Hilton Head Island: talk video uploaded; a question

 Joe Balderrama kindly sent me a link to a copy of the recording of last Saturday night’s Zoom talk.  I thank him.  With unexpected ease and speed I have uploaded it to my YouTube channel.  Several readers have asked if it would be available and now it is.  I am about to watch it myself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBXawsyjqLs&t=629s

Art asked a question that did not get presented during the talk.

“How much baby skin do you have left?”

For those of you who inexplicably deprive yourself of the pleasure of reading the ‘lines’ page on my main site—-http://inthepresentsea.com/the_actual_site/lines.htm—-this refers to:  life is the process of turning baby smooth skin into scar tissue.

The answer is none.  Zero.  Not a millimeter.  Not all is scar tissue, though I have a lovely new one forming where my left leg has become infected after the recent skin cancer removal.  This is not serious and should be resolved within a week by antibiotics, but it is leaving a nice scar.  What is not scarred is most decidedly not baby smooth and hasn’t been for a very long time.

Hilton Head Island: questions, answers, an opinion, a galloping horse, and a poem

 A rainy day in the Low Country.  Solid overcast with intermittent downpours and gusts.  A small craft advisory is posted for coastal waters, which happens here much more frequently than I expected.  So I have a day in the condo.  After writing this, a little housework.  Reading EXTRAORDINARY LIVES:  The Art and Craft of American Biography.  Listening to music.  Weight workout.  Watching some soccer and the wind in the live oaks and the rain on Skull Creek.  

After Saturday’s talk Joe forwarded a few questions to me that had not been asked at the time.  Thinking they might be of interest to others I post them and my responses.

From Matt:

Do you enjoy sailing out of Safe Harbor on the Atlantic for fun? 

 

How does the sailing on the East coast compare with sailing in the Bay Area?

Generally I don’t daysail much.  I don’t like to go out and have to turn around and come back and I find that it is almost as much effort to go for a daysail as to start an ocean passage.   However, having said that Hilton Head is decidedly different from sailing in San Diego, mainly because there are many places to anchor here and few regulations, so I can sail for an afternoon and then anchor overnight.  My last video was shot at anchor on Election Day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjI6vLEJJPo

They call this the Low Country and another significant difference from California is that a lot of the water is shallow and shoals extend far offshore.  To get completely clear of them I have to sail several miles beyond the shoreline.

In Skull Creek itself, the Intracoastal channel has buoys and is 20+’ deep, but outside that you can quickly run aground, even in GANNET.  I have yet to do so and hope to keep that record.

Another difference is that there is no prevailing wind here as there is from NW along the California coast.  The wind can come from any direction.  And the water temperature varies considerably, from above 80 in the summer—good for hurricanes—to around 50 in winter.

From Scott:

What was the most challenging aspect of sailing a Moore 24 around the world? What was the best aspect of the boat?

In your books you have commented that your prefer boats without lifelines? Why?  What safety gear did you have on Gannett and how often did you wear a life harness?  Did you ever fall or get washed overboard?

The most challenging aspect of sailing GANNET around the world was dealing with the water that made its way below deck even with the hatches closed.  GANNET was of course not as wet as CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE, my open boat, but everything in her is subject to getting wet, including me, and if it can be damaged by water has to be in watertight cases.  It wasn’t until I reached Durban, South Africa, that I came up with a spray hood around the companionway that partially solved the problem of the water coming in there. Actually I did not solve it, a reader who sails a small boat out of the Netherlands sent me photos of a simple spray hood he devised for his boat.  On GANNET it is necessary that any such hood be easily and quickly raised and lowered because I often sail the boat standing in the companionway.

The best thing about GANNET is her sailing performance.  She is so responsive, so quickly accelerates catching a wave or a bit more wind, runs so true.  She is a joy.

Of lifelines, I only didn’t have them on EGREGIOUS and CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE.  CHIDIOCK was an open boat and lifelines were never intended. I have had them on all subsequent boats and am very glad to on GANNET.  Generally I felt that lifelines don’t really keep you on a boat and they cause a lot of holes to be drilled in the deck which can and often do leak.  On EGREGIOUS I wore a safety harness whenever I left the cockpit.  I had a long line attached to an eyebolt inside the cabin so I could put it on before going on deck and a shorter line to clip into the toe rail when I was at the bow.  EGREGIOUS did not have jib furling gear, which back then was new and untested.

