Overview

Presenter

Conrad Breitenstein  EMail

After a short business meeting, Conrad, our cruise guy extraordinaire, gave a presentation on cruising, voyaging, parking the Snake, and demonstrations of special tools for towing and tree anchoring, and provided advice on easier lock passages, choosing river routes, terminating a loop in high strength rope, Knoxway Bay panorama pictures, and much more. 

His GPS reports he goes 1,500 miles a year, forwards and sometimes backwards, on his Catalina 27 Sweet Haven.  

Summary

This is a rough summary of his wide-ranging Program.

1. •Four sailing activities,
   

2. •Knoxway Bay,
   

3. •Tree anchoring tool,
   

4. •White storm,
   

5. •Dinghy ‘Towbar’,
   

6. •Chart interpretation,
   

7. •Loop for hi strength rope.
   

Four sailing activities

There are four things to do on the River.

1. •Racing,
   

2. •Cruising - just putzing about w/ no destination, e.g., Wednesday Nite Sails,
   

3. •Voyaging - preparation needed.  Traveling to a destination, supplies, piloting, perhaps overnight,
   

4. •Parking - secure the boat.
   

Knoxway Bay

Knoxway Bay provides a very unusual, sheltered bay to anchor in and primitive camping site.  Piloting the dead tree stumps sticking out of the water is challenging, but they provide a good tie-ups for parking.  There is a small, valley behind the Bay with trees and bushes and interesting geological features surround it.

Tree anchoring tool

"Tree stump in the water at Knoxway Bay" anchoring tool.  Conrad developed this to ease tying up to and untying from the stumps sticking out of the water.  There is a wire buried in the loop end to keep it "loopy".

White Storm

Very good war story, abrupt storm, slipping anchors, lee hazards...

Dinghy ‘Towbar’

Every element carefully selected with many upgrades to current version.  Dinghy will track well and is secure.  Can also shift position to keep dinghy safely out of the way, beside the boat when locking thru.

Chart marking

Important to check and mark your charts to pilot river well.  He used an example of the Chart below Lower Granite Dam where the river is free running for a couple of miles.

Loop in hi strength rope

He says typical burying end of loop in hi-strength line doesn't work - too slick.  He reverse-engineered the loop "knot" that he got from West Marine on some sort of fixture he got from them and has much improved hi-strength loop "knot" that will persist.

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