Yuba 9\9 9\12 5.4 to 7.5

[Sarah Ranes]

It was nice to see so much water still in Yuba! Hardly anyone there! Friday we arrived to white caps on the whole lake. So we set up camp on the west beach, as quickly as we could and decided to join Willie up by the dam. I have never launched from there before so we gave it a try. the wind was strong coming over the dam from the south, kinda squirly on the far side. 5.4 worked well for a while until the black sky and lightning scared us off the water. We packed up and headed back to camp. As we pulled up, the water was glassed off, then with in 10 minutes it came in from the north, and was white smoke on most of the lake in no time. I don't think the 3.5 was small enough. Well that did not last for long either and mellowed out to just a north breeze, that felt cold!
Sat we had 4 friends that wanted to learn to ws. I gave them a land lesson first, then we hit the water. they all did very well and seemed to get the concept of steering and turning. I can't believe what a difference the Start board made! ( Thanks Fred and Lana)
Linda got plenty of rides on the carve 155 and 7.5 sail. After lessons, I got some rides on Linda's gear too. Then it picked up even more and I rigged the 6.5 and 91 ltr board. Layne and Cindy were getting rides too. The wind was extremely gusty next to the shore and it was challenge to make it out to the wind line, but once you did, it was some screaming rides, making me wish I was on the 5.4. Lot's of good rides and we all made it back in!
Sunday was really light, and we only saw slight caps for about 15 min...not enough to even rig the fat gear. Monday was about the same, so we packed up early afternoon and headed back. I did see a few more slight caps as we pulled out. Over all a fun and relaxing weekend.