May 26-31 — Three Day Sails on The Three Day Weekend and Damage

 Most of these days were devoted to many additional “errands” getting things squared away in anticipation of ILENE’s  scheduled June 1 departure for 3.5 months in Maine. Hurried hectic days in New York, separated by peaceful nights aboard. No real rainy days yet. 

Friday evening we enjoyed dinner with Jamie and Laurie at a Bulgarian restaurant near Lincoln Center where they had come in from Boston for the ballet. Lots of talk about boats and sailing and we are again invited take a mooring at their Club, Manchester by the Sea, this summer

Saturday we sailed with Elaine, nurse-actor, center, and Sharon, professor of English literature, right.

A lovely peaceful day on the water— too peaceful for my taste: in three hours off the mooring our round trip measured three nautical miles and we did not get out of Eastchester Bay. Much of the time we drifted with the tide and achieved a maximum speed of 2.1 knots,  briefly. But the repair I had made to the autopilot recently came out. I later put the joint back together as best I could and asked Raymarine for any better ideas, but no response yet.

Sunday we sailed with Rhoda and Lloyd on their Catalina, Jazz Sail. Enough wind during our two hours underway. Rhoda elected to not raise the main and yet we got to almost five knots. Dinner at the Club followed, after which we all drove to the NewRoc multiplex to take in the recently released and critically praised:  “You Hurt My Feelings,” with Julia Louise Dreyfus.  Let’s just say that the critics liked it a lot more than we did.

Monday saw the best wind of the weekend, gusting to more than 20 knots in the morning and gradually diminishing. Yet I put the first reef in the main and kept it there until near the end. Our guests were Sid, who worked with me back in the day, Jan and their daughter, recently graduated Danielle with a degree in Marine Biology.

We made it deeply into Little Neck Bay, out and under the two bridges to the longitude of Laguardia Airport, beat back out and through the channel off Kings Point  before heading for home.

And upon shaking out the reef I noticed the rip in the sail:

It could be patched again, but Tuesday we let Paul, our sailmaker, persuade us that a new sail was needed. Yes, he could put on another patch, but the sail was original, 24 years ago, and had seen a lot more usage than most sails get during our stewardship of ILENE. The problem, in addition to the expense, is that we are delayed four weeks here at City Island, true not the worst place in the world, while the new sail is built. We will be able to day sail our boat using headsails only and sail on friends’ boats and go to events in June that we had turned down because we were planning to be off cruising.

So the 2023 cruise will be only ten weeks rather than fourteen, and in Canada we now plan to visit only New Brunswick rather than Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and or Prince Edward Island. But I’m grateful that my cup is still more than half full.

We also enjoyed dinner with Dave and Chris after some wine in their apartment. Dave truly runs the Harlem’s Old Salts and the Winter Hike programs. He has no title, but, like the officers and directors, is a mainstay keeping the Harlem humming.