Received: from zonker.hpl.hp.com (zonker-fddi.hpl.hp.com) by jr.hpl.hp.com with ESMTP (1.37.109.24/15.5+ECS 3.3+HPL1.1) id AA002659764; Tue, 7 Jul 1998 01:22:44 -0700 Return-Path: <poulton@zonker.hpl.hp.com-DeleteThis> Received: (from poulton@localhost) by zonker.hpl.hp.com (8.8.6/8.7.1) id BAA15087 for wind_talk; Tue, 7 Jul 1998 01:22:42 -0700 (PDT) Date: Tue, 7 Jul 1998 01:22:42 -0700 (PDT) From: Ken Poulton <poulton@zonker.hpl.hp.com-DeleteThis> Message-Id: <199807070822.BAA15087@zonker.hpl.hp.com-DeleteThis> To: wind_talk@zonker.hpl.hp.com-DeleteThis Subject: A week in Da Gorge Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
[ First two days are a re-post. ]
------------- Mon 29 Jun 98
I drove up to the Gorge - pretty much of a spur of the moment trip.
Everything just came together: a good time to take a week from my
project at work, no major family activities planned, a sympathetic wife,
a mother-in-law willing to have my 10-year-old boy David come up (to Eugene)
for the week, Walt had a place near Hood River, and Monday morning, a
good Gorge forecast for the week.
============= Tue 30 Jun 98 - Hatchery - 4.4,3.9,3.5/257 (196#)
Dawn patrol: "It's windy!" says Walt at 7:20. I popped out of bed,
checked the river with the binoculars and we breakfasted and then rolled
down the hill to be at the Hatchery by 8:30. Walt rigs 3.9 and I rig
4.4 (feeling a little heavy still after so little sailing). That worked
for a while, but pretty soon I conclude that Walt had a better idea and
rig down to 3.9. That worked okay for a while - swell is 5-6 feet and
some really nice big rollers are coming through. We worked on riding
swells, but my arms are getting really worked as I realize what a month
with no sailing will do to you!
After lunch, we go out again and get blown off the water in pretty
short order - the wind has notched up. We rig 3.5's and sail for a
while. The swell is up to 8 feet, in beautiful smooth faces, but I'm
working too hard to deal with the gusts and lulls to do much with it.
We rest for a while - my sailing periods are only abot 30 minutes now.
One particularly hard catapult crash breaks the buckle on my harness.
After getting my spare harness ("you're going to use that piece of junk?"
asks Walt) we go out again about 4:00 and get blown off the water in
short order!
COTW (Swell City) shows 25mph(14-35) at 9:00 steadily ramping up to
34mph(24-42) by 4:00. Small wonder the 3.5 didn't cut it! (Comparing
sail sizes to SFO readings, I think this reads 15% low compared to
SFO.) In the process I got to use my new 4.4 and 3.5 sails for the
first time. And Michael didn't think I'd ever use that 3.5.
This day has done a great number on my hands - tore open two blisters on
my right hand.
In the evening, we watch lightning flash right around the house and
worry that the thunderstorm will kill the wind.
============= Wed 1 Jul 98 - Hatchery - 3.9/257 (196#)
Wednesday arrives overcast, but windy anyway. Feeling some doubt because
of the clouds, we meander down to the Hatchery, and after watching the few
sailors out for a while, we rig 4.4's. I've relearned my lesson to ignore
Walt's rigging choices at my peril, but before I get to the water Walt
is back to rig 3.9, so I follow suit. This turns out to be a much
better choice, but I'll still working really hard to sail. I have lots
of excuses: atrophied arms, the narrow swell zone at the Hatch calling
for jibing as soon as you get your feet in the straps, learning new
sails, the gusty wind... but Walt is ripping it up. I add several
inches of downhaul and go back out and things are getting better. For
half an hour, I feel like I'm in control. The swell is around 6 feet
and I get a few really glorious rides.
We decide to go into town for lunch; I leave my gear rigged at the Hatch.
DaKine has fixed my harness (no charge!). I go back out for another
short session that starts out good, but pretty soon has me heading way upwind
and just to handle the wind and then way off the wind to get back down to
the launch. I packed it in around 5:00.
COTW shows 28mph(22-38) most of the day.
I ran into Kris Mills at the Hatchery. She's been here for a week and
a half and says that she knows of about 15 3rd Ave regulars up here.
We watched The Postman on video. Silly movie, but quite a luxury
compared to my usual campground evenings.
============= Thu 2 Jul 98 - Hatchery - 4.4,3.9/257 (196#)
Ever have one of those days where you zig when you should have zagged?
It's windy again, so we're up and out early, but when we get to the Hatchery,
it's only about 5.0. I have this hankering to sail Doug's Beach and
Windsight is showing the same reading at both sites (making the usual
+4 mph Doug's correction). So we cruise up to Doug's (zig) to find... nothing.
The wind has backed off. Half an hour spent watching the water produces
no improvement and another call to Windsight shows... 25 mph at the Hatch.
