Tales from the deck of Tortuga

[captleasure]

A recap of the Three Bridge Fiasco race yesterday.
Tortuga and I have sailed this race about a dozen times and only finished I think 3 times. It’s usually a light wind affair with heavy currents. I was actually optimistic that I’d be able to finish with the forecast of about 8-10 knots of wind. There were patches on the course where it was much less wind than that for sure, which added to the challenge of getting a full keel boat around the race course.
I decided I was going to try and not fight any currents as much as possible.
I went with the flood at the start to just get across the start line and get away from that start area with a ton of boats and then ride the flood current to Red Rock by the San Rafael Bridge. It’s a stressful start in any race with Tortuga given the limited maneuverability compared with most boats so I got across and out of that area as soon as possible.
I had originally planned to sail through raccoon straight where the current is stronger but was being pulled towards the gap between Angel Island and Alcatraz so went with it.
Had a good run and then the wind was getting really light. I switched out to the large light air jib, I started the race with the small working jib because I thought I might need to do some tacking through raccoon straights and did not want to be tacking around the start area with the large jib. Once I made the sail change I got a bit more boat speed. It was a mellow ride up around Red Rock with boat speeds from 3-5 knots. There’s definitely shipping traffic around there you need to watch for and you don’t want to get caught in the way of a ship and get the 5 blasts or your race is over. I could see loads of boats get up and around Red Rock and the spinnakers started popping. Most of the boats were well on their way to Treasure Island as the next mark by the time I got up and around. It was a relaxed downwind sail from Red Rock to TI doing about 3 knots.
I could see a bunch of boats all stopped around the east span of the bay bridge and as I got closer to TI my boat speed started to drop a lot.
I was doing about 1 knot and not making good progress. At that point the ebb current had started making it counter to where I needed to go. Looking at all the boats stopped on the east side I could see there was decent wind on the west side of TI and thought maybe it might be a better option although the current is stronger on that side. I decided to give it a try and then saw some others that followed. We were making good boat speed of about 4 knots albeit at a wind angle more towards the west end of the bay bridge and city front. Our speed started dropping as we got closer to the bay bridge span. It took about 4 attempts to get under the bridge fighting the adverse current. Trying to keep enough boat speed while getting swept away from the bridge. There was a moment when the log jam of boats made it around the back side of Yerba Buena and into the ebb so I got to see quite the parade of boats sail past. At that point I knew I’d be lucky to finish fighting the currents. There was decent breeze from the North so I thought I’d be OK on the back side of TI but once I got around, I was eeking along at 2 knots albeit it in favorable currents. By the time I got to the North end of TI around 5:30 there was barely any wind and I could see that the bay east of Alcatraz had pretty much glassed over so I knew my window of trying to finish was closed.
It was a beautiful day nonetheless but it was only a 2 bridge fiasco for Team Tortuga this time!

2024 Three Bridge Fiasco Aboard Westsail 32 Tortuga
https://youtu.be/4FCl9qqwtMo

 

[captleasure]

