After a winter of planning and making a few systems changes, Resolute was launched on March 17. But the new standing rigging (I had already put a lot of miles on the old stuff) wasn’t installed until a week later, March 24. Since then, Lyman-Morse has been fine-tuning the installation of the batteries and charging system.
But I did have a chance to bend on my racing mainsail, which I didn’t use at all last year, so I could take a look at it and (more importantly) make sure that I had all the requisite bits and battens on board.
On March 30, I sailed Resolute together with Glenn Cook from Doyle Sails and local Camden J-Boats aficionado Tom Babbitt, for the first time in 2017. We tested the racing main, a new jib top and an old whisker pole that I bought with the boat but have never used. With oscillating winds of 20-25kts gusting to 30, it was a good test for the whisker pole and the jib top. All went well.
Since then, I’ve been out a couple of times, testing my Dacron delivery mainsail and a new light/medium jib. I still need to get out to recalibrate some of the instruments and double-check the autopilot (which gave me no end of trouble in 2015).
But, mostly, I’m loading up the boat with everything I’ll need: sails, safety gear, etc. I’m also testing communications via satellite phone (weather updates and email) and the SPOT tracker I’ll be carrying—that’s what should be feeding my location to the tracker map on this site.
I hope to do another sail on Tuesday, April 11, to finish checking out the systems. After that, I’ll be provisioning perishables on Wednesday morning, then leaving as soon as the weather looks favorable.
Thanks for this. This is the real reason people build sailboats.
I had been wondering whether it would be possible to keep track of you while you were on your way, and I’m delighted to have the chance. Deal: allowing for time zones and all that, make a point of knowing when 10:30 am EST comes every Monday, and think of us mumbling our way through the topic of the day in the Howard Room, and we in turn will think of you wherever you are on this great adventure. Godspeed.