I have never fallen overboard.  If I had I would not be writing to you today.  Sailing a boat alone across an ocean there are simple mistakes that you can’t make even once.

From Topher:

You mentioned, that while adrift, your “great pleasure” was having a bit of jam.   While sailing Gannet, I wonder, what is your greatest pleasure?

Standing in the companionway or sitting on deck listening to music, sipping something, while GANNET sails perfectly balanced toward the setting sun.

From Eric comes an opinion about my legacy, assuming I have one.  I thank him for taking the time to express it.

I understood at one point that you were wondering what legacy Webb Chiles would leave behind, I think that beyond the shadow of a doubt Webb Chiles will have definitively proved that it is not necessary in order to cross the oceans to own or build sailboats with battle tank architecture as popular culture or some offshore sailors have always claimed, but as you have often proven a light and fast sailboat well built weighing only half or a third of the weight of the old sailboats can not only be safe but more affordable and available to many. Your contribution to the world of sailing has been not only to change the perception of what is, but also of what must be.  In addition to democratizing an activity that is no longer reserved for the richest or the most do-it-yourselfers of this world.

You change an archaic conception of oceanic sailing to become a modern reality by changing paradigms largely outdated.

Last evening my shoulders ached.  I waxed GANNET’s starboard topsides and was glad that she is not bigger.  I calculate her topsides are less than half the area of THE HAWKE OF TUONELA’s, another reason to like small boats.

I had previously done the transom.

Although while I was working, the line between what I had waxed and had not was clear and GANNET definitely looks better than she did, I am uncertain if waxing will be enough.  As I walked away her starboard side seemed to pass the ‘viewed at a boat length distance test’, but that may be easy for one half blind.  So I have emailed Audrey of the Armada to get on her horse and ride up here and gallop by to give the definitive decision.  Audrey lives near Pensacola, Florida, five hundred miles away.  I don’t know how long it will take her to get here and am a little concerned about a horse galloping down the dock, but I will let you know the results.

I was going to turn GANNET around today so I can do the port side and even considered going sailing.  The rain has intervened.

William Butler Yeats:

Hilton Head Island: zoom correction; Milky Way Ring; Ryan has left

First, a correction.  The information posted Wednesday about how to join tomorrow’s webinar is wrong.

If you want to join you need to click on the following link to register:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_0LrYWr8GTZGgviq31lQ-tA

The time remains the same.  5:00 PM Eastern Time.  2200 UCT.

The above photo of the plane of our galaxy is NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day and was two years in the making.  I quote from the site:

Explanation: An expanse of cosmic dust, stars and nebulae along the plane of our Milky Way galaxy form a beautiful ring in this projected all-sky view. The creative panorama covers the entire galaxy visible from planet Earth, an ambitious 360 degree mosaic that took two years to complete. Northern hemisphere sites in western China and southern hemisphere sites in New Zealand were used to collect the image data. Like a glowing jewel set in the milky ring, the bulge of the galactic center, is at the very top. Bright planet Jupiter is the beacon just above the central bulge and left of red giant star Antares. Along the plane and almost 180 degrees from the galactic center, at the bottom of the ring is the area around Orion, denizen of the northern hemisphere's evening winter skies. In this projection the ring of the Milky Way encompasses two notable galaxies in southern skies, the large and small Magellanic clouds.

Ryan Finn is underway.  He left Brooklyn yesterday afternoon and is sailing fast.  When I last checked he was making 17 knots.  I again wish him fulfillment of his vision.

His tracking page is:

https://share.garmin.com/82X63?fbclid=IwAR2xO6vdkRoPpOcCumASc_Ya5AtTMwi9TA05NKMO5xoQBoURZxXeQFDVUU0

Hilton Head Island: at long last; an invitation

This has been a great week to work on GANNET.  Sunny.  Low’s in the high 30sF and highs in the 50s for a few days, now lows in the 40s and highs in the 60s.  But I haven’t been working.  I have been in the condo waiting for workmen and delivery men.  On Monday stonemasons to fit granite around the fireplace.  Yesterday men delivering our months ago ordered bed.  Today men from a cable company who need access to the attic which in this building comes through our utility room and workmen to replace the baseboards around the fireplace.  This has all been worthwhile and today is momentous not only for the inauguration of a new President, but that the long running renovation from Hell is completed.  This is Carol’s triumph.  There are still more details to be taken care of, but they are add ons.  The place is not fully furnished and may not be for quite some time.  But the renovation really is over.  I can’t yet believe it, but we will go out and buy a bottle of champagne to celebrate this evening.  

