Boat Show ends

The boat show ends this weekend, under appropriately sunny skies. Our last day was Thursday, however, which wasn't quite so sunny, but was considerably less crowded and slower-paced than our first two days.

We went to the South Lake Union section first to take another longer look at the sailboats there with more opportunity to poke around in the nooks and crannies and more time to talk with the salespeople. We spent quite a bit of time chatting with one helpful gentleman from Discovery Yachts brokerage aboard a Regina of Vindo--Mandy loved the (uber-expensive) pilot-house boat but I thought our conversation with the broker was more useful... more information and better informed speculation than one might get in a year of surfing various Internet message boards. Goes to show you that you can't live life successfully entirely online, I suppose.

The Regina was not to my taste, although obviously well-built and well-appointed. It was only a 35, of course, which seems pretty small next to most of the boats there, but it seemed a little cramped even compared to our 33... probably due to more storage and tankage and a different, off-shore-oriented design philosophy.

Two 38 foot Bavarias there had caught our eye on Monday and I went aboard both for another look. I had done a little digging in the interim and found that they are pretty poorly regarded boats, seen as more expensive but in the same category as many of their American coastal cruiser counterparts. I had noticed some problems--puddles at the bottom of lockers, a segmented bilge without drainholes through stringers, and some other design defects. And like the American boats (Bavarias are built in Germany; you're more likely to see them in Europe than the west coast of the US) they weren't designed for heavy ocean-going work, without the host of small features you want to see in a boat that is going to take a beating from time to time. Apart from that, though, I couldn't find the construction and finishing defects that everyone online seemed to complain about. And they do seem better suited for off-shore work in some respects, with more tankage and some of the fittings one would expect on a beefier boat. It's an odd combination, I suppose, and I'm still ultimately not sure what to think. I was initially impressed by their CE Class A (Offshore) rating until I chatted with someone who had gone through the rating process and insisted it was a bureacratic joke. Still, for the money they seem to have better offshore features than their American counterparts in the same size range, and I imagine that even if it is mostly lipservice to the CE rating, that is why.

One of them was used, but it presented a currently unavailable center cockpit version, which I quite liked. Mandy wasn't impressed by either one, though, which I suppose is just as well. Something common to those and the other European boats was the inclusion of the head amidships or slightly aft, which I really like. Our Hunter has a similar arrangement and I can't imagine considering anything else for use in bouncy waters. It's a task to stand up forward of the mast when we're in heavy seas; trying to use the head would be a disaster. The easier motion toward the stern makes the necessary functions much easier. I am not sure why it has been left to the European designers (with a few notable exceptions) to come up with more practical modern accomodations, but that seems to be the trend.

Mandy was quite impressed by the Catalina 44DS, which practically has a basement in the bilge... but then, she's the one who doesn't want a boat bigger than 38 feet in the first place. The space is nice, but a floating condo isn't really what we're after.

At the end of the day, there wasn't really a lot down on the lake that impressed us. We did get some ideas on various features we like, though, which will probably be a help when it comes time to shop around for an upgrade.

After we were done at Lake Union, we took advantage of the free SLUT (South Lake Union Trolley for you non-locals... they changed the official name pretty quick when they realized the acronym it formed, but you can still buy "Ride the SLUT" T-shirts in a variety of venues in the South Lake Union area) tickets and grabbed the streetcar downtown for lunch. Then we hoofed it over to Qwest Field to catch the Man Overboard presention by Chuck Gould, editor of Nor'westing magazine.

This turned out to be a presentation we both liked. It was suitably generic to type and size of boat, even though Gould is primarily a power-boater, and suitably specific to the region and our climate. There were no flashy insights or silver bullets, but then none were expected. Gould gave a good talk and presented an effective framework for thinking about crew safety in terms of MOB accidents.

After all that, I feel like I should be out in the sunshine today working on Insegrevious. Since it's SuperBowl weekend, though, I'm at home instead, doing the work that I might instead have done tomorrow, had I not been going to a SuperBowl party instead. But it feels like spring is getting ready to burst out soon, and with it we'll have to find some time for sailing again.

Seattle Boat Show

It's that time of year again... freezing, windy, with a dash of snow thrown in for spice. The warm breezes and gentle swells of summer on Puget Sound are but a distant memory, which only the most stout-hearted are able to chisel out and contemplate without tears of sorrow sweeping their cheeks.

