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Its the last Friday in August and I am at work (the Telephone Company) and if I'm being totally honest I'm daydreaming about retirement, it would be just about this time of year that we will be packing up Rose Lee to head South but that's a few years away:( I finally step out of my office to grab a coffee and boy does it look like a perfect day for a sail. I make an executive decision that I will do a team-building exercise (normally done on a golf course with your peers) but this time the team-building exercise will have a twist. I will be a team of one and do something I enjoy, go sailing (golfing is just a waste of a good walk:). By 1300hrs Rose Lee and I are under full sail with a fresh breeze pushing us along. Isn’t it amazing how quickly you forget about work once the wind fills the sails and the boat comes alive, all is right in my world today, wow! I had 14knots of breeze which is just about perfect for Rose Lee and easily handled with the help of Bobby Lee our trusty auto pilot. I use the self-tacking feature on the autohelm where you push two buttons simultaneously which brings Rose Lee around onto a new tack while I take care of the sheets. The Dartmouth Yacht Club is located in the Bedford Basin a large body of water located deep in Halifax Harbour and in order to get into the basin you pass under two large suspension bridges the McDonald and The Mackay. Our prevailing wind is SW so as you leave the basin the wind is on your nose and you have to short tack up through the narrow's and under the Mackay Bridge. Short tacking Rose Lee when Joyce and I are both on board is challenging and doing it solo is quite the work-out. I was up for it and was pretty pleased losing count of the number of tacks I had to make to clear the 1st of the two bridges sweet. The bridges are far enough apart that you get a little rest before you have to tack under the second one, thankfully. A few long tacks later across the Harbour I was under the second Bridge and having a great time as the breeze carried me across Halifax Harbour, what a day. Once I had gone as far as McNabs Island I decided it was time to turn Rose Lee towards home and have a nice run along the Waterfront as I made my way back to the DYC. It was so quiet with the sails pulling us along while watching then sites along the waterfront, people strolling and lots boaters out enjoying the last Friday in August. The motor started without incident again and I was able to grab my mooring on the 1st try, what an awesome sail as well as a very successful team-building exercise:) Joyce is home from work now and waves from the deck as I am coming ashore in Gypsy(our tender), I cant wait to tell her all about my big adventure.
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