When we left the dock, the tide was low, really low. The wind was out of the NW at a steady 8 knots. We made it out to Boston Harbor, that's five and a half km in less than an hour. The current was against us. We only tacked once to stay in the channel. The wind just wanted to lift us up--couldn't believe we were that lucky.
Coming back was better. The wind shifted; came out of the SW and WSW at 8 knots--no waves. We were close hauled all the way, The current was with us. We turned south at exactly 1800. At 1830 we passed the Olympia Shoal--4.4 km in exactly 30 minutes. We were throwing a nice clean wake all the way; add in the current and we were way faster than hull speed.
Sometimes you get double lucky!
And--by the way--the new sail from Schurr worked well. Well built--great service.
*It was a lot easier hook up the luff since I use the winch on the trailer to raise the mast. I had some mechanical advantage so that I could over-tension the mast against the shrouds, hook the Genoa, then back off the winch tension. It was also helpful that I have temporary supports (shrouds) in place as part of the gin pole mast raising process. It allowed me to disconnect a shroud while I worked on the spacers and still keep the mast standing in good control. Without that feature, I would have needed to raise and lower the mast three or four times.
