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First Person Account: Remembering My First Ocean Sail
By Gary Friesen -- I was about 21 years old and had just bought my first Hobie 16. It
was a beat up, old red thing with plain white sails. I wasn't proud
of her appearance, but I could afford her. I think that I paid about
$350, on the trailer. As usual, I had no crew.
This fellow boater explained to me that not only would it become much
windier as the day progressed but also, that I would have to beat
upwind to make my way back to the dock; "that might not be good for a
beginner." He was surprised that I was there and asked me why I was
not going to Claremont. Once he found out how oblivious I was to the
sailing scene, he schooled me on this beautiful cat launching area, on
the sand, within the confines of the 100-mile bay, where the wind is
good and steady. I did not know why he was so surprised and I did not
know that I was at a place with such a scary name.
My niece who was about 9 years old at the time, was a good swimmer, body-surfer, and had taken some kind of a junior life saving swimming pool class. The two of us had swum like fish together in the ocean surf, many times. So I invited her along for a possible boat ride. I invited my parents too. It was a ploy. I could tell them that they were needed to baby-sit my niece in case I found it unsafe to take her on the boat. This way, I did not have to admit that I wanted my father there in case I couldn't raise the mast or get the boat back onto the trailer.
I had sailed my friend, Dan's Hobie 16 in a lake and had sailed my 12' mono hull in another local lake. Both experiences were lacking much wind. I knew where to find wind; the Pacific Ocean. I was familiar with where all the public motorboat launches were and I chose the one that I thought looked like it had best access. I was not too far from a well-known catamaran beach at Claremont Street but did not know anything about Claremont.
Los Angeles harbor is huge, a hundred square miles. It seemed like a good place to get ocean breeze while not being too affected by the surf. I headed to Cabrillo Beach public boat launch in San Pedro. When I got there, the wind was already blowing pretty hard and I was noticeably intimidated. I spoke to one of the locals and asked about how windy it gets there. He found out that I was a rookie and immediately told me that I was at the wrong place. I did not know that I was at the windiest hole in Los Angeles that carries the nickname "Hurricane Gulch!"
I packed up, asked for a refund, and headed to the other community facility on the bay. I left San Pedro and went to Long Beach, at Claremont Street. This is a place where you need a roller and I did not even know what a catamaran beach roller was. It was quiet and there were no other boats at Claremont, just a couple of windsurfers.
My trusty old father, along with my niece, helped me drag the boat down the couple of hundred feet of sand beach to the water's edge. It was going to be a lot of work to bring the boat back up to the trailer and I was happy to have some helpers with me! The first time I returned to this facility, a week later, I saw people using a home made blue plastic barrel beach roller and I was in a state of awe and wonder.
Lucky for me, my friend Dan had given me a good lesson. I knew how to set up the boat, sail the boat, and had practiced a capsize recovery.
After I was finished with the final rigging on the beach I took my niece aside to present her preliminary lesson. With her being a water bug, it was pretty easy for me to get all the necessary fundamentals across to her in an understandable manor. I stressed life safety, cooperation, and cohesiveness in both sailing and recovery from potential problematic events. As soon as all the fundamentals were covered, I made sure to broach the subjects of man overboard procedures and capsize recovery.
I made it clear to my niece that capsizing is a part of catamaran sailing and even though you may not purposely capsize, there is always a few unexpected capsizes along the voyage. My beautiful student was astute and without fear. She was nervous at the thought of an unexpected capsize, but very willing to accept its inevitability and to learn the drill. So I made sure that she understood what would happen, what she should do, what we should do, and what not to do. To break the nervousness and maintain her excellent astute concentration, I tossed in some comedy. Well sort of.
I knew that she was nervous, as was I. I also knew that comedy relief could work wonders when the nerves are getting you a little too wound up. So I planted the seed that would later lead to me being able to make her laugh in relief. I knew that if I made things sound worse than real, and then could tell her that I was only joking, that this would induce relief and laughter that should wipe away all the fear.
Not being the wise man I am today, who always is wearing a personal floatation device (PFD) when on the water, I did what many of us did back then, I strapped a couple of life jackets to the boat. We were both comfortable with swimming in the ocean at depths that remained "over our heads."
