Can you imagine “shooting the rapids”, upstream, in a 70,000 pound boat? Well we did it today, twice. This morning we passed through “Hole in the Wall”, a 2 mile channel that’s about 1000’ wide much of the way, but narrows to 400’ at the mouth. The tide was against us and running 6 knots according to the charts. This afternoon we did the Upper Rapids of the Yaculta Channel. This channel was about a mile wide but with currents as strong as those at Hole in the Wall. We’ve included a picture of both, but they don’t do justice to the reality. At Hole in the Wall there was white water swirling, eddying along the shoreline as the water whipped around the corners. In the upper rapids the water would “boil”, and create giant whirlpools. In one place you could see a 3-4 foot difference in the height of the water, due to the wild currents resulting from the changing shoreline and bottom profile. It was exciting. Bob was at the helm as we passed through Hole in the Wall, with Greg close at hand. Greg piloted us through the Upper Rapids with Bob glad that he was watching. Greg worked up a sweat fighting the wheel as the current tried to whip us around. At one point our forward speed dropped to less than 2 knots, and this was at the same engine RPM that usually pushed us along at 8 or 9 knots.
Insert pics of sail boat at upper rapids and hole in the wall
08/05/09 6 PM
Can you imagine “shooting the rapids”, upstream, in a 70,000 pound boat? Well we did it today, twice. This morning we passed through “Hole in the Wall”, a 2 mile channel that’s about 1000’ wide much of the way, but narrows to 400’ at the mouth. The tide was against us and running 6 knots according to the charts. This afternoon we did the Upper Rapids of the Yaculta Channel. This channel was about a mile wide but with currents as strong as those at Hole in the Wall. We’ve included a picture of both, but they don’t do justice to the reality. At Hole in the Wall there was white water swirling, eddying along the shoreline as the water whipped around the corners. In the upper rapids the water would “boil”, and create giant whirlpools. In one place you could see a 3-4 foot difference in the height of the water, due to the wild currents resulting from the changing shoreline and bottom profile. It was exciting. Bob was at the helm as we passed through Hole in the Wall, with Greg close at hand. Greg piloted us through the Upper Rapids with Bob glad that he was watching. Greg worked up a sweat fighting the wheel as the current tried to whip us around. At one point our forward speed dropped to less than 2 knots, and this was at the same engine RPM that usually pushed us along at 8 or 9 knots.
Insert pics of sail boat at upper rapids and hole in the wall
08/05/09 6 PM
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