Sorry about the length of this post. I started to post a couple of gel-
coat questions, but somehow the whole story just spewed out of its own
accord. If all you care about is gelcoats you may skip to the bottom.
Several weeks ago I had my first beaching experience. And what an
experience it was. I was sailing with a friend from work on the Great
Salt Lake and decided to go ashore on a nice sandy beach on the south
end of Antelope Island. The wind was very strange that day. It would
gust to 10 or 12 Knots for five minutes and then drop to dead calm for
five minutes before repeating the cycle. It seemed like we were sailing
in exhalations of some giant creature’s breath. Eventually the wind
died to a zephyr but the chop, which is especially choppy in the GSL's
abnormally dense water, chopped on unabatedly. My friend, Michael was
turning a little green and I thought he needed to get out of the boat
for a little while so he could settle his stomach and get his lunch
down. It was a lee shore and although there was very little wind, the
waves were still churning pretty hard from an earlier blow. I learned
the hard way that these factors should be taken seriously in finding a
spot to beach. Add to that the fact that the water is very murky this
time of year before the brine shrimp hatch and eat the algae that clouds
the water. It turned out that a few yards from shore the nice white
sand of the beach gave way to rocks that were invisible in the murky
water. Of course this wasn't revealed until later. The beach formed
the rim of a shallow bay about 1/2 mile across with a scary outcropping
of rocks along the shoreline of its South end. The wind (at this point
only about 1 or 2 Knots) was coming ashore out of the Northwest, so I
beached several hundred feet upwind of the rocks.
We beached with little effort, although the waves were pounding the
boat, making it turn its beam into the shore and causing the centerboard
trunk to spurt sandy water like a severed artery. I did my best to
stifle it by stuffing a couple of tube socks in it. We got out and had
a nice little hike and Michael's stomach settled enough that he could
actually eat his lunch. As we headed back to the boat I realized that
the wind had picked up significantly. The boat was sitting alarmingly
high on the beach with a lot of sand piled up on the port (seaward)
side. After several minutes of grunting and pushing we were able to get
her more or less floating, something I could never have done on my own.
At this point I still wasn't too worried. My biggest concern was still
keeping my shoes dry, so I tossed them onboard while Michael carried the
anchor back from the spot where we had tied it around a big piece of
driftwood. The plan was for me to push the bow around and give her the
old heave ho while Michael started the engine, then I would hop aboard
and off we'd go.
No such luck. This was my first encounter of the unique dynamics of the
raised keel / high freeboard combo. The wind was now up to about 12
Knots and every time I got the bow into the wind and tried to get her
moving the wind would blow the bow around and the beam would become a
big sail that pushed her back onto the beach with about twice the force
of my rapidly dwindling strength.
With each attempt we also traveled downwind toward the rocks about 50 or
60 feet. The water was still in the 40's and I had been standing waist
deep in it pushing and pulling my guts out for quite a while. I
gradually became aware through the faltering nerve endings of my numb
feet that for some time I had been standing on jagged rocks and slashing
my bare feet to shreds. About the same time I realized that the
pounding I was hearing was not my heart, but the sound of my hull
banging repeatedly on said rocks. Visions of rescue helicopters danced
in my head. Now that we were out of the sand the boat was floating but
it was taking all of my strength just to keep it off the shore. I felt
like Sysifus as the wind pushed us slowly down the shore into the evil,
fang-shaped rocks while I danced around in ice water, my nether parts
shriveling audibly. I had to do something quick, since what I had been
trying was only postponing (very slightly) the inevitable and I had
about one minute of strength left at this level of exertion. I yelled,
“Toss me the painter and gun the motor when I tell you!” I grabbed the
painter and headed straight into the wind, dragging the boat (later
considered naming her the African Queen) behind me, Bogart style. I had
to move fast and before I knew it I was wet up to my armpits. When I
yelled, “Hit it!” Michael gunned the motor and , always one step ahead
of me, dropped the transom ladder. As he zoomed pastI grabbed the
ladder, making certain of course not to fowl the propeller with any
dangling flesh. I managed to haul myself onto the first step and rode
there for several minutes before I had him kill the motor so I could
climb aboard.
Fortunately I had brought a change of clothes, and once I was dry and
happy, apart from the numerous foot lacerations, I decided to set sail
for the marina. I turned the crank to let down the keel, but it
wouldn’t go. I was feeling this weird bouncy give around the trunk.
Now I thought the hull was damaged so much the keel wouldn’t drop, so we
motored all the way home, wondering if the hull was going to split open
under us at any moment, and arrived on vapors (another lesson learned –
bring lots of fuel). Once we were underway, I turned to Michael and
asked, “How’s the motion sickness?” His answer was, “Adrenaline cures
many things.”
Anyway, I was pretty tense pulling the boat back onto the trailer,
wondering what I would find. I was relieved to see that hull was intact
and the weird fluctuation I had noticed was just hull flexing slightly
under the weight of keel, which had been jammed with sand and small
gravel. A few more seconds of turning the crank back and forth caused
it to lower unceremoniously in the normal manner.
Prologue: Two days after this event I beached safely and successfully
and without event on another island, having applied all of the lessons
learned on the first attempt.
And now the questions, assuming you made it this far. I ended up with
some shallow gouges in my gelcoat up near the chine and some spots
along the bilge gutter at the very bottom where the gelcoat had
completely chipped off, leaving the darker resin and fiber visible in a
coupld of 1/2 to 1 inch chips. A couple of weeks ago someone (Judy B?)
posted a gel coat repair procedure. I'm sure this will work for the
gouges, but should I use the same process to repair the chips where the
glass is exposed? Also, is there any harm in leaving my Potter in the
slip with these (very shallow) chips exposed to the salt water?
Thanks for your attention,
Kellan Hatch
P-19 #1059, Moondance
Great Salt Lake, Utah