Good Idea, Bad Idea, Vacation.

In July, I'll be spending a week and a half of vacation time at my grandparents' time share on Lake Maxinkukee in the wonderful city of Culver, Indiana.......and I will be the lone hobie on a lake full of C-Scow owners. The scow owners will gawk and point, while ever so careful not to ruffle their popped collars.

Sorry.....got carried away. My problem is that the cottage has a lovely 3 foot seawall with several feet of sharp rocks directly before it.

Not very suitable to the hobie


Ok, then I'll just trailer sail it all week, like I normally do.......Only the public boat ramp is often very crowded, and has practically no staging area (even when not crowded), and overhead obstructions that would mean stepping the mast once already backed into the water.....


Here we see the poor excuse for a ramp and the two lane road that runs right in front of it. The google earth shot is decieving, there are lots of branches over the ramp. Might even be power lines, I've never paid attention.




Normally the inhabitants of the lake pay a hefty fee to have the marina hoist their scows into the lake, tow them to their house, and then crank them up on boat lifts for the duration of the summer.

I do not wish to pay an astronomical fee, I do not have a boat lift, and I suspect the fishermen using the public ramp would become quite enraged were I to hog the ramp for 30 minutes to rig.

Most of the houses have tie off bouys that they tie their boats to, while headed up into the wind. This way they can back the off of the boat lifts and get the sails up at the buoy.

One of the other family members has a lift for his mono and a buoy, at our cottage.

When my grandmother was growing up on the lake, spending entire summers sailing, they would actually leave all of the sailboats tied to mooring buoys. Heck, the naval academy leaves their C-Scows and MC-Scows, and lasers on buoys at times. The scows have rotating masts, similar to cats. I think they keep their shrouds much tigher though.

Would I be a fool to try to leave my cat tied to the mooring buoy for the week? I could find a way to extend the jib halyard, so as to use it to pull the entire rig tight without the jib..........

I sense it's a bad idea, but I really don't have any other options. I guess I could just sail the sunfish.

Here's a thought. Take a large piece of pc tubing and cut down the sides, so you have two ramps or half pipes. See that tree to the left? Angle the pc tubing at 35 degree angle,(some how) so it aligns with your hulls then tie a winch to that tree and crank her up by the dolphin striker. Or you just bungee the 1/2 pipes under the hull at the dock, the difficulty then would reaching down for that back breaker to get her started up on the break wall. That's a week and a half of not wishing you brought your hobie.

Don't moor it! The loose rig will be murder on the standing rigging. Search this forum for "Moor" for previous discussions.

Can you devise a kind of rack/dock on which to pull the boat? 4x4s upright in the mud/sand supporting 2x4s?

It's a tough call. I recently replaced the standing rigging, perhaps I'll put the old stuff on for the week. I'm only up there about 10 days a year, so I don't want to spend too much time.

I hate to leave the 16 at home, as the lake sees a lot of good wind. It's usually 10+ knots on any given day. There have been years that we couldn't take the sunfish out at all because the wind was too much and the white caps too tall.

The marina is in a very protected bay, accessed via a channel, and I can moor it there for $15/night. I've seen the marina perfectly calm while the rest of the lake has violent white caps. Sailing out of the channel could be tricky.

I'm wondering if I could take the sunfish off of it's lift and use the sunfish lift to pick the hobie up be the beams. It was originally a jet ski lift, so the weight should not be an issue.

Or pull the rig crazy tight when it's moored. I could use a ratchet strap and the halyards to pull it tight.....I dunno. I hate to leave it at home when I've got a nice large lake out front and tons of steady wind. It'll be so much nicer than our dinky little hueston woods that I normally sail.

Maxinkukee is almost 2,000 acres, a lot more than my normal 700.

Maxinkukee is a great lake for sailing. My brother's in laws live right on the lake in Culver. There might be another ramp on the east side off 117. I'd launch it and rig it at the nearest place you can beach it. Get a tow if you have to. The people there are pretty nice. Then I'd dock it for the week. There's not that much wave action that it's going to do in your rigging in a week.

