Kaimusailing

I looked on You Tube for any information about the superfoilers. I had awoken late at night, about 1 AM, and watched the racing the previous night. I didn't feel particularly fatigued or tired except near the end, just before daybreak. I thought I had been watching a replay, so I wanted to catch the racing this evening (Saturday here) before 1 AM Sunday. I found that the replay of the Saturday racing started just about where I had started watching. 1 AM? I remember the America's Cup racing off of Western Australia about maybe 35 years ago or so and I stayed up at night and watched it on ESPN. Such a sailing nut.
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Just to check the time, I found the link on You Tube for Sunday's racing just now, "in four hours". Yes, 1 AM, our time. I can watch it on Sunday in replay. Or, I can catch it at 1 AM for about 3 hours. What kind of sailor are you? It's a four hour mid-watch that you will only do one time. When I haven't been at sea and then go sailing, for the first couple of days I can stand watch for hours and hours and find it hard to sleep. Then later in the voyage sleep comes too easily. Almost like life itself.
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I worked on the keel today, honest, but I only put one slender 50 inch long patch on the starboard keel. I was advised by Capn Tom to not do things the way I am doing them. Just glass whole areas and get the job done en mass. I will not do it that way. I must be a control freak. I want to put just the fiberglass I need on just the areas of the keel that need it and no more. My method is tedious, but not too tedious. I am glad it works so well and the glassing will only take a few days. We are forecast for some 40-60 degree days and a rain day, so there might be a little glitch.
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I did go shopping today and posted the pix of Rocky's monstrous boat moving tricycle, and it began to get chilly, so I didn't do more glass work, and that is probably how it will be for a few days.
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Capn Tom confided in me that he has to go in for major heart surgery in a couple of weeks. I hope anyone who reads this will give a blessing for him to have an easy go of it. It would be difficult for me to have bad news from him, he is younger, and none of us are getting any younger.
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I have in front of me two sailors who I have kept tabs on, read their online diaries, and considered their courses, because they are older than me (yes, it is possible), and I hope to face the future in a way that follows their lead. One is Jack von Ommen, a Dutch sailor, who has sailed extensively on a small plywood sloop, wrecked it, and continued on a sistership, and wrecked that, and now is prepared to continue once more. He is 81 years old and has written a couple of amazing books. One is about his extended family and it is about the resistance in the Netherlands during WWII and also part of his family was in Germany. The other is about his solo sailing. I can summarize his diary in a few words, he is devout and sings in churches around the world, he makes mistakes sometimes, and he relies on others to help him at times. He is a well grounded individual who is spiritual and common, but has uncommon results. I eagerly await anything he writes, but sometimes the wait is tedious, I should be more patient. The other sailor that I have kept tabs on is Webb Chiles who is about the same age as my older brother, so I could maybe see what my brother was doing, see what Capn Webb was doing, and then look at myself to guess what I might be doing a few years from now. Webb Chiles just was awarded the Cruising Club of America's Blue Water Award. This is a significant award only given to sailors who personify an extreme distilled essence of ocean sailing. I understand that place, and it is a special place. But, I am only a visitor, Webb Chiles is the Mayor.
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I often try to brag about something I have done with a boat, but the bottom line is that I am in a boatyard with a boat that has been basically wrecked. Only the designer and his overspecification saved me, the water vehicle did the job. A lot of stuff happens out on the water and we can read about ships crashing, racing sailors crashing, and there is a lot of conjecture about what the sailors should have done and what the boat designers should have considered. I agree with Webb Chiles that when we leave the shore we leave the shore and it is up to us and our craft to deal with conditions at sea. I don't have any issue with sailors who sail into trouble and use whatever electronic hailing device or radio, signals, to get help when they are going to die. There have been many dramatic rescues at sea over the years and many times the rescuers were in dire straits. I wouldn't want to put anyone else into that situation, just because I hit something or something hit me, but an ordinary rescue is maybe acceptable.
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The sailing that Webb Chiles is doing, and has been doing, is kind of like what I dreamed about when I was younger, but the reality is that we get physically and mentally tested, brought to the edge. I realize he has some of the same trepidations that I have, and he is using his skills, his techniques, to do what he has to do, he is like the Picasso who developed a brush stroke and then could use it. There is a creative situation where the artist cannot do anything without the tools and technique. So, you have Webb Chiles showing how it might be done, just like voyagers of old times did something that knocked down a barrier, opened up a corridor, made a portion of a map, found out how to survive at sea, and so those that followed had a basis to build further.
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Those earlier sailors were much more creative, when you really look at what they did, than a lot of sailors now who can sail 500 miles in a day, please jet me to the next venue. I guess we who sail now are laying a groundwork for those who come later
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I think that the essence of sailing is far from the foiling contraptions that get the media attention, the essence of sailing is being on and near the water, working the elements to go where you want to go, it might be the singular organic experience in the universe to be sailing on the planet Earth. There is a general movement now for expedition sailing with minimal boats, no mechanical propulsion, close to the water, and maybe a survivalist mentality, but those who participate have a sense of humor, so it is not as dire as it might have been in the old days.
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I would really like to direct people to go down to the sea and look out on it. If they can do something enjoyable on the water, go and do it. Row, fish, swim, look at your local water. It is the people who actually go down to the water and get involved with it who are going to realize that the water needs help, protection from pollution. The legislator who is sitting at his desk has no incentive to make our water improved. The ocean is for dumping, it is a repository for all that we do, condoms, debris, every sort of chemical and plastic, lubricants, effluents, just pump all that into the ocean, it is big, it will absorb it all. And when we go into the ocean, someday, it won't be the ocean we love, it will have other qualities. It is getting so today.
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It has been getting so over quite a few years. Fortunately the ocean is huge, but it is only a puddle on the Earth's surface. I ask everyone I meet about when they last bathed in the ocean, when did they water ski, when did they windsurf, when was the last time they really came in contact with the ocean water. I feel that there is a time when a swimmer or windsurfer, or a fisherman, or a mother who took her family to the beach, when they decided not to go into the ocean. We came from the ocean and we migrated with the ocean. I don't want the ocean to become a cesspool of pollution. My surname means the ocean. We want to be intelligent on this planet on how we manage the environment. Maybe the time has passed when a political effort could have cleaned up the ocean. But I can see that if we have trouble now, it is only an indication of a much greater trouble years to come, maybe when we are gone, and maybe humans will be gone due to our disregard for our effect on our environment.
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I did not stay awake long enough to see the Sunday superfoiler racing live, but watched it over breakfast. I was able to fast forward over the delays due to no wind. Yes, they sailed in almost no wind, there was little foiling, and some boats were lucky and won with a wind shift, and others were unlucky, stuck in a no wind hole, watching the others sail away. Euroflex had two wins but they needed more, had a loss in their third race of the regatta, and afterwards the race committee abandoned further racing due to no wind. It was the first regatta Euroflex did not win.
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The image is of a neon sculpture by Lisa Schulte, the "Neon Queen". It is available for purchase at saatchiart.com.