It must be time for the Seattle Boat Show again!

We got three day passes again and have gone for two of those days. My first impressions are that the show is both smaller and more sparsely attended than last year, but the deals are much better and more easily had. Pity we're not shopping for much this year... most of our outfitting was either done or won't be done again until the next time we are getting ready for along trip. Most of the boat budget this year will probably go into engine repairs, if that.

We are taking the opportunity to catch some of the seminars that we missed last year in our haste, and to check out potential future upgrade boats should we suddenly have a fit of profitability in one of our businesses. We're only catching the free seminars, not the presumably more comprehensive "Boat Show University" presentations, which cost extra, and they've been a mixed bag. Mandy liked the Marine Weather skills presentation by Lee Chesneau, which I felt was scattered and confusing (to be fair, Mr. Chesneau looked as if he were having a horrible day, with some sort of fever and an uncooperative electronic equipment, and I am sure that hurt his presentation), whereas I liked Clyde Ford's Situational Awareness presentation and Mandy felt it didn't address the topic that was promised. We're going to go to Chuck Gould's Man Overboard presentation tomorrow; hopefully that will score a hit for both of us, as it's a significant concern of ours.

As usual, the show has us all fired up about getting out on the water again. With the economy in the dumper, why not spend all this time not working by sailing, instead? I'm not sure I know the answer to that rhetorical question yet, but with the economy the way it is and our impending nuptials this summer, there might be "Perfect Storm" conditions for taking another sizeable trip considerably before we had ever thought we would. Sailing as a honeymoon has the virtue of putting the dollars that might otherwise be blown on airfare and accomodations into something that we will get more long-term use out of (ie, the boat). And diesel prices are lower and the exchange rate better this time around, to boot.

Mid-winter musings

Still not a lot going on sailing-wise in our world, but I have been using some of the enforced indoor time from our recent cold and stormy weather in the Pacific Northwest to catch up on some of my blog-following, and came across this account by some Seattle sailors braver than we are, who ventured out last month weather notwithstanding. It sounds like about as much fun as we had assumed...

I can't remember the exact date, so I can't be sure it was the S/V Hello World that I saw, but sometime around this timeframe I was driving out to Shilshole to check up on Insegrevious and happened to catch a glimpse of a sloop just heading out the south breakwater, bucking and slamming into the surf, and thought to myself "Those poor gutsy bastards, it's gonna be a long day for them wherever they are headed."

Of course, the best way to learn is to put yourself in a position where you have to, so I don't think it's inherently crazy to go out this time of year. And from the laundry list offered at the end of the post, it's clear they did learn from it... which is better than I can claim from my experiences in similar situations.

I thought I would comment on a couple of their "lessons learned" though, after several passages through similarly rough Puget Sound/Strait of Juan de Fuca waters which have lead me to slightly different conclusions.

• A time machine is the only accurate weather forecasting tool. Don't rely on the forecast being accurate!

Especially in the Pacific Northwest!

• Get your PFD on before you leave the dock because there's too much business to attend to once the boat is in motion.

Absolutely; if you can see waves outside the breakwater, it's time to suit up. In fact, it's time to do everything you possibly can, even if you have to putter around a little bit and leave late. Those first few minutes outside the breakwater are often the most stressful and difficult of a trip... getting the sail up, the course set, discovering all the little equipment glitches... it's full of distractions as it is, and if you haven't already covered the important safety stuff, you're not likely to do so right then. But it's also exactly when you are up on the foredeck without your sea legs. Prime falling off the boat territory (coming from someone familiar with falling off the boat, sans PFD).

• Being on the foredeck in four to six foot seas sans PFD isn't a great idea.

I'd go one further and say that being forward of the cockpit in those conditions without being clipped on somehow is an even worse idea. I've had enough experience sailing through seas like that to know that it's no picnic handling the boat (and those are relatively mild conditions... it gets worse, even around here). It's better to float than to sink, but floating is just the first step to surviving if you go overboard. Someone has to get the boat back to you, and get you back aboard. No doubt they have considered and practiced that contingency, but probably not in such conditions. Mandy and I tried it once up on the Strait of Georgia with a spare seat cushion, and both of us calm and helping to run the boat. That's one seat cushion we'll never see again, despite a good fifteen to twenty minutes attempting to manuever close enough and slow enough to grab it. And we were cheating and using a boat hook at the end, just trying to snag it as we passed each other on the sides of five-foot waves. Which probably wouldn't have mattered anyway, had it been a person, because we would have crushed his or her skull on the second pass. Add in a little adrenaline and subtract a pair of hands, and the odds of recovery have to go way down.

