I first heard about Hurricane Mitch at dinner with Andre and Vivienne in the thatched-roofed marina restaurant. John had been gone about a week. Eating at the awful marina restaurant, our conversation revolved around fabulous meals we had enjoyed elsewhere, in contrast to the rubbery steak and tasteless bread we now consumed. Kate, Emilie, and Hugo played tag under the empty tables. Some boaters focused on a TV at the bar where a weatherman pointed to a cloudy mass drifting around the Western Caribbean.
Kate reading before leaving the Rio DulceJohn, Kate and Elmo freezing on the Intracoastal
“A hurricane but it doesn’t look like it is headed our direction. And Category 1 is not bad,” Andre said after wandering over to the TV to check it out.
I trusted Andre’s judgment. Andre and Vivienne had sailed across the Atlantic and raced in world-class sailing races. I wasn’t sure, though, whether he would play it down to keep me from worrying. The pit of my stomach tingled. The others who had listened to the weather milled around, ordering more watery Gallo beer, yawning, and playing cards. A couple of people leafed through the used books, looking for something to read before bed. It was the end of October, late in the season for a hurricane. It didn’t feel like a crisis. Still, I wanted John around if something major was happening.
The next morning, I dropped Kate off at Renee’s boat, Big Easy, and went to Felipe’s Internet café in Fronteras to write John and see what information Felipe had about Hurricane Mitch. Before this voyage, I associated the dinghy with New England seafood dinners in Connecticut harbors or Block Island. On summer weekends, we would pass other sailors heading into shore to quaint seaside restaurants—a man running the dinghy, a woman, and children crowded alongside. Since John left, Kate and I had been bombing around the river on White Fang together, and on our own. We wondered how we could have been so chicken about it earlier. We were like teenagers who had just gotten our licenses. But we were not on a summer vacation; the dinghy was our lifeline.
Felipe sat before his computer with a small crowd of locals and cruisers around him. He was in his thirties, mustachioed, and six feet tall, an unusual height here. He had lived in the States before returning to his native country.
The satellite picture on Felipe’s screen showed a fiery mass covering most of the Western Caribbean. Mitch was huge. Winds had strengthened to Category 5. At two hundred miles per hour, it was the largest and strongest hurricane on record. It had strengthened rapidly from the evening before. A few hundred miles out, its direction was unclear. Mitch seemed to be heading north, meaning it would miss us, but there was talk of evacuation. We gawked at each other.
“I’ll keep track of it and broadcast over the radio. Check channel 67 and call me if you want,” Felipe said in Spanish, then in English. He printed out a copy of the satellite map and scotch-taped it to the window in his door.
In a daze, I headed for a computer to check email. I would have to handle a Category 5 storm without John. Right now, the sun was out but that would change soon enough. John and I had weathered a couple of weak hurricanes when we lived in Connecticut on Phaedrus, but Hurricane Mitch was on a different scale altogether. This was not the first time John was away during a storm, either. He had been away for the storm in Beaufort, North Carolina. But now, I was in a poor foreign country, in what was shaping up as a major disaster. I became conscious of my shallow breaths. As I sat at a computer to log in, a cold shiver wriggled through my gut.
John had just heard about Mitch—his email had yesterday’s date when Mitch was not yet very powerful. He wished he could be with us. Just hearing his words in my head calmed me. I looked around to see people shouting anxiously into Felipe’s long-distance phones and frantically typing on keyboards.
To learn more about Susan or order Holding Fast, visit Susan’s website.
I’m pleased to share an excerpt from Susan Cole’s cruising memoir, “Holding Fast.” I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the book, which from its title and first few graphs promises to be a reflective look on the cruising life. Coles recently moved to the Northwest (Portland), and joins the many sailing and adventure authors already here, including Wendy Hinman, Jordan Hanssen, Jim Lynch,Jeffrey Briggs and others. KH
Excerpt from Chapter 1: Underway
We still lived in Connecticut that Saturday my husband John and I took our seven-year-old daughter Kate to Mystic Seaport. As we reached the town of white picket fences and tidy window boxes of petunias, geraniums, and zinnias, John turned to Kate and said, “In a few weeks, we’re going to move on Laughing Goat and go sailing.”