San Francisco’s Singlehanded Sailing Society asked me to speak to them via zoom in what is called a ‘webinar’.  I really should have copyrighted my name.  I will talk for maybe twenty or thirty minutes and then take questions.  Unlike many of you I am unfamiliar with zoom and don’t know how this will go, but if you wish to view I am told you can.  It will begin at 5 PM Eastern time/2200 UTC this Saturday, January 23.

Here is a copy of the link I have been given.

You are invited to a Zoom webinar. Date Time: Jan 23, 2021 02:00 PM Pacific Time (US and Canada)  Topic: Webb Chiles, January Guest Speaker  To join: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_0LrYWr8GTZGgviq31lQ-tA

Hilton Head Island: waiting for the delivery man

 

A lovely week here.  Clear skies.  Spectacular sunsets.  Lows in the high 30sF.  Highs around 60.  A great week to be working on GANNET.  But I’m not.  I am presently waiting for delivery of our long ago ordered bed.  Yesterday I had to be here while stone masons fit granite around the fireplace.  Tomorrow other workmen are to replace the baseboards beside the fireplace.  All worthwhile, but confining.  So while waiting, let me catch up on some unrelated odds and ends.

Above you have a painting of the clipper ship, STARLIGHT, in Boston Harbor not long after her launching in 1854.  I run it because it is pretty and thank Tim for the photograph he sent me taken at Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City.

From Dana come this photo taken by a friend of his in I believe the U.S. Virgin Islands with the caption ‘envy’.  I thank them both and quote:

You go through life thinking you’re king of the hill.  Buy yourself a 200-foot yacht, drop anchor in front of the Dupars, the St. Thomas Dupars.  “Apogee” on the right.

 

Then the 240 foot “Lunasea” drops anchor next to you (left), and you can hear “Mine is bigger than yours!” piped over the PA system.  Spend the night making fun of the “little guy next door.”

 

Then the 320 foot “Faith” steams into the harbor Saturday morning, and you realize you’re nothing but a testicle!  Made in Italy, ooooozes sex appeal as she slides into port.  Canadian billionaire  Lawrence Strol.  Life is good.

To which Dana replied:

Then I wander in on my 45 year old 30' sailboat and they all envy me for the simplicity and not having to worry if someone is going to scratch the paint or try to steal my stuff as there isn't anything worth stealing.  Ah life.

As you may have observed I am not a crowd person, but sometimes, occasionally, groups are good.  I thank Alan for this link to an enjoyable and heartening video of a zoom rendition of the sea shanty “Leave Her Johnny.”  Some of the comments are puerile.  Others point out that the song is not from a sailor to a woman, but sailors to their ship at voyage’s end.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Fow61Zsn2s

A frank defining of oneself in six words has come:

Father, artist, sailor, pilot, programmer, drunk.

An added note mentions trying to save jobs and pain.

I don’t put names on these to preserve privacy.

My friend, Carlos, asked in an email for a list of my ‘ten best reads’.

I have given it thought and I have reviewed my list of books read which goes back to June 2009 and have come up with the following in no particular order:

TYPHOON   Joseph Conrad

DEBACLE   Emile Zola

THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE   Thomas Hardy

ANNA KARININA   Leo Tolstoy

NIGHT FLIGHT   Antoine de Saint-Exupery

A SAND COUNTY ALMANAC   Aldo Leopard

BALTASAR AND BLIMUNDA   Jose Saramago

LIFE AND FATE   Vastly Grossman

VOSS   Patrick White

SAILING ALONE AROUND THE WORLD   Joshua Slocum

I am quite certain that if I were to make such a list tomorrow it would vary and I have excluded the epic poems that are among my most favorite books.

I could easily have chosen other works by several of the authors.  Conrad:  THE NIGGER OF THE NARCISSIS;  HEART OF DARKNESS; and others.  Zola:  THE BEAST IN MAN; and others.  Hardy:  TESS OF THE d’UBERVILLES; FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD; JUDE THE OBSCURE; RETURN OF THE NATIVE.  Saramago:  THE DEATH OF RICARDO REIS.  Patrick White:  THE VIVISECTOR.

Of sailing books:  TWO YEARS BEFORE THE MAST   Richard Henry Dana; and although I have not read it for several decades, ALONE IN THE ROARING FORTIES by Vito Dumas.

