David Bacon
(inducted 2011)
King Neptune,
My first blue-water experience was a delivery of Donnybrook, a custom Santa Cruz 72, from Annapolis to Saint Martin in early December of 2004.
Donnybrook is an all-out racing boat with two full-time professional sailors and some 20 sails. I had crewed with them on the Vineyard Race over the summer as grinder/rail meat. During the race things got hairy when the wind built from 5 to 30 knots in just a few minutes while we had the 3000 square foot light air spinnaker up. As the boat oscillated downwind at 20 knots I resisted the urge to run screaming belowdecks, and went to the foredeck to help bring down the spinnaker in the dark -- it took 10 people. Apparently I acquitted myself well enough that I was invited on the delivery to the Caribbean.
The delivery crew was the two full-timers -- the skipper, Guy, and first mate, Matt -- and myself and two of the racing regulars. As we departed Annapolis it was 28 degrees and blowing 25 knots. Carrying only a double-reefed delivery main, we zipped down the Chesapeake and out to sea.
As the sun set, I forgot about the cold as I began my first two-hour shift on the helm. Donnybrook has no self-steering, a twitchy helm, and no dodger, so we ran a staggered 4-on/4-off watch system where you spent the first half of your watch on the helm. But I often steered for part of Matt's shift, giving me 6 or 7 hours a day at the wheel -- bliss.
The winds stayed strong and we averaged 15 knots over 10 foot swells for the first two days, quickly crossing the Gulf Stream. It was fantastic sailing. And on the second day we started shedding layers and were soon down to shorts.
As we finished our easting and turned south, instead of picking up the trade winds the breeze dropped rapidly to a flat calm. After such a splendid run, it was really frustrating and by the second day irritation began to set in.
In the Patrick O'Brian novels, when the ship is becalmed Captain Aubrey lowers a sail into the water to create a pool and lets the sailors go swimming. I always had a hard time imagining what that would be like, but now was my chance: I proposed that we stop for a swim. After some debate, a GPS fix, and deployment of 2 50-foot trailing lines, we took turns jumping into the water. It's a primal feeling swimming in water 3 miles deep, 300 miles from the nearest land.
After our swim, the sun went down, the few clouds reflected perfectly in the glassy water, and the sky to the west slowly turning purple. I caught the sky at the same moments facing west and east over the course of 15 minutes.
Suddenly, we began to see the lights of ships on the horizon, our first in two days. But after a few minutes we realized that they weren't ships -- they were stars rising at the horizon! It was the dark of the moon, and you could see the entire sky, horizon to horizon, in every direction. I spent the whole night on deck, and watched Orion rise, reach its zenith, and set. The Milky Way was reflected perfectly in the calm water, and it was bright enough to read by. Occasionally shooting stars or satellites would streak across the sky.
The next day, much to everyone's relief, we finally caught the trade winds and made good time to Saint Martin. We cleaned up the boat, hit the usual watering hole, and by the next morning our tight-knit crew was spread across several flights on the way back home.
But for all the magnificent sailing, when I reminisce about the trip, I think about that magical afternoon and night when we weren't sailing at all.
P.S. The trip that really "tested my mettle" doesn't technically qualify as blue-water: the delivery of Miss Manhattan down the east coast when we came all too close to a hurricane (http://www.research.ibm.com/people/d/dfb/irene.html