Open House at Crow's Nest Yachts this weekend

Crow's Nest Yachts is having an Open House this weekend, February 13-14.  They will have four sailboats in their indoor showroom available for walk-throughs, and will be hosting a range of informational seminars both of the days. Nothing like walking thru a big new sailboat to get you jazzed for sailing! It's a nice late winter treat for us in the Twin Cities, as the Minneapolis Boat Show is mostly a powerboat and pontoon affair. The boats on display will be

Hunter 31
Beneteau 34
Beneteau 40
Hunter 41 DS

Although the Bennies will be my favorites, I'm very interested to see the the 41DS. I've yet to step inside a Deck Saloon style boat, and am really looking forward to that. From the pictures I've seen, the exterior design is not quite as graceful as the current Jeanneau DS models, but that's a really high bar to reach. OK, they are clearly NOT Lake Harriet boats, but fun to look at!
The Open House run from 10:00AM to 4:30PM both days.

Saturday11:00AM - "ALL ABOUT CANVAS" presented by SHIP SHAPE CANVAS
1:00PM - "HAND HELD GPS NAVIGATION" presented by WEST MARINE
3:00pm - "WORKING WITH A CERTIFIED YACHT BROKER" presented by CNY

Sunday
11:00 - PASSING USCG BOARDING INSPECTION
1:00- INTRODUCTION TO SAILING presented by CNY


Sounds like a great time. I've bought a boat at CNY and they are great boat people, fair and knowledgeable. They are located on the North-East corner of the 94/x94 junction in Oakdale. They are on the web HERE.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

DNR map of Lake Harriet

Image
The Minnesota DNR publishes a bottom contour map of Lake Harriet. Although not really intended for ship navigation, it shows good anchorage locations and is handy to have on-board. It also shows that unlike Lake Calhoun, Lake Harriet is uniformly deep, and that means that is is mostly free of the nasty Milfoil that plagues its sister lake. The full-size map in PDF format is HERE . FYI, a map of Lake Calhoun is  HERE .  If you own a Garmin handheld GPS and are interested in a FREE depth chart of the lakes, be sure to see this post HERE .
Read more

Milfoil, and maps of where to expect it

Image
It's a fact of life, both Lake Harriet and Lake Calhoun are plagued by Eurasian Milfoil. This non-native water plant was brought to the lakes on the propellers of powerboats. Once it hits a lake, there is little to do except try and control it by mechanical harvesting. It is a slow and costly process. Milfoil grows into a thick clumpy mat, and depending on your keel and rudder configuration, sailing into it can range from a nuisance to a danger. But where might you find it? Well, the key is that the Milfoil seeds need sunlight to sprout, so on Minneapolis lakes, that means less than 10 feet of water. For everyone's benefit, I have created two maps that show the problem areas. See them after the break:
Read more

Keeping an eye on swimmers

Image
Maybe it's just me, but it seems there are a LOT more people free-swimming across the lakes. I'm sure it is people training for the triathlons, and I didn't give it much thought until last night, when we almost ran over one. We were reaching at about 5 knots, sitting on the low side to induce some heel when we quickly slipped by a swimmer. We didn't see him, and he didn't hear us. I don't know who was more surprised, but I DO know who was in more danger. There was over 20 boats on the lake last evening. Under these conditions, swimming in the open water is just dangerous. I knew the MPRB was thinking about setting up open swim areas, but was pretty sure they had not done so. I called them, and they confirmed that open swimming was illegal, and pointed me to THIS page on their site. In addition, that told me I should call 911 to report swimmers. I'm not sure that I'll do that, but I would really hate to hit one, or even come close. I don't know ...
Read more