A few friends asked me at the beginning to write about this boat acquisition experience. But I haven't written anything in many ages. The words just don't flow and honestly I've been avoiding it. Quite a few months have gone by now. Recently, the topic was raised again so I've decided to bite the bullet and make the attempt. 

But writing feels off. Something is missing but I don't know what. It's as if the words just don't taste right.

It's strange to think that I only started sailing three years ago when Dana first invited me to crew onboard AraVilla, a 2010 Leopard 46 Catamaran, on a crossing from Annapolis to Sint Maarten which involved 13 days non-stop at sea. At that time I had no sailing experience to speak of. I did, however, have over a thousand hours at the helm of a power boat, a 1988 SeaRay 300 Weekender express cruiser named OverDrawn that I owned for nearly two decades for all the wrong reasons.

 

My old man had died. My mom became agoraphobic. At the time I had been looking into getting into sailing and was actually in the market for a small sailboat. But it came to pass on one fateful July 4th when I had actually gotten her out of her house to watch fireworks at the Baltimore Inner Harbor that we took a little tourist put put boat and roamed around the little harbor there looking at the power boats before the fireworks started. A few captains actually invited us aboard their boats to show them off. Later, after the show was over she ominously said, "I think we should buy a boat." 

"Oh hell no.", I responded in German of course. My mom and I only spoke German with one another.

But I got to thinking about it and realized this was the first thing she had expressed any interest in. I knew full well it would suck for me because I'd be spending all my free time, which was precious little, keeping the thing running but she would enjoy it. She could invite the few friends she had left to join us. My friends would probably get a kick out of it and pitch in. I didn't want to do it. I have always found express cruisers to be brutal and loud. But doing my good son bit, I stepped up and learned all I could and tried to select a reasonably priced boat following all guidelines I had read. SeaRay, I was told, was a good brand with solid hulls. I found a boat. I hired a boat surveyor. The survey found no major problems with the boat. But, as Morgan Freeman would say, "But there were major problems with the boat." It was a disaster. Within 10 hours, one of the engines self destructed. It turns out both engines were completely shot and needed to be replaced. The surveyor missed rot in the deck, wiring issues, endless leaks, and a host of other problems. I was devastated and just felt sick thinking about all the money it was going to take to make it right. But we decided to keep the boat. After having hired professionals to re-power it and seeing the shoddy work they did, my friends and I stepped up to learn how to do all maintenance, repairs, and improvements ourselves. We all learned a tremendous amount. My mom would come out fairly often but as the years went on she would come out less often. But my friends and I, until they had kids, would go out most weekends. We put 1000 hours on the replacement engines and even managed to do a circumnavigation of the Delmarva Peninsula. At our furthest we were 14 miles off shore in the Atlantic which was the furthest out I had ever been on a boat. We would go on to explore much of the Chesapeake bay. 

But I never liked that boat. I always felt guilty about all the fuel we put through it. I felt terrible about the money and how, even after everything we did, it just never felt like a place I wanted to be. It was fast but couldn't go very far so taking some kind of Big Trip was out of the question. 

When my mom was placed into assisted living and it was clear she would never go out on the boat again, I got rid of it as soon as I could and declared that I would never again own a boat.

It was a miserable experience.

Boats are stupid. 

But I have to admit that I learned a tremendous amount which has served me well in a variety of areas including that first time aboard AraVilla.  

It was somewhere about 200 miles south of Bermuda when a long lost memory appeared. As a teenager, I had dreamed about sailing to Bermuda on a big catamaran one day, realizing it would never happen. Yet here I was on a midnight watch sailing much further than I ever imagined. It was also on that first crossing that I realized I had none of those bad feelings being aboard this boat that had plagued me on my power boat. Power boating was not good for me. 

But on that day it became clear to me that sailing definitely was. I just felt better. And this came as a surprise to me because the only place where I had previously experienced that sense of clarity and calm was on my motorcycle far away on my long distance rides. 

