Cruising the Lake Erie Islands

[Tod]

On a trip of over 10 nm in flat water, we are usually motor sailing, so we seldom notice the issue.

It is very rare to find people who will sail in light air. Or heavy air. Many a time I've almost been alone in sailing, while nearly all the sailboats are motoring. For example, in this pic I was sailing from PIB back to Sandusky (that's Kelleys in the pic), and in that stretch between South Bass and Marblehead, I was the only sailboat sailing. Everyone else headed back at the close of the weekend was motoring. And the sailing was great, with pretty small waves since the wind was from the SSW! Had I motored, I wouldn't have been going any faster.

It seems like that trend of motoring in a sailboat has increased a lot over the years since I first started sailing on Lake Erie, back in the seventies.

 

[David in Sandusky]

This trip, we stayed on the sails twice when our average speed dropped below 4 knots. The first was the last couple of miles of our leg from Middle Bass to Pelee. I don’t think we encountered any motor boats then The second was the return to Sandusky Bay from Kellys on the last day. The channel was pretty busy, but once we turned WSW toward Sandusky Harbor Marina behind the coal piles, we had a pleasant, wing on wing run with no motor boat wakes to contend with.

In both cases, our speed varied from 1.5 to 3.5 knots. Fun sailing when we have the time.

We have enjoyed sailing in winds up to 30 knots, depending on the sea state, and our course. It’s no fun trying to head into the wind and waves at that wind speed. We returned to port once in winds gusting to 45 knots, and went through 50 knots at anchor once. We would not choose to sail our boat in those conditions.

I sailed my Sunfish in 40 knot winds in the seaplane basin north of Key West long ago. That was a real thrill! The boat was planing like a skidoo, and was easy to handle, boy was I moving!