Chickawaukie Ice Boat Club

It’s official: the 2013 Moosehead Long Way is in the books. Of ten boats starting, six made it the thirty-five miles to Mt Kineo and back. How windy was it? Well, we didn’t see dogs getting blown off their chains, but Lee Spiller has to get the raw balls award. He was sleeping in his van at the launch site, but had to move to a calmer spot because the van was getting so buffeted by the wind that he couldn’t sleep! And it’s not just about getting some sleep, but he must have been laying there awake thinking that he actually has to sail in this stuff in the morning.

And this is what the morning looked like: Did I mention we discovered a half inch of snow to add insult to injury?

How windy was it? It was so windy that at one point in the middle of the largest bays there was a shallow white-out of wind whipped ice pellets. The wind was scouring the surface of the smallest chunks loosening in the noon sun and just driving them in a blast-cloud.

Yes, that’s a pressure ridge hiding in the white-out. There were five pressure ridges between Greenville and Mt. Kineo, all easily crossed, some under sail once scouted by the first boat. The ice was very good, probably a 7. Peter Coward spent some time on a particularly fine plate doing speed runs while the rest of us were trying to keep our speed down! Denis Guertin’s brother, Yves, did the whole trip in a DN with a full sail and kept us amused with his gymnastics. He is an excellent athlete.

He nearly wore through the heels of a new pair of boots trying to slow the boat down!
Francois and Kate Morrone both busted stud plates, Denis and Lee both had rigs come down; the rest of the boats held together amazingly enough. Always tape your pins in heavy air. Steering pins included!

This is Mt. Kineo in the distance, our windward mark. The ice was as good as it looks in this picture. The roster: Warren Nethercote, Denis, Yves and Frank, Curtis Rinlaub, Lee Spiller, Bruce Brown, Kate Morrone, Dave Fortier, myself, and the hard-core bros Lamb and Coward.

The happy gang in the shadow of Kineo, too tired to set up a proper line. We sailed into this cove and all just coasted to a stop in a silent lull. There wasn’t a breath of wind in there, and it took some work getting back out with the little storm sails. But once around the point it was fifteen miles of delightful downwind sailing. We had to brave a reach every now and then but generally it was nice and deep. I did get way ahead at one point and thought I should beat back up to the fleet, but a couple of minutes of that was enough so I peeled off and continued sun bathing.

Aside from the ridges and the drain hole over which Denis unintentionally flew his windward runner there were no major flaws. If this is what we can expect from Moosehead in the spring, let’s consider cultivating our spies and make this an annual event. The one change we should make is to take Bruce Brown’s advice and have lunch at the turn-around.

Thanks to Curtis for the maps, Denis for the commemorative stickers, Warren Nethercote (8 hrs from Nova Scotia!) for finding the lodging, Kelly’s Bar for keeping us well fed and juiced, and Christian Jacques for scouting the ice last week which set this whole event in motion, and to everyone who had the faith to make the drive. Faith, after all, is just asking your heart to believe what your eyes can’t see and you mind can’t understand. It’s finally time for some well deferred boat maintenance, and maybe even a little gardening. And as you are sitting on the porch this summer sipping your gin&tonic, the ice cubes will be speaking to you: it’s not just mindless clink-vlink against the glass. What they are whispering to you is THINK ICE!

Nova Scotia correspondent Warren Nethercoat sent this report of some very good racing. We’d love to see these guys on Moosehead next weekend!

Seven DNs came to Sherbrooke Lake today, including Doug Gaudet from PEI. We still hadn’t sailed the Snelly Cup, so the Fleet Captains decided that today’s number of entries warranted sailing for the trophy. Special thanks go to Terry Hayward for taking time away from sailing his Isabella to be our race officer.

Winds were right down the axis of the lake so we sailed 2 laps of a 1 1/2 mile course. We started sailing on hard ice that gradually softened over the course of six races, but most people were able to use 3/16th inserts until the very last race when a few changed over to 1/4 inserts. The wind started at about 6 to 7 knots and built to 10-12 as the morning wore on, so that we had adequate power to overcome the softening ice. But wind strength varied across the course, so taking a flier could make you a hero or a fool!