Had I made such a list a few years ago I would have included HUCKLEBERRY FINN, but when I last reread it, I liked the parts about Huck and Jim, but found the those about Tom Sawyer too childish.

Likewise I would have included MOBY DICK if about a hundred dull pages were eliminated.

Hilton Head Island: audacious: vaccine; changeless

 I have been reading about proas and watching videos of the 36’ JZERRO sailing effortlessly at 18 knots.  Proas have two hulls, one shorter than the other and are sailed with the shorter hull to windward.  I did not understand why they don’t capsize.  Now I sort of do.  No.  I am not planning on buying one, but a sailor with whom I have been in communication for a few years, Ryan Finn, is about to try to sail JZERRO single-handed from New York to San Francisco.

JZERRO has been sailed from the US to New Zealand and back by her builder, Russell Brown, from whom Ryan bought the boat.  

JZERRO is very fast.  I followed Ryan’s track a few years ago when he sailed from San Diego to New Orleans via Panama and observed many 200+ mile days.  Whether she is up to this voyage, including an east to west rounding of Cape Horn, I do not know.  This is truly a sailing edge voyage and Ryan has displayed perseverance and nerve, which you may recall I define as the willingness once one has prepared to the extent of his resources to embark on an endeavor whose outcome is uncertain and may be fatal.

You can read more at a piece in Sailing Anarchy and its links.

https://sailinganarchy.com/2021/01/11/why-7/

Ryan intends to set off soon.  His tracking page is:

https://share.garmin.com/82X63?fbclid=IwAR2xO6vdkRoPpOcCumASc_Ya5AtTMwi9TA05NKMO5xoQBoURZxXeQFDVUU0

I will be following him and wish him fulfillment of his vision.

I read of chaos in the COVID vaccine program.  That has not been my experience.  Being really old, I received unsolicited an email from the Hilton Head Hospital advising me to register with the CDC. It provided the link.  I did and then clicked on a calendar for an appointment.  I received ‘no appointments available for this date’ until March 10 when there were several at ten minute intervals.  I clicked on 12:20 and received a confirmation email.  March 10 is a year from when we first became aware of the pandemic.  That there are vaccines in such a short time is remarkable.  That people are complaining about the vaccination process is expected.

From one of my few friends from before age fifty, Sandy, an American living in Australia, came this photo with her caption: you haven’t changed at all!  Right.

I can’t place the photo or when it was taken.  I note that long before I owned GANNET I was wearing a gannet tee-shirt.

Hilton Head Island: on

 I appreciate the comments a few of you made and emails I received.

Yesterday was an aberration.  I have known despair, as have all who live, but always there was a reason:  loss of love; disappointment about writing; structural failure of boats.  Yesterday there was nothing to point to.

Today was misty and rainy.  I did not go down to GANNET.  I am only doing cosmetics.  All sailing systems have already been restored to pre-circumnavigation levels.  I would have liked to work, but that I couldn’t made little difference.

For whatever indescribable if not inexplicable reason, yesterday’s malaise is gone.

I am sipping post-pizza Chianti.  Hardly health food, but we usually eat well, and I am well.  Listening to a scrambled playlist of soundtrack music which reminded me of a friend I have not communicated with for a while, so I did.

I have correctly called this the dying part of my life.  I have not yet figured that out, but I am working on it.

Onward.  Upward.  Or at least sideways.

Go at life as hard as you can as long as you can.  I will if I can understand how.

L’Chaim (to life).  My favorite toast.

Hilton Head Island: off

 6 PM.  The sun has set.  The sky and Skull Creek have lingering shades of peach and gold.

I look out on beauty.  I hear beauty.  I am listening to Max Richter’s audacious and successful recomposition of Vivaldi’s FOUR SEASONS.  Yet I am having an off day.  For no reason, which is perhaps all the more troubling.  I have access to more money than I need.  I am with Carol.  I am in extraordinary good health for an old man.

Perhaps the FOUR SEASONS is the clue.  I wanted to create something that lasted as did Vivaldi.

I look up from my iPad on which I am typing.  The colors have deepened.  The contrast between dying light and silhouetted live oak trees greater and even more beautiful.

The body of an athlete, the soul of a poet, the mind of a scientist.  That might even be true.