Strangely, after that first crossing, I continued to get invited to crew. I've crewed half a dozen times and been on a number of charters. I've logged nearly 5000 nautical miles already. On that first charter down in Sint Maarten, I had invited Jackie and Wayne in addition to two other couples. Jackie and Wayne used to sail smaller boats many years ago. It was on that trip that I learned that I actually prefer racer-cruiser mono-hulls. Jackie, towards the end of the charter, said to me, "I thought we were done with sailing but this has reawakened it in us."

Wayne created a very nice video of that trip:

It was because of Jackie that I started taking sailing courses. She signed up for one and sent me the link. Just as I realized the school was just 30 minutes away she sent me a message, "So you're taking this with me, right?" Thus it began in earnest. Wayne would join us for the next two courses. They would then go on to take many more courses and sail on a wide range of boats. Wayne has taken it so seriously that he is already getting paid crewing positions, which is extremely rare. He just got back from an all expenses paid position delivering a boat from Sweden to Germany. It's simply nuts. 

But for me at one point on a second charter at Saint Barts, I accidentally ate something off diet. I don't look sick but am chronically ill. I control it through a strict diet. But when I eat something off diet, it's just awful. It's a full on multi-systemic problem and often my mood is taken right down with it. While there is a lot of pain, I also just get to feeling worthless. When it's bad it lasts for days. I hate being so sick, fragile, and weak. But, mostly I've made my peace with it.  But this just hit home how much of a liability I can be Out There(tm) around other people. On my solo motorcycle trips, I can just hole up somewhere until it passes. But on a boat, even a big boat, there's no place to hide. I felt terrible. I had been supposed to crew on the next leg but was promptly uninvited and told I was a liability. I knew it was coming. After that event, my enthusiasm for sailing had all but vanished. It began to feel like i had always felt about the power boat. So while Wayne and Jackie went on to take all these courses and go on all these trips, I dropped out and sat at home here working ineffectively and slowly rotting away. 

Stagnant.

I began once again to feel that there is no point to me, which has been a recurring theme.

Then last year, Dana called saying he wanted me to crew on a trip down the Chesapeake Bay aboard AraVilla, a 2010 Leopard 46 Catamaran, the boat that started it all. It would just be the two of us.

"We've got 7 days before my crew arrives in Norfolk so we can just take our time and stop where ever we want. We can just do day sails. There's no need for overnight watches." he said. 

I told him skeptically, "It's been quite a while since I've been on a sailboat. I don't know if I remember which side is port or starboard." I was honestly apprehensive. Even though it was most of a year later, I was still feeling like I would be nothing but a liability.

"When I throw you into the deep end, you'll do fine."

I arrived at the boat on a gorgeous fall day and just as he promised, he said, "Just get us there." and despite my misgivings I ended up not only doing all the navigation but I essentially single handed the catamaran for most of the next 7 days. Most of it was just under motor because the wind kept coming from where we wanted to go and catamarans can't point into the wind to save their lives. But even motoring, AraVilla is a wonderful vessel. We did manage to get the sails up a couple of times and it was glorious. 

Dana is a very good cook and is familiar with being around chronically ill people with all kinds of dietary restrictions. He made certain I was well taken care of.

This was less like a delivery and more like a cruise. We stopped at a number of places include Tangier Island, a place I had wanted to see for decades. 

There came a moment, I think it was on the third day, that I realized I was starting to wake up. This awful feeling of stagnation had lifted and I started thinking about writing again. I started to move more. The creaking in my joints had lessened and I remembered once again that sailing, like long distance motorcycling, is really good for me despite how taxing it is. Life began to return to what essentially had become an animated corpse.

 

And once again I started feeling that maybe there is a point to me after all. There is none, of course, but the inner critter felt a sense of irrational purpose even if it's just getting this boat to Norfolk.

"Why does a dog chase a stick?" is a question I often ponder quite seriously.

I usually follow this by, "Why do I ride a motorcycle?" which seems like an analogous question. People come up with all kinds of "reasons" to ride a motorcycle. They talk about freedom, economics, membership, etc. These are all upper brain function nonsense trying to explain inner critter level feelings that have no explanation or meaning. 

"Why does a dog chase a stick?" There is no why. 

