Lessons Learned

These are the musings and thoughts of my brain while standing watch in the cockpit of a small boat on a very big ocean, my first experience with blue water sailing.  I have spent the last 17 years or so reading and researching in preparation for this moment.  In so many ways I was prepared and I knew what to expect and in so many ways it was so different, so, so much more.  I don’t think that you can really put into words what it’s like to be out there on the ocean.  Everything that I had read was true but I guess that I didn’t grasp the essence of what the authors were saying.  Any way, settle in because this has the potential to be a lengthy post, after all my brain musing for 4 hours at a time 3 times a day while on watch at the helm at the very least promises to be entertaining.

Lessons Learned

1. A boat under weigh is noisy…really noisy.  The boat itself has little moans and groans, the waves rushing by the hull, water trickling off the deck, halyards and lines thrumming and humming in the wind.  Inside there’s the clink and rattle of this and that, lots of this and that.  I had thought that we knew how to secure everything from our sailings in the Sound and the years docked at the Bremerton Marina with the regular sloshing we would get from the ferry wake.  I didn’t notice it much my first time or two off watch because I was too excited to sleep much but after 20 hours or so of being awake and looking forward to 4 hours of sleep only to close your eyes and realize there are several hillbilly bands warming up for a battle of the bands contest in your salon, I noticed it.  Eyes pop open and the quest begins.  Stalking around the boat matching movement to sound and figuring out how to best silence them.  The first culprits were easy to find and fix but others were much more elusive and it took me nearly 3 days to get them all figured out.  I literally spent precious hours of much needed sleep time searching for the little noisemakers.  It was a fun sleuthing game at first but the fun was short lived and then is was just a nuisance.
2. Our boat is far more capable than I am at this point.  This is a hat tip to Robert Perry and his hull design for creating a boat made for blue water ocean cruising.  A hat tip also to the previous owners who over the decades since she was first launched have taken very good care of her.  I admit that I would often hold a course that deliberately spilt wind from her sails so that I felt like I had more control.  It reminded me of growing up and riding horses.  Sitting astride a horse and keeping her at a trot or easy gallup when she flat out wanted to run.  You could feel the energy bunched up under you ready to be released.  Magic Dragon was the same, she really wanted to do much more than I would let her….baby steps Dragon, I will get there, just look how far I’ve come.
3. I greatly overestimated my desire and ability to cook and prepare meals while under weigh.  I spent months preparing menu plans and making lists.  I bought books published by women who live on boats that talk specifically about meal prep and I even have a cookbook specific for sailors.  I went to seminars at boat shows and consulted with other cruisers online.  What I learned is that I consulted with the wrong people.  I should’ve consulted with our daughter Heather who has spent the last decade of her life planning healthy meals for 3 year olds.  I say this because when you are coming down the Northwest coast there is not an option to duck into a quiet harbor or cove each night to anchor and stop to prepare meals and wash dishes.  When you are out on the ocean whether you are at the helm on watch or down below off watch you have only one hand available to do anything with.  The other hand is holding on, you are holding on to the wheel or if down in the cabin you are holding on to keep from getting body slammed across either the stove or the table.  I don’t care how many hand holds there are in your cabin, there is not enough, add more.  Also since there is just the two of us, cooking times takes away from sleep time.  So Heather, let me apologize now for making fun of your eating habits and let me say that my next menu list will consist of single hand finger foods that don’t make a mess…aka a menu with a 3 year old in mind.
4. The power of the ocean and the winds that drive her is nothing short of breathtaking.  There are no words that can describe the dance between those two forces.  They graciously share a measure of that power with us sailors and allow us passage through their realm.  When you are out there with no land in sight, you realize just how insignificant you are and at the whim of one or the other or both of them together they could take you down.  It is truly a gift and a privilege to complete an ocean passage.