John, Kate and Elmo
I sprang to attention in the back. We had discussed breaking the news to Kate, but I hadn’t known when John would do it. He waited until we came under the spell of the tall ships and recreated nineteenth-century village where blacksmiths and carpenters plied their trades. As usual, John took his time, raising a cigarette to his lips, inhaling, flicking ash in the tiny metal tray, flashing a grin at me, and waiting for Kate’s response. Though the smell of his cigarette smoke no longer intoxicated me as it had twenty years ago, I still loved the sensual curve of John’s hand around a cigarette.
John was six when his family moved to Africa. Before they went, his mother told him about lions and tigers and elephants and snakes, anthills as big as houses, and the wild bush that would surround their new house where he could play. He couldn’t wait to go. He wanted to impart a similar excitement to Kate about our voyage.
“Where are we going?” Kate asked.
“South. First to Florida. Then we’ll figure out where we want to go from there—somewhere in the Caribbean. We’ll snorkel. There are fantastic coral reefs, like nothing you’ve ever seen.”
“What about school?”
“You and Mom will do it on the boat.”
“What about our house?”
“We’ll rent it out.”
Kate glanced at me. Passing the schooners on Mystic River, I could imagine sailing down the Intracoastal Waterway through charming towns like those on Long Island Sound.
“It’ll be fun,” I said, feeling like Judas. I didn’t share my doubts and fears.
Kate Reading
Kate told her class the next day that she was sailing to the Caribbean and snorkeling, and she wasn’t going to school anymore. Her teacher, a sailor, was thrilled for her and asked her to write the class about her adventures. She promised they would write back.
I wish it had been that simple for me. I did not want to go. John would tease me and say, “I’ll have to drag you out kicking and screaming, clinging to the garden.” I imagined myself red-faced and shrieking, my fingers black with dirt, while John yanked my legs and Kate stared open-mouthed.
It’s pretty safe to say that for most of us, sailing is critical to feeling alive. But as performance sailors will tell you, pushing one’s limits in big breeze is about feeling really alive, whether it’s on an Opti going 7 knots or a foiling cat going 25. Andy Mack, a performance sailor if there ever was one, pushed his limits on the Columbia River Gorge on Labor Day in his RS Aero. He told his tale to fellow Aero sailors and has graciously allowed us to share it here. Read on! -KH
Feeling Alive
By Andy Mack
Andy Mack
Around 2:00 pm on Labor day I was noticing the breeze from the east was picking up and started to think maybe it would be worth considering trying to make a run at the Hood River YC 20/20 record, Hood River to Cascade Locks. The last record was set in 2014 by Bill Summerfield and crew on his Express 27, 1:54:38. Doing the math; for 20 miles you need to average better than 5.73 minutes per mile, which is an average of 9.1 knots. After pulling up the charts and a calculator for some quick estimates, I figured it could be possible in the Aero. The challenge to being successful is to be able to keep the overall average speed up high enough to make up for the typically slow first 3 – 4 miles where the wind is barely enough to get on a plane. You start out at a deficit to the average since the wind builds as you go west through the Gorge, so you have to be really cooking in the second half to make up for the early lost time. I did some quick estimates for where I would need to be by what times for the first half, after that, it doesn’t really matter. Just get there in one piece. It can get pretty sketchy for the second half, not much time to think other than 100% focus on staying upright and in one piece. This day was especially unique. The forecast was for a once in a 50 year easterly blow. The i-windsurf forecast had estimates of 40 – 50 knots. How likely was that going to happen? I was convincing myself that those peaks would be further west of Cascade Locks, not through the mid-Gorge corridor.
I sprung the idea of the downwinder on my wife, Jaime. To my surprise, she thought it was a great idea and said to “go for it”. She offered to help support me in a power boat, but I talked her out of it. Once I’m in 20+ knots the RIB could be a liability. The next best plan would be to track me through my phone location and meet me at the other end. Worst case, I could haul out in Viento or one of the other beach launches. I’ll call for help if I need it. Everything is within 30 minutes by car. So, I packed my dolly in her car just in case.
