Who REALLY wanted to sail on Sunday?

It promised to be a great day in February, with 25mph winds and 50 degrees forecasted.   But by the time it was done, six of nine windsurfers were rejected, discouraged, turned away, left dry or otherwise unable to enjoy any shreddage in the star-crossed session I’m about to describe.   Brace yourselves (not really)…

The nine windsurfers: Frank, CD, CPU John, Jon Ford, the Wolf, Scott, Jeff Shlecter, Peconic Jeff and your editor.

1.  Where’s the wind?
After an aborted drive to West Meadow (the Wolf arrived first and found suboptimal conditions…a dozen cellphone calls later we were all headed to Iron Pier)  nine windsurfers arrived at the Pier to find barely a whitecap.    Never mind that while driving there our cars/vans/pickups were all being buffeted by big winds…it was blowing maybe fifteen on site.     The Meschutt cam showed the Great Peconic is blowing strong, so we leave the Pier and head for Sebonac Inlet.     Jeff Slechta drops out…now we are eight.

2.  Roadblock!    
One hundred yards from the Sebonac Inlet launch, Sebonac Inlet Road has a fence blocking the road.   Apparently the end of the road is getting washed out and the town has closed it.   They’ve left a narrow passage apparently intended for 4WD’s to access the beach, and we’d use it (even P-Jeff and I with our 1WD vans) except for…

3.  The Case of the Poly-Screwed Fisherman.
In the aforementioned passage apparently intended for 4WD’s is a fisherman’s van.    The van is stuck in sand buried almost to its axles.  It’s also wedged against the fence post, which has put a healthy dent in the side of the van.   Standing outside the van is the fisherman.  He’s standing next to his stuck dented van because he’s locked out of it.  Did I mention that the engine was running?   “He is screwed in so very many ways,” observed Jonathan.   All agreed.

But we had to sail, so by and by the fisherman got in his van and we pushed and towed him out of the way, so we could drive through and windsurf.   All except for CD, who got on the phone and was talking about god knows what for hours.  “You know, that’s CD,” said the Wolf.  Now we were seven.

4.  The Wind Dummies Disappoint.

While Bruce, the Wolf and I rigged, the rest of the crew (Scott, Jeff, Frank and Jon Ford) stood around to see just how we’d do.   When the Wolf planed away on his 5.8 (followed shortly by CPU and I) the gallery seemed unimpressed.   And it wasn’t long until a big lull set in, and the three of us semi-planed back to the beach.   As we landed, Scott and Jon Ford had seen enough and said ta ta.  Jeff decided to rig anyway (“I came all the way out from the city for this session”) and I thought the departure of S&J might work as a wind sacrifice.    Five windsurfers remained.

5.    Who Trusts the Gust?
Sure enough the wind came back up a minute later, and the Wolf, Jeff and I went back out into the stiffening breeze.     CPU was all but derigged, and Frank decided that it wasn’t gonna be good enough, and soon they too left.    Now we were three.

And we got about 2 hours in!     There were small but playful ramps, and we nearly had to rig down as the wind settled in.   The promise of epic conditions never came to pass, but the three of us had some fun.   We really wanted to windsurf!

Comments

[George Markopoulos]

3.How did the fisherman get back into his van??

sounds like you had a decoupling issue?

[Michael]

He successfully shimmied the side door lock with a clothes hanger, as far as I could tell.
When Jon Ford towed him out the guy lost a side view mirror, unfortunately.

Speaking of "side" a side note is that this fisherman was not Fisherman. "Fisherman" is the name one of the crew goes by (I've never heard him called anything else)...he was not with us Sunday.

[F Messina]

Any time in the straps is good time. You had to work for it. But I'm glad you got some.