Marathon: accelerating

        Google alerts, to which I do not recall engaging, sends me emails when my words appear online.  Usually these are unauthorized use of “A sailor is an artist whose medium is the wind”—all that I expect will be left of seventy decades of struggle and passion and joy—but I just received one that quoted me from STORM PASSAGE as saying:   “I would have set my course at that instant not for the nearest star but for the farthest.”

        I don’t recall ever writing that.   It is decades and millions of words ago, but I would be proud if I did.  And while frayed by time and chance, I am still what I was or I am nothing,

        So now I find myself considering a passage of six hundred miles, not light years.  

        The forecasts are not what I want.

        Not the nearest star but the farthest.  

        The forecasts show another front with strong gale force north wind in the middle of next week.

        I may leave Saturday instead of Sunday and try to reach Port Pierce before the next front.   I care about protecting GANNET, whose hull/keel cracks prove that I have taken her far beyond anything for which she was ever conceived, more than I do myself.  But tomorrow I might just buy another bottle of Laphroaig and then last it out at sea.

        I am seventy-six years old.  I am a work in progress. 

Marathon: coastal

        A year ago I was in Durban, South Africa, looking for a weather pattern that never appeared.  Now I am doing the same thing, though on a lessor scale.  

        I’d like five days of west and south wind.  I actually like six, but five should be enough.  It isn’t happening, so as I did last year I am going to depart and adapt to whatever does happen.

        Strong north wind is due to be replaced by east wind this weekend.  The course for the first fifty miles from Marathon is ENE to NE, following the curve of the Florida Keys, and from there roughly north the rest of the way.

        I don’t believe in long range forecasts, but what I see indicates light wind for a few days next week, then stronger wind, perhaps from the undesired north.

        GANNET’s interior has three modes:  passage, harbor and chaos.  Presently she is in harbor mode with a few more stray objects around than usual.  On Friday I will move her into passage mode.  And on Sunday I will probably leave my side tie here at Marathon Boat Yard and sail out to pick up a mooring near Sombrero Light, where I can remove and stow the Torqeedo more easily than when underway.  If it is not too rough I’d like to spend the night there and sail off the mooring when wind comes up Monday morning.

        What I do from then on I’ll make up along the way.

        I’d like to make the passage non-stop, but it is possible I will pull in somewhere.

        That I am going to sail offshore rather than power up the Intracoastal surely goes without saying.

        Although this is a less than 600 mile passage and GANNET has made one ten times that long, I do not take it lightly.  On coastal passages there are more things to run into and more things to run into you than  while crossing oceans.  

         I really like to go out and across, but I will be a coastal sailor for the foreseeable future.  From here to Hilton Head Island, from Hilton Head to the Chesapeake and back if I do that later this year, even all the way from Hilton Head Island to San Diego via Panama is alongside land, not away from it.

        Pelagic has  become littoral.

Marathon: unexpected crew; shredded; old food; Medicine Wheel

        I returned from biking to the supermarket to find the above creature on GANNET and a chihuahua who lives on a nearby boat barking furiously at him.  He is a big iguana, at least three feet long.  In a reasonable tone I told him that I sail alone.  He ignored me.  Hoping that when I stepped on board, he would abandon ship, I did.  The incensed dog couldn’t stand it any longer and jumped on too, causing the iguana to dive overboard and swim away.

        I hope he stays away.

————

       

        This is the only boat in the yard still showing Irma damage.

        In addition to needing a new mainsail, she was blown from her stands during the storm and in falling over one of them pierced her hull, leaving a hole you can put your fist through.

        The home port is New Jersey.

        I do not know why the owner hasn’t had her attended to.

————

        I am eating old food.

        Last night’s freeze dry lamb fettuccine was bought in New Zealand at least two years ago.

        My oatmeal this morning came from either New Zealand or Australia, at least a year and a half ago.

        The powered milk from South Africa a year ago.

        I’m not sure about the trail mix, but, it too must be at least a year old, if not more.

        It all still tastes just as good as ever, which is perhaps not a gourmet recommendation.

————

       

          Kent, of Kent and Audrey, boat creators and restorers, as well as joint commodores of a fleet of small boats, numbering about twenty, is on the tribal rolls of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation.   He is also a former Marine helicopter pilot.

        He painted this Potawatomi Medicine Wheel on the deck of their carriage house.  (I don’t believe I have ever before known anyone with a carriage house.)

        He explains here the meaning of the wheel which I find elegantly evocative of the natural cycles of life.

        I thank Kent for the image and permission to link to his site.

Marathon: simple, pure

        Just after 7 p.m.  Dark.

