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YourHub.com \\ Vero Beach \\ Stories \\ Outdoor Sports, Activities \\ Boating

Predicted Log in Vero Part 4 of 4 " The Outcome”

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Contributed by: Robert Scully on 3/24/2008

The Day - So this event took place yesterday, 3/22/2008, in spite of the weatherman's prediction of showers likely, with thunderstorms after 2 pm, mostly cloudy with a high near 76, east southeast wind around 10 mph with a the chance of precipitation at 70%. The forecast was partially true. The weather was foul, mostly cloudy, it did rain and it was cold, but it wasn't real cold and it didn't rain real hard. It started to clear up as we docked the boat for the day.

Indian River Traffic-There was some boat traffic after all it was Saturday and that's part of the weekend. There were some diehard boaters out enjoying the day on the water. Some were just sailing or boating up or down the river, some were actually fishing, the police were out in their boat watching the No Wake Zone at the Barber Bridge Underpass, the Coastguard zoomed up and down the river seeing how fast they could go, just to stay in practice. A barge passed up heading north. A group of boaters passed by with a person water-skiing behind the boat. They forgot about the no wake zone passing under the bridge. Some of the Vero Beach Power Squadron boats, which were in the contest, as well, passed us on various occasions.

The boat, occasionally called a party boat is a 25 ft long Chapperal, mostly fiberglass with a canvas canopy over 1/3 of the boat. Its a deck boat fiberglass boat moved thru the water by a V8 inboard/outboard. John had it out for the day from the Freedom Boat Club (freedomboatclub.info), which he belongs to.

The gang met at the waters edge of the MacWilliams Boat basin next to the squadron building. We talked for a bit and headed into the building and turned in all the paper work. Jack Knauss,a member in good standing and avid boater, was our observer.

We set her at a constant cruse at 1600 rpm, which is about 6.5 - 7.5 miles per hour, depending on where you are in the river. There is a relationship to vessel speed, which also relates to the current, what time it is in relationship to the tide, whether its going in, or going out or its at a lull. We had talked about the wind factor the prior day, which was a factor in determining vessel speed for the contest. There was NO wind most of this day.

The trip was approximately 20 miles long and took us about 3 plus hours to complete. There was a lot of time to talk about anything on your mind. Most of the stories were about boats, or boating, and everyone had things to share. You can learn a lot about a person on a slow boat ride. I heard one boat did the trip in about 50 minutes.

First place winner was Captain John Spilman. That means he had the least amount of variance to his predicted Log. I was on his boat. There is nothing wrong with being on a winning boat.

So if you liked the story and want to get in on the action visit us at www.verobeachps.org

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