On a 26 foot Grampian, sailed one year to the marina for winter storage on October 31. It was blowing 40 knots straight at us and the seas were well above my head, standing in the cockpit. The wind died down in those troughs. I had triple reef and had furled the headsail to a beach towel size. It was worrying: even the coast guard came out to see that we were ok — I waved them off (of course). My father in law no longer sails with me! He had previously equated sailing with watching paint dry but stopped that analogy after that day. In order to climb the waves, the diesel engine was needed. . . It took about 9 hours to go 20 miles.
This was Lake Superior within the bay of Thunder Bay, about 20 years ago. My current max comfortable sailing wind is 25 knots now!
