I headed out one evening singlehanded for a quick spin. There wasn't much time to spare, but I was determined to get a little time on the water. I motored out the channel uneventfully, and entered the open lake. The wind was blowing around 10 to 15 knots - mostly on the lower end of that range, and there were moderate waves. Nice.
I cut the motor after raising the main, and entered a close reach. Wanting a bit more excitement I then unfurled the 150% genoa and hit the gas. Ravat healed over to a nice 15 degrees, put a bone in her teeth and took off. I was enjoying the heck out of this run, and knew turning around was going to be a tough pill to swallow.
The wind continued to build as I put distance between myself and shore. This is common due to the land formation off Rochester. After a while I decided I needed to bring the genoa back to around 100% to reduce heal a bit and rebalance the boat. I headed up a bit to relieve some strain on the furling line. After uncleating the line I pulled, and nothing happened. The furler was stuck tight, and no amount of jiggling or course changes were letting it go. Looks like I was going to stay out longer than planned despite my intentions.
This was one of those moments sailing throws at me which put me in my place, and force my evolution. It is not so much that a stuck genoa put me in peril, but rather that it knocked me out of my comfort zone and out of the comfort of "plan-A". I began considering my options.
The wind dies down as you enter the channel, so I could probably motor into my marina with the genoa out and loose-sheeted. Getting docked would be exciting in a cross-wind with the genoa out, but certainly possible. Clearly, this didn't seem like the ideal circumstance. Next I started thinking about trying to take the genoa down from the furler. Again, this was probably possible, but would be very challenging single-handed. That's a lot of sail to be flogging around.
The last thing I thought of was, why not go up there and fix it? And so I spent some time working on balancing the sail plan so Ravat would stay on a course. I watched the compass for a minute and saw very little change in course. I made my way up to the bow, nestled into the pulpit, and hugged that furler. After some investigation I discovered that the line had somehow jumped the drum and gotten wedged between the "fingers" and the drum itself. Back to the cockpit...
A quick verification showed that Ravat was still holding her course happily. I went below to unfurl my tool roll and grab a pair of channel locks, then back to the bow. The waves were breaking on my feet and legs as Ravat pressed onward. (The picture is a re-creation which unfortunately took place on a day with flat seas). With a subtle bend I was able to get the line back where it belonged.
After inching back to the cockpit I came about and headed back to port. Another small victory in my journey, and a short but sweet sail.