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The ox is slow but the earth is patient

I used to sail on a lake with a similar shoreline. Build a stand on four dock posts with a 2x4 frame. It sat about 2-3 feet off the water and two of us could easily get the 16 up on it. It helps to have a dock to lash the stand to, but depending on how much you beef up the frame it would work free-standing, as well. I think we put the whole thing together for less than $100. Rigging's still an issue, but with poor dock placement at the cabin I frequent I bring my own mooring and paddle out to the buoy to rig and rest. I've left the boat on the mooring overnight with everything VERY tight and it seems to work OK as long as the lake's not too rough.

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Bill
H20 #433
Southeast Iowa

How much does the boat weigh approximately? I muscle my WAVE through all kinds of stuff but she only weighs 250 lbs.

It's hard to gauge slopes, distances and conditions per the photo, but maybe thick carpet straddled over the wall and rocks with a winch secured high on the tree? At least above the "Y".

With a little design thought, you could possibly build a crane arm out of appropriately sized lumber and metal brackets secured to the tree in a triangular fashion that could be removed and stored when not in use.

But, if you were going to go through all that trouble, might as well rig a track style ramp with rollers.

It looks like getting it up and down that grassy knoll would be challenging as well.

I guess I'll figure it out when I get up there.

Oh, I remember the one on 117. That's about a 1/4 mile up the road from us, it's a sand/gravel ramp that where I've seen stuck cars.

I'm thinking I'll call around and see if I can rent a boat lift.

It's a great town and the people are so laid back.

I'd go with a rig like Bill suggests. Make two troughs from 3 20' 2 X 4's each, and line them with some cheap plastic grass to make them slick. Use two 8' 2X4's to keep the troughs the proper hull distance apart. Either make temporary legs for the whole thing or rest one end on the seawall and weight the other end down in the water. You only need to pull the boat up high enough so the wave action doesn't cause the boat to move.

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Alan
'86 H16, Sail #89057

For only 10 days use - carpet on the wall. Thicker, the better.

You'll need help to get the boat started up, but should be no problem after that.

Been there, done that.

BTW, there used to be a Hobie Division 10 regatta on Maxinkukee about 20 years ago.

Hey! There's an idea! Or how about sheets of plywood? 8x10 not wide enough? Then cut it in half and nail them together with 2x4s. Tie a winch to one of the trees to hoist it out.

I think even if I got it up on the wall that the mast would hit the trees.

I think I'll just call and see if I can rent a lift for the week.

You could take the cover off that power boat lift and moor the power boat, then put your Hobie on the lift!

Just FYI, there is plenty of clearance to raise your mast on the road by the ramp. When you come from the east, you can (if there's room) park on the side of the road, raise your mast, then jump in line with the fishermen for the ramp. You'll need someone to drive your car away as soon as you're in the water. And beware of the giant hole at the bottom edge of the concrete, where the power boaters gun their motors to get on/off their trailers. When you pull your boat out, there's just enough room on the west side of the ramp to park and drop your mast. Be careful though, there are trees and power lines on the sides.

My old Interlake fleet always held our own "travelling regatta" there (one member had a house on Long Point) one weekend each summer. About 8 or 10 of us would drive up from Indy, and we would all put in at the ramp, then he'd tow us over to his house. Last year, one guy trying to help get the boats out, decided to drive back to the house to drop the mast. He hit trees, power lines and then a concrete wall, with someone else's boat!

I may drag my Wave up there for Homecoming at the Academy, July 18-20 (plus a day before or after). I'll probably put in by the Naval Building or on the beach at the old motel. The alumni sailing race is on Saturday, so I'll be sailing an Interlake again for that.

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What - Me Worry?


2006 Hobie Wave 7358
"Ish Kabibble"

Except for the shoreline by your cottage, Lake Maxinkukee looks like a nice little lake for sailing. If my MIL were still alive (lived in Monon, IN) and gas weren't so expensive, I'd bring my boat out for a week or so (I'm really getting tired of the heat and salt water in NC). My BIL lives only a mile of so from Geist Res. which if I remember, is not all that great for sailing, though I saw a few Hobies parked at the yacht club.

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Alan
'86 H16, Sail #89057