Chickawaukie Ice Boat Club

Chickawaukee Sunday Jan 28 was as nice ice as we have seen in sometime, but too much wind. The “Old farts” and guests had a fine time, some brisk sailing but not really enjoyable for all day the fire side bench saw heavy use. Bill Bunting insisted that I try ballasting my Super DN. I dropped a 20 Lb snake in the cockpit and, as advertized, the addition of this tiddly weight to the 100Lb boat was amazing. Dennis Glidden came up from Southern Maine with his well used “Grey Ghost DN, he and Don Stearns have had epic voyages on Sebago in past years. I asked him if he had his storm sail? “Nope, don’t have one, when the window on my full sail (criscrossed with duct tape) blows out then I will”. Al Heath, new member, sailed his ancient rickety looking iceboat ancestor of the Alcort Sailfish/Sunfish in the heavy air with and without passengers. Nothing bent and nothing broke. What holds the thing together is a mystery, it works just fine. We have a new member Zander Aurbach who thinks a replica of it would be an interesting low cost project. We await further developments. It us just a lumber yard wood A frame, wood runners with angle iron blades, aluminum tube spars, some permanently bent. Super simple. Sort of a wood Skimmer with sailfish sail/lateen? rig.
In the meantime Jory and Lloyd explored Damariscotta, wall to wall washboard surface on 8 inches of ice. The usual pressure ridge system off the the right is just healed cracks. A couple of days of warm wind and rain might fix it right up for next weekend. The outlook depends on how much snow in the mix.

Buckets of wind yesterday kept the fleet huddled behind the point at Bailey’s Cove yesterday. The tall pines were working hard to remain tall and not fall. We’d poke our bow runners out every now and then for a hit and if we managed to get out of the Broads and into the Western Reach in one piece we could tack north where there are plenty of relaxing lees. As long as you didn’t get nailed by a gust on a lee shore things worked out.

Dave Buckley had his outhaul destruct and get launched into low orbit, and John Eastman snapped the pennant on his reefed sail causing the halyard to scurry for cover inside the mast. He dashed home for a plumbers chase and was back out there for another good thrashing within the hour. Our Canadian friends, who had been calling for more wind the day before, decided they had a long drive ahead of them and quit while they were ahead.

Trying to get back to the pits the long way around.

Mike Acebo from Long Island in his modified J-14. C. Rindlaub photos

Looks like all kinds of precipitation in the next few days with a warming spell at the end. This might Zamboni Damariscotta for next weekend. Also, Tom Childs send this report from Sebago:

The boys and I sailed lower bay of Sebago today. The entire bay is 4-5” of clean glorious rock-hard ICE!! There are rough spots along the shore and other areas, but my estimate would be that 70-80% is 8+ with areas of 10+ (Can you believe that…10+!). WARNING: the main body of the lake is wide open. Use common sense and stay well in bounds of the lower bay proper. Also, there is a good sized pressure ridge along the westerly side of the bay. Cross it with caution and you may find some of that 10+ stuff we all need once in a while. Anyway, if anyone has the day off tomorrow, they would be wise to take advantage of this spectacular, early, plate of wintery goodness.

Wide eyed with wonder, like kids on Christmas morning, is the best way to describe the small fleet of DN sailors who were discovering the charms of Megunticook for the first time today. At each bend, Denis and Francois from Quebec, and Curtis from Peaks Island, were convinced that this was the end of the lake, but no: there’s yet another straight and bay. We covered the entire lake with abandon in the 10-20kt northwester. The usual hazzards at the Fangs were beginning to show their teeth, but aside from that all we had to watch for were pop-ups and the occasional strong gust. Francois must be a windsurfer in his summer life as he kept asking for more wind!

Dave and Kristin Buckley made the trip from Newport for the weekend, and Hal from Friendship had his second sail in his new DN. John Eastman plans to sail his new Mead tomorrow, as well as the Able brothers. John Hanson and Ben Fuller will have their stern-steerers, parties planned for Cam Lewis’s up north, and at Polly Saltonstall’s at the southern end. Kristin will be grilling burgers at Baily’s Cove. We will attempt to get some sailing in, too!

Hope to see you there. Launch at Bog Bridge, pits at Baily’s Cove. Ice fisherman are driving on the ice, so I guess we can too, but you didn’t hear it here!

Just a quick note to add to the previous post that we’ll be sailing Megunticook on Saturday as well. There might be a few boats sailing on Chickawaukee tomorrow and the weekend too, but with The Queen Lake in such great shape it would be a shame to miss it. Temps will have shot up to the low twenties by then.