3 bridge fiasco - Angel Island parking lot

All photos from Pressure Drop writeup:

http://www.pressure-drop.us/forums/content.php?4139-2014-3-Bridge-Fiasco-There-Can-Be-Only-1-Winner

3 bridge fiasco - The city front parking lot

Unless otherwise specified, photos by Ultimate Yachtshots

A lot of boats at anchor, waiting for the wind to rise...

View from Opa! (photo courtesy of Peggy)

Sleeping on the job?

Following pictures from the excellent Erik - and from Pressure Drop:

http://www.pressure-drop.us/forums/content.php?4139-2014-3-Bridge-Fiasco-There-Can-Be-Only-1-Winner

I guess cruise ships only come to San Francisco in the winter when it is warm and not windy...

3 bridge fiasco - dinner with Elise's caretaker

Without whom I probably wouldn't have made it on time to the start!

We looked at photos

And shared a drink, just like sailors do.

3 bridge fiasco - Heading back to port

 The wind had totally died in Raccoon Strait and I was going nowhere fast, also fighting now a flood. I turned to the engine. It started but died within a minute or so of running and there was no way for it to run any time long...and it wouldn't start all the time.

So I hailed the fleet monitoring channel 69 asking for a tow to the nearest wind line. Otherwise, I might have pulled into Tiburon and take a ferry back. I didn't really want to spend the night bobbling along in Raccoon Strait ( I would have had to anchor at some point when the tide turned...to avoid going to the lightship)

 

Crescendo answered the call and gave me a tow to Little Harding.

Past the mark, the wind picked up at a nice 9 - 10 knot true and I had a fabulous crossing, into the sunset...

Once I got to about 20 boat lengths of shore, the wind died again and I managed to get a tow from a party boat. They were just out motoring around, dancing to music and drinking beer. They didn't mind where they were going so they towed me to the entrance of the harbor

They threw me a beer!!! I am at the bow to catch it.

 We talked to the entire time. It was so cool and fun.

 And Elise's mast head light worked fine. Nice work Peter!!!

Getting to the entrance of the harbor

Seeing me struggling to get up the channel, tacking back and forth (meanwhile I had on the radio that Opa! and Peaches were on their way back and I knew I could get a tow from them, so I wasn't too worried, I could even wait for them at the Golden Gate guest dock or something like that.

How nice! They took me all the way in!

The 'teenagers' as I called them because they were just much younger than I was dropped the line right before Elise's slip for the night and I maneuvred the boat using its momentum between 4 boats to find a spot right by the dock where Serge was waiting.

Most of the pictures are from Serge/Ultimate Yachtshots, except the ones taken from Elise.

How I love the sailing community where we just help each other out...

3 bridge fiasco - Red Rock

This photo was taken aboard Motorcycle Irene (Will Paxton, Zach Anderson), heading to the mark the other way around

 Riding the wind as far as I can...

I kept listening to the VHF all day all the way until 7pm to find out if there would be one finisher.

Wind get lighter and lighter on the way to Red Rock, you can see a no wind at all area ahead.

Even thinner!!

Until it died completely

Dropping the spinnaker and raising the jib as the kite was so droopy that it wouldn't carry the boat forward. The jib was better able to keep some kind of shape in the light air and keep the boat moving.

Not by much...

Close to Red Rock I called it a day...and turned around.

3 bridge fiasco, Raccoon Strait

Really wasn't very fast...but I could fly the spinnaker a little bit...

The flood started and carried Elise through Raccoon Strait, past Tiburon

A common sight during the race: droopy spinnakers

It was so light that I didn't bother with the autopilot for the gybes. I just prepped the lines, started the gybe with the tiller, walked forward and by the time I had gybed the pole and was back at the tiller, the main had gybed and the boat was ready to sail on the other side.

More 'retirees'

Downwind, it was a lot warmer...

All photos taken from Elise

3-bridge Fiasco - After the Golden Gate Parking Lot, en route to Raccoon Strait

Photos Ultimate Yachshots and Nat from Elise or from Pressure Drop's writeup

http://www.pressure-drop.us/forums/content.php?4139-2014-3-Bridge-Fiasco-There-Can-Be-Only-1-Winner

I sailed well into the Bay before turning to get over to Raccoon Strait, basically all the way to the wind line which was West of Alcatraz.

What I love about this race, other than the fact that it is the largest race in the United States is that it is short handed (a big hobby of mine) and that boats of all sizes, and of all types participate. There is a non spinnaker division, etc... it is all about participation, and a fabulous expression of the love of sailing.

Particularly since most years, it is just a collection of parking lots with most boats struggling to finish before the cut off time. This year was not an exception...there was only one finisher...

 I love this photo that Serge took, with the monster city of San Francisco towering the boats

 102 leaving the parking lot

 It was super light near Angel Island also

 Another Express on the race course

 On the radio it was a long list of boats hailing the race committee to tell them they were retiring and the race committee doing a fabulous job at making the day fun with remarks like

'we sadly accept your resignation'

or

'enjoy your retirement'

or

'may we ask for the reason for your early retirement?'
and a boat replied 'we've run out of beer'

The J22 fleet were out in large numbers

the view from Elise while I am enjoying lunch - packed by Serge.
Lemon water, a banana, tuna salad and crackers, a slice of whole wheat bread and banana bread. Delicious!

Sailing toward Alcatraz before turning toward Angel Island, sailing along the wind line.

On my way to Angel Island

Hi everyone! I kept a tidy boat that day. I had plenty of time to move around the boat and make sure that everything was nicely packed...

Yes, that's right, the wind was dying even further as the day advanced...The central bay between the golden gate and alcatraz was really the only place I could see a bit of wind.

So I opened up a bottle of cold beer. We have to make tough choices sometimes.

Hehe...What a gorgeous day though.