Stormy passage to Gore Bay
With 25 knot winds howling overhead and my friend’s wife among us (she was a real sport about things, but was sensitive to sea sickness) my call was to spend the day anchored. But my partner had less time to spend and wanted to explore, so we set out for Gore Bay.
I learned that diesels were better for battling directly into very rough chop with a sailboat. At the most power I wanted to maintain, I could not go directly into the wind. I had to go a bit starboard then port. Slowly, another sailboat eased passed us, directly into the wind. Diesel.
Finally, we were able to turn and run for Gore Bay. As I recall, we surfed briefly at speeds of 10 knows, the fastest I ever went in the boat, if only for brief periods. I’m sure we maintained 6 plus knots for long periods. The tiller was very heavy, and we had to trade off. My partner’s wife went below ill. The log reads:
9/7/92 - Gore Bay. Battled 7 foot waves, winds 25 SE, 4 hours, 14 NM
This was pretty much two hours at a crawl, and two hours flying in rough chop on the rear quarter.
After than trip, we spent an extra day at port in Gore Bay. We had access to shops, saw a couple of other boaters and invited them for a meal, and enjoyed the beauty of Gore Bay.
- the MuseTags: North Channel
