Finally took the plunge and got a Sail for my Outback yesterday and decided to try it out today.
Location was the Coorong down here in South Australia (for the Google Earth lovers 35°32'10.67"S, 138°50'42.09"E ).
With winds forecasted at 15 – 20 knots from the South and the Coorong running east/west this was (I thought) a good decision as there is a line of protective sand hill sheltering the Coorong from the Southern Ocean (next stop Antarctica) so waters were comparatively flat.
Thing were going well as it didn't take long to get the general gist of this sailing biz.
Decided to turn about and this is where things got interesting.
With me feeling a little cocky I was letting the Outback lean to the Left with the wind and getting up a nice head of speed.
Only trouble the left side is the side I stow the paddles on and soon the front blade takes a dive underwater and the whole paddle pitch poles doing a 180 with the back blade giving me a clip on the back of my head, more embarrassment and surprise than pain
.
Now the big question, short of stowing the paddle below deck is there a trick to prevent this happening again?
Thanks from an Ozi left scratching his head