A portion of her capsize instruction went like this: "Once you are in the water there are a few things which must be done before worrying about what to do with the capsized boat. You need to make sure that you are safe and unharmed, and then you need to make sure that your partner is safe and unharmed and deal with that situation. Just as you do when you dive beneath a surf wave, you get a nice fresh breath of air before you go under the water. Stay under for a quick count of ten and then come up and say `I'm okay, are you okay' as you look to spot your partner. Once you have communicated with your partner to know that you are both okay, you prepare to right the boat. First you go to the bow of the boat while I climb onto the boat to rig the righting line."
Of course she asked about why we had to count to ten while underwater. "Well that is to ensure that the sharks would not bother you. You see, the chance of a shark encounter here is rare but the initial splash is what would attract them if they were around. So you avoid the surface for the count of ten so that there are no subsequent splashes to attract them. If they don't notice continued splashing for a few seconds, then they are not even attracted to come and check things out. Once you've remained calm for a few seconds, there are no worries at all, about sharks." I knew that if I could get her to take this in stride, that all rest of the capsize instructions would be easy for her to deal with and that I could give her a much deserved laugh of relief when I told her that I was only kidding her.
We did pretty well together and it was a lot of fun. Entering though the tiny surf within the harbor was painless. We managed to stay pretty dry at first but as usual, the cumulative spray chills your skin to the point where you simply don't notice the wet spray anymore.
We were screaming around on beam reaches and sailing closer once in a while to fly a hull. We had one of those A-frame shaped ice chests (playmate) tied to the center tramp lacing. Once we hit a wave while flying a hull, the ice chest flew down to the low side and the tether just yanked the lid open and all of our food and drinks ejected into the ocean. It looked like a real fast dump truck. I sat up on the highflying hull and watched my nice, fresh, and cold seedless grapes go to sea, followed by an unopened cardboard can of cheese balls. At the time they were a new kind of cheese puff snack in an all-new type of container; replaceable plastic lid after you pulled off the tin can top. Then the cokes followed. It all dumped, then sailed out of view rather quickly.
Knowing now that we would not be spending any time eating, we just sailed faster and faster and had more of the fun that we had come for.
Inevitably, we got a little too high and capsized, somewhat gracefully. I was so proud of my niece for not showing fear as we went over. As I shook the wet hair out of my salty eyes, I looked around and asked if she was okay. Just a few seconds later she erupted from the water saying, "I'm okay, are you okay?" I nearly cried in laughter as I realized that I had forgotten to tell her that it was all a big joke about the counting to ten underwater. I proudly watched her as she perfectly followed my instructions and showed absolutely no sign of fear of panic.
She asked me if I really thought the capsize was that funny. She said that it might have been kind of fun but she could not understand why I was getting such a big laugh out of it. By the time we got finished laughing about it, all the stress of being in the cold water with a capsized boat had instantly vanished. I felt bad that I had teased her and forgotten to inform her that there were really no sharks. The calmness in her approach to righting the boat was partially a result of her feeling successful in getting past the scariest part. So maybe I actually helped her by forgetting to tell her that the shark thing was just a joke. Anyway, we had a real good laugh together.
When we returned to the beach, we laid down in the sun-soaked sand to warm our skin. The sun warmed our backs, the sand warmed our bellies, the wind blew us dry, and the water left a layer of salt on us that made us feel like real Sailors. My dad, niece and I began to drag the boat up the beach and a couple of sunbathers offered to help. I was exhausted and very happy to have the extra help. Little did I know about the invention of the wheel!
I had just had a great first day on my first very own catamaran, sharing the fun with family. I was eager to return to Claremont for more cat sailing fun. A week later it was a different scene. This time there were many catamarans as there was some sort of regatta in progress. I learned about beach rollers and sailed my first solo run.
Alone on my boat, I laughed out loud when I found an unopened can of cheese balls floating around in the water. The label was soaked, and sun burnt. I picked up the mushy mess and carried it back to shore to the trash can. I didn't find any grapes or cokes. But I did find sun, water, wind, and great hull flying fun!
Gary Friesen
Copyright 2005 all rights reserved
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