I'm sure we'll get better, and goodness knows the crew of Hello World are probably better sailors than we are, but I have come to the firm opinion that not going overboard in the first place is the number one goal. A PFD is a nice touch for the Coast Guard when they come to recover the body afterward.

So; in addition to putting one of those on before leaving the dock in such conditions, I'd make sure I had a jackline rigged (we kept it rigged more often than not last summer, though we used it only twice that I recall) and harnesses on the crew (because trying to get a harness on while you are bouncing around is a one-way ticket to Vomitville if you are prone to that sort of thing anyway).

• 25 knots is not enough wind to go under reefed main and staysail on our boat.

True... and in fact, 25 knots isn't really much wind in the grand scheme of things. Everything depends on the individual boat and sailplan, but going to windward in 25 knots would probably see Insegrevious with a working jib out and no reefs in the main (although just on the basis of wave conditions I probably would have tucked a single reef in while raising the main, because you don't want to have to get up there and mess with it later in such slop should the wind increase)

They also mentioned in the post that instead of raising more sail, they fired the engine up to beat north. That seems to be a very common response in such conditions (we've seen people do it frequently both around here and further north) but in my experience it's exactly the wrong thing to do. Sailboats sail... they make for lousy motor boats, or at least those of our vintage seem to. We are almost always more comfortable in "marginal" conditions under sail rather than under power. It's counter-intuitive, and I am not enough of a mariner to explain why, but the boat rides more easily (a relative improvement only, to be sure) and handles better with some sail up... not just some, but enough to give it some power through the water. We smoked a newer, larger boat heading into an anchorage on Texada Island after they dropped sail in very similar conditions and fired the motor up, and we spotted them a handicap of fifteen minutes starting off.

I also have concerns about running the engine in those conditions... crud churned up in the fuel tank, the chance of backflooding the exhaust, spinning the prop out of the water, and the like, all seem like unnecessary risks that could diminish our capability of navigating safely in-shore wherever we did happen to end up. And if you are prone to getting sick (or even if not) the last place you want to be in such conditions is below with your head in the engine compartment trying to figure out why it conked out on you.

I feel bad about the cat, but I think at the end of the day everyone would probably have been happier (and closer to Kingston) with more, rather than less, sail out, no matter how crazy it seems when the wind is howling through the rigging and the waves are slapping you around like an extra in a Clint Eastwood movie. I don't know how well a Caliber 40 points, but Insegrevious goes like gangbusters in those conditions... that would probably have been the fastest trip to Kingston we ever would have had!

• Why didn't we try to heave to in those conditions? [slaps forehead]

This isn't quite the magic bullet it might seem. While it does result in significantly less motion, I wouldn't call it comfortable. Moreover, you're just prolonging your misery when, with a little more water over the bow, you could be making good time toward someplace sheltered and infinitely more comfortable.

• If you're prone to sea sickness, don't play with your iPhone.

Can't comment on that one, since I'm waiting on a sufficiently performant gPhone instead, but I can tell you that it's best to keep your focus on running the boat.

• Christy and I have a veto rule. If one of us is ever uncomfortable in a situation, that person has the right to veto our way out of that situation. Period. We both played the veto card during this trip in different situations and it worked great.

I've read about other sailing couples who work under a similar arrangement and it's always seemed like a good idea to me, but Mandy and I have never been able to get it to work. For one thing, we're both too stubborn. For another, neither of us really trust the other's nautical knowledge sufficiently.

• After the boat is safely in port and everything calms down, we like to talk about what happened. This goes for trips that go smashingly well and trips that don't. This also worked great and is always a good learning tool for us.

We don't do this regularly either, but again, it seems like a good idea.

Anyway, I salute them for getting out on the water and using it as a learning opportunity. I wish we had more time, both to get the boat ready and to actually get out there, but it'll probably be spring before that happens. Even worse, the boat show is coming up at the end of this month, and that'll probably spark our imaginations up and make us even more anxious to get out on the water!