could scarcely blow out a birthday candle was all she needed to keep moving.

I started circling the lake in a big parallelogram traverse, orbiting an area of maybe a mile by a half mile. I tried coaxing more from the gusts but it’s not fun for me. I didn’t like to grab too hard at the sky. Better to give the mainsheet some slack, sail flat, and avoid drama.

I don’t have any gear to measure the wind so I tried calculating “birthday candle breezes” (BCB). It felt like a steady 2 BCB wind was plenty to bring my little craft up to “stupidly faster than canoe” speed… which is just the sweet spot I’ve been aiming for. It’s pretty heartening because I used to be a canoe guy. I was fearless with them and loved them but canoes are just damn slow so my bar is set low. (Also, I’ve no desire whatsoever to go fast. If I wanted to go fast I’d have bought a damn Jetski. In my mind, “exciting” sailing takes away from the magic of sailing. The pell mell full tilt lean that sail over and hang your ass off the high side to keep the bucking bronco under control slalom just turns me off.) I mostly managed the speed of “not annoying the loons” with zero drama. Steady 1 or 2 BCB winds could handle that easily.

Unfortunately, the breeze didn’t stay at 2 BCB. It died to zero often and with no warning. Nor did it stay at the same compass point when the breeze came back.

This year has been wetter than last. The lake didn’t seem any higher than the last time I was there but the water plants seemed… softer? Experimenting I sailed my ass straight into clusters of waterborne weeds. The boat would pivot as the weeds slowed us but if the wind was anything more than minimal the daggerboard could be coaxed to tear through them. I wound up dragging some weeds on my rudder and daggerboard but I didn’t care and they soon fell off anyway. (This is just one of many “what can this thing do” experiments I’ve done with my boat.)

With a canoe and calm conditions like these I can point straight across a lake and paddle toward a target like a slow but precise laser beam. My boat caught bits of wind here and there and often moved quite faster, but measured in terms of “am I going where I want to” I wasn’t much faster than a canoe at all. Then again, another 10% of wind would have me blasting out of my own shadow… so I still think I was doing well.

I snapped a few photos and it was gorgeous on the water. However, my GoPro has been giving me issues and I don’t like interacting with my cell phone when I ought to be in the moment. So, I didn’t get many pictures.

I wish I could have someone on shore take photos of my little boat. It looks pretty, but I can’t take a picture of what I’m already in. I started daydreaming of tripods and timers but then decided the world could live without more pretty photos.

There was a lake with a little boat and it looked like a pleasant dream. You’ll just have to take my word for it.

The boat was going more or less where I asked. Maybe not fast or directly, but it was getting there.

I decided to duck into a narrow channel to challenge myself. Not the best idea. The wind went from a hint of a breeze to dead calm. I stopped moving. Also, I was getting tired. I needed to get out and stretch.

I have oars but they’re hard to use when a sail is in the way. Finally I used my emergency collapsible paddle and splashed my random way toward a likely shore. This was a sloppy foolish looking mess but there was only one witness.

A loon paused from its fishing to watch me flounder by. It seemed entirely unconcerned as I approached; probably because I was moving at the speed of a tired snail.

This loon was super chill about my boat. About an hour later something (?) tried to eat it.

I got to shore and splashed out of the boat. This was a small victory. You can be forgiven for thinking that every inch of shore on a lake is suitable for landing a tiny boat. Not so! In some places the substrate under the water is muck. Locals sometimes call it loon-shit. Some of those deposits are pretty gross… pure organic goo that goes seemingly to the center of the earth. You know how sometimes a prehistoric “bog person” comes to attention in an Irish swamp? I don’t want to be that guy!

In this case the substrate was nice clean sand but it was littered with fallen tree trunks. It looked like a great place to fish but I’d left my fishing stuff back at camp. I slotted between two hull eating logs only to bonk my mast into an overhanging tree branch.

No worries. The little boat can handle a tree branch or three. I dropped the useless sail, tied up the hull, and then checked my knot like three times.

