September 05, 2006
Sailing Lively to Redfish Island
I had had enough labor on Labor Day: Doing Homework, flooring a laundry room, and griping about it. I know it doesn't sound like very much but this was a holiday weekend after all and I felt entitled to some fun. So we put Day Sailer Lively that I've been working on this summer into the water at April Fool Point (29°28.3'N, 094°55.6'W) and sailed her to Redfish Island, bearing 36.5°, distance 3.2 nautical miles. Winds were Northeasterly between 5-10 knots according to PORTS( see below).
I managed to get a GPS track of most of the trip, but I'm missing the first part because once again the thing wasn't recording tracks. Luckily I noticed it before we got to Eagle Point where there's a lot of shoals and obstructions. I've been through the pass between Eagle point and Redfish before, the last time was in May.
I've been to Redfish once before, but that was several years ago, and Kathy had never been there. The last time I was there, I hit a few things underwater and had some work to do on my rudder and centerboard as a result. Since I didn't wish to do that again, I decided to take a route I knew was safe. Why go to redfish island? It's not that there's much to see, unless you like seeing a pile of rocks. It's just a place to go. Because it's there.
On the leg up, we were definitely sailing against the current, which makes sense given the high tide was at noon and we set off around 3pm. I stuck close to shore so that I could make it through the gap just off Eagle Point. We arrived at the island after a couple of hours and saw about a half a dozen larger craft anchored there. Many boats go there and the people stay overnight. Most of the boats there when we arrived were powerboats, but there was on large Trimaran and a large sloop. We watched a few ships pass by the island and returned home, setting the spinnaker. Arriving back at April Fool point, we found we had to tack up the marina channel, since the wind had shifted to the north. Three short boards and we were back at the dock. A nice way to end the long weekend.