Doug Gaudet showed impressive speed upwind and down in the first two races, and led the series until the penultimate race, but as the wind built he lost his upwind speed margin – although he was blistering fast downwind all day. Going downwind was a challenge. It was easy to forget how sticky the ice was: gybing to too deep an angle would lead to near immediate stalling of the sail and loss of speed. There were lots of place changes, upwind and down.

photo: Terry Heyward, with a little bit of Dick Tracy in his genes when he decided to take pictures standing next to the leeward mark!

Bob Crinion won the championship in the end with consistency all day. Although Bob had but a single win, against two for Art and Doug, he was the only boat able to discard a third. But he was only a point ahead of Art Samson, and another one ahead of Doug Gaudet. Tyler Garland got the bad luck award of the day, first breaking a forestay, and then having the hound fitting fail on his mast.

We had our 6 races in by 1PM, and then retired to Howard Garland’s deck to bask in the sun and tell lies. This spring iceboating is wonderful!

Warren

DN 3786

It’s been a long wonderful winter and I’m out of superlatives. Besides, words can’t do justice to the wonder of Moosehead. It has the horizons of Sebago and the intimate geography of Winnipesaukee. It also has two feet of ice. So, speaking of Winnie, I am proposing a Hard Way Moosehead for next weekend. The forecast shows some warming followed by sub-freezing nights AND days later in the week. If the cold holds we could sail from Greenville to Rockwood, or visa vera. The warmth might smooth things out a bit, but quite frankly it’s not nearly as rough as Damariscotta two weeks ago.

The most fun was to launch the windward runner from a mound of hard snow and set it into a long easy hike. Even as the ice softened and we switched to slush runners, these mounds would still provide lift-off. The wind built nicely to a steady 10-15 from absolutely nothing. There’s not much that tries the traveling iceboater’s faith more than watching limp flags and straight smoke mile after mile. But it held all day, and outlasted us. Have a look at Denis’s video to see what we were sailing in; it really wasn’t as bad as it looks. As a matter of fact I believe that we risk becoming ice snobs. Sure, smooth ice is nice, but blasting around in sprays of slush, the boat all squirlly, and trying to stay powered up is an absolute blast. (I know, I said that last week…)

This is Mount Kimeo, a major landmark on the lake. It can barely be seen from Greenville, but will be the windward mark if we can pull together enough people for a Hard Way. Winnie Hard way rules will generally apply. Send me an e-mail directly if you want to come: hilltop.

This is what you’ll be seeing, and I think the surface will not be any worse. The only pressure ridge we found was small and easily crossed. We did not sail the proposed Hard Way route, so we will all be doing it for the first time. That’s one of the Hard way rules that won’t apply. The launch ramps at both Greenville and Rockwood are excellent with drive on trailer access. It’s about 15 miles as the crow flies.

So, put away the potting soil, get your survival kit together, and help inaugurate the new Northern Hard Way. The way it’s going, by the time I’m Stu Nelson’s age we’ll be doing this on Hudson Bay!

It was forty degrees all night, but just to see what had happened to the slush sandwich I went to Megunticook. The water was gone and the surface hard. There was even a skim of ice over holes I’d chopped the day before. The wind was blowing so I called Brian Lamb and he was there in ten minutes. We set out on plates first; that’s how hard it was. An hour later I was on Slush runners having a ball but Brian’s boat was stuck. We swapped boats for a while, this being his first time out this year. We were a bit nervous about getting off the ice as the day warmed to nearly fifty, so we packed it up and were home in time for lunch.

The edge is rotten of course, but the 14″ on the main plate remains. I guess the point of the story is to never assume anything when considering ice. Or, better yet, against all logic assume that the sailing will be great. And don’t forget the slush runners!

Tomorrow to Moosehead!

Moosehead has nearly wetted out and spies say that the surface is pretty good. Without knowing exactly what that means, myself and our Canadian friends Denis and Francois will sail there tomorrow. The lake is big enough for more than just us three so please feel welcome to join us.

We are working our way into April sailing. Local temps next week will dip back into the 20’s at night which might give us another day or two on Megunticook.