Following a Trial by Water

Sailing is one of those avocations that can take a lifetime to learn; even past the attainment of mastery there remain many subjects to lure the aficionado into deeper investigation. But at the very beginning of every sailor’s journey are knots. Lines (ropes to landlubbers) are used to raise and lower sails, trim sails, anchor, moor, tie up to docks and other boats, to tie fenders to railings, to create a sling to drop a bottle over side to cool, to rig a sunshade, and for a hundred more uses. If one can’t quickly snub a line to a cleat, at the very least, one can’t perform ninety-nine percent of the most basic acts of sailing.

Coiled Mooring Line wound about a Cleat

My friends Vern and Ed Koepsel had invited me to race with them on Ed’s boat, The Malabar Star, which was moored in San Diego. The annual race was from Newport Beach to Ensenada. In an earlier blog titled, “Trial by Water” I recounted the first half of our voyage. The episode below starts when we finally reach Newport Beach.

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We passed the Newport Beach jetty at 4:00 p.m. Monday. We had departed San Diego Sunday at midnight, experienced taking on water midway in our journey, solved that, and were a weary sixteen hours into our noisy, diesel-driven voyage.

“We’re probably too late to tie up to a dock tonight;” Vern mourned, “the yacht club probably closed at 4:00.” 

“Nonsense,” I replied. “I’m not getting this close to a hot shower and missing it.”

Ed handed up the VHF (Very High Frequency radio). “Balboa Yacht Club, this is Malabar Star, Whisky Alpha Foxtrot 4666,” Vern called. Minutes passed in silence. “See,” Vern said, “they’re gone.”

Bunch of pessimists, I thought as I stood up on the cockpit seat for a better view. We were drawing abreast of the Club. Its dock, sporting big signs that said “Docking permitted for 30 minutes only” was already two deep with race boats rafted up. Clearly we could tie up alongside one of them if we had permission. I scanned the area carefully. “Look!” I exclaimed. “That little power launch just leaving the dock says Balboa Yacht Club. And the man driving it—his shirt says Dock Master.”

The two men in the cockpit stood silent and tired looking. The dock master was getting away, along with my hot shower. “Ahoy the Balboa Yacht Club,” I yelled, waving my arms. “We’re here for the race. May we tie up to your dock?”

The dock master altered course to come alongside us. Drawing his boat up until he was even with me, he replied, “Sure you can. What’s your draft?”

Oops, I thought, time to be a crew member again. I deferred with a glance and a wave of my arm to Vern, who came alive suddenly. “Five and a half feet,” he answered.

“I’ll put you on the inside then, Skipper. It’s a bit shallow there. Do you mind waiting till I deliver this man to his boat? Then I’ll come back and guide you in.”

By 4:30 we were snuggly tied to another boat, fenders out, bow and stern lines tight, and spring lines fore and aft. We shut down the diesel engine. Silence at last, always a sailor’s favorite moment with his engine. We had a good position, only one boat to climb over between us and the dock.

Fenders (white and dark blue cylinders) – Toe rail (short white raised edge of boat)

Hot showers all around gave us the energy to prepare and eat a simple meal and even to clean up after ourselves. By 8:00 we were slumped in the cabin and no one had spoken for ten minutes. Vern looked almost asleep and Ed was staring vacantly into space. My own eyelids were heavy. “Ed, you about ready to go to bed?” I asked.

“Oh, no. I can’t go to sleep for a couple of hours yet. I’ll wake up too soon.” 

“Well I’m going ashore to use the bathroom, then I’m turning in. I’m tired.”

“I’ll go ashore with you.”

“Me too,” said Vern.

I was last back to the boat. Ed was in his sleeping bag unconscious on the port settee. To starboard, Vern lay with a book across his belly, his glasses on, and a light in his face. He was snoring gently. I tried to sneak his glasses off, but woke him in the attempt. He grinned at me and finished the job.

I went forward and climbed into the V-berth. Sleep at last.

Next morning we were still dopey. After an hour or so we figured out that a cup of coffