Art Attack Central

Fixing stuff, myself included…


Bobbing About on Boats

With the usual fanfare and near running aground at the dock, we shoved off from Dreams Landing on Saturday at 12:30 PM. The 15 knot wind pushed us down the Chesapeake Bay, under the Bay bridge and past Sandy Point. We turned (helms a lee) to the right and motored up the Magothy River to meet with 20 other sail boats. The winds of fortune smiled on us, because we only had to cross one other boat, to reach the dock of the rendezvous party host.

What’s so fortunate about that?

My mother has two knee replacements, and my dad is walking with a cane, because he needs one as well. The boats all raft up against one another, lashed together bow and stern, separated by bumpers, and spring lines to keep the mast spreaders from tangling. You make your way to the either the dock, or the boat hosting happy hour by crossing from boat to boat. Each boat deck is surrounded by a life line, which is usually about 2 feet high and strung through stanchions. Many an unsteady sailor has fallen, tripped and sometimes tasted sea water, especially while trying to maneuver his/her way back to their boat.

Do sailors drink too much?

Much like any other group some do and some don’t. Even those who don’t, find it hard to make the reverse trip in the dark guided only by flashlight. My experience on these cruises has been that happy hour lasts about an hour and a half, and then everyone “usually” returns to their own boat. Dinner is light, because happy hour snacking is heavy. Sailors who’ve been south to key West or the islands of the Bahamas blow the conch shell horn at sundown, sending boat pets scurrying down below.

Was the whole voyage lucky?

Of course not. However we had a magnificent sail on Monday. Sunday we motored/cruised across the bay with just the jenny up, and rafted up with 7 boats on Swan Creek not far from Rockhall. Monday came with 20 knot winds, and for once in the direction we were going. One of my dad’s rules of cruising is: “if you have a predetermined destination, the wind will be against you.” With the mainsail and the jenny raised we made an average speed of 7.5 nautical miles an hour for several hours. We sailed up the Chester River and rafted with 5 boats beyond Davis Creek. The raft was small with two anchors out, as the night was expected to bring stronger winds. The wind was not a problem, and the anchors held. Sleep was only occasionlly interruped by an annoying squeak from one of the rubber bumpers pressing against the hull.

What’s the unlucky part?

An injury occurred on Monday morning. During a minor crisis aboard the boat rafted next to us the palm of my right hand lost a smallish (lima bean size) piece of flesh. I was below deck, when I heard the woman on the next boat shouting at her husband, “get back here and hold us off.” I rushed up on deck, and fended their boat off from ours by pushing on the life line. A bit of my palm was pinched between the line and the stanchion ring, and as she went full speed ahead it went with her. All sailors are not created equal.

“If you don’t learn to laugh at troubles, you won’t have anything to laugh at when you grow old.”

–Edward W. Howe

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