Knot Yet Adventure Travels

Team Knot Yet traveled to Pensacola to take on the Regata Al Sol, a race from the Pensacola Yacht Club to Mexico’s Isla Mujeres (Island of Women). Fittingly, the skippers meeting served margaritas and Mexican food. High marks for the best skippers’ meeting ever!  Andy at the bar: The start was upwind in light air. Double-slotted with the jib and screacher, we passed much of the monohull fleet before leaving Pensacola Bay. Dolphin, a sea turtle and fighter jets escorted us out of the inlet. The wind continued light and upwind, foreboding an arduous 550 nautical miles! The chop and light air led to aggravating tacking angles.  I ventured to fly the drone underway. Launching it was no problem, but encouraging it to stay near the boat was a challenge. Recovering it while underway in a chop was an adventure! So far we have a 100% success rate on landing the drone underway, with almost no injuries.  The Gulf of Mexico is home to birds that only come to shore to mate and nest, o...

  I just returned from an excellent trip to Bimini, in the Bahamas, and thought I'd share the story if you're interested. I certainly am. Jim Goempel and I launched the boat in Crandon Park in Miami, and sailed over to No-Name Harbor on Key Biscayne. There we toured the lighthouse and finished rigging up the new screacher. My first new sail, it was exciting to see it up. The next we day we headed to Boca Chita Key and spent the night by another lighthouse. Thanks to Sackville Currie, I learned that I could depart directly from Boca Chita Key using a shallow inlet. We scouted it out before dark, then headed out that way in the morning. I had been following wind forecasts for over a week using PredictWind, and found a good weather window that got us to Bimini in just under 5 hours, averaging 10 knots. We touched 15 knots several times, at which point I furled the new screacher to be conservative. I don't have a 2:1 halyard set it up on it yet, and the current halyard has some...

  I just returned from a week-long Bahamas trip, and thought I'd post some photos for anyone interested. Jim Goempel and I set up the boat in Jupiter, FL on a Wednesday and docked at a public park near Jupiter Inlet for the night. I planned the trip for a full moon, after hurricane season, but before the start of weekly cold fronts. We left Jupiter inlet early on a Thursday morning. It was a tricky inlet, I don't recommend it but it worked! Out of the inlet, reflecting on the whether we bounced off the bottom once in the process. It was a sloppy upwind ride across the Gulf Stream. I've heard sloppy weather is good for fishing.... so we caught a mackerel. We arrived at West End, Grand Bahama Island, after dark. Although it was a rough ride, we came through fine. The large powerboat on the left came over on the same day, and had sustained enough damage to head back the next day for repairs. Sunrise the next morning, Bahamas-style! Sailing upwind in light air to Great Sale Cay...