We went out sailing in the harbor earlier this week. Lacking a destination as we sailed out the channel (we had already arrived
), I saw that a cruising sailboat was about halfway across the harbor, loafing around under mainsail.
Old habits are hard to break. I used to own a Corsair F-27, and would amuse myself by picking out some hapless hull-deficient sailing vessel across the harbor and using him as a race mark. They're more or less stationary compared to an F-27, and after rounding one I would pick out another on the far side of the harbor. It's good multihull entertainment.
Well, this week I decided to see if the AI could run down a cruising sailboat. It happened to be a nice reaching angle, so we were going pretty fast. Faster than the cruiser.
After a while the cruiser turned back toward us. I hate it when they make it too easy.
I passed only a boatlength or so away, and as I waved at the skipper he said, "Hi Tom! Lookin' Good!" "Uh, Hi!," I replied. Huh? Who was that? Looking into the sun, I didn't recognize either person, but saw that the boat was a Beneteau Oceanis 32. OK, who do I know who has one of those? No one. Hmmm.
I got an email from the mystery skipper, with a few pictures attached. I don't know anyone with a Beneteau 32 because I sold this man's Precision 23 through the brokerage so he could move up in size, and he found the boat up near his northern home. He was still pretty far off when he took these first two pics, and was approaching the channel as he took the last pic.