"Why do I ride a motorcycle?" There is also no why. I am drawn to it for feelings that make no logical sense. I can talk about effects. I feel better. I move better. I think more clearly. While it hurts quite a bit, overall I hurt much less. My mood is lightened. People talk about "wind therapy", but then will also never entertain real therapy. But these are not reasons. They are just effects.  

I can observe a phenomenon and realize I do not have to have a model to explain the "why" of a phenomenon. If I do not know of a "why" then I remind myself not to try to make one up. It's strangely freeing. Just observe. 

Why are we going to Norfolk? Well, he gets his crew in Norfolk and will sail to Sint Maarten for I believe the fourth time. Why are they doing that? Because the boat is here and not there. And once they get there what will they do? Go here, of course. Why? Because here is not there and there is not here. 

So I conclude from this that sailing, like motorcycling, is just a big game of throw the stick and bring it back. 

Dana and I got to talking about his desire to sail AraVilla to the Mediterranean in 2025 or 2026 and asked if I would be interested in crewing on that crossing.

During the conversation he gave me a bit of a talking to about the head space I was in. "Yea, you've got your issues and you're low energy, but I know I can rely on you. When you're on a watch you take it dead seriously. You're careful. I know when I go down things are in good hands. You even reef well before I do. I would have you crew anywhere." 

It was something I needed to hear. 

So I said yes before I even pondered how much such a crossing scares the bejeesus out of me. In comparison to my now regular sailing partners, Wayne and Jackie, I have slacked off while they have gone to achieve an impressive array of sailing accomplishments. I've got some catching up to do if I'm going to be a competent contributing crew member on such a challenging long crossing. Even on that very first crossing, I was keenly aware of the risks represented by having too much knowledge or ability tied up in one crew member even if that crew member is the captain. Accidents happens. People get ill or injured. If the captain becomes disabled someone else needs to be able get the vessel either to the nearest port or to its destination. On those first crossings, that's not something I could have done by myself. Then, on a different boat with a different captain on delivery from Bermuda to Halifax, I found myself alone at the helm in bad weather and relatively high seas while the captain was effectively disabled. The boat was also partially disabled. We had no auto-helm and hardly any steering. It was also very cold, wet, and windy. My foul weather gear was inadequate.  

That event had made quite an impression on me.

So here I was contemplating being on a proper trans-Atlantic crossing where really Bad Things(tm) can happen. On all the trips I've been on, I always took note of as many little details as I could. I would take note of the kinds of problems that would arise and how they were dealt with. But on these few trips, only a limited number of things have arisen. I've seen running rigging fail. A 1"+ sheet flailing in high winds slamming the deck carries a force that will slice a man open. I've seen sheets get all tangled up. I've seen sails blown out. I've seen the auto-helm fail and the key in the steering sheer off. I've seen the entire electrical system go dark due to a short. I've seen engines fail. 

What is it that I don't know? I've heard of all kinds of problems that I've never experienced directly. How bad is a broken thru-hull? How do you fix a broken head? How do you deal with fuel contamination? There are just so many problems I've never seen. What happens if the rig gets loose or god forbid falls down?

But then it dawned on me that in the end when you're on a charter or on a friend's boat, or a crew member, you just don't get the same depth and breadth of experience that you do when it's your own boat. When it's your own boat you deal with all the problems.

And at that very moment, for the first time, I felt drawn towards buying a boat.

It was not that I felt I was going to enjoy it. I knew that if I did this, it was most likely going to be a disaster like the last time. 

I realized I wanted all the problems that come with getting and owning a boat. I wanted the experience. I wanted this because big water scares me.

But I also realized it would challenge me in ways that I probably need to challenged. It would force me to interact with many more and different kinds of people, a prospect that causes me to shudder. I would be on the other side of the crew equation looking for people. 

But it would also allow me as much time as I wanted to practice everything I've learned about sailing as I want so I can turn all these awkward movements into fluid muscle memory. Taking classes is fine. Chartering or borrowing boats is fine. But none give you the kind of time to practice repeatedly what you have learned until it becomes effortless and no longer involves so much of your mind. This is something I know intuitively from motorcycling. 

"I guess it's time to make a move." I thought and decided I was going to get a boat of my own.

I knew this decision made no sense. But then again, chasing a stick doesn't either.