Our Sprint Holiday
Posted: Sat Oct 29, 2016 10:56 pm
So Jane and I are back from our first (short) holiday with our Sprint 15.
We went to Lee-on-the-Solent (drove to the M27 services late on Sunday night for some sleep, then onwards on Monday morning). This was our first journey with the Sprint 15 on the car roof while towing the caravan.
The combination of 4x 30cm Rooster Deluxe Cordura Roof Rack Padding for the hulls and cheap ratchet straps from Screwfix worked really well (we positioned the hulls with the front beam socket just behind the front roof rack bar). We added lines from the rudder pintels to the towbar and from the bridle attachments to the car tow loop to stop them shifting sideways. There was some wind noise which turned out to be from under the front roof rack bar where the clearance under the padding was howling. Sorted that with a rolled old towel. Fortunately the long mast section just fitted diagonally in our caravan.
20161024_081507
We were really pleased with how easy it was to get the hulls on and off the car and the whole boat dis-assembled and re-assembled.
We paid for 4 day memberships at Stokes Bay Sailing Club where people were very friendly if a little surprised that we went out even when there was not much wind and also that we wanted to go out for the whole day. Maybe moth sailors get tired of falling in after a short while
Anyway we managed four nice sails.
Monday: 9.1 miles to Ryde https://www.strava.com/activities/754633730
Tuesday: 14.1 miles to a buoy off Cowes https://www.strava.com/activities/755501193
Wednesday: Much more wind and 25.1 miles to Cowes and then towards the Hambles https://www.strava.com/activities/756555935
Thursday: to Bembridge 12.6 miles with the roughest chop of the week https://www.strava.com/activities/757476743 and then packup and home by 11pm
The Sprint 15 proved to be brilliant for two of us going out for really nice sails together. No scary moments, comfortable and fast. Easy to eat lunch while sailing (downwind at least).
20161025_124253
We did find the windward leg back from Bembridge very very wet
The front beam kept slicing the top of waves off and dumping them on the trampoline Didn't cause any real problems and we were still moving nicely. Still it was great that when we got back in we could just take our drysuits off and be fully dry underneath - made it much easier when living in a small caravan and going out each day.
This was exactly the sort of thing we bought the Sprint 15 for. For this the Sprint 15 is unique as an easily car top-able dinghy that is great to sail with two adults (and not need to trapeze). Doing some racing is a surprising bonus
I'd love to encourage more sailing clubs to make a day membership visible on their website. On a holiday like this we need to be able to store the boat securely in a dinghy park at night as we don't want to dismantle each day to put back on the car roof, sadly there are few campsites with direct dinghy launching (although I'm sure we will go to places like Loch Lomond - where we once took the 3 young kids with a Laser 16 behind a VW camper).
We went to Lee-on-the-Solent (drove to the M27 services late on Sunday night for some sleep, then onwards on Monday morning). This was our first journey with the Sprint 15 on the car roof while towing the caravan.
The combination of 4x 30cm Rooster Deluxe Cordura Roof Rack Padding for the hulls and cheap ratchet straps from Screwfix worked really well (we positioned the hulls with the front beam socket just behind the front roof rack bar). We added lines from the rudder pintels to the towbar and from the bridle attachments to the car tow loop to stop them shifting sideways. There was some wind noise which turned out to be from under the front roof rack bar where the clearance under the padding was howling. Sorted that with a rolled old towel. Fortunately the long mast section just fitted diagonally in our caravan.
20161024_081507We were really pleased with how easy it was to get the hulls on and off the car and the whole boat dis-assembled and re-assembled.
We paid for 4 day memberships at Stokes Bay Sailing Club where people were very friendly if a little surprised that we went out even when there was not much wind and also that we wanted to go out for the whole day. Maybe moth sailors get tired of falling in after a short while
Anyway we managed four nice sails.
Monday: 9.1 miles to Ryde https://www.strava.com/activities/754633730
Tuesday: 14.1 miles to a buoy off Cowes https://www.strava.com/activities/755501193
Wednesday: Much more wind and 25.1 miles to Cowes and then towards the Hambles https://www.strava.com/activities/756555935
Thursday: to Bembridge 12.6 miles with the roughest chop of the week https://www.strava.com/activities/757476743 and then packup and home by 11pm
The Sprint 15 proved to be brilliant for two of us going out for really nice sails together. No scary moments, comfortable and fast. Easy to eat lunch while sailing (downwind at least).
20161025_124253 We did find the windward leg back from Bembridge very very wet
The front beam kept slicing the top of waves off and dumping them on the trampoline Didn't cause any real problems and we were still moving nicely. Still it was great that when we got back in we could just take our drysuits off and be fully dry underneath - made it much easier when living in a small caravan and going out each day.This was exactly the sort of thing we bought the Sprint 15 for. For this the Sprint 15 is unique as an easily car top-able dinghy that is great to sail with two adults (and not need to trapeze). Doing some racing is a surprising bonus
I'd love to encourage more sailing clubs to make a day membership visible on their website. On a holiday like this we need to be able to store the boat securely in a dinghy park at night as we don't want to dismantle each day to put back on the car roof, sadly there are few campsites with direct dinghy launching (although I'm sure we will go to places like Loch Lomond - where we once took the 3 young kids with a Laser 16 behind a VW camper).