5. Night watches are magical.  Your senses are much more sharp because vision is so limited.  You can hear the waves but you can’t really see them so I quickly realized that I could feel them through my feet and legs through the motion of the boat.  They way the wind came across my face told me how the wind was hitting the sails.  I knew that if it was coming off my chin then the sails were full but not fully into the wind with a big heel so the noise and motion of the boat would be minimized as much as possible to try to help Dave rest. The smell of the air was so clean.  The night sky on the ocean is reminiscent of the Big Sky of Montana.  I also loved the phosphorescent critters that twinkled in our wake or in the water next to us when we cruised through the trough of a swell.  I wanted to believe that they were twinkling could be likened to Tinker Bell with her pixie dust.  In reality though I am sure it’s their version of the middle finger for interrupting their night time feeding frenzy.
6. I was worried that I would get fat and flabby being cooped up in a small space for long periods of time.  I am here to tell you that ocean cruising is a combination of Yoga, Plyometrics, and Tai Chi all rolled into one.  For 4 hours at a time 3 times a day you are at the helm balancing on essentially a Babpst Board or theraball engaging legs, core, and trunk.  With your upper body you are engaged with the ship’s wheel constantly pushing and pulling keeping the boat on a steady course.  Thank God I had been doing the Plank Challenge for the last month and a half or I wouldn’t have made 4 hour watches.  Even a short trip through the cabin to the head requires feats of gymnastics and American Ninja Warrior training skills.
7. This brings me to another head related issue.  The head on our boat is approximately 5’x5′.  It contains a sink, a couple cabinets and the toilet.  If you drop something, there isn’t enough room to bend over and pick it up.  Most of the closets in my house were bigger then this space.  I’ve been on other boats and may of them had larger heads/bathrooms.  I have to admit that I was a bit jealous.  They have baskets for towels and countertops and maybe even a decoration or two.  I have a new found appreciation for our small space.  At least in big seas there is no danger in getting catapulted off the pot in mid stream.  And Sierra, there is no aiming anything so your parting gift given in jest may actually get some use.  My boating friends will understand but my non boater friends will have no concept of what I am talking about so I am going to try to give you an analogy to bring you up to speed.  When I was growing up, a friend of ours, Merle Clark, was a local rancher and a great rodeo announcer.  I would make a point to go to rodeos that he was announcing at just to listen to him.  At any rate he had a great analogy for steer wrestling.  He would tell the men in the audience to drive out into the summer fallow field with their wife.  Have her get behind the wheel and him sit up on the hood of the truck.  She was then instructed to accelerate to about 40 mph and slam on the brakes.  That is essentially what happens when a cowboy dives off his horse onto a racing steer and wrestles it to the ground.  Hat tip to you Merle, here is my analogy of going to the bathroom on a small boat in 20 foot seas and 30 knot winds.  Ladies have your husband put a toilet seat on a 5 gallon bucket and bolt it to a small trailer.  The trailer should have 2 different size tires to give it a nice slant to accommodate for the tilt/heel of the boat.  Drive to the nearest prairie dog town.  Ladies take a seat on the throne.  Men drive in a sharp zig zag fashion at about 15 mph across the prairie dog town.  This should create a very nice motion that encompasses all 3 planes of motion.  Ladies, good luck in keeping your seat.  Now hopefully you can understand my new found appreciation of a small head.

8.  I had forgotten how active my mind is without facebook and the media telling me what and how to think.  There is this little girl inside that I always used to chat with, debate and analyze issues with.  I thought she was gone, turns out she was still there but was being drowned out by all the media and technology.  I missed her and glad she is back.

9.  Although I have learned a lot, there is so much more for me to learn.  I remember earlier this year sitting in seminars and knowing the answers to questions people were asking and was feeling pretty pleased with myself.  The ocean has a way of humbling a person.

10.  The biggest lesion that I’ve learned you might be wondering as clearly ocean passages are neither easy nor comfortable.  My biggest take away is that I’m happy, I’m excited to be where I’m at and I’m free.  I’m free from the rat race and schedules and making money for other people.  I was so worried that the reality of sailing wouldn’t match the dream.  Thousands of dreamers every year complete their first ocean voyage and find out it’s not for them and they put their boats up for sale in the first marina they come to.  I have invested 17 years into this dream, would that be me?  No, a heartfelt no.  I loved it.  The sense of accomplishment, the freedom, the peace, the excitement, the exhaustion, the everything.  I am exactly where I am supposed to be.