Dinghies vs. Yachts
All these days that I have been lying on the beach, here in Astros, I have been watching sailing boats coming in to the harbour. All of them put the sails away and start the engine well before they come in. We, dinghy sailors, do everything under sail. Launch, sail, come back in. We’re even supposed to know how to reef while afloat! I might be completely wrong but I think that a sailing boat has sails for some reason. I am not trying to be awkward, but I really felt I had control of a dinghy when I brought her next to the pontoon. Then I knew I could control the boat. I don’t expect a yacht to come in and moor under sail, but you can make your way in under jib alone with the engine running but disengaged and as soon as you come in you furl your jib and maneuver with the engine to the mooring space.
I hadn’t thought that I would be making these comparisons so early in my sailing career. But after seeing Nielson’s flotilla I couldn’t stop making these comparisons. Things, though took a very interesting turn. This afternoon I got the chance to sail a yacht. I have to warn you though that this yacht is not a fancy racing machine. It’s a 30-foot ketch made of steel. It’s a unique boat that some guy designed somewhere in Switzerland, called it Waggis, then sold it on to the current owner and he never made a second one, as far as I know.
A ketch is a sailing craft with two masts: a main mast, and a shorter mizzen mast abaft (rearward of) the main mast. Both masts are rigged mainly fore-and-aft. From one to three jibs may be carried forward of the main mast when going to windward.
But, let’s start from the beginning. As I was lying on the beach, yesterday, I saw this chap that he was just coming out of the water. He seemed that he really enjoyed the water and as I commented on that we started chatting. He told me he had come with his family the previous evening on a yacht and he invited us over to his yacht. I told him we would definitely visit them as soon as Lydia was back. About an hour later we went over to visit them, had a chat drank some wine and then we all went together to have dinner. We had a quite nice dinner, then we walked to a patisserie and we had some really nice sweets and some ouzo.
They told us they were living in that boat. He is a computer programmer, and he actually works remotely, from the yacht, and he uses a 3G data card to access the Internet ands connect his laptop to his company’s VPN. They told us about the problems they face living in the boat and since one of them was laundry, we offered to take some clothes and wash them for them in our flat. This morning we returned with the washed clothes and they offered us to take as out for a “spin”.
So, in the afternoon Mike took me and Lydia out for a sail. I offered to help with the sails and everything. First we untied the main-sail and pulled the halyard to raise it. Then we clipped the luff of the jib on the forestay, tied the two jib-sheets on the clew and pulled the halyard up. Last was the mizzen-sail. That’s a smaller sail attached to the second, mizzen, mast. Once the sails were up, Mike asked me how I want them set. So, I had all the freedom to set and trim the sails as I wanted. The wind was quite light, so we were not doing more than 3-4 knots. I was really enjoying it. It’s quite amazing the fact that a big, heavy boat like that was moving on the water so quietly and you could hear the bow wave. Later on the wind died down and we were doing around 2 knots. We had only sailed for about 2 hours when we decided to head back.
As we were going back in the wind picked-up and Mike’s family were walking on a hill that is facing the sea. So Mike sent them an SMS message asking them to take pictures of his yacht as we were sailing by. We were sailing close to the shore, but we had a depth sounder so we knew we were safe sailing there. As the wind grew stronger the boat started heeling and Mike rushed to get some stuff of the deck before they would tumble to the water. It was a nice off-shore wind, the Greeks call it “Batis”, that locally will always come at the same time. You can almost set your watch by it. By that time I was at the helm, and I was tacking and managing the jib-sheets on the winches by myself. According to the GPS we hit 6.4 knots. That’s not bad for a steel ketch. That moment I can tell that I had forgotten the peace and quite and the sound of the bow wave and I was focusing on pulling those jib-sheets, trimming the sails and keeping the speed.
After we decided that Mike’s family had taken enough photos of the boat, it was time to bring her in. Mike said that we should show those Nielson’s sailors how to do things. So we started the engine, left it running while disengaged and we were coming in under sail. First, I folded the main sail, then the mizzen and last the jib. The tricky bit is that we didn’t have any fancy sails that furl into the spars. We didn’t even have a furling jib. I actually had to stand at the bow and pull the jib down as quickly as I could because we were already in the harbour. As soon as the sails were down, Mike engaged the engine and we moored.
We were out for 4-5 hours and I really enjoyed it. I realised that a boat is a boat and as long as it has sails you can sail it. I am trying to arrange with Thanasis to sail a Hobie 16, again this weekend.