Short Tacks and Tacking Depths.

I was thinking about a certain spot in the Caribbean where the wind and current are always against you. The island to the north is a notoriously deep drop off. You could never anchor there because the water is 65' just off the bluffs.

One thing I've done many times is tack up through there. Tacking is the zig-zag process of sailing upwind since sailboats can sail at most 45 degrees to the wind. So this is a challenging tacking situation--worthy of your full attention.

It is also a good exercise in choosing a tacking depth. Usually my tacking depth--the depth of water where I feel it is necessary to tack is on the order of 10-15'. This particular spot I used 70 for many years and dropped it to 65 and occasionally saw depths around 35 in the course of the tack as the stern swung through the turn.. We were a softball throw away from cliff side and a small thin tiny beach.

Why cut it so close? Because this spot was narrow, the wind and current was particularly strong. Every time you tack you lose a boat length of distance upwind. The fewer of these tacks the better. Also while the water was deep near the shore, it was still shallower than the center of the channel, and much of my progress upwind was made close to shore is current less swift than the middle. Hugging the edges makes sense.

Frequent tacking in a narrow channel is called short tacking. So short tacking through this narrow passage is zig-zagging back and forth trying to make headway against the current and wind both in the most adverse direction.

I've sailed many boats down there, and I think I'd like to sail my own at some point. My boat was made for the trade winds. It would power up and sail upwind beautifully. One difficulty would be handling my Genoa. It is a huge sail to sheet or trim in on every tack. So what I decided I wanted was a self tending stay sail, or possibly a jib also on the same track. That makes it easy to tack, you throw the helm over. It makes for a smaller sail without overlap which develops much more power, so I thought a double or triple head sail configuration would work best.

The idea is the outer sail is a spinnaker or drifter, set flying. The next in is an overlapping Genoa, for longer tacks. Inside of this is a stay sail with a single sheet going to a track just in front of the mast. So if you are in a short tacking situation, you don't use the Genoa or the lighter sails of course, and instead. The self-tending stay sail flops back and tacking only involves one person at the helm or someone steering with the auto-pilot. What could be easier?

Then on longer tacks, when you need more power, you unfurl the Genoa or perhaps a high cut Yankee. My plan is to make a curved track and support it at the ends--through bolted thru the deck, or else a glassed in structure. For the former, I might be able to buy a whole track system from Hanse--and voila--done. Nothing to it but bolting it in, which means it could also be removed if desired.

I think that little stay sail is the perfect place to fly a storm jib. My third reef is pretty deep. At most I'd need a hollow cut trysail about half that size and the pair of sails would keep me going upwind in any conditions.

A bigger problem would be light air downwind sails. In my case, I'd just as soon motor. Light air sails can make it hard to steer unless the winds are very light. I feel they are only necessary close to the equator, and even then a motor and lots of fuel are better. I don't like bobbing around. I like to keep moving--which means that at my heart I'm a cruiser not a distance racer. I don't like hours of tedium going nowhere with flapping sails.

So my boat sails well in light air in flat water--Long Island Sound for example, or the Cheasapeake Bay. It is even better in places like San Francisco or my favorite, the Carribbean Trade Winds. In fact the trade winds are perfect for my boat. It would blast through the Drake Channel light chop like it's nothing. Even the north side waves are not a problem for my boat in those conditions. While in the open ocean, it would be fine, but stuff the bow from time to time.

And because ECHO is heavy, it is one of the most comfortable rides. You can still get sea sick, but not as bad as on a lighter boat.