Motorin'... Not Anymore!

Every year on our trip the wind is almost always directly behind us wherever we want to sail. Well, this year has once again been the same story. During every hop we try our best to sail, sometimes for extra hours, whether it means that we have to tack back and forth, or putt along sailing directly downwind with only the jib, etc. With a sailboat, you can work with the wind being anywhere but on the nose, however directly behind you is not ideal. Since you're running with the wind, the faster you go, the less the wind pushes you along. Also, with a normal sail setup you can't catch wind directly behind you very efficiently. This year we purchased a whisker pole to hold the jib out nearly perpendicular and rigged a preventer to hold our main sail out as far as it can go. This is called running wing and wing and has been our nemesis to setup correctly. With all of our attempts we ended up motoring more than we probably should have due to frustration. Each time we weren't doing something right. However, after this year's round of multiple attempts and failures at running wing and wing yesterday we FINALLY got it right! Finally. We were able to sail downwind for two thirds of our trip yesterday. As soon as we got some wind at Little Sable Point we were able to sail ALL the way down to the mouth of the Grand Haven break wall.

It. Was. Awesome. Better yet, we were averaging 6 or more knots the entire way!

The positive was that with each failed attempt to sail on this trip we learned, we think, how to attempt the next one a little bit better. For example the first attempt we were not able to extend the whisker pole that far out or unroll the jib completely but by yesterday our pole and jib were full extended and beautifully positioned. BAM!

This was such a smooth way to sail! It's no wonder people sail like this around the world. Our winds went from 8 to 18 knots and our wave height increased as well but we would have never noticed the change if it wasn't for the rudder getting a bit light while we were riding the highest waves.

Enjoy the pics and video of our wonderful sail! 

Hopefully we get a couple more of these on our last few days of vacation!