Set Sail

I spent most of the weekend out at Camp Constantin with Amber as an "honorary staff member/scout", which translated to me getting to hang out at Possum Kingdom lake, help around the camp office a bit, enjoy a late night campfire, swim, meet some cool people, and GO SAILING!

Sailing has been on my bucket list for awhile now, so I jumped at the opportunity to go to camp with Amber and go out on a boat. I was thinking something along the lines of this catamaran:


Well, Perry (Amber's friend/Mr. Aquatics Director/Expert Sailor) decided we should take out a Sunfish. Um... that's like really small...

But it was awesome! Amber captured a few shots of the endeavor. Here are the boats lined up ready to go out on the lake.

Getting the sail ready.

Sail is up, and Perry is giving me instructions mixed with boat terminology that I forgot within 5 minutes.

This is the part where we flipped over. It was super, super windy. Not the ideal weather for sailing. I slid right off the top of the boat, but I think Perry tried to save us...

Eh, not happening!

But due to my brute strength, we righted the boat...

...and got back in the saddle.

And we're off again. I learned to navigate with the Main Sheet (rope that controls the Main Sail) while Perry manned the rudder. Actually, he maneuvered both on quite a few occasions! It seriously takes some mad skills to sail by yourself in one of these.

Here we are way out on the lake. Our 30 minute trip lasted a good hour and a half because we kept getting stuck "in irons", facing directly into the wind and unable to catch enough momentum to turn. Since the wind kept gusting, it was a difficult position to recover from, and we spent some time drifting. But once we caught the wind, wow, those Sunfish can fly! So much fun.


I'm quite certain that I didn't earn my Small Boat Sailing Merit Badge, but I like to think I somewhat got the hang of it. Regardless, it was awesome. And I'd like a Sunfish for my birthday to be able to take out on White Rock. They're around $4,000. Ha!