May 20 - 27 -- A Frustrating "Other" Day with GIC, Two Work Days and Lene's First Two Sail Days

The frustration occurred when I was all set up for a nice day of sailing, with Alison, Patrick and their younger son Ian. Alison was a classmate and friend of my oldest daughter, Sharyn, and both of her parents served as presidents of our Congregation before my years in that office. I had a reef in the main,

but due to my own stupidity and a failure of communications with Patrick, I drove the boat over the mooring and the bridles. The bridles, their connector and the pick up stick got all wrapped around the propeller so we were moored to our own mooring from astern! Fortunately, Two Cees, the local mooring servicing company was passing by, tied up to starboard, leaned over and cut us loose, and towed us to a vacant mooring, actually, Bennett's mooring. The guests made the most of a day on the water, even though it was NOT a sailing day. I have offered them a "rain date". After lunch and some wine they departed, I put things away and changed for the 133rd annual Going Into Commission ceremony and party. After all the flags were raised,

the cannon was fired to announce the official beginning of the sailing season.
More frustrating communications failures: I had arranged for the Club to obtain memorial paving stones for the flagpole patio with the names of Josh and Letitia, former members whose ashes their three adult children had scattered from ILENE's deck last summer. The family had authorized me to lay them in the patio, shown above, as part of the ceremony. But the Commodore, who had a zillion other more important details to attend to, heard my "Yes" as a "No," so the laying will have to wait until GOC, at the end of the season in October. The penultimate performance of Lene's play made GIC a solo event for me ("the show must go on!"), and I was a bit depressed not having my "arm candy" by my side.

The food was as good as ever and the service was as slow as ever.
Bennett asked me to help him launch "Ohana" from the Morris YC and bring her the mile to her mooring at the Harlem. The only problem was that ILENE was on that mooring. So we drove Ohana to a nearby vacant mooring and took the launch to ILENE. The remnants of the old mooring having been unwrapped and removed from her prop by Barnacle Busters' divers, we tested the engine: ILENE passed the test -- no vibrations! We drove ILENE to her own mooring with its new bridles and pick up stick, the old bridles having lasted eleven seasons. We took the launch from ILENE back to Ohana, drove her to her mooring, and then took the launch back to shore where we drove my car to the Morris YC so Bennett could retrieve his car. Seems complicated but it went easy, with a bit of trouble from Ohana's engine's cooling system, that has since been fixed.  And one hand washes the other: Bennett helped me bring my dink from its upstairs locker to the floating docks. Much easier with the help of gravity that pushing the dink upstairs in the fall! All this before breakfast so the launching could coincide with the high tide. I had planned to inflate the dink but the rain got heavier so that plan was adjourned.
Two days later I did the inflation along with the gathering of all of the dink's equipment except for its lock and cinching straps. (Where the heck did I put them last fall? An hour of searching with no results yet, though I do recall having seen them during the winter, somewhere.) I had lunch with the Old Salts but had to pass in their sail that Wednesday afternoon because I had to leave at 3:45 to get home, get cleaned up and changed and drive three of the guys to Jim's house in Chatham, NJ for a meeting of the book group. But after lunch the launch towed the dink to ILENE and I hoisted it on its davit bar with strong cordage temporarily substituting for the absent cinching straps. I brought a case of wine aboard and stowed its contents. I attached the blocks to the rail bosses and got the side sheets for the small jib installed through them, and I reinstalled the shined up, polyurethane protected ship's clock, with fresh battery.

And we finally got in Lene's first two sails of the season. Ann and David are neighbors and the volunteer heads of our Co-op's gardening committee; they make our gardens so lovely. We got to know Ann in the house gym. They were not sailors but David took to it quite well.

We were underway for 3.5 hours to Peningo Neck and back in very strange winds. Gusts to 30 knots with high winds at both ends of the trip, with as low as 10 knots in the middle. Going out we passed two tugs with fuel barges heading west. They wanted to pass close to Hart Island and cut across our bow so we turned to starboard to avoid them. Outbound was a long port beamy reach under reefed main alone, achieving speeds averaging over seven tide-assisted knots. We passed north of Execution Rocks. Homebound was a long starboard close reach aided by the small jib, passing south of the Rocks. A terrific windy day, followed by dinner at the Club. we enjoyed the pleasures of sailing.
The next day our guests were four friends I made through Lene. The two men have sailed with us before. They had a great time out on the water and the rain did not fall. But while the main was up throughout, so was the engine, due to lack of winds, except for about an hour passing from the far end of Hart Island into Manhasset Bay, during which we put out the genoa as well, and made stately speeds of two to 3.5 knots. So a day on the water for fellowship, but most of it was not sailing. Left to right, back on the dock at the end of the day, are Elliot, Jules, Jeff, Lene and Sharon, all performers except Sharon who teaches writing in College.