        A cold (relatively) front is passing and the temperature has dropped (sob) into the 60sF.  Sitting here at Central with a breeze blowing in I am wearing Levis and a Polartec.  I may even dig out my heavier sleeping bag tonight.

        I’m listening to music, a ‘less than five’ playlist, the less being number of times played, which is not accurate because it doesn’t take into account other devices, still music I don’t hear frequently.  At present Dulce Pontes, a Portuguese group, singing ‘Cancao De Embalar’.  

        I am drinking hurricane proof boxed wine that is not any worse for having been aboard for more than four months and Hurricane Irma, but am about to move on to something better.

        Dinner was Good To-Go freeze dry Marina Pasta.

        Earlier today I dug both Torqeedos out of the stern, and the old one is now fixed to the transom.  It started at the push of the button, as it did not at St. Lucia.  I am going to leave it there until I leave.

        In fetching the outboards, GANNET’s interior became absolute chaos.  Fortunately I was able to move some of the stuff on deck while moving other stuff about.  There is too much on this boat.  As I know and believe I have stated before, stuff spontaneously increases.  I am talented at throwing stuff out.  I truly take great pleasure in giving stuff away if possible or throwing it out.  Yet always there is too much.  In Hilton Head I will completely unload GANNET and move some stuff ashore and some to a dumpster.

 

        A pause during which I replaced the plastic tumbler in which I was drinking boxed wine with a crystal glass of Laphroaig.  

        Being back on board is wonderful.

        The breeze against my face.  Little wavelets lapping against the hull. GANNET’s cabin in order.   The prospect of sailing ahead, if only five or six hundred miles.

        Life simple, almost pure.

Marathon: improving

        I did the chores I planned yesterday.

        GANNET looks much better with a clean deck.

        While washing her I hosed a ton of leaves overboard that were hidden in corners and beneath sheet bags.

        Today I tested the tiller pilots.  All four—three Raymarine, one Pelagic—work.  For now.

        The rigger came and went up the mast.
        Irma blew the tacking arms off the Windex.  They aren’t essential, but it didn’t look right, so I had him install a new one.

        The other night I tested the lights.  All worked except the steaming light.  This is actually irrelevant because GANNET has never been under power after dark, but he installed a new bulb and now I will be legal if she ever is.

        The Raymarine masthead wind unit was not transmitting to the display.   I hoped it just needed re-pairing, but when brought back down to deck, that didn’t work and it needs to go back to Raymarine.  Again.

        I cleaned the bilge and scrubbed mold.

        An epic life.

        Strong north wind is forecast for the next week, exactly what I don’t want.  South or west would be perfect.  East would do once I get around the corner and head north.

        I could easily be ready to sail tomorrow.  I will be ready a week from today and leave when the wind cooperates.

        The sailing distance to Hilton Head Island is about 550 miles.  I will probably sail there directly, but there are lots of places I can stop if I decide to.

        The Yellowbrick is charged.  I’ll turn it on for the short passage.

        A little over four months after Irma,  there are still some piles of debris beside the road and some businesses have not reopened, but mostly the Keys look as though the storm never happened. 

        I am told that there were 280-300 boats in Boot Key Harbor here when Irma’s eye made landfall twenty miles to the west.  50-60 survived.  Only a few moorings failed.  Mostly lines connecting boats to them chaffed through and some cleats were torn out of decks.

Marathon: raking the cockpit

        Because weather delays are common in Chicago in winter, I had made a reservation for the 2:30 p.m. shuttle from Fort Lauderdale, but my $40 flight landed on time at 11:30, so I was able to board the 12:30 shuttle and arrived at the boat yard earlier than expected at around 4:00.  As I went through the gate, I saw GANNET’s distinctive mast and knew she was not in the water.  However I was assured that she would be within the hour, and she was.  

        I was glad to be able to inspect her bottom on land rather than have to dive.  It looks perfect.  

        The yard towed the little boat to her place on the wall just at sunset.

        The first necessity was to remove the new jib from the forepeak and bend it on the furling gear so I would have a place to sleep.

        That is one stiff sail.  Some of you will recall that it is laminated not stitched.  It is a slippery piece of unbendable plastic.  I couldn’t remotely get it into its bag before I left and I had trouble even getting it through the forward hatch onto deck.  I finally did get it up and furled and retired to the Great Cabin to find that I had small amounts of tequila, Botanist gin, and Buffalo Trace.  No Laphroaig.  I drank the gin.

        My LuminAid lamps were uncharged so my only light was a flashlight until I telephoned Carol who reminded me that she had given me a similar solar powered light which I had charged a month or so ago and it was in my bag.  Carol said, “Let there be light.”  And there was.

