Left Puerto Pollenca for Menorca, only to face the full Beaufort range up to Force 7. A fellow named Beaufort invented an incredibly useful way to measure wind speed. I don't really know all the details off the top of my head, but at Force 1, you can barely feel any wind and leaves barely move on trees; at Force 7, the wind turns umbrellas inside out; and Force 10 blows away shingles off of roofs. This is an incredibly subjective scale, as improvements in umbrella technology can render the scale obsolete, but it's very useful because it gives a decent human sense of what the wind's effects are.
So, I left Mallorca with a crew member who wants to remain anonymous towards Menorca. The day started slowly, but we soon found ourselves 7 miles out of Mallorca, with wind speeds reaching Force 7 at times. I hate the idea of reducing the amount of sail (called "reefing"). I paid for all that sail and I want to use it. But at some point, the boat heels over so much that you just have to reef or else topple over. So I reefed the mainsail, from the size of a large dining room to the size of a room for a really spoiled only child. Then things got rough enough that the main needed to be reefed again. And the second and final reef on this sail is pretty small; the sail essentially got down to the size of a moo-moo for a large lady. And even then we were heeling over so much that I had to find ways to reduce the force. I noticed that my jib is reefable as well, so I reefed the jib as well. Amazingly, reefing actually sped us up -- I've seen this very rarely, where reducing sail improves the boat's heeling so much that the boat starts going faster.
Even with a tiny amount of canvas up (actually, dakron), the boat was still going too fast and we were getting banged around in the high chop that had developed, so it was time to turn around run for safety.
And after two consecutive aborted attempts, I needed to spend a day just getting some rest. So I decided to take the next day off and spend it enjoying Mallorca.
So, I left Mallorca with a crew member who wants to remain anonymous towards Menorca. The day started slowly, but we soon found ourselves 7 miles out of Mallorca, with wind speeds reaching Force 7 at times. I hate the idea of reducing the amount of sail (called "reefing"). I paid for all that sail and I want to use it. But at some point, the boat heels over so much that you just have to reef or else topple over. So I reefed the mainsail, from the size of a large dining room to the size of a room for a really spoiled only child. Then things got rough enough that the main needed to be reefed again. And the second and final reef on this sail is pretty small; the sail essentially got down to the size of a moo-moo for a large lady. And even then we were heeling over so much that I had to find ways to reduce the force. I noticed that my jib is reefable as well, so I reefed the jib as well. Amazingly, reefing actually sped us up -- I've seen this very rarely, where reducing sail improves the boat's heeling so much that the boat starts going faster.
Even with a tiny amount of canvas up (actually, dakron), the boat was still going too fast and we were getting banged around in the high chop that had developed, so it was time to turn around run for safety.
And after two consecutive aborted attempts, I needed to spend a day just getting some rest. So I decided to take the next day off and spend it enjoying Mallorca.
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