[Rhodes22-list] Weekend Sailing Misadventures

[Wally Buck]

Brad,

The river level is very low for this time of year. TVA has pushed back the 
fill dates for the head waters of the TN one month. Typically they start 
filling the river in mid April. Now it has been pushed back to mid May. The 
main reason for the change was the flood in 93.

I touched bottom 4 times this weekend. I could here the CB tapping the mud 
bottom. Just kept on cruising!

Wally

>From: brad haslett <flybrad at yahoo.com>
>Reply-To: The Rhodes 22 mail list <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
>To: rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org
>Subject: [Rhodes22-list] Weekend Sailing Misadventures
>Date: Sun, 6 Mar 2005 07:05:40 -0800 (PST)
>
>The wind on Friday was awesome!  15-20 mph with gusts
>to 30.  I had the CoraShen indicating 9 knots when the
>max hull speed is supposed to be about 7.5.  My older
>brother was on his first sail and was as excited as a
>little kid.  We came up on a part of the river I'm
>pretty familiar with and decided to swing wide rather
>than tack because we were going fast and having too
>much fun.  THEN, I made the shortest landing in my
>career.  We went from 9 knots to 0 knots in about 10
>feet.  It wasn't a jolt, we just quit moving.  About
>two seconds later the depth alarm went off, real good
>timing.  What we had after that was a sailing
>simulator.  You could do anything you wanted with the
>sails, engine, etc. because the boat wasn't going
>anywhere.  As the sun started down we lost the wind
>and the will to solve our prediciment.  I made some
>calls on both the radio and cell-phone but couldn't
>raise anyone for help.  So, we spent the night on the
>boat.  It got down to the low 40's and I didn't find
>the blanket I knew was on the boat until the next
>morning.  Anyway, I was able to get ahold of a friend
>of mine that lives on the lake Saturday morning and he
>showed up with his pontoon boat with a 115hp engine.
>We towed the bow, the stern, clockwise,
>counter-clockwise, but didn't move the boat.  We were
>only 5 feet from deep water but couldn't get there.
>Finally we tied the halyard to the side rail and
>started towing from the top of the mast.  After the
>boat was heeled about 45 degrees it started floating
>and we drug it sideways to deeper water.  Hopefully
>this will be my only grounding for the season but if
>it happens again, I'll pull that solution out of the
>trick-bag first.  By 11 am Saturday we were free and
>sailed back to the dock.  I was so tired from the
>experience I didn't feel like doing any work on the
>boat.  Oh well, that's a good excuse to go back to the
>lake later in the week.
>
>Brad Haslett
>"CoraShen"
>
>
>
>
>__________________________________
>Celebrate Yahoo!'s 10th Birthday!
>Yahoo! Netrospective: 100 Moments of the Web
>http://birthday.yahoo.com/netrospective/
>__________________________________________________
>Use Rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org, Help? www.rhodes22.org/list