So we race back down the 25 miles to the Hatchery (zag) and even at 10:00,
we still score prime parking spots. I guess the last two days took some
of the edge off of some peoples' wind craving.
We rig 4.4's and go out to sail and have quite a handful. Some nice swells,
but not as much as the previous two days. After a while I'm hurting, so
I come back in and rig 3.9 (zig). Whoops, the wind has dropped and I'm
slogging (as are many people, but I'm worse) so I go back to the 4.4
(zag). After lunch, the wind is up (28g34mph) and my 4.4 is pretty
wild, so I take the 3.9 (zig) and the wind immediately backs off - I go
back to the 4.4 (zag). It doesn't take but a few minutes to get the
wind to come back up and I sail for another half hour or so overpowered.
It's kind of frustrating since I can't sail very long at a time, so I
don't want to go too far up or down wind as I usually do to avoid the
traffic right by the launch.
After resting some more, I go back out around 4:00. OP'd on the 4.4, then
slogging on the 3.9 (zig) so I go back to the 4.4 (zag) and figure out
that I was having problems with the head cap adjustment slipping on the
new sails, so I never had enough downhaul. It finally is working right!
For the first time this trip, I feel like I'm in control of the sail
rather than vice-versa. What a nice feeling! By 5:30 I've pretty well
used up my arms again so I call it for the day.
This makes 3 days of all-day wind at the Hatchery. The usual pattern
is for the wind to back off at midday at the Hatchery and for the better
afternoon wind to be further east, e.g., at Doug's.
I have now gone through three levels of blisters on my right hand.
It turns out that this is where it starts to bleed. Oh well.
============= Fri 3 Jul 98 - Hatchery - 3.9/257 (196#)
We get to the Hatchery around 9:00 and get some prime parking.
The wind is 28g35mph so we rig 3.9. Alas, after half an hour the
wind is backing off. We watch, hoping for it to come back up, but
it continues to drop the rest of the morning.
A bunch of 3rd Ave regulars are hanging out here: Kris, Troy, Harry,
Jerry, Bob, and several other folks I recognize but don't know names.
============= Fri 3 Jul 98 - Doug's Beach - 3.9/257 (196#)
Around noon, we bail and go into town for lunch, and then go to Mosier
to visit Walt and Jean's new homesite. This spot has a
beautifully-framed view straight up the river from Mosier to the Hood
River bridge, and they're about 5 minutes from the Rock Creek launch.
Jean suggests that we go up the old highway to Rowena Overlook. This is
a mistake for Jean, since a) she doesn't sail and b) we can see the wind
is up at Doug's! We buzz through The Dalles to get to Doug's and by
2:00 we're rigging 3.9's again. We're not the only ones - it takes 4
minutes to walk from our parking spot to the rigging area, but the
reward is huge. Beautiful big swells, steady wind, and hero jibes in the
flat shallow water on either side. We sail until we're good and tired
around 5:30.
COTW shows around 26g37mph all afternoon, but it's more on the water at
Doug's.
After sailing, we drop by Windwing and they replace all my slipping
adjustable caps for the new never-slip versions. After dinner, we
watch the Hood River fireworks from the Washington side.
============= Sat 4 Jul 98 - Doug's Beach - 5.4,4.4,3.9/257 (196#)
Molly has the day off (from her summer job as a Park Service firefighter)
so she joins us in a leisurely departure to Doug's. At least this time
we get good parking spots, but the wind is not really up yet. Walt
and Molly sail 4.9 and 4.4 off and on, but it's up and down. I am
hoarding my strength for the Big Wind to come (I hope). So I hang
around, rig my 4.4 in burst of enthusiasm, slog Walt's 4.9 in a fit of
boredom, hang around some more, but the wind is still only 5.5 or so.
Around 4:00 I give up on Big Wind and rig my 5.4, downhauling it
super-floppy just in case. This is just right at first, but within 15
minutes the wind is rising: I have apparently succeeded in insulting the
wind gods. It came up so fast that it made for quite a scary ride back
downwind to the launch. I switch to the 4.4 and now we're talking!
But even this is more than I need, so after a half an hour I rig the
3.9. This works well in the 25g40mph and I sail until about 6:30.
I sailed 4.4 or smaller all five days I was here - about twice as good
as my usual 50% hit rate! Including 2 days at 3rd, half my 14 sailing
days in the season have come in the last 8 days.
-------------- Sun 5 Jul 98
I make the Long Drive Home. I'm not a fast driver: 9:15 AM to 11:10 PM
for 787 miles (with lots of breaks). As much as I dislike the
Redding-Vacaville stretch of flat, straight road that goes on forever,
at least it was not slow. I was less than thrilled to get into
stop-and-go traffic on I-80 at 9:30 at night! Oh well, we survived.
Ken Poulton
poulton@opus.hpl.hp.com-DeleteThis
"Windsurfing is like comedy: timing is everything."
-- Ken Poulton
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