We bought an Open!

Well we decided to get the open. The test sail confirmed everything we thought looked good on paper. Layline happened to have a white hull in stock and honored the new American pricing even though it’s a French built boat. They also happened to be coming north to Annapolis for a regatta so the dragged the boat up with them. My parents took a drive down to Annapolis on Thursday to pick it up. They had horrible weather down there so my parents decided to stay through Saturday morning. We rigged the boat Saturday night in around 2 hours (not bad for a brand new boat). Unfortunately mothers day kept us off the water Sunday.

Last night we finally got to sail it for the first time. It was a light air night, but we still had a blast. Who knows how we’ll do around a course in light air (the boat likes hot angles) but we were moving quite well last night in 6~8 knots of breeze.

I also gybed the boat “alone” no problem (Dad’s only help was to step on the sheet) and doused the chute alone as well. Seems like I should be able to sail the boat alone easily in ~15, more w/o the chute for sure, but I’d bet ~20 with the chute will be possible alone once I have more time in the boat.

Check out 2 videos I snagged last night:

We’re thrilled with the boat. It will be interesting to see how it stacks up on Tuesday nights, but it’s the perfect little boat for us. So far my only complaint is it really needs a main feeder. The mainsheet is easy to adjust to. It’s not hard or bad, it’s just different, but after ~15 minutes with it again last night it’s getting pretty easy.