Day 2 - July 27, 2009
“Dawn comes early on a boat, right Cap’n?” “Yep, sure does, happens every morning, just about sun-up.” —Captain Ron
I woke up early to find the whole crew still completely zonked out, but that didn’t stop me from having my morning fun. I went topside to get my fishing gear ready and launch the kayak.
Our kayak was a blue, 15’ single, Ocean Kayak. My dad had bought it for me some 6 years ago. Its maiden voyage was when he dropped me off on the northern beach of Penn Cove, hopped in his truck, waved, and said, “I’ll see you on the other side!”
If you’re going to do something, make it epic. That was our motto, I guess. When we met on the other side he jested, “I just wanted to see if you could beat me here,” which I did not. He got a good laugh out of the whole thing. That was until I stole the keys and left him standing there with the kayak. It was his turn.
I shoved off the dock and headed for the point that separates Bowman Bay from Rosario Bay, which turned out to be nothing more than an underwater desert. Not a fish in the area. Eventually, I resigned to just mindlessly drifting around with a worm dragging on the bottom. By the time I paddled back to the boat, Dad and Tami were up and on deck. Tami was getting the basic 101 class on snorkeling and diving gear.
Yeah, my dad had cunningly convinced her to take a dive in the 58º water.
Cold enough to freeze the balls off of a brass monkey, but Tami was dedicated.
She got the hang of it after about a half-hour, but by then she was so cold I don’t think she cared whether she was on her way to being a pro diver or just a piece of driftwood floating around.
Back onboard the lovely smell of crab had been replaced by scrambled eggs and bacon cooked in a cast-iron skillet—some of which was still sizzling on the stove, every crackle and pop echoing through the cabin. We ate and got ready to cast off our lines so we could get back on course to Spencer Spit.
I stood on the bowsprit as we motored out of the bay, and could feel a slight breeze against my cheek, just strong enough to quickly whisk away the steam of every exhaled breath. With the sun coming over the distant mountains in the east, I felt a chill go over my body as the cold was chased away.
A quick fishing stop was made along the way. When I say, “quick,” I mean a four-hour detour, of course. Located due west of Deception Pass is Lawson Reef. When I saw it on the chart for the first time, it didn’t quite make it past my thick skull. Knock, knock, anybody home? But when I saw the reef register on our depth finder, I realized just how shallow the area was. From a depth of about 3 fathoms (18 feet) at Deception Pass, it drops off to 61 fathoms (366 feet) at its deepest. And as you approach the reef, it shoots back up almost immediately to only 1 or 2 fathoms. Knowing that, my dad had me posted out on the bowsprit making sure we weren’t taking his boat to an underwater salon to have her belly scratched.
Around the outer portions of the reef, as it drops off, there are a number of fish just—well, doing whatever fish do. We geared up our poles with a root-beer-colored jumbo shrimp jig. All you have to do is cast near the edge of the reef and let his little shrimp head bounce along the bottom as it drops off. Sure enough, not 5 minutes into the first cast, Lani had one on the line. We were all anxious to see what we were going to be pulling over the rail during this little trip, so we huddled around her as if we expected to see a mermaid at the end of her line.
It was a Rockfish.
An ugly Rockfish, but what did we expect, it was a ROCK-fish.
Eventually, everyone onboard pulled another hideous Rockfish over the rail, enough to have quite the feast that night, so we pulled our gear in and let our canvas take us north, through Rosario Straight.
By about 2:00 p.m. the wind had picked up a bit and we were making pretty good time up the straight. I figured it would be a good time to clean all the blood and guts from the fish off the deck. I thoroughly enjoyed it. You really feel a sense of pride in cleaning and maintaining your boat—scrubbing decks, fixing leaks, coiling and recoiling countless lines. It’s the little things aboard a boat that make you feel like you are part of it, rather than just on it.
While scrubbing fish guts, I happened to look up and notice my dad was missing one of the most important items you can have on a boat. He was missing a pirate flag. I remember in 2005, the Northwest Latitudes & Attitudes BBQ at Cornet Bay, every boat there had a pirate flag. There were flags of every shape and sort, from simple skull & crossbones to skeletons raising a glass to the devil.
I have heard it said that although modern-day pirates are a violent and evil bunch, there is still a good reason for sailors to fly pirate flags today. The notion of a pirate is often viewed from a more romantic perspective. Picturing Long John Silver hobbling around a ship’s galley with a parrot on his shoulder, or Cap’n Jack Sparrow swinging from ship to ship or riding the mast of a half-sunken dinghy is my idea of a pirate. Or course all of that is pure fiction. However, there is one element of 18th-century piracy that is worth holding onto. Aboard a pirate ship, every man had a vote. Including a vote to determine who would be their captain. And at any time, if the crew was dissatisfied with their captain, they could simply declare a challenge and re-vote. If you ask me, that sounds a bit like Democracy in its most raw form. At the very least, they understood the importance of a free and fair election. To me that says whether you are rich or poor, strong or weak, big or small, while you’re aboard this ship and part of this crew—you have a say. So, hoist the colors!
We had to fix this little problem my dad was having. I went down below and found an old black shirt I’d packed with a skull & crossbones on the front. I cut it out and tied some lines to the left corners. Before the skipper knew it, there was a 12”x18” pirate flag flying high above our deck. In a ridiculous kind of way, I was proud.
With the remaining piece of black shirt, I made myself a makeshift pirate bandana, which I wore religiously throughout the rest of our trip. Josh, being the supportive brother that he is, went below and began ripping one of his shirts to pieces in an attempt to show his “pirate spirit”.
As we rounded the corner, heading west into Lopez Pass, we had to be pretty careful. To our starboard side, just ahead, there were a set of submerged rocks with about a 30’ gap in the middle. Some sailors take their chances and can slip just between them, but we hadn’t sailed through this pass enough to just “go for it,” so we took the safe way down and around. It only took about an extra 15 minutes, which to me was just fine and reminds me of something I’ve been pondering.
So many “boaters” are into speed nowadays. They’re in such a hurry to get from POINT A to POINT B, that they miss the “POINT” of the whole trip. To me, it’s not about how fast you can get to where you are going, or how much time it took you to get there, but about what you went through along the way. I think it’s the big-city mentality that does this to most people. I certainly have fallen prey to it a time or two. It’s true that in most cases time is money, and on land the faster you get somewhere, the more you can get done. However, as a cruiser (or even a day-sailor) the point of the trip is the trip itself. Besides, most of us don’t have any money anyway.
Consider food, for example. As someone who loves good food, I can say that it’s not just about eating. It’s also about the preparation, the way the ingredients come together, the way they smell as they’re being cooked, the way they look after being plated, and then the savoring of all the flavors as you eat.
Yes, I’m fat. Why do you ask?
Sailing is the same way. Why spend 2 months at sea to get to a distant shore, or even 2 hours to cross the lake, only to forget the journey and the experiences you went through along the way?
Spending time at sea is something that at least 75% of all people will never experience. Even though cruisers are viewed as a minority, I’d like to think of us more as, “the privileged few,” a select group of adventurers, hand-picked by the gods to take on the sea. When you look at the world from that perspective, you see that the majority of people on earth are bound to life on land, leaving us to freely claim a world primarily covered by water. Virtually connecting every corner of the planet, the sea has been a home for sailors for thousands of years.
Don’t miss the ocean for the palm trees.
That evening we anchored just to the south of Spencer Spit. There weren’t many other boats around—a couple to the east of us, but they were a ways off. On the way up the straight, I had taken the liberty of pouring myself a couple of drinks, a grand mixture of Montego Bay Gold Rum and Coke—light on the Coke. I was positive my dad didn’t care for rum, and Lani had been down below most of the day. Yet somehow my drinks seemed to be going by faster and faster, and eventually one disappeared altogether without me taking a single sip. Hmm...
I couldn’t be sure, but I think my mystery was solved by the time we all decided to take an evening swim. My brother had the great idea to stand on the main boom and swing into the water using a halyard. What gave it away wasn’t the crazy idea, but the process of getting on top of the boom. Watching Josh attempt to climb up was like watching a blind monkey try to swing from tree to tree wearing a straight-jacket. It took near 10 tries for him to simply stand up, but he managed.
With a big breath and a quick butt-pucker, he leaped forward, squeezing the rope until the momentum of the swing could counter his body weight, letting his feet trail behind him as if he were flying. The rope reached its forward limit, Josh released his grip, and for a split second probably thought, “Why did I jump?”
Flailing his arms, trying to regain his stability, he hit the water with absolutely no grace at all. He crashed through the surface like a fragmented piece of falling concrete. As he surfaced and began to swim towards the stern, he stopped and swore there was a warm pocket of water. At this point, my mystery was solved. That sea-snake owes me some rum.
Not wanting to be outdone by my little brother, I took my shot at the rope swing. If you want to know how it ended up, read the previous paragraph—except there wasn’t any warm pocket of water to greet me afterward.
I guess once you are wet it doesn’t take much to get you back in the water. If anything, the wind chill makes you feel colder once you’ve gotten out. I made my way to the bowsprit, climbed on top of the pulpit, and with a quick burst, I dove forward. Arms stretched out to my side, feet perfectly together, it was a swan dive for the record books. Okay, so maybe not that good, but a swan dive nonetheless. I hit the water, and unlike the crash from the swing, my body slipped into the water, diving to a depth of about 9 or 10 feet.
It was an evening to remember.
I watched as the sun went down below the horizon, and felt the warm glow of twilight between each gust of sea breeze. It made me wonder, “Why would someone—anyone—not want to live on a boat?” It is a life of adventure and thrills that just can’t be found on hard ground.
As I have said in the past, “Life on land always seems to be just a bit too hard!
Comments