I’m not the most tech savvy, other than I can run an app on my phone. I had made sure “Find My Phone” was working for Jaime to track me and “Race Qs” to record a GPS track record. Then, I put my Velocitek SC-1 in the cockpit, which I hadn’t used in about 11 years. No video or GoPro on this excursion. If I had more time to prepare I would have put one on my boom. Another non-typical added environmental condition was forest fire smoke that had started to blow in from the east from fires in eastern Washington. Visibility was down to about 3-4 miles. Air quality was starting to be problem, I thought I could deal with it for a couple hours. I was a little concerned about not being able to see barges coming upriver before they could be a problem. However, since it was a holiday, there may not be any barges on the river. Air temperature was about 80 degrees, water temp around 72 and not much current. I decided to go without a spray top or insulating layer. In hindsight, a helmet would have been a good idea. I have a few different rig sizes to choose from and decided to go with the 7 square meter rig.
When I went down to the marina I sent a message to the HRYC group that I was planning to go for the 20/20 record. A few minutes later I got a message that a Moore 24 had already left to go do the run too. Oh great! I wish I knew this ahead of time, I would have tried to join them for at least a little safety in numbers. Maybe I’ll see them with their rig down or some other carnage.
4:00 I rigged up and shoved off the Hood River Marina dock into the smokey Mordor looking scene.
I spent 5 minutes getting mentally ready, setting my phone tracker, watch countdown set to 1:54:00, just under the last record, then deciding the best position on the start line and angle to begin my run. Double checking with myself if this is really a good idea. Of course it is!
4:07:50 Bore off and went for it. I had some nice initial puffs over 15 knots and flat water, hitting 12 knots over the bottom. That was a good start.
4:10:50 I was hit by a puff which must have clocked to the south a little and caught me off guard, leading to a deathroll. That was dumb! Fortunately, I was able to climb over the rail and get on the board quickly while the boom was still up in the air. I lost a little time. As I got back upright I heard some cheering from some people that had walked out to the tip of the sand bar to enjoy the awful weather and air quality conditions. Immediately after recovering I was hit again by a 20 knot puff, sending me back up to 14 knots.
4:12:00 I had to luff up for a few seconds to put the main halyard back in the sail pocket. I figured I better stop now to take care of it before the wind got too crazy.
4:17:00 Mile 1, I needed to average better than 6 minutes a mile to break the record, I was over 1.5 minutes behind.
Slow going the first 2 miles.
4:25:30 2 miles down, passing by the Hatchery Buoy, 4 minutes behind the average. My mantra for the run was to focus on keeping my average boat speed up over 10 knots, “Keep the average up”. As I was going through the corridor from the Hatchery to Viento, the halfway point, the wind was steadily picking up over 20 knots, my average speed getting closer to 10 knots and trending up. The waves were kicking up too keeping me cautious to not stuff and wipeout.
4:45:34 First heavy air jibe, resorted to a chicken jibe. I didn’t want to risk another capsize to keep my average up. The waves were getting bigger, forcing me to slow down and steer around more. I was easing my vang a little for safety, trying to keep control over where I had to steer to avoid stuffing the bow.
4:50:19 Waves and gusts were getting bigger, forcing me down the troughs into the backs of bigger and bigger waves, I had to resort to burning speed by luffing up to avoid stuffing. Not fast, but still better than a capsize.
4:50:07 Chicken Jibe #2. My strategy was to stay to the leeward side of the channel on the Oregon side of the river as much as possible to avoid shifty and disturbed wind on the north side of the channel. On final approach to Viento Park, it was WINDY, gusting well over 30 knots, waves were getting bigger. My goal was to pass Viento before 5:00.
4:58:15 Passing by Viento, the midway point. Now, I was about 5 minutes ahead of the record and feeling kind of crazy, but more confident I could make it. As I was cruising by the park I only saw one windsurfer braving the conditions, and he was headed back to the beach in retreat.
Lulls were 20 knots, gusts up into the high 30’s. As I made the commitment to proceed past Viento I was extremely focused on not dropping the mainsheet, oversheeting to reduce power and keeping the loads balanced, easing vang to let the top of the sail twist off, pulling controls on and steering with deliberate precision. Stuffing waves and filling the cockpit was a regular occurrence at this point. After I passed the park, to my surprise, I experienced much flatter water, and the boat lit up planning much more steadily, helping the average. For 20 minutes I almost never dropped under 10 knots and hit one peak of 16.3 knots. This section was a blast.