Of the mind of a scientist I have always liked to quantify and as a teenager I quantified what I wanted from life.  I wanted the love of one woman and I wanted to write something that would last a thousand years, having concluded that if a work of art lasts a thousand years, it will last forever.  ‘Forever’ being defined in human terms.

So I have been loved by many women, or like to believe I have, but my words and voyages will not long outlive me.

Is this the cause of my malaise?  That I will not be immortal?  I do not know and I do not expect sympathy.  There are greater problems in the world.

Perhaps I am just having an off day.

Hilton Head Island: an analysis

 Some scientists and engineers read this journal.  One of them, John, sent the following after viewing the video about water circulation yesterday.  I am very grateful for his analysis and want to publish it quickly to correct misconceptions.

I enjoyed the video of the guy with the swirling funnels at the equator but my BS alarm went off.

Here's a back-of-the-envelope estimate of what's going on.  The circumference of the earth at the equator is about 25,000 miles so people at the equator are riding the planet at a speed of 25,000mi/day or 25,000 / 24 =1,040mi/hr, due east.

At a latitude of 45 deg the circumference of the earth is about 0.707 x 25,000 miles =17,675 miles.  People at this latitude are riding the planet at a speed of 17,675mi/day or 17,675 / 24 = 736 mi/hr, due east.

So if a person at the equator aimed a gun due north and shot a bullet, there are two velocities to consider: the muzzle velocity of say 100 mph due north and the easterly velocity of the shooter at 1,040 mph due east.  As the bullet heads toward 45 deg N the people there are only moving at 736mph due east so the bullet, with its 1,040 easterly velocity will veer to the right over land (to the east).  If you shoot from 45N to the equator, the low easterly starting velocity will make the bullet veer right over land again (more to the west).

Back to our guy with the funnels.  The diameter and circumference of the earth vary as the cosine of the latitude.  If he moved the funnels 30' north of the equator, the circumference of the earth changes immeasurably.

Oops, I just Googled a reference and came across the link below that says pretty much the same thing.  I like my version better though.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-somebody-finally-sett/#:~:text=A%20toilet%20or%20sink%20is,in%20a%20sink%20or%20toilet.

To which I replied:

Thanks for this.  I will post it.  I sensed entrepreneurship in the video but lack the math to refute it.  Also I wondered because my experience has been that the Intertropical Convergence Zone, which I still think of as the Doldrums, is not on the Equator.  In both the Pacific and the Atlantic I have found it several degrees of latitude north.  Your email caused me to google after all these years, though much of my sailing life took place before googling existed, as strange and distant as that may seem, and I found some answers.

Here is a screen shot from today’s Earth Wind Map clearly showing the Convergence Zone in the Pacific well north of the Equator.

And here is a link to an explanation why.  I really should have sought the answer to this years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymmetry_of_the_Intertropical_Convergence_Zone

Hilton Head Island: circulation; tough shift change; Marvell; OUT OF AFRICA; big; wax

 First, gratuitous beauty, though perhaps beauty is never gratituitous.

From Larry came two short videos for which I thank him.

The first demonstrates the difference in water circulation north and south of the Equator.  I know this first hand, though even after all these years I sometimes have to consider for a moment.  In the northern hemisphere water circulates around a drain clockwise.  In the southern, counter clockwise.  So do the major oceanic winds.  Think northeast trades and southeast trades and it is easy to complete the circles.  Winds around lows circulate in the opposite direction.

However I have never seen this so clearly demonstrated and am startled by how definite the demarkation is and what happens exactly on the Equator.

The second video displays suburb boat handling and why lighthouses should be automated.  Most now are.  I am not sure why this one isn’t.  A serious commute.

A few days ago I came across Andrew Marvell’s poem ‘To His Coy Mistress’.  I read it in an English Literature class long ago.  Perhaps you did too. 

A different perspective from almost 80 than at 20?  No.  I still think it an excellent poem and advice.

Carol and I just rewatched one of my favorite films, OUT OF AFRICA.  I bought it for $5,00 from iTunes.  I’ve seen it several times since my first viewing in Sydney, Australia in early 1986 as I related in a video on the passage from Panama to San Diego two years ago.  We both enjoyed the film this time as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOngJa_ZMpo

Google sent me a link to a site that offers free ebooks.  Several decades and circumnavigations ago the editor of an American magazine told me that if I were French, I would be a national hero.    This site uses some French, but ends in .it.  Regardless, If the number of reviews is to be believed—and I am skeptical—perhaps she was right.

http://minholivrek.altomarte.it/download/967612.pdf

I went down to GANNET yesterday and put the floorboards back in place.  While there I discovered that my hacksaw has corroded to destruction.  Obviously I seldom use it, but keep it accessible during passages to cut away rigging if the mast comes down.  I need one now to saw the replacement track for the pipe berths to length.

