Outdrsmn: Vacation is over

--This is a double post. The older new post is just below this one. I got lazy and didn't plug the photos into the previous post till now--

All in all it was just what I needed as far as R&R. The wind definitely could have been better though. On Thursday, After I wrote the previous post I was blessed with 3 hours of planning wind. Once the storm cleared out we got some gusty SE in the 14 to 18 range and I even got use my 6.7 instead of the 7.8. That evening we went to our friends house for part two of our 8th annual seafood night. We bought way too much food for the previous night so we had to do it again.

Friday the wind was again light so we packed up the 4x4 and headed out to the beach nearest Hatteras inlet. I haven't done this in a couple years, I had forgotten how much fun it is. The surf was a blast to play in. The larger waves came in around 3 feet. The area where we were had a gentle sloping bottom and the tide was low. That combination allowed for some pretty good rides for the kids on the boogie boards.

ORV

That evening when we got back to the house there was a little wind, S 12 to 15. I grabbed the 7.8 again and made a few runs on the Hifly. Since the Cross hadn't been wet all week I put the 7.8 on it just to see what would happen. 7.8 is the largest recommended sail for the 102l Cross so I didn't have much hope of it doing anything with the 9.5 Surfgrass fin on it. Once the board got some forward momentum (schlogging) it just wanted to go upwind. I was really expecting to have to walk the board back upwind with the smallish fin and big sail. Strange thing was it actually schlogged upwind better than the Hifly with the 7.8 and twin 29 cm weed fins. I went ahead and sailed out to where the wind was stronger on my previous runs. Unfortunately the wind had dropped off so I couldn't get the board to plane up. Being that the wind was light I tried to tack the board to get back in. With the big sail on the small board naturally I fell in. I struggled for 15 minutes trying to get sailing again. I was bound and determined that I was not going to walk/swim the board back the 1/2 mile or so I sailed. The wind was too light to do a deep water beach start and the sail was to big to uphaul on that board. I'm sure with practice I could do it though. Finally I caught enough of a gust to mount the board. With great effort and what felt like a hula dance I was able to get enough momentum to get balanced and sail back to shore. I had to push hard with the rig to make the board go downwind, I managed to sail within 50 yds of my launch area. I would have never imagined having to do a downwind walk but that's what happened.

One of the other great things about being on Hatteras Island is the abundance of wildlife. The number of small crabs scurrying about after the rain surprised me. The kids found turtles, hermit crabs, skates and even had a water snake swim much too close while wadding in the sound. I saw a small sand shark swim by while in the ocean. There were numerous species of seabirds including the resident ducks and a crane. There was a possible Sasquatch sighting, we even had a Hornet doing ariel maneuvers directly behind us over the sound.