The weather forecast for the Round the Rocks Race had been slightly improving all week. I had decided I was not going to do the race and float around in frustration in the light winds and currents. The first 2 races of this year had been just that and I wasn’t able to finish either of them. What started out as a 4-6 knot SW’ly started getting more tempting by the end of the week with 6 knots around start time building to 9-11 knots. At the risk of being Charlie Brown and the wind being Lucy, pulling the football away every time he tried to kick it, I decided to try anyway and figured it was going to be enough breeze to get around the course.
Sailor amnesia is real.
There was barely any breeze when the start sequence began at 11am in the Berkeley Circle.
I was hopeful that by my start at 12, which was the last to start, it would fill in. The first fleets eeked their way across the start line floating with the current and then the starts began to pile up. The race committee issued a postponement to wait for the breeze to break up the log jam. You could see the wind line getting closer coming down from the city front so it was the right thing to do. I was watching the other boats that had started and I could see the ones out the farthest were looking well heeled over. I had my large light air jib hanked on and ready to go, but I was having the back and forth conversation in my head with what I was seeing on the water and what the forecast was supposed to be. If it’s blowing anything over 12 knots or so, trying to work my way up wind, the large jib quickly becomes over powering and I didn’t want to have to wrestle it down in the building breeze knowing there would likely be even more wind the closer I got to the first rounding mark, Alcatraz. So I scrambled 5min before my start to get it rolled up and off the deck, not being able to fully get it in the sail bag, I haphazardly rolled it up enough and without dropping it in the water, threw it below decks. I tacked back towards the starting line and got the sheets tied to the small working jib and with all the last minute chaos, was about 3-4 minutes late to my start and was the last boat across the line that I could see. Once across the start line I hardened up the sails and was on my way towards the first mark. I caught up and passed a few boats in my fleet and was so glad I decided on the last minute sail change! It was blowing in the high teens gusting into the 20s by the time I got close to the first “Rock”. I really should have put a reef in the main sail at that point but I didn’t want to lose ground and was dodging some shipping traffic at that point.
On my tack that was looking to put me in front of Alcatraz, I could see a small tug with a barge dumping their dredging muck and fell off to pass behind them. As I got closer they turned around for another pass and I had to throw in a quick tack! It’s crankin in the low 20s at this point in short confused chop so I had hoped to minimize anymore tacking. I’m actually glad I did have to throw in that last tack to avoid the barge, because it allowed me to lay a good line for the next “Rock” to round of a buoy a bit off Angel Island and then Raccoon Straights. The wind eased up a bit getting through RS and then I was on a beautiful broad reach on course to the Brothers rocks & East Brother Light Station. I could see the faster boats that had rounded EBLS had to make a few tacks to get up and around to clear Red Rock and take it to port, so I knew I was in for a beat to get to the finish. At that point I could see that I was definitely not DFL and there were some other boats behind me. After a few tacks back and forth watching my depth to make sure I wasn’t getting out of the channel and making the most of the tacks, I had a good up wind line to get around Red Rock and head for the finish. It was a little nail biting going under the San Rafael Bridge, when the piling blocked the wind I was blanketed in the lee, and with the flood against me at that point, I drifted towards the next piling and had a moment where I almost grabbed for the ignition key to not float down and hit it. Luckily the wind was strong enough to give me a boost to get out of that and it was a beat all the way to the entrance to the Richmond channel. I could see a dredging barge in the channel and it looked like it was making way with the waves smacking against it, so I took it to port and then headed straight to the finish at the Richmond Yacht Club. Once you are in that channel it seems the wind eases up and you enter the Richmond Riviera with warmth and sunshine. A welcome relief to a breezy day! I finished in just over 4 hours (it’s seemed a lot longer!)and I think that was my best finish time ever for that race. I placed 5th in my class of 12 boats and ended up correcting out to 41st out of the 118 boats entered. Not too bad for a classic plastic lady approaching her 50th birthday this year!

2024 Round the Rocks Race Aboard Westsail 32 Tortuga
https://youtu.be/QyLFZDe5nFA

 

[captleasure]

Tortuga sailed in the BAMA Double Handed Farallones race this past weekend. Thanks to Rik from the Westsail 28 Irish Rose for being such an awesome crew!
The conditions were pretty epic with the steady winds in the mid 20s, peaking in the 30s while rounding the Island. Heard there was a dismasting, lots of boat carnage and saw the USCG Helo overhead headed to the island. Could not make out what was happening on the radio. Hope all our fellow racers are OK!
The winds were out of the south so it was literally a single port tack all the way out! We made amazing time rounding the island at 12:30. We started out with the working jib, staysail and single reefed main. By the time we rounded we were down to just the staysail and double reefed main ripping along at 6-7 knots. We kept a good distance off the island due to the huge swell at that point. It was about 10-15ft. Put in a jibe and then we’re roaring back to the gate. The wind started to lighten up a bit and we were getting pushed north away from the entrance, so we put the jib back up to try and help us point higher and make the entrance. We got about 6 miles off Point Bonita and we were too far north to make the entrance and then around 5pm the wind went from the teens to single digits and was more SSW. It was difficult to make any progress in the big swell and light wind. The bow was getting thrown off the waves and we could not point. We tacked back and forth for another couple hours but could not make any progress, only doing 1-3 knots as the wind was from the East at that point. We finally called it a day after that and motored back in fighting the ebb that was building. Getting back to the dock took almost 4 hours and of course the wind picked back up and was blasting out of the East so we were bashing our way in the ebb to get back in the bay! All in all it was a great day with challenging conditions. It was hard to not be able to finish after making such a great time out and back (the fastest Tortuga has ever done it!)

Here’s a video of the race recap:
https://youtu.be/SkNmbqU8_l0

Cheers,
Randy
Westsail 32 Tortuga
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