5:20:00 Settling into the start of the Home Valley stretch where it can get squirrely from the wind pinching between Wind Mountain and the Oregon hillsides. As I was passing by the Wyeth park and launch area I looked to my leeward side and realized I was only about 3 boat lengths from a long native American salmon net. At least it was strung along the current, not across it. The thought of running over a net in these conditions was not a good one.
5:23:00 Conditions were now getting very lively. I was hitting new high speeds, surging to 15 knots then hitting 16.5, with a short burst to 16.7, my peak for the whole run. And then, I don’t know what happened. Next thing I know, I’m in the water and my boat is pitch poled in front of me completely straight up in the air with only one foot of the bow in the water. That would have been a cool photo! My first thought was to start swimming towards the boat quickly before it blows away from me. The next thing I realize, my ride is falling back towards me, on to me. I managed to not get hit in the head by the port side rail as the boat fell back down into the water. My left shoulder and thigh took a blow from the hull or rail. Fortunately, I was able to quickly reach up and get on the board and get going again. Needless to say, I was a little shaken up wondering how much windier it was going to get and what else could go wrong. At this point, I was straight across from the Home Valley park boat ramp. As I looked down river the smoke was obscuring the next point where I would be hanging a left into the Cascade Locks/Stevenson stretch. As soon as I got going again the breeze dropped, big lull. More encouragement to keep going!
5:30:00 the breeze came back on hard. I have been out in big breeze and waves many times in the Aero, but this was different. I was worried there was a lot of potential to brake something as the puffs kept getting well over 30 knots, driving the bow down and loading up the rudder. I did my best to not push it too hard. Hiking off the back corner was helpful and necessary to keep the bow up.
5:31:21 Any time I felt the boat was getting overloaded I purposely rounded up to burn off speed and unload the rudder. As I bore off and got going again down the Home Valley channel, I was in more of a “safety” mode, trying to stay in control as the puffs got bigger and the waves were stacking up.
5:34:34 A huge gust hit me, I jumped to 16 knots again, stuffed the bow and capsized. This time I was getting concerned about what to do next. Once I got the boat back up, I cranked on controls to flatten my sail as much as possible. In the process, I was hit by a huge puff, and had to hike out just to stay upright while I was luffing on a beam reach angle. Not good! When I looked out into the channel it was knarly; big breaking waves, with the gusts blowing the tops off the waves. There was no way I would be able to go upwind in these conditions. With no boat launches or beaches nearby to pull out, I had no choice, but to keep going. I bore off in the next lull, with the belief I may be able to still make it. Success! I proved I could still bear away and survive. It didn’t take long before I had to do another round up to slow down. Then I decided to tack to stay closer to the Oregon shore. One of the awesome features about the Aero is, it’s very light. The downside is it doesn’t carry much momentum through tacks, especially when it’s blowing over 25 knots. The tack took me two tries to complete. Worst case scenarios were starting to cross my mind. Where could I bail out? About now, I knew Jaime would be either close or already in Cascade Locks to pick me up. As I approached the Oregon shore, I knew I didn’t want to get too close to the lee shore or shallow water, so I tacked again and bore away.
5:42:48 Capsized again. Shifting priorities, I have given up trying to break the record and focused on trying to survive and keeping my boat in one piece. I noticed my rudder was starting to kick up a little, so I had to cinch down the tie-down line. If the rudder kicks up too much, it increases the weather helm and could over stress the rudder and rudder head. I managed to bear away again in a lull and kept going. I was thinking, if I could just get downwind another quarter mile I could duck into the coves at the east end of Cascade Locks for shelter. Once I got going again, I kept in control enough to keep pushing towards the finish. In these conditions, when I was stuck going up the face of a wave, all I had to do was sheet out a little to power over the wave and sheet in again to slow down on the backside. Now that I was pointed towards the Stevenson kite launch area I knew I was almost home free. This section was 7 minutes of high averages and almost no dips below 10 knots. As I approached the Stevenson boat ramp area a few kiters were ripping around, smiling, having a ball as I was trying to loosen up and enjoy myself. The wind had moderated a little more, gusts in the low to mid 30’s, lulls around 20. The tracking data of this 25 minute section really revealed the extreme up and down conditions and wave action.
5:53:24 As I was bombing towards the Stevenson shoreline I found the lull I was hoping for and went for a legit jibe, barely landing it. Knowing I was potentially on final approach to the Cascade Locks beach, no more jibes were necessary, I was starting to relax a little more and enjoy the ride. I looked at my watch one more time and realized I could still potentially make it under the previous record. Hard to believe it was possible with all the flailing around I had been doing. Port jibe was more challenging with the wind and wave angle, I was having to spin up a couple more times to keep from going down the mine in the big puffs. At least I was getting quicker at the recovery and bearing off again. The last four minutes were really fun, with higher averages and awesome surfing conditions. As I came up on the Cascade Locks park I was thinking a photo or video to capture the occasion and accomplishment would be cool. Nope! Just me, myself and I. With the smoke filled air and gale force winds, who would want to be going for a walk to the beach on a day like this?
6:01:07 I finished this crazy adventure! Broke the old record by a little over a minute. Nothing broke on my Aero and I was in one piece.
Jaime got there a few minutes after I landed at the dock. She had pulled off the highway a few miles back looking for me when the phone tracker showed me flailing around. She took these pictures while looking for me. Not much to see with the heavy smoke screen. By the time she took these I must have got my act together and carried on. When she met me at the dock, she said I looked like Gollum; pale, shaking and my eyes bloodshot from the smoke.
I didn’t realize until a couple days later how hard my boat had hit my shoulder.
The Moore 24 “Nice One”, owned by Andy Estcourt, with crew Sean “Doogie” Couvreux, and Mike “Spike” Slater managed to smash the record by a little over 10 minutes, 1:43:20. The bruise was Andy’s take-home from the adventure.
The Moore 24 “Nice One”, owned by Andy Estcourt, with crew Sean “Doogie” Couvreux, and Mike “Spike” Slater managed to smash the record by a little over 10 minutes, 1:43:20. They left Hood River an hour before I did, around 3:00 pm. When I look at the wind data and my GPS track, I am confident if I had left when they did, it would have been a very close race. Nice run and perfect timing guys! It doesn’t hurt to leave the task to a couple of veteran pro’s and an experienced Gorge sailor. I hear they had their own harrowing experience during the second half of their run.
Obviously, it was not blowing 20 – 30+ knots yet, cocktail hour on the back deck!
Final Conclusion: I am completely impressed with how well the Aero is built and handled these extreme conditions. I now know I can trust my boat to hold together, should I end up in these kind of conditions again. Looking at my recorded track I followed very close to rhumline, only crossing the river four times and staying close to the channel to maximize the current push. While I am disappointed I missed the new record, set an hour before me. I can look at the data and know if I had not capsized, I would have easily saved 10 minutes. If I had left an hour earlier, I would have had about 10 knots less wind on average, which would have made a big difference. It was a bit much to expect to survive every massive puff and pearl into the waves ahead of me, which lead to most of my capsizes. Maybe the 5 rig would have been easier to control in the 25+ knot conditions. I’ll have to test this out for future attempts. All I can say is, this experience left me Feeling Alive! I loved it! Can’t wait to try again next year and beat the new record.
Alert reader Walt Guterbock of Anacortes brought the passing and story of Marvin Creamer at age 104 to our attention.
Creamer circumnavigated with (maybe you remember this?) no instruments in the 1980s. We’re not talking about no GPS here. We’re talking no compass or sextant. So much for those Golden Globe Race throwbacks. He figured he could navigate on the strength of his knowledge of geography, which as a geography professor was extensive.
Kurt grew up racing and cruising in the Midwest, and has raced Lasers since the late 1970s. Currently he is a broker at Swiftsure Yachts. He has been Assistant Editor at Sailing Magazine and a short stint as Editor of Northwest Yachting. Through Meadow Point Publishing he handles various marketing duties for smaller local companies. He currently is partners on a C&C 36 which he cruises throughout the Northwest. He’s married to the amazing Abby and is father to Ian and Gabe.
Thanks to the Internet, we’ve all seen some pretty dramatic photos and videos of ships hitting each other, boats getting tossed through the surf onto beaches and general on the water crisis moments. But before the camera phone, bad things happened too. And, fortunately, there were some good records of it even if you have to read! Alert reader and outstanding skipper Steve Travis (Smoke) found the following written piece when going through some of his father’s old things. It wasn’t written by his father, and the connections to the piece are unknown, but Steve volunteered to share it with Sailish readers.
I think it’s OK to laugh. Apparently nobody was seriously hurt and it appears to have happened a long time ago (no date given). Maybe one of you readers knows something about this incident. Pacific Northwest?
I think the best way to read this is read a couple paragraphs, then close your eyes to see it in your mind’s eye. Then go along another couple graphs and repeat. The captain was writing to the ship’s owner, explaining exactly what happened and why he’ll be getting a few bills. In a few words this captain lays out the roles of the officers onboard, the pilot (way too funny) and the tugboat captain (also too funny).
Enjoy. I did.
Marine Casualty
A report sighted by Captain G.P. Byth
Dear Sir,
I write haste in order that you will get this report before you form your own preconceived opinions from reports in the world press, for I am sure that they will tend to over-dramatise the affair.
We had just picked up the pilot, and the apprentice had returned from changing the “G” flag for the “H”, and being his first trip was having difficulty in rolling the “G” flag up. I therefore proceeded to show him how, coming to the last part I told him to “let go.” The lad, although willing, is not too bright, necessitating my having to repeat the order in a sharper tone.
The Chief Officer overhearing from the Chart Room, and thinking that it was the anchor that were being referred to, repeated the “let go” to the Third Officer on the forecastle. The effect of letting the port anchor drop from the ‘pipe’ while the vessel was proceeding at full harbor speed proved too much for the windlass brake, and the entire length of the cable was pulled out ‘by the roots’. I fear that the damage to the chain locker may be extensive. The braking effect naturally caused the vessel to sheer in that direction right towards the swing bridge that spans a tributary to the river up which we were proceeding.
The swing bridge operator showed great presence of mind by opening the bridge for my vessel; unfortunately he did not think to stop the vehicular traffic. The result being that the bridge partly opened and deposited a Volkswagen, two cyclists and a cattle truck on the foredeck. In his efforts to stop the progress of the vessel the Third Officer dropped the starboard anchor, too late to be of practical use for it fell on the swing bridge operator’s control cabin.
Up to now I have confined my report to the activities at the forward end of my vessel, aft they were having their own problem. At the moment the port anchor was let go, the Second Officer was supervising the making fast of the after tug, and was lowering the ship’s towing spring down onto the tug.
The sudden braking effect on the port anchor caused the tug to ‘run in under’ the stern of my vessel, just at the moment when the propeller was answering my double ring Full Astern The prompt action of the Second Officer in securing the inboard end of the towing spring delayed the sinking of the tug by some minutes – thereby allowing the safe abandoning of that vessel.
I never fails to amaze me, the actions and behavior of foreigners during moments of minor crisis. The pilot, for instance, is at this moment huddled in the corner of my day cabin, alternately crooning to himself and crying after have consumed a bottle of gin in a time that is worthy of inclusion in the Guiness Book of Records. The tug captain on the other hand reacted violently and had to be forcibly be restrained by the Steward who has him handcuffed in the ship’s hospital.
I enclose the names and addresses of the drivers and insurance companies of the vehicles on my foredeck which the Third Officer collected after his somewhat hurried evacuation of the forecastle. These particulars will enable you to claim for the damage that they did to the railings of number one hold.
I am closing this preliminary report for I am finding it difficult to concentrate with the sound of police sirens and their flashing lights. Had the apprentice realized that there is no need to fly pilot flags after dark, none of this would have happened.
Kurt grew up racing and cruising in the Midwest, and has raced Lasers since the late 1970s. Currently he is a broker at Swiftsure Yachts. He has been Assistant Editor at Sailing Magazine and a short stint as Editor of Northwest Yachting. Through Meadow Point Publishing he handles various marketing duties for smaller local companies. He currently is partners on a C&C 36 which he cruises throughout the Northwest. He’s married to the amazing Abby and is father to Ian and Gabe.
Here’s something special. Captain Tarin Todd, harbor master at Tacoma’s Foss Harbor Marina, was inspired to write from his heart in a marina newsletter. After reading this, go create some sea stories, even (especially) in virus times. Then tell them often, even if there’s no campfire and no guitar. After all, the stories get better each time they’re told!
By Tarin Todd
Boating is such a unique hobby.
Boating simultaneously develops independence, camaraderie, self reliance and unity. We are alone on our boats, and yet we have the VHF radio that keeps us connected. When something goes wrong, we must first try to solve it alone, and when that fails, we reach out to whoever is in the vicinity to assist. We leave the dock a singular vessel heading out to our next great adventure, and when we arrive at our destination or return to our home berth, we often chat with fellow boaters on the dock, regaling them in our most recent adventures afloat. It is those moments, those sea stories we relate to others, that carries on a tradition spanning centuries, millennia.
If we pause and think for a moment about the time humans have spent on the water, a vast majority of it has been in the pursuit of discovery. What is up that river? What can be found in the next bay? Even today, a place visited hundreds or thousands of times is discovered anew by the family who just bought their first boat and are on their maiden voyage. Yes, we have charts and GPS now that help us navigate to these spots but upon arrival there is always discovery that occurs. What sort of ice cream does that little dock store have? Where does that trailhead on the beach lead? Is there a better anchorage on the other side of the island?
Captain Tarin Todd at Seattle’s Opening Day last year.
All of these experiences will become a personal sea story, a memory that will forever have a place in the mind and a place at story telling circles. On more than one occasion, I have ended up sitting next to a campfire on Sucia Island amongst other boaters we have just met. Someone always has a guitar (I think they are hidden in the trees there for just these moments), voices rise in song, sea shanties of old. In the pause between songs, stories fill the air. “We saw a huge pod of orcas today! And there wasn’t another boat around anywhere! As we floated there watching them…” Another song fills the space as this moment’s story teller finishes their yarn. The group, all strangers until just a short time ago, and now the closest friends a boater could have, even if temporary, take turns sharing experiences that come to mind, reminded maybe by a lyric in one of the songs, or a memory floated to the surface because of another’s story. All sit quietly, enthralled as the next chronicles their tale of adventure and discovery afloat. Even the telling of misadventures has a place in these moments. What was once a scary or dangerous moment can become a teaching for others on how to handle an emergency. It can become the tale of heroics, ingenuity and fast thinking that saved the day.
Sea stories are an important part of the boating culture. Oral history is a human phenomenon that boaters embrace without even thinking about it. I encourage you to notice these moments, the times when the stories begin to flow. As you listen, embrace the story teller’s tale. Try to imagine you are experiencing their adventure first hand and allow them the space to have their moment in sharing their experience. Even if you have had a similar event occur in your boating, be sure that you allow the teller to celebrate their own in that moment, because for them, that is what they know, what they have experienced. When it is your turn, be sure to share, rather than “one up”. With your tale, add to the moment instead of trying to prove you had the better adventure. We all have our own unique stories to tell and in them the most precious of moments to share. A sea story is a gift, a window into the life of another mariner. That they want to share that with you should be a compliment and a treasure to keep.
Boating, like life, is a constant education. As we learn our lessons and in turn want to share them with others, we can celebrate together those moments and support each other in our personal journeys, both on land and afloat. Share your sea stories, and share them often. Allow others a venue to share theirs. I truly believe that it is these moments that makes boating even more spectacular and unique of a hobby. Be good to one another and I will see you on the dock.
Bio: Born and raised in the Tacoma area, Tarin grew up playing on the shores of Puget Sound at the Tacoma Outboard Association’ club facility, which his family were members. His boating career started when he was 14 with the Sea Scout Ship Charles N. Curtis in Tacoma. Earning his 100 ton Master License when he was 21, Tarin still enjoys educating new boaters and young people to the joys of boating on the Salish Sea. He has cruise extensively from Olympia, WA to Princess Lousia, B.C. Tarin is currently the Marina Manager at Foss Harbor Marina in Tacoma. Whether sailing on the bay, cruising to the San Juans or diving with friends on Ruston Way, Tarin is most at home near the salt water.
Kurt grew up racing and cruising in the Midwest, and has raced Lasers since the late 1970s. Currently he is a broker at Swiftsure Yachts. He has been Assistant Editor at Sailing Magazine and a short stint as Editor of Northwest Yachting. Through Meadow Point Publishing he handles various marketing duties for smaller local companies. He currently is partners on a C&C 36 which he cruises throughout the Northwest. He’s married to the amazing Abby and is father to Ian and Gabe.