I was in a place where I’d be stuck for ages if the boat drifted away. I thought about this as I walked up the steep slope and away. When I was a teenager I could swim across a mile of lake easy enough. Now? Definitely not a mile. With a sore wrist? Best not to even entertain the idea… I went back down the slope and tied a second line and knot.

I was on a narrow spit of land. If I know my geography I’d say it was a glacially created esker… though it could be just coincidence. The area had been sheltered from fire and nicely drained due to the steep slope so it was a righteous little pine patch. There was another lake on the other side of the esker… the two bodies connected by the narrow channel where I’d gotten stuck in dead air.

The moss was so deep the walking was more like maneuvering on a green mattress than soil. I’m sure the place would have been inhuman a few weeks earlier during mosquito season. Thank God it had frozen them out a few days ago. There was nobody but me and the loons. It was beautiful and shaded and deep green. Yoda would have liked it there.

The loon I’d been watching was idling not far from my boat. Another loon showed up. I began scanning the opposite shore with my binoculars. Lots of fallen trees, the other side of the esker (maybe) showed logs that seemingly dropped steeply down into dark water. If I was a fish… that’s where I’d be.

Just then the first loon went absolutely berserk! I’ve never seen anything like it. It suddenly started squawking and tearing a hole in the lake and thrashing around. Loons don’t take off fast but this one flapped into the air like it had been punted. It looked for all the life of me as if something from below had grabbed it.

There’s basically nothing in this environment that can pull down a full sized loon but I know a pike will hit on anything if it gets the idea in its fishy mind. Did a big pike see a black loon foot and decide to go for it? I didn’t see a pike but unless there are Canadian alligators nearby I have no other theory. I don’t think I’ll skinny dip there!

After a snack and some water I was eager to get back. The sun was setting faster than I’d like. Unfortunately the wind was just nothing. A butterfly flapping it’s wings would be an improvement. I was at least a couple miles from the dock and my truck. This would be a challenge!

The boat isn’t hard to row but there’s a sail and rudder and daggerboard and rigging and you can only squeeze so much into the tiny area. I got clever. I tied up the sail to the boom and hoisted the fluffy mess with the haulyard. It was slightly above head level. To keep the boom more or less centered I tied the mainsheet to the rudder. A few years ago I installed little cleats and lines so I can clip the rudder port and starboard so it tracks mostly straight. Then I pulled the daggerboard and lifter the rudder mostly out of the water.

On paper it was genius. In practice, it wasn’t bad but it wasn’t ideal. My oars could do the job but it was clumsy at best. I rowed out to more or less the edge of the narrows. The wind picked up so I stowed the oars, and re-rigged as a sailing vessel. I caught a breeze and made some headway, but then it was gone.

The water turned glassy. Shit! Then it turned to 1 BCB and I sputtered into motion again. Unfortunately, I had to tack back and forth trying to inch toward the landing. It worked, somewhat. I’d move at walking speed on one tack until I was about to hit the shallow weeds near the wrong shore. Then I’d tack the other way at half walking speed until I was in the middle of the lake. Lather rinse repeat.

I worked across the lake and got 95% of the way to the landing. Then the wind died for well and good. The water was completely smooth… not a breath of wind. There was nothing I could do but repeat all my rigging efforts and row the last couple hundred yards, which I did.

Back at the dock I tied up, retrieved my utility trailer, and used the Dodge to sink it in a lake. I drifted the boat onto the trailer and got soaked to the knees. I drove up onto shore and by then the sun was really low. I retied everything so it would be safe it if got windy, unhitched the trailer, and left it there. Then I headed to camp.

Back at camp I was too tired to cook anything clever. I boiled water and dropped it into a freeze dried packet. It was a brand I wasn’t familiar with. The taste was incredible but the texture was awful. I think I won’t buy that brand again.

I grabbed some kindling for my little stove but didn’t light it. I just stashed it in the tent and hung up my soaked pants in case they might drip dry a little. I was exhausted. Uncharacteristically, I was in bed before the night was really in full swing. It was a great day. The boat took me more or less wherever I wanted to go. What more is there?