Too Cool

I recently added a new Standard Horizon GX2100 VHF radio with built in AIS (Automatic Identification System) to the boat. According to Wikipedia, "AIS is an automatic tracking system used on ships and vessel tracking services (VTS) for identifying and locating vessels by electronically exchanging data with other nearby ships and AIS Base stations." So what's this mean to us? It allows us, especially when I'm singlehanding, to see, avoid, and contact commercial vessels that I might not otherwise be aware of. Bottom line, avoid collisions.

Below are some screen shots taken from our boat computer showing a southbound barge.

MaxSea shows the barge as a green target. Bootlegger is red.

OpenCPN shows the barge as a yellow target.

The yellow box has the barge's name, mmsi number, speed, heading, position, and more.

Who Pulled the Plug?

This past weekend the harbor hosted a Cinco de Mayo party, and the Army Corp of Engineers decided to drain the river. Why? Who knows since there isn't a flooding risk upstream. I usually have about 11ft of water at the dock, yesterday I had 5.8ft. Needless to say, my keel is deeply embedded in the mud.

This cove is usually full of water, now it's all mud.

PHRF Rating

We received our LMPHRF (Lake Michigan PHRF) rating today, and have been given a rating of 90. I don't have enough experience on the boat to know whether or not it is a fair rating, but based on my research of other Peterson/Wiggers 37's it appears to be. We should have our ORR rating sometime in May.

Change of Date

We're now going to move Bootlegger to Chicago Saturday, May 26, Memorial Day weekend, instead of April 21. Between the OWS folks causing problems in Chicago and some other issues (kids still in school, travel, etc.) I think moving the date to the last weekend of May works out better. David, Joe, Scott (Joe's son), and myself are definite, Jim and Ronie are maybes. If anyone else wants to go just let me know, the more the merrier.

We should arrive in Chicago on Tuesday, May 29 and put the mast up on Tuesday or Wednesday, May 30. After the mast is up we'll be able to go directly to the mooring, instead of trying to figure out what to do with the boat for a week.

I haven't yet decided what to do about the following weekend practice/race, but once I have a plan I'll let everyone know.

Mast Down

I want to thank Gary Kuncar, Keith Wagner, Jim Sliger, Phil Bonzon, Matt Roth, Parker Roth, Todd Merrill, and Sam Hardy for helping me drop Bootlegger's mast. I've raised and dropped at least 50 mast, and this was the first one that made me nervous: the lift house boom was so low that we had to put the lifting strap about 7 - 8 feet below the balance point making the mast top heavy and prone to twisting.  The mast will break if the spreaders are allowed to go perpendicular to the water, we had a few close calls.

I set the mast up on stands at the same height as the boom so that we'll have room to maneuver under the mast on the river trip.

Volvo 70 doing Mac

The Mac Race now has 280+ entries including one boat that some of you Volvo Ocean Race fans might recognize, Puma II Mostro. She is rumoured to have some of the best professional sailors on board.

And then there were two...

Our sistership, Absolute, has entered the Mac Race. She's carrying a crew of 10, while we're going with 6- 7. If it's windy and/or upwind for most of the race the advantage is hers, if it's downwind and/or light then the advantage is ours.