We Did It!

Sunday morning we broke down camp and headed to the marina. As we arrived we were excited to see a few sailboats already out on the water.



We launched the boat reasonably well for our first go, pulled the sail up and were off. As it turns out sailing downwind is fairly easy.



Before too long we were across the lake. However, when we turned around we noticed an armada of boats had entered the water behind us. Unsure as to exactly what was going on we decided to set a course towards the fleet of sailboats. As it turns out sailing into the wind was not quite as easy.



As we got closer we realized we had stumbled into the middle of a boat race. Trying as best we could we limped around the mass of sailboats to safer waters. We spent the rest of the day fine tuning our skills, only losing total control of the vessel once or twice, relaxing in the cove and playing a game of chase the hat. In case you are wondering the hat was lost during a not so intentional jibe. At the end of the day we were feeling pretty comfortable navigating the boat.




Finally we executed a perfect landing, pulled her out of the water and headed home. It was a fantastic day and experience we will remember for the rest of our lives. Stage one of the Sailboat Experiment is complete.