I also applied the heavy duty 3M restorer and wax to a small area of GANNET’s topsides.

3M has two different restorers.  One with a blue label for lightly oxidized hulls which I have not found effective and one with a green label for heavy oxidized hulls which I used in Opua four years ago and found very effective.  Because I have been considering repainting the topsides I have not waxed for the past year or so.  The results yesterday were so pleasing that I am going to touch up GANNET’s topsides and then use the restorer/wax.  With a bit of luck I can keep off repainting until it is no longer my problem.

While I strongly believe that aesthetics count, long time readers know that I consider my boats workboats not yachts and my standard is how they look from a boat length away.  My friends, Kent and Audrey, of Armada fame, whose workmanship far surpasses mine, call this how a boat looks from horse back galloping past.

But not today, which is overcast, misty and cool.  That is one of the great things about having the little boat so close.  If it is a good day, I am there in ten minutes.  If it isn’t, I find other things to do, such as writing to you.

Hilton Head Island: bilged; prices; two poems; the better side of the Equator

 I am just back from spraying a second coat of paint on GANNET’s bilge.  

I went down yesterday and removed the floorboards and cleared the considerable debris that had collected in areas under them I cannot reach when they are in place. I don’t think of myself as messy, but the evidence proves otherwise.  After cleaning I sprayed the first coat from an aerosol can of Rustoleum. 

I may be done painting for a while.

I have ordered a 3M restorer and wax that I have used before and will experiment to see if it mproves the topsides sufficiently so I don’t have paint them.

From Pat in Australia came a list of the thirteen boats he has owned and the prices he paid for them and for which he sold them.  Pat is among those of you with great woodworking and building skills and he usually made a substantial profit.

It happened that several days ago I found myself wondering what the boats I have owned would cost today.  I’ve owned only seven:  the unnamed Excalibur 26 bought in 1967; Ericson 35 EGREGIOUS bought in 1969; Ericson 37 also EGREGIOUS 1973; Drascombe Lugger CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE 1978; She 36 RESURGAM 1983; Heritage One Ton THE HAWKE OF TUONELA 1993; Moore 24 GANNET 2011.

I found an inflation calculator online.  Here are some results.

EGREGIOUS in which I made my first circumnavigation.  I don’t recall the exact amount I paid for her, but it was about $30,000.  I think the base price was $27,500.  I spent another $7,000 to $10,000 preparing her for the voyage.

CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE

RESURGAM 

GANNET

I came across this poem in THE SEASHELL ANTHOLOGY OF GREAT POETRY.  I did not realize that the author also wrote,THE COLOR PURPLE, and I am not sure I understand it.

From Ken also in Australia came a recommendation for SHACKLETON’S FORGOTTEN MEN, the story of the other half of Shackleton’s expedition to try to cross Antarctica.  They landed on the opposite side of the continent and were to set out food depots to resupply Shackleton’s party on the last half of their planned journey after reaching the South Pole.  As is well known Shackleton’s ENDURANCE was destroyed in the ice and he never made the attempt.  The men on the other side did not know that and suffered terribly doing their futile duty.  Several died.  In the very readable book are quoted lines from St. John Lucas

                                We were the fools who could not rest

                                In the dull earth we left behind

                                And burned with passion for the South

                                And drank strange frenzy from its wind.

The deplorable events of yesterday speak all too clearly for themselves.  You may recall that I have long believed and have often said that the Southern Hemisphere is the better side of the Equator.  Some of you may remember that before the last Presidential election I wrote that if Trump were elected I would apply for political refugee status in New Zealand on the basis that I come from a failed state.  Four years later the case is much stronger.

Hilton Head Island: looking out

7:15 PM here.  Long after sunset.  I am sitting near the bedroom window and by leaning forward  can see the green flashing light marking the Intracoastal channel.  That pleases me.  That is the way to ocean.

A fine winter’s day here.  At 8:30 this morning I got a phone call that the rigger would soon arrive to install the wind transducer.  I went down to GANNET.  He arrived at 1:15 in the afternoon.  In the meantime I moved the stuff temporally stowed on the v-berth while I painted back to its more or less usual positions.  Some normally rests on the pipe berths which don’t presently exist and so sit on the sides of the hull or the cabin floor.  Still GANNET’s interior is again reasonably organized.

When the rigger and his coworker arrived he went up the mast with the wind transducer and proceeded to drop it.  It fell into the water.  His coworker instantly leaned overboard to retrieve it, over balanced and went into the 50ºF water and came up with the unit.  He and it back on the dock, he was in good spirits and denied my offer of a towel.  The unit seemed to connect and transmit.  We sent it up to the masthead on a messenger line.  This time it was successfully screwed in place.  

The Windex was also re-secured.  It had been wobbling when last I sailed.  The rigger said he thought the threads in the plastic base may have been stripped and it may happen again.

Not long after the riggers left the wind unit stopped transmitting.  This is disappointing.  Maybe it will be working tomorrow.  Whether it is or not, I will spend no more thought or money on it.  If it does not work, I will write it off as an unsuccessful experiment.  I have had others.  I may be one myself.

From Dan comes a link to a piece from the NY TIMES about one of Katsushika Hodsuai’s ‘Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji”.  I hesitated before including the link because it has nothing to do with sailing and I don’t know that many of you will be interested, but I was and am. This is a remarkable and new way of offering art evaluation.  I knew of Hodsuai’s work though I would not have been able to recite his name.  An artist is his work, not his name.  I learned and am enriched by the piece.  I thank Dan.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/08/07/arts/design/hokusai-fuji.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty-six_Views_of_Mount_Fuji

Few have responded to my request that you define yourselves in six words or less.  There are times I think this is an uneven relationship.  Well, some of you do give back, as did Dan, and I am grateful to have anyone reading.

Only three responses:  a worrywart, a tyrant bunny, a moveable ballast.

You had your chance for immortality and missed it.

Yesterday Carol and I walked along a nearby street we had not walked before and came across  lush landscaping that seemed to come from Jurissac Park.  I don’t know what the plant  above is or that the photo accurately shows the voluptuous texture of the leaves.

Hilton Head Island: the other side; books read; 17,520; neighbors

 Thanks to Carol’s family we have the use of a car for a while.  A few days ago her parents, sister and brother-in-law, drove down from near Charlotte, NC, in two cars and left us one.  We are appreciative.  It has enabled Carol to venture to stores beyond the convenient five mile bicycle range and yesterday for us to go to the other side of the island where we had a picnic lunch and watched people and dogs and birds and a dolphin just off shore.

The ocean side of Hilton Head is a different world than where we live on Skull Creek.  A beautiful wide white sand beach stretches almost all of the island’s eleven mile length and is the primary reason almost three million tourists come here every year.  Or every normal year.  They even come in the winter when as you can see the sky is overcast and the ocean cold.  48º F/9C today.

The ocean side is a nice place to visit, but I’d rather live here with the live oaks and spartina and quiet.

Here is the list of books I read in the last six months.

I worked out more than 100 times last year for the first time in nine years.  If I do my primary workout three times a week that would be 156 times a year, but always there are interruptions.  Last year a sprained ankle and a skin cancer removed and while I can do the full workout on GANNET’s foredeck I can’t at sea and for whatever reasons I did not while GANNET was in San Diego. I think it is a matter of routine that I never got into in San Diego.

2008 and 2009 were my fifth circumnavigation.

2014-2019 were my sixth.

I don’t recall why I started keeping statistics in 2004.  I have done some version of this workout for more than 50 years.

Of the 101 workouts last year, and that does not include weights or resistance bands, 34 of them were what I call 100s.

In the standard workout, in the first set I do 80 push-ups and crunches, 60 knee bends; the second set 40 of each; the third set 40 push-ups and crunches; 100 side leg rises each leg; 150 knee bends.

On days when the spirit moves me I do the 100s.  In the first set 100 push-ups and crunches, 60 knee bends; the second set 50 push-ups and crunches, 40 knee bends; third set 50 push-ups and crunches, 110 side leg rises each leg, 200 knee bends.

Total for 2020:  17,520 push-ups.  

I started writing this entry, but before I posted it Carol and I biked to Dolphin Point.  Along the way we passed a pond around which were dozens of cormorants and egrets.  I commented that there must be a lot of fish there.

On the way back come further confirmation.

That is the bike path in the left foreground.

A closer view.  Enlarged, not by my getting closer.