First Sail !

Some more background on the boat and a report from the first sail

In December, I "rescued" O'Day Mariner #1460 (1969 2+2) from where it had been sitting in a back yard for almost 10 years. Over the past couple of months I've cleaned off all the scum, replaced a few bits of broken rigging, and refitted with appropriate safety gear. I finally had a chance to try the boat out on April 6. From scanning through the MarinerSailors yahoo group and the Mariner class website before I bought the boat, I had a pretty good idea that it would make a nice little family boat (the family is little, too.), but she sails even better than I had imagined. The forecast called for 5 to 20 on San Francisco Bay, and I'd say we got all of that. A bit more wind than I had planned for on a first test sail, but we quickly discovered how comfortable, well behaved, and surprisingly fast this little boat is. After a few practice tacks/jibes in the marina, we followed the Richmond shipping channel out into the bay and were soon tacking across to Angel Island with an occasional glimpse of San Francisco poking through the typical fog. Perfect. After an hour or so, we spun around and reached for home topping out at 8 kts. a time or two. Cool!This boat's a keeper. Just ordered a bunch of parts to remedy some of the old boat shortcomings (old jam cleats don't hold the jib in any kind of wind) and spiffy her up a bit.

Here's a Google map log of the first sail

Or, view in Google Earth