After dropping the sails I slam my shoulder into the mast and use all of my might to hold the mast in place. The crashing of the waves made it painful to hold the mast up. As small as the waves were, they still jostled the boat enough were the weight of the mast was being placed on the starboard side. While I was holding up the mast my father was searching for a place to re-connect the shroud so we could concentrate on getting back to shore. This was proving to be unsuccessful and the length of time was making it unbearable to hold the mast up for much longer.

Finally after about an hour we were able to tie the shroud of to the port side jib block. While I paddled, my father was pulling on the shroud to hold up the mast. This was extremly painful for my father and tiring for myself. The wind was picking up and the tide had shifted, we were being taken deeper out into the lake faster than I could paddle. My father; holding on the the shroud, repeatedly blew on a distress whistle, hoping a near by boat would hear us, come to our rescue and tow us to shore. Unfortunately it was geting late and there were no other boats in site, we were alone on the lake and in serious trouble. With a water temperature below 60 degrees, swimming was no option, hypothermia was a factor and my fathers heart would not have been able to take the cold.

Over two hours of paddling had passed and we were making no progress. The tide had taken us further out into the heart of the lake, and floating to Canada was a fear. My father was becoming weak from holding up the mast so I had to think of something or we were going to be spending the night out on the water. I then decided to attempt sailing with the jib sail. With the wind coming into the starboard side, this was dangerous, I didn't want to add to much weight into the sail and lose the mast. So I unrolled about half of the jib and tried sailing towards shore. This approach seemed to be helping, so I traded places with my father and let him take control of the stick. Rigt away I was amazed at the will of my father, the weight of the mast was very difficult to hold and he'd been doing this for hours. We were making small progress at this point due to only being able to roll out a partial jib. After trying to use a full jib the wind and waves nearly poped me forward enough for the mast to generate momentum towards falling. This had to change, we needed to secure the mast better or we were doomed.

"I'm going to try putting on the harness Dad, latch onto this line and use my body weight to hold the mast in place OK!?" I then slowly wiggled my way into the harness while holding onto the "jerry-rigged" shroud. Once into the harness I stood up and latched onto the shroud. Not being able to lean back far enough caused be to lose my balance on the first bob the boat took. The mast poped and jiggled as I quickly dropped to the trampoline and grabbed the shroud with my arms. That was not going to work and I had to think of another solution.

"Wait, the trapeze is connected to the mast, why don't I just hang from the trapeze?" I ask pretty much just looking for confirmation that it was a good idea. So I latch onto the trapeze and hang off the port side of the boat - this was a winning solution. My body weight was plently to counter the mast on the port side, and I then suggested using a full jib to dail back to land. With a good wind we were moving well, and my worries began to fade - we were going to make it back, and this was much better than freezing to death.

The course we were on took us right into the bay next to the one we sailed out of, so walking back to the club house wouldn't be a problem. I could head back and grab spare parts to fix the boat, or get the motor boat to tow us back. We crash landed onto a private beach and there was a family having a picnic so I was going to forget about walking and ask for a ride. "Hi, My name is Brad and as you can see we had to crash land on your beach here. Would it be possible to catch a ride from someone so I can get my boat back?"

Luckily my father new the man who owned the property -can't go anywhere and not find someone that the Shipston's don't know- so he was happy to give me a ride back to the club. Once I got there I explained to my fellow fleet members what had happened and they dug up some parts so I could fix the boat well enough to sail back. I headed back to were I left my father and the boat and using the parts given to me, I was able to re-attach the shroud and set the main sail.

We thanked the family for their assistance, jumped back onto the boat and headed out once again. This time all of the rigging was secure and the wind was in our favor. We had a smooth sail back to our beach and the fleet was cooking some food for our return. All was well and I was able to give my old man a fathers day we will never forget.

I was initially thinking of naming my boat "The Blue Torpedo" but now due to the number of adventures I have had, I am going to name it "The Minnow".