Tethered to the ground

[rmjohns]

We had kind of an interesting experience this past weekend. We were sailing in the North Carolina Sounds, and had a big family group (11 people are a little tight on a C34). We sailed for about an hour out from the marina, hove to for lunch and then were sailing back. As we were getting close to the marina, we turned into the wind to roll in the headsail with the intent to sail for a while just under main. Once the headsail was in we bore back off the wind and surprising did not really start moving, according to the GPS we were making around a knot. At this point the wind was 15-20 so even just drifting we should have been making a couple knots. We had enough speed to tack around and on the new tack, our speed was still less than a knot. We were like that for maybe 10 minutes.  The water depth was just over 9 feet, so we weren't on the bottom, plus we were moving, albeit slowly.  Finally we pulled back out a good bit of head sail which heeled us over a bit, and we slowly started picking speed up until we back into the 5+ knot normal range.   I saw nothing being dragged behind us. I walked around the boat a couple times and never saw any indication of a crab pot buoy, though the crab pots are out now. Once we had sailed for a while, I took the tranny out of reverse (we try to always sail in reverse) and checked that the prop was spinning OK. We motored back in and all was fine.

The only thing I can figure is we picked up a crab pot and didn't notice it. Some of the buoys they put out are dark so they're hard to pick out in the water. I was surprised though that a crab pot could slow us down that significantly unless it was stuck in the mud and had a really long line attached that we snagged on the wing keel. 

So I guess I'll bring my wet suit down next weekend and dive under it to see if there's rope attached anywhere.

Ultimately we did fine, but I've been looking back trying to think what I could have done better.
1) I should have done a better job looking for pot buoys, assuming that's what we caught. We were doing sail handling at the time so the focus was up, not down.
2) We do have a sonar option on the depth sounder. In all the ruckus, I didn't think to switch to that view to see if there was anything untoward below us. The depth sounder showed 9feet, so again, we had water.
3) We ended up going back the way we came. That was not on purpose but looking back, I think probably helped. 
4) I could have dropped all sail, dropped anchor and dove on the boat. That seemed like a later resort. (maybe not last resort, but later)
5) The rudder turned fine, so didn't seem to be impacted.

Anyone been in a similar situation? Thoughts?

Thanks
Rob.

[Catalina007]

sounds like you snagged a line on your keel or skeg that was attached to something (abandoned pot or Jimmy Hoffa)  and when you tacked it fell off.

[Noah]

As a Pacific coast deepwater sailor with a fin keel, sailing in 9ft. of water would freak me out.

[waughoo]

Noah,

I feel the exact same way, when it gets to 40' deep I start to get REALLY concerned. 

[Ron Hill]

Rob : A similar occurrence happened to me only I took in all sail, got ready to thru out the anchor and prepared to go swimming.  As the boat stopped I went to drop the boarding ladder a crab pot float popped up just off the transom!!   Yes, it's amazing how much a crab pot caught by the wing can slow you down.

A thought

[Breakin Away]

I'll play devil's advocate for a minute and suggest an alternative explanation.

Our boat can have pretty bad weather helm in 15-20 kt of wind if we don't reef the mainsail. In those conditions with full main, I have to turn the rudder so far that we lose speed. When we reef, our speed goes up because of less rudder drag, but even then we have a little weather helm. Interestingly, sailing on our 135 genny alone give almost perfect helm balance in a blow, so if we're going out in 15-20 kt we will sometimes leave the mainsail down and just sail on the genny.

Given those performance characteristics, I could easily envision sailing in 15-20 kt on mainsail alone, without the opposing lee helm offered by the genny, could require a lot of rudder drag to avoid rounding up, which may be slow your speed and also cause you to lose a lot of hydrodynamic lift under the waterline.

[Nicholia]

I was thinking the same as Breaking Away.  When I first got my C34, I was out in 18 knots and decided to go main alone (since that's what I would have done back in the day on my San Juan 24).  I was amazed at how nowhere I was going (hadn't learned to reef it yet, also different from the SJ).  I don't remember looking to see my SOG, but by feel I was just sitting still and maybe drifting slowly to leeward (with any current I may have been standing still as the OP states).  Since then I've gone the genoa only route in a stiff breeze with my I-don't-love-to-heel crew aboard and she balances nicely.

[Jim Hardesty]

I agree that a C34 doesn't sail well on main sail alone.  The power sail is the head sail.  On Shamrock the genoa is cut lower than I'd like, and I do sail on the main sail alone for the visibility.  Power up the main sail, lots of draft ie ease outhaul and sheet.   She will sail on the main sail alone, just not fast.
I think it's worth the effort trying to learn to sail your boat on only the main sail.  Better visibility and easy tacking.  Especially when there's a full cockpit of people out for a casual sail.
Jim

[Ron Hill]

Guys : I like just the opposite.  I frequently sail only on the head sail - 150 % down to ?75%. Like having front wheel drive!!

A thought

[rmjohns]

Yes, my last boat was terrible under just mainsail, but it was a 1970s design with the smaller main and larger genoa. I sailed that boat for 20 years and could always tell when it wanted a little Jib to really pull.  I think the Catalina does much better under just main. Having said that, I won't rule anything out in regards to if it was a crab pot versus just a very slow boat.  I'll have to go out and purposely pay attention to speed under just main. We were hove-to for lunch and were making a good 1.5 knots easy so strange that I would go faster hove-to vs just main. 

[Ron Hill]

Rob : So many times in the Chesapeake and tributaries a storm will really screw up the crab pots and the floats will be submerged.  That pot that I picked up That time - because I've picked up more than once!!) was caught by the wing keel and the line must have  streamed back wards across the rudder so that when under sail I could let go of the wheel and the wheel would spin back to center (mid ships)!!

When a  under water pot float happens there is NOTHING you can do to evade that submerged crab pot float!! Just hope you don't have the engine in gear & running!!

A few thoughts

[rmjohns]

Ron,
   Did you have the bottom checked out afterward? The rudder and prop seem fine, I suspect it was something around the wing, can't imagine there was much damage that could be done to the keel.

Rob.