Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Health of River in Question

TCPalm has been covering this problem. Here is a link to one of their pages with some good links for more information.

Monday, July 22, 2013

South Wind Sailing

Friday after weeks and weeks of rain we caught a break. Ron alerted me to the fact that the wind was coming up and we were at the causeway around 5:30. The water was red from all the water they are dumping from Lake Okeechobee and a stiff breeze was coming out of the south. The tide was low and there was a strong incoming tide running with the wind. I rigged an 8.5 on the Isonic 117w and was well powered. Ron was on his Xfire 115 with a 7.8. We had an hour plus of good sailing.

Sunday Dino, who is somewhere in New England, forwards a wind alert to Ron and I. The conditions are the same except the wind is a bit stronger and it was a thunder storm north of us generating all the wind. We rigged the same as Friday and were really powered up and surprised how long the wind lasted. I could here thunder but never saw any lightning. Storm sailing is tough; wind can increase or die in a mater of moments and getting fried like a bug is a possibility. We ended up with another great hour of sailing. Art was on the water in mid afternoon on a SUP before the storms stirred things up. Then he was out on a 7.5 when the wind kicked in. Brandon showed up when we were rigging and came back later with his gear.

Friday and Sunday was really the first time I had some well powered sailing on the Isonic with an 8.5. I was able to get my jibes dialed in and am very pleased with the board. About a month ago Ron and I sailed in some lighter wind, he was on an RRD formula board with his 9.2 and I was on the Isonic with the 8.5 and they seemed to perform about the same. In the spring I sailed the board in gusty SW wind with a 7.0 and it performed great.