Florida 120 day 0, Wednesday 5/17
- scottonsax
- May 28, 2017
- 2 min read

This adventure was to be four night raid-type challenge sail in the Pensacola area with many other sailors organized via Facebook by another great guy named Scott. I caravaned to the FL-AL border town of Lillian with my friend JF. Met on the road in Holiday at oh-dark-thirty just north of his boat building shop in Tarpon Springs. Mostly an uneventful road trip, two trailered boats, two vehicles, two friends, coffee stops and rest stops along the nature coast main street, which is Rt. 19 to I-10 to Pensacola to Lillian, AL boat ramp just across the state line. We met other FL120ers rigging boats at the ramp. First night meet-up location was Dupont Point on Perdido Bay about 3 miles SE from the Lillian ramp, and just south of Blue Angel recreation area
Getting this Astus tri, s/v Embouchure, off the ramp was a bit of a challenge. The ramp being at most 12 feet wide, and the expanded beam of this boat is just over 14 feet. So I launched with the amas tucked in. The wind was up a bit, maybe 10 knots out of the SE. Motored to the opposite shore near a sailing center (lots of beached Hobies cats there) and pulled up to the sand. Dropped the hook on the beach and proceeded to extend the akas. I saw video demonstrations of extending and contracting the akas on the water. It is not as easy as it looks. Well like most stuff, takes practice, and this was a first time at it. On the trailer, it’s a two-hand heave ho off the trailer pad and for me, the ama slides out laterally, fairly easily. In less than waist deep water, tried a straight pull out, and made a little progress. Eventually positioned myself between the hulls with my back to the ama. Using one leg to the main hull, used my lower back to ease out the ama and that worked well. The guy in the video sat on top of the main hull at the gunwhale and used his leg and foot to push out on the ama. Was also able to jostle the akas to get the retaining pin in. The video was not clear on pinning. In hind sight, could have used the outer shrouds to add a bit of vertical lift to ama for easier slide out. The splash trampolines were stretched and tied down. Was ready to go sailing now, just 2 miles to the meet point beach head. By then JF on his RoG (River of Grass 15 foot Cat-Ketch) pulled up to the shore to check my progress. I was ready, hoisted the main and we were off.

Once at Dupont Point, selected a beach point to anchor, and proceeded to introduce myself to the other 15 sailors there. First night of the sailing party was conservative, fun, and anticipatory for the upcoming four days of sailing. Pitched the Coleman pop up tent to the starboard trampoline, and had a pleasant sleep.
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