Off Grid

We’re back floating! The last couple of days have been fairly laid back, sure we did some work on Taleisin. Double checking the hull is clean, making sure everything is removed behind the rudder. She’s looking pretty sweet! While I was at it, I got Lin to supervise me replacing the Sikaflex on a few small deck seams. Whilst it’s not rocket science, there was a few things I didn’t know. It’s always silly in my eyes to not learn from those around you before you go experimenting and trying to work out how to do something that’s already been done.

This morning we decided to sail around to the Kawau boating club, seeing as we’re newly joined members we get some benefits from membership, like free showers, laundry and water. We needed all three of those.

We attempted to sail off the mooring in North Cove, but the temptation of the motor was too great. The wind was light and it seemed like we were going backwards. We only had a short sail around the corner though…

We used the outboard to get out of North Cove and caught some wind. It was really annoying me that we used the motor and it felt like we gave up too easily. So we sailed under full canvas around the corner and into Bon Accord Harbour. Since I still had the sour taste in my mouth from using the motor, I was determined to get a win today even if it’s just a small one.

I said to Annie, we’re going to sail past the boat club under full sail, turn around and come back to anchor. For bonus points since it’s not blowing that hard, lets try to do it under sail.

So we had our plan, we were reaching into the harbour and then the wind died down. We were doing 0.7 knots according to the GPS. It felt like we were standing still. We could see the club house, but it looked like it was an eternity away. Since we weren’t in any danger and there was nothing around us we persisted. We were waiting for the wind to pick up. It was a little bit frustrating and very tempting to use the motor, but we refused to give up. The wind finally picked up and we were doing 4.8 knots according to the GPS. Persistence paid off!

As we sailed past the club house we picked a spot to anchor, well away from other boats! I dropped the jib while Annie sailed us through the other boats. We gybed and came back around under main and stays’l. As we approached the spot we wanted to anchor in I dropped the main while Annie kept us going in the right general direction. I let the anchor go while still sailing slowly under stays’l.

When we had a reasonable amount of chain out and it looked like the anchor have set I dropped the stays’l and let out some more chain. Taleisin fell off and started to lay head to the wind. We sat on deck for about an hour to make sure everything was ok.

Both Annie and myself felt pretty good about anchoring under sail. We were also the only ones who sailed into the harbour at that particular time, let alone anchor under sail. I will chalk this one up to a successful adventure!

We spent the rest of the day doing laundry and carrying water to Taleisin. Sure we could have motored up to the dock and filled her up, but where’s the challenge in that? Yes it was hard work carrying water and rowing back and forth. But we feel better for having done it that way, we got some much needed exercise and we feel less guilty about doing very little in the previous days.

We still have to do a couple of water trips in the morning, but that’s ok. It’s not like we have anywhere to be. I believe this is called earning a living…

Our laundry is clean and we had a nice shower - not that the shower on Taleisin is anything to complain about, we’re quite happy using it.

The anchorage filled up rapidly towards the end of the day. We anchored where we thought we’d be out of the way. Since then we’ve been surrounded by boats of all shapes and sizes.