Thursday, February 14, 2008

Boat #1: Pre-Delaney and Mitchell


Lisa and I met in 1989. Delaney wasn't born until 2000, and Mitchell didn't come along until 2002.
Lisa had never sailed before we met, whearas I had been introduced to sailing as a Sea Cadet when I was 13 years old.

In 1993 we bought a Laser II at the Toronto Boat Show.

The Laser II is a 14' planing dinghy (fast!) equipped with a spinnaker and trapeze. She was incredibly fun and a great boat for introducing Lisa to sailing.

I'll never forget the day out near Point Abino when we flipped while Lisa was out on the trapeze. We were flying along with me on the tiller, Lisa out on trapeze (she is hanging off a wire that goes to the top of the mast, feet on the edge of the boat, out off the side parallel to the water) with only the last 1/3 of the boat in the water. Suddenly we hit a lull in the wind, we rounded-up, and next thing we knew Lisa swung away from the boat like a pendulum! The boat then came back up and all I saw was Lisa flying back towards the boat stil attached to the trapeze wire. The boat went on it's side, we were both in the water, and all I could think was "That's it, Lisa is going to freak and the boat will be for sale tomorrow". I was completely wrong! She was killing herself laughing, having such a good time! So other than a bruised belly (from hitting the boom) and scrapes on her shins (from smacking into the side of the boat) all was good and Lisa was hooked!

We kept the boat for a summer, then started to look at something a bit bigger.

No comments: