Alaska Intro

So I kind of got ahead of myself on the last post, and failed to explain when I got to Alaska and where I'm going and all that.

I met the Barking Spider (the boat I was supposed to crew on in the Transpac race to Hawaii in July) in Juneau on Aug. 15. David, the skipper, and the 5 other crew (including myself) are taking the boat down to Vancouver, planning to arrive no later than Sept. 5.

A bit about everyone...

David Kory, our fearless leader. Although he has a tendency towards being a bit type-A about schedules and departure times, he's been more pleasant since he switched into "vacation mode" from "racing mode". There's less shouting in vacation mode.

Marianne, first mate, was on the race crew to Hawaii, has sailed around the world, and is the proud owner of a Cal 40. She is also a fabulous cook. And if you give her enough wine and encouragement, she'll yodel.

Steve was on the crew from Hawaii to Juneau. Whenever its REALLY flat out, he mentions how it looks just like it does in the middle of the Pacific. It was a very calm crossing. He's turning 61 tomorrow, but is in better shape than any of us, and wakes up mornings to run miles around town. He's a real character.

Mike is David's older brother. He's a stay-at-home father in IL, kite-man, and part-time programmer. His laid-back personality and sense of humor have been much appreciated, though he's the first to admit he doesn't know much about sailing. Here he is pretending to read the chart on the way out of Petersburg. Looks very convincing, eh?

Katie is David's youngest daugher, who turned 12 a couple of days ago. She's a fanatic for horses. Although we all thought we'd learn a bit more about sailing on this trip, we're also learning about horses. Whether we want to or not.

So that's the plan and the crew...

Birthday in Alaska

I got to Juneau without much trouble, meeting up with Marianne (a traveling companion on previous Barking Spider trips), Katie (skipper David's daughter), and Mike (David's brother) in the Seattle airport for our connecting flight. Steve was already on the boat, having helped sail from Hawaii. David WAS there to greet us, and not somewhere offshore waiting for a breeze or some fuel... which was good. There were a few rain drops as we left the airport, but then it cleared up for a few days. After checking out the tidewater glacier just outside of town, we cast off and motored to Tracy Arm.

We spent the night in a nice, protected anchorage -- our only complaint was the gnats. But they weren't biting, so we didn't complain too much. The next morning -- the morning of my 30th birthday -- we started up Tracy Arm towards the Sawyer Glacier.

The rock walls on either side of the narrow channel were carved smooth and steep by glaciers, and looked a lot like Yosemite. Actually, I had to keep reminding myself we were in salt water, as it seemed we were boating through Hetch Hetchy, or some other freshwater res. And there were waterfalls! How close can you sail to a waterfall? Didn't learn that in the basic class...

We were able to sail quite close to the tidewater glacier, through a minefield of small iceburgs. I though we got a bit TOO close, but the view was really amazing... still haven't heard a good explanation of why the ice appears blue... anyone? anyone?

And the day just kept getting better! Between the lovely dinner prepared by Marianne on the way to the next anchorage and getting to the anchorage before dark, we must have seen at least 25 whales. Or at least we saw that many breathe. This one kept raising his flippers and flopping them on the surface of the water. Over and over. And I saw him breach once. Weird, but interesting. Have a neat movie of it that I can't upload...

All in all, a birthday that will be hard to top.

I'm getting a little behind as internet access is spotty. My birthday was the 17th. Katie's was the 20th (it was also spectacular). We're in Ketchican today. If we stay another day, I'll try to do another post tomorrow, otherwise it might be a while... and I'll try to remember to bring the limericks I wrote to the internet cafe to post. Lucky you.

Hawaii

I flew into Honolulu on the evening of Tuesday July 26, picked up my rental car, and immediately headed over to the Ilikai Hotel to check on Barking Spider's progress. The race committee staff let me know that they weren't expected to cross the finish line off of Diamond Head until 9 am the next morning. This was good news for me, as I would get to see them cross the finish line and greet them as they arrived. I happened to run into David's wife, Carolyn, who said she'd call me in the morning so I could join her family on the "follow me" boat which would lead the Barking Spider from the finish line to the marina. Great! So at 5:30 am (which is fortunately 8:30 am Pacific Time, which is where my head still was), I got my wakeup call, and was off to the marina. We headed out to the finish line in a little power boat with some memebers of the Hawaii Yacht Club.

As we headed out of the marina, I noticed surfable waves breaking adjacent to the narrow channel. One of the Hawaiians said during rough weather, the waves break in the channel. In fact, once he saw a sail boat get rolled over on the approach, and the helmsman get tossed off. His story got better. The boat then righted itself, did a 360 turn, and came back at the swimmer, near the break. When the boat rolled again, the guy saw his chance and grabbed onto the boat, made it back on, and motored out of there. Sounded pretty incredible. Then Carolyn piped up and said, "Hey... that was Hans. The guy Marianne circumnavigated with." Small world. Marianne said she has pictures of it, which I'll try to get a hold of.

Anyway... back to the boating story at hand... we motored out toward Diamond Head, watching the little spec which was the Barking Spider growing in the distance. The seas were calm, it was warm and breezy, and the intermittant spray felt good. As they crossed the line between the lighthouse and channel marker denoting the finish, we all cheered. They looked really happy. You may notice in the photo to the left that they're flying only one sail. And that the boom is lashed onto the deck instead of hanging above the deck like it usually does. The pin holding the boom to the mast sheared about 250 miles from the finish line, so they had to finish with just the headsail. Note for sailing geeks only: While in the Molokai Channel, they hoisted the spinaker to try to make a good looking finish. However, without the mainsail to stabilize the boat, the helm was unable to control the boat. They pitched from one side to the other, and ended up following going around in a circle before putting the genoa back up (see the chart at right).

The equipment failure and the light, variable winds contriubuted to their arrival two days later than David had been hoping. They had anticipated being able to hoist the spinaker and leave it there for 9 days, doing a nice easy downwind sail, but that wasn't how it ended up going. To try to keep up with the changes in the wind strength, they were alternating between the spinaker and genoa at least once per day. Sail changes are exhausting. Although the crew were tired when they arrived, they didn't let that stop them from enjoying cold drinks, fresh fruit, dry land, and new company.

David spent only three days in Hawaii, just enough to resupply, fix the boom, attend the parties, and then he loaded up the next crew and headed for Glacier Bay and then Juneau, AK. While I was in the hospital a few weeks earlier, I thought that I might be able to rejoin the crew for the sail to Alaska. However, as the date grew closer I was not healing as fast as I was hoping I would. My lung capacity was slowly increasing, but Xrays still showed a lot of fluid in there. The inspirometer gadget (measures how much you can breathe in) showed my lung capacity was at 500 mL at the hospital, then 1500 mL a week later when friends came to visit. They all gave it a try, and it turned into a strange little competition. The smokers averaged 3,500 mL and Sam maxed it out at 5,000 mL (way to go, Sammy). So I still had a ways to go to get back to normal. I could go for slow, short walks and got tired easily. I couldn't lift anything, but I was beginning to be able to raise my right and then left arm. Which was very exciting for me. Showering is difficult and exhausting when you can't easily reach all the parts you want to wash. So, anyway, I decided that I wasn't fit for sailing... or even being a passenger on a sailboat, as I really didn't have the arm strength to keep from flailing about.

But that meant I had more time to spend in Hawaii!! My friend Jenny Ryan had recently moved to Waikiki from Santa Cruz. She let me stay in her second bedroom and was a fabulous tour guide. Although you can't actually see it in the picutre, it somewhere behind us, just below Diamond Head -- a choice location near the park, the beach, the Diamond Head Grill, and a walking distance to the Waikiki tourist strip. She took me for a walk through the botanical gardens near the Manoa Falls. The flowers were amazing, as were the mosquitos.

Niels joined us, after the boat left, leaving him without a bunk. Jenny took us up to the north shore to a beach with swimming turtles -- which were very difficult to photograph -- and to the best fabulous mahi mahi burger place. The next day we went on a hike one the windward side and then to a beach with sand that was like sugar. Jenny introduced us to the love of her life -- shave ice. We ate some poke (like a salad of sashimi), checked out a ukelele festival in the park across from her house, and went shopping at the flea market. All and all a good time.

And all the walking, sunshine and ahi did wonders for me. My doctor was quite impressed by the recovery my lungs are making. She has cleared me to meet the Barking Spider in Juneau and sail down the Inside Passage to Vancouver. However, I'm not allowed to lift anything or to fish. Which is going to be difficult...

Race Across the Pacific

The former owner of the Tradewinds Sailing Club in Richmond, CA http://www.tradewindssailing.com decided he wanted to enter the Transpacific sailboat race, which starts in Long Beach and ends 2,300 miles later in Hawaii. I was one of the 5 club members selected to crew on his 65' ultralight displacement boat, the Barking Spider 3. I had sailed with David Kory (the skipper) and two of the rest of the crew (Marianne and Niels), in a aborted attempt at the LA to Puerto Vallarta race earlier in the year. I met the two new crew, Steve and Joe, during our three practice sessions between Richmond and the Faralon Islands, and they proved to be fantastic people. David's plan after the race was to sail up to Alaska, cruise down the inside passage to Vancouver, and harbor-hop down to San Francisco. Leaving the Bay Area in early July and not returning until late September sounded pretty good to me. (Photo left to right: David, Joe, Niels, Marianne, and Steve)

And when I found out how much equity my house in Santa Rosa had amassed in the few years I'd owned it, a little light bulb went off in my head. Why don't I take some time off and go sailing? Unfortunately, due to the disparity between rents and mortgages, I couldn't keep the house as a rental. Fortunately, the market was still quite hot when I sold it for a smidge more than the asking price.

So I planned to join David for a 7,000 mile sailing adventure around the Pacific this summer. The first step was to get the boat from Richmond to Long Beach. Simple run down the coast. No problem, right? The weather man called for a fairly standard 10-25 knots of wind from the Northeast. Great. However, as we pulled out the gate and turned left, that's not what we got. At first there was virtually no wind, and we motored for a while. Later that afternoon the wind had picked up to 25-30 knots and we put a reef in the mainsail. Reefing makes the sail smaller so the wind wouldn't push us through the water as fast. The picture to the left shows Steve and David gathering up the sagging bit of sail after reefing. By the time I got up for my midnight to 4 am watch, steering had become difficult, and I remember hearing several accidental jibes while "sleeping" below.

Here's a little sailing primer that will help those of you not acquainted with sailing jargon understand the rest of this post: "Jibing" means to move the stern of the boat through the wind. So if you were at the wheel, for example, the wind would change from blowing from behind you on the right side to behind you on the left side. The wind's effect on you is rather trivial compared to its affect on the 1,000 square-foot mainsail. When 30 knots of wind changes from pushing the sail and boom one way to pushing it the other way, the sail and boom move with great speed and force to the other side of the boat. During an intentional jibe, the helmsman has someone control the movement of the boom with a "mainsheet", the blue rope attached to the boom in the above picture. During an accidental jibe, the helmsman has maybe a second to yell "Duck!" before the boom does a swoosh through the cockpit and crashed to a stop on the other side.

I did a half-hour of steering, which was much more difficult, and totally unlike cruising around the bay. The night was pitch black and the deck lights did nothing to illuminate the water. As the 10 foot swells were impossible to see, I had to anticipate their action by feel, and keep my eyes glued to the compass. There was nothing on the horizon to aim for -- in fact if there had been a brick wall 10 feet in front of the boat (very hypothetically speaking), I would have run right into it. A half-hour is about as long as one wants to spend on the helm. Steering requires such intense concentration, that its quite nerve wracking and a bit tiring. I'm proud to say that I managed NOT to accidentally jibe. When Niels took the helm again, the wind picked up. The boat was cruising along at no less than 15 knots. So David called for us to reduce sail again.

There's a saying about reefing: don't wait until you have to reef -- reef early. Reefing is one of those many (I'm coming to find) challenging maneuvers which involves stationing most of the crew at different positions around the deck. My position is on the main sheet, which is (thankfully, I thought) in the cockpit, and not at the mast, where I'm just a bit more uneasy. If you anticipate the need to reef, you can do it before the wind picks up to the point where the heel angle is uncomfortable, the wind isn't yet screaming, and the swells aren't too bad. There was a monkey's fist (a big 'ol knot) in the reefing line we needed, so we probably waited a little longer than we should have. After a good while spent getting the line unfouled, we turned into the wind to take in the second reef. The boat became typically uncomfortable as we turned into the wind, as the wind's howl picked up as our "apparent wind" apporached the "true wind" speed of 30+ knots and the bow alternately climbed swells and plunged into troughs.

I remember we got the reef in. I'm not really sure what happened after that. But apparently Niels took his eyes off the compass for a second too long and jibed. I never heard or saw it coming. The main sheet, which is attached between the quickly jibing boom and the deck right beside me, hit me on the left side and pinned me to the deck. I tried to get out, and Steve unsuccessfully tried to lift the mainsheet off, injuring his finger in the process. The rope was pinning me down with X pounds of force (I'll do the math later). Niels jibed back to get the rope off me. I do remember crawling to the floor and looking up at Steve to tell him "I'm not ok. I think I broke my back." Unfortunately, words were not coming out of my mouth. In fact, my lungs had been squished and I wasn't getting air in our out for a little bit. When my breathing restarted it was extremely shallow and irregular. Then I looked around and saw a surprising amount of blood all over the place. Niels said, "It's Steve's blood. Don't worry." That helped. And then he told me my back wasn't broken. Like his first comforting statement, it wasn't really based on any sort of knowledge. But, again, it helped. A team effort managed to get me below so I would stay warmer during the 8 hour trip to Morro Bay, and Marianne swabbed and band-aided the cut over my eye, which due to the excruciating pain in my back, I was rather unconcerned about.

We got to Morro Bay fine (at least there seemed to be no more than the standard amount of yelling and jostling), and Niels escorted me via cab to the Sierra Vista hospital in San Luis Obispo. The staff there was great from the moment I got there. They put me in a wheelchair at the curb and wheeled me straight into an emergency room, bypassing the paperwork of the front office until after my cut had been cleaned and some X-rays taken. I was surprised by my inability to "take a deep breath" at the X-ray tech instruction. Then I saw the X-ray. The whole left side of my lung was white due to a contusion, and there was a lot of fluid floating around in there. The lung injury obscured my ribs, so although the doctors guessed there was probably at least one broken, they couldn't really tell for sure. (Side note: Today, one month later, I got another X-ray which shows rib #8 is broken. My doctor said the fluid is mostly blood from the arteries and veins running along that rib that were severed. Gross.) Then they finished picking white deck paint out of the inch-long cut just below my right eyebrow, and did a nice job sewing up the wound. For those who like counting stitches: I got 7 subcutaneous including 2 through split muscle tissue, and 5 on the surface.

So they kept me there overnight to observe me. I stopped complaining about their repeated insistence on sticking me with needles later that afternoon when they hooked me up to the self-administered morphine bag. That stuff really works. My friend John Butler, who recently moved to SLO, came by to keep my company. He beat me at cribbage while I was doped up on morphine, but when they took me off of it a couple days later I got him back. Ha! I was in the hospital for 6 days, where I slowly regained use of my body, piece by piece. I couldn't lift my arms above the elbows for quite a while, and John joked about my "Tyrannosaurus Rex arms" flailing about.

Ironically, someone from my last job called to make sure I'd have health insurance for as long as it was available. I told them I appreciated the call, as I was currently in the hospital. And, like wildfire, the story spread. Which led to me receiving flowers and cards from folks wishing me well. Which was very much appreciated. Mom and Dad happened to be in Long Beach, and were able to come pick me up and drive me back to their place in Orangevale to recuperate. Which was much appreciated. The heat wave the Sacramento area has been experiencing since then has not been so appreciated.

I think I looked pretty beat up while I was in the hospital, though I didn't spend a lot of time looking in the mirror. As I left my camera on the boat, I didn't have the opportunity to have someone take my picture at my absolute worst. But I did get a picture of the really nasty swollen bruise on my left side a week later.

So, the race went on without me. My doctor cleared me to fly to Hawaii to see the Barking Spider finish... more on that later.

Hi friends, family, former coworkers, casual aquaintances, and curious onlookers!

Some of you are already aware that I recently quit my job and sold my house in Santa Rosa to travel for a year. Those of you who were not yet aware of this can testify that I am not so good at keeping folks up to date on what's going on in my life.

People seem to be expecting that since I'm temorarily freed from the daily grind, my life should be more interesting. Or at least afford more photo opportunities. One ingenious person (you know who you are) asked if I was doing a blog, since emailing everyone is time consuming. It was then that I realized I should be doing a blog. So here it is...

If this posts like I think it is supposed to, the next blog will be about leaving Santa Rosa and starting on my 7,000 mile summer sailing journey around the Pacific.