It's a power boat.

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Roger Long



"Capt. JG" wrote in message
...
"Roger Long" wrote in message
...
There has been a Canadian flag mega yacht in the 150 - 200 class
named "Floridan" tied up in Portland for the past couple weeks.
It's about as big a private yacht as I've seen up this way in the
past couple years.

I was heading back in today solo and close hauled in a good fresh
breeze with the boat working hard under two reefs and hoping to
clear Ram Island without having to make a short tack. The
"Floridan" was coming out and settled on exactly the opposing
course with her stemhead exactly lined up with her mast. I watched
for a long time thinking they must take a slight deviation out into
the 3000 or so miles of open water to their starboard but the angle
never changed.

Finally, at about half a mile, I eased the sheets and bore off
until I could at least could see a little angle on the hull and it
wasn't like staring directly down the sights of a shotgun from the
wrong end. Cursing the loss of 100 yards on what was going to be a
pretty tight squeak to clear the island, I watched her pass about
100 feet off my beam. Then, I got to deal with the wake of a large
displacement hull going nearly hull speed on top of an already
considerable sea.

The captain was standing on the bridge wing having a ciggy with the
autopilot on and never even waved.

As someone said, Yes, the rich are different than you and I.

Keep an eye out for this turkey if you're cruising downeast. It's a
bad one.

Roger, was she on starboard tack, engine, or restricted in her
maneuverability?

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"j" ganz @@
www.sailnow.com