        Today I stowed the stuff I brought with me.  Sorted out the cabin and cleaned some of it.  Got my rusty bicycle operational—the front brakes were frozen.  And raked the cockpit.  Not literally.  But there were a lot of leaves and twigs.

        I haven’t tested the tiller pilots or Torqeedos, but thus far everything is working as it should and GANNET appears to have sustained no damage from Hurricane Irma.

        Of the more than 150 boats stored on land at the yard, only seven were toppled from their stands.   I am told that at the highest surge two feet of water covered the yard.

        Tomorrow I will scrub the deck and do my laundry.  I thought I had done it before I left in August, but the bag is full.

        I’ll also bicycle to the supermarket.

        I was away from the little boat for four months.  Too long.  I hope never to be away that long again.

        The photo was taken yesterday just before GANNET was launched.

        Her topsides need to be painted.  That might happen this year, but more likely next.

Evanston: goodbye to all that

        We are having a heat wave—34ºF/1ºC.  The first time it has been above freezing since before Christmas.  For more than two weeks our temperatures have been around 0ºF/-18ºC.  Many mornings there has been a minus sign in front of the F temperature when I got up.  And the wind chill was, of course, considerably, sometimes dangerously lower.

        Twice last week when it reached a balmy 12ºF/-11ºC, I bundled up and walked down to the lake.  In the photo above the white line on the horizon is solid ice.  I was surprised that the lake was not frozen all the way to the shore.

        Winter does not actually end for me when I fly to Florida and GANNET tomorrow.  I expect to be back in Evanston in March and it will still be winter here then.  But it will end for a while.  I’m looking forward to that.  And I’m really looking forward to being on the little boat again.

Evanston: a pleasant surprise

        A few days ago Dan, the former Australian submariner whom I met on the dock at Driscoll’s Marina in San Diego in 2013 and who subsequently sailed his Medalist 32, COYOTE, to Australia with his American girl friend, emailed that a mate showed him a book, NOTABLE BOATS, that had been given to him as a Christmas present.  In skimming through, Dan came across CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE.

        There are two versions of the book, one published last year in the United States, one the original published in England.  The English version was the one Dan saw.  I bought the US version from Amazon.  

        Here is the US cover.

        Here the UK.

        The titles are slightly different and the UK cover mentions forty boats.  The US version includes only thirty-six.  CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE has made the cut in both.

        Four pages are devoted to each boat, including outstanding illustrations by Peter Scott, a chart of the voyage, and a summary.

        Most of the boats are relatively small sailing vessels, by far the biggest being the 143’/43.6 meter Canadian schooner, BLUENOSE.

        A few of the choices are whimsical.  Huck Finn’s raft and the gondola in which Casanova escaped from a Venetian prison.  But mostly CHIDIOCK is in good company—SPRAY; DORADE; JOSHUA—and I am pleased.

        I knew of most of these boats and voyages and have met several of the sailors in person.

        I smiled when glancing through the Index I found CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE’s name immediately above my own.  I had not ever made that connection.  Chid-, Chil-.

        A surprising omission, at least in the US edition, particularly for a book coming from the UK, is the Hiscock’s WANDERER III, their favorite of the five WANDERERs and a boat that is still making fine voyages.

        I also would have included LEHG II in which Vito Dumas became the first man to survive rounding Cape Horn.
        And were the book being written now, GANNET might deserve a place, too, 

Evanston: committed; drinking Shackleton’s; the next recession; mutiny

        While some think I should be committed, this ‘committed’ is to keeping GANNET on the east coast this year.  I just mailed an annual contract and check to Skull Creek Marina.

        The condo purchase has still not closed.  Two pieces of paper, one from the seller, one from the condo association are needed, and now the winter storm has brought business on Hilton Head Island to a halt.  While it is much colder in Chicago than Hilton Head, almost unbelievably they have more snow on the ground than we do.  I have read reports of as much as 4.5 inches.

        Nevertheless I have grown tired of waiting.

        Whether we buy this place or not, I will sail north later this month and quite probably, unless hurricanes intervene, to the Chesapeake Maritime Museum Small Boat Festival in October.

        I expect to be arrive in Hilton Head about February 1 which will enable me to depart for Panama just before the contract expires next year.

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        I had read, probably in New Zealand, that bottles of whisky left by one of Ernest Shackleton’s expeditions a century ago had been discovered and found still to be drinkable.  Now, as an article in the NEW YORK TIMES relates, the spirit has been replicated and will soon be on sale for $160+ a bottle.

        From the description, too high a price and too little peat for me. 

————

        I am aware that attention spans have been reduced to near vanishing point.  Even the weather woman on our local ABC station says ‘temps’ instead of ‘temperature’.  A one syllable world.  A recent article in the WALL STREET JOURNAL leads me to believe that memory span is also severely impaired.  

        Unfortunately the link to the full article now requires a subscription.  I was able to read it yesterday without one.

        Here is a summary that only hints at the potential disaster if the FHFA changes the rules.

        The Great Recession was only a decade ago.  

        Let’s see:  We sell a lot of houses to people who can’t afford them.  They predictably don’t make payments.  The mortgages are worthless.  Banks fail.  The whole system collapses.  Sounds good to me.

        Are people really so greedy and so stupid as to do it all again only ten years later?  A rhetorical question whose answer is an obvious ‘YES!’

————

        I thank Larry for a link to today’s Bizarro cartoon.

        A new cartoon appears every day.

        If you click on this and you don’t see  “Muesli on the BOUNTY” hit the ‘previous’ button until you do.

        One of the advantages of solo sailing is that it reduces the risk of mutiny.

        This crew would not want me to be their captain.

Evanston: annual report to shareholders

        Were the above a sales graph, reading from left to right, the company would be in serious trouble, but I trust you will recognize it as GANNET’s  2017 track that reads from lower right to upper left, Durban, South Africa to Marathon, Florida, with two stops:  St. Helena and St. Lucia.  Day’s runs total 7746 miles for the year.  23339 miles since leaving San Diego in 2014.

        Although it was not an intended goal, since leaving Darwin, Australia, GANNET has sailed 211º of longitude--Darwin is 131ºE, Marathon 80ºW--almost two thirds of the way around the world, with only three stops.

        I have changed the Yellowbrick tracking default page to one named 2018, now blank.  I am back on the little boat a week tomorrow and don’t yet know what lines will be drawn on it.

        I worked out 57 times, far fewer than the 100 I aim for, but higher than usual for a year in which I cross oceans.  Of those 57, 42 came in the last four months of the year.  I did not workout aboard GANNET in Marathon because of the heat.  I think working out there would likely have resulted in death by push-up.

        I estimate that I did 9050 push-ups and crunches during the year.  Only an estimate because I now frequently do 80 pushups in my first set, instead of my age of 76, but not always.  I also have started taking the stairs two at a time during my twenty flights a day.  One at a time was getting too easy.

       I close the three circles on my Apple watch activity app at least six days a week.  Sometimes I take Sunday off.

        Two other noteworthy events:  

        I started wearing hearing aids.  A mixed review.  They are comfortable, unobtrusive.  They definitely enable me to hear better, but sometimes I would rather not.  Fortunately mine are controlled by an iPhone app and I can cut off with a tap the noise of the world when it becomes too intrusive.

        The other is the probability that we are buying the condo on Hilton Head Island.

        The list of books read in the past six months is below.

        If you read this journal and the passage logs, you are a shareholder and know me better in some ways than those who don’t, even if they frequently see me in person. 
        Your loyalty is appreciated.

        The company makes no profit, pays no dividends, has no capital appreciation, no credit rating, is rated by Morningstar at -5 stars.  On the plus side the CEO is not among those who are extravagantly overpaid, although he is extravagantly compensated.

books read July-December 2017

    THE QUEEN OF THE SOUTH   Arturo Perez-Reverte

DEATH OF KINGS   Bernard Cornwall

PEDRO PÁRAMO   Juan Rulfo

THE FALL   Albert Camus

FOUR MONTHS IN A SNEAK-BOX   Nathaniel H. Bishop

WE’LL ALWAYS HAVE PARIS   Ray Bradbury

PANDORA’S LAB   Paul A. Offit

JACKPOT   Jason  Ryan

THE PAGAN LORD  Bernard  Cornwall

THE EMPTY THRONE   Bernard Cornwall

THE MOVIEGOER   Walker Percy

SHADOW COUNTRY   Peter Mattiessen

WARRIORS OF THE STORM   Bernard Cornwall

THE FLAME BEARER   Bernard Cornwall

A LEGACY OF SPIES  John le Carré

BRAVE NEW WORLD   Aldous Huxley

HUE 1968   Mark Bowden

PLAY IT AS IT LAYS   Joan Didion

ALI   Jonathon Eig

RAGTIME  E. L. Doctorow

GRANT   Ron  Chernow

TREKKA ROUND THE  WORLD   John Guzzwell

ALL THAT YOU’VE SEEN HERE IS GOD   Bryan Doerries

THE  ODYSSEY  Homer/Emily Wilson

THE FRINGES OF POWER   John Colville

BRAVE COMPANIONS   David McCullough

AN ELEPHANT FOR ARISTOTLE   L. Sprague de Camp

THE FLEET THAT HAD TO DIE   Richard Hough