Celestial Navigation on the Spit...

Tuesday, 15 September 2015 

 

I went out on the Spit to try and practice some Star sextant shots prior to the Offshore course in BC. On Tuesday there were some wisps of clouds as the sun was setting and it became evident that this would prevent seeing all the stars that I was targeting to shoot. As it happened I was only able to see and shoot Altair in the observation period before it got too late and the horizon disappeared in the darkness. One star shot is not enough to get a fix.

The wispy clouds do make for a phenomenal sunset.

I could see Altair with the naked eye quite well. Altair came up quickly easily once the altitude had been preset on the sextant.

It made for an challenging exercise as I juggled binoculars, clipboard, compass and sextant. It will be interesting to see how this gets done on a boat out west.

Wednesday, 16 September 2015

This was a clearer evening so I headed to the Spit again - same location and ready to shoot all four stars. It took a while before I got going but after a bit of searching I finally shot all four just as the observation period had ended and the horizon was disappearing in the darkness.

It seemed as if all 4 stars were where they were supposed to be so that was the only assurance that I had properly identified each one. Between lights across the lake and planes coming in, it took a bit of waiting and observing before catching and dropping the right object (star) down to the horizon.

After reducing and plotting the sights, there was no proper fix to be gained with the position lines as compared to the GPS fix of the location. Not sure what was missing - the intercepts were not that great.

Nauticed - Captain Level V - 200 Days on the Water

Today represents the achievement from having spent 200 days on the water beginning with my CYA Basic Cruising course at the beginning of May 2011.

After 5 years, lots of courses, many boats and a lot of terrific sailing experiences with family and sailing friends - I have completed the requirements of NauticEd CAPTAIN Level V.

NauticEd is a terrific on-line education system, and I would highly recommend it to anyone that wants to learn to sail - www.nauticed.org. There are a number of components that are free and is therefore worth the initial time to explore it.

So what I have achieved over those 200 days are:

• ISPA certification for Competent Crew, Day Skipper, Coastal Navigation and Coastal Skipper Advanced Sail.
• RYA certification for Day Skipper, Coastal Skipper and Ocean Yachtmaster (Theory).
• Sail Canada certification for Basic Cruising, Coastal Navigation and Basic Cruising Instructor.

On those 200 days I have sailed on 17 different boats as Skipper and Crew, covering more than 3,500 nm (tidal and non-tidal) as well as clocking 57 night hours while sailing on Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, Lake Huron, Georgian Bay, up and down the Strait of Georgia, Florida and the East Coast of Australia.

The best sailing experiences have been the Family cruising vacations on the BC West Coast.

Thanks to Margot and the Kids for allowing me to do all this.

Preview of Things to Come...

Route of 2011 Course

Just over two weeks away is the big trip of the year - a 2 week circumnavigation of Vancouver Island. The chart above shows a possible proposed route that could be a clockwise or counterclockwise route - depending on prevailing winds on the Pacific at the time of departure.

Preparations and study for this ISPA Yachtmaster Offshore course have been underway for a number of months including refreshing my Celestial Navigation knowledge and skills. Other areas of research include tides and currents, hazards to navigation, fuel and provisioning locations and also safe harbour destinations should it be necessary.

The trip will begin from Nanaimo on VI possibly heading north through the night to Campbell River, passing through Seymour Narrows with stops at Port Neville, Port Hardy and an anchorage at Bull Harbour on Hope Island at the top end of the Island. After waiting for HW slack, we will be going around Cape Scott with an overnight stop at Winter Harbour just inside Quatsino Sound. After final preparations and provisioning the next major leg will consist of an overnight offshore sail southwards towards Hot Springs Cove. This leg will be the big one involving watches, Celestial Navigation and dealing with whatever the Pacific Ocean seascape has in store for us. After Hot Springs Cove with stops at Tofino and Bamfield, another overnight passage will take us southwards to the Strait of Juan de Fuca and a destination within Victoria Harbour. Almost done - the final remaining stops northwards may be in the the Southern Gulf Islands at Ganges on Saltspring, and Silva Bay on Gabriola.

Aerial View of Cape Scott

Photo above showing the ruggedness of the west coast of Vancouver Island looking back towards Goletas Channel.

14 days and some 750 nautical miles later - back home to Toronto.

Can't wait!!!

More to come on this...

Sail Instruction at HCSP

Today was Day 1 of 4 days for 7 students of the 1H Basic Cruising course at Harbourfront. My group of 4 were very keen to start learning how to sail in Toronto's Inner Harbour. All are looking to graduate to become sailboat Skippers in the very near future.

Students at Work Preparing to Depart the Dock

Night Race at Etobicoke Yacht Club

Google Earth with Course and our GPS Track

I crewed on Ron Ander's C&C 29 Mk2 boat ALCHEMIST in a 10 nm race from the EYC Race Mark #8 to the Gibraltar Point TE18 Red Buoy, then an offset to the Mo(A) T Fairway buoy and return to EYC.

Winds were 12 to 15 Kts from the East and waves had been diminishing from  visible whitecaps to make for a fairly comfortable upwind leg. Downwind the spinnaker was used from just before the Morse A buoy to the Gybe before the Finish. Temperature was somewhat balmy and cooling. Skies were clear, some stars were visible in the twilight.

At first our tack was towards shore until deemed less favourable than going onto the Lake - this brought us on a much better course to the mark after tacking.

Saw a few boats on the water - but became much harder to see at night against the lights of the City. Duration of the race was about 2.5 hours done entirely in the dark.

ALCHEMIST ended up finishing 3rd in its Division on elapsed and corrected time.

OpenCPN Chart with our GPS Track

HCSP Charter to Clarkson on Lake Ontario

GPS Track for a Day of Sailing

Today I took 3 sisters out on a cruise - it was a Friday off for fun in the sun for them. They had no particular destination in mind so it ended up being a very nice, easy sail along the North shore of the Lake. We ended of being on a Close Reach the entire trip there and back. The 3 sisters ended up spending most of their on the bow of the boat in the sun relishing the Sun and catching up with what was happening in their lives.

On the way back stopped off the beach just south of the Toronto Island Airport. We anchored and the ladies all went in for a swim in what was deemed to be very cold water by all. Next stop was the beach at the East and South side of Wards Island. This water ended up being warmer and therefore more agreeable, too bad that it was time to head back.

It was a great all day sail for me, basically single handing SIONNEAN, a C&C 29, except to get some steerage assistance when required to drop and raise anchor or to raise and lower the sails.

HCSP Celestial Navigation Cruise

GPS Track for 8 and 9 August 2015

Just back home after a 2 day overnight cruise on Lake Ontario in order to take some sextant sights to practice some Celestial Navigation with a proper horizon after getting out into the middle of the lake.

Accuracy of the shots needs some work - after working up the sight reductions and plotting the 9 Aug 2015 position against the GPS, it showed a significant error in comparison. Will have to do some more sight practice to get more accurate.

Sun Run Sun Sight Reduction - 2nd Sight

Sun Run Sun Position Plot of 2 Sights