I used to love to sail. My mouth waters when I read your stuff Safebare. Many years ago, a group of us had a 21 ft. wooden sailboat docked in Alameda off of the San Francisco Bay. It was a fix up. We had spent many hours working the woods like the teak and pouring bucks into marine quality hardware and were itching to take it out for its intended use.
We had a spontaneous decision. We set sail, no motor, no running lights, nadda, one afternoon on the bay. We would just do a quick run. It was wonderful to finally get out there.
The wind died. The sun went down. A huge cargo ship nearly clipped us in our black hulled watercraft on te dark waters. We sat and prayed looking at that towering bow coming at us off of the portside. Tides, or current, a touch of light breeze, we milked everything that we could muster. We tried blowing at the sails and certainly luffed them by hand. We got down the channel leaning over the side, paddling with our hands, the least of our concerns was to get a ticket. Stupid people get guardian angels, too.
I now have that faltboote kayak. It has a place for a mast. It has a rudder also, to rig it with a sail. One of these days, the plan is to spend a few hundred dollars and many hours to set it up to sail. It will get us across lakes and to remote places to nude beach heads much better than with paddles. It will be great fun to sail again. It also can be rigged for a small motor.
I noticed years ago, when I used to go to Ft. Lauderdale to fish, that it was the sailboats which had the nude people on them. There was a significant number nude or in very skimpy, compared to never seeing a nude on the power boats. I never understood why that was so.
Jbee
