Irish Mist Sea Fever

by Kathy
(North Andover, MA)

Hi I'm back again to tell you of my sailing trials and tribulations. I put her in the water for the first time about a month ago. My boyfriend doesn't sail nor do his kids. We hitched the trailer to his truck and drove to Winter Island, off the end of Salem. We dropped her in the water then began the task of untangling all the lines and wires. I must admit, I never put up a mast myself, I always used my dads boat where the most I had to do was put up the sails.

It was a bit of a challenge at first, especially not sure if I was doing it right and having my boyfriend getting stressed because he was holding up the mast as I tried to get everything attached.

I finally got her all set and must admit my crew looked nervous. I, myself, have always been one to just wing it and worry about problems when and if they arrive. So off we went! Dave said he never saw me smile as much as I did for the next three hours. The wind was awsom and I was living what I had been dreaming about for months. We sailed around Salem, Beverly and Marblehead harbors for the rest of the afternoon.

I was in heaven, the poem Sea Fever explains it all don't you think?

Well, since then I've only been sailing one other time. We went camping up in Freeport, Maine a few weeks ago and went out sailing in Casco Bay for about 4 hours! Again living the dream. Now mind you, my boat is only 20 feet long, but it's all I need to make me smile. My trailer on the other hand is a whole other story. When we went to launch the boat while in Maine we discovered the handle to crank the boat off of the trailer had been lost during our ride up. That didn't deter us though, we put the trailer in the water as far as we dared and pretty much floated her off.

Getting her back on the trailer wasn't as easy. We thought we had her on perfectly only to discover the next day while we were driving home the seam wasn't on the rollers and the front roller was gone. We were lucky the boat didn't slide off the trailer and we wouldn't have known had I not been driving behind Dave. I really need to go back and thank the fine gentleman that sold me that piece of junk trailer!!! But from what I hear that's what boat owning is all about right?!?

I don't care it's worth all the suffering. Yesterday, Dave pumped a small lake out of the boat only to have it torrentially pour all night (I told him we should have put the cover on it!) Tomorrow we will bring the boat down to the river to take it off trailer and repair the roller. It's all been a big learning curve for us, that live and learn theory is really kicking in here.

Anyway, this weekend we're headed back up to Maine, this time to Sebago Lake. I certainly hope the weather turns out better than its been the past few weeks. We've had so little sun, that when it does come out it's blinding!!! I'm hoping for some of that for the fourth of July weekend.

Hope all is well with all my fellow sailers out there. Have a happy and safe 4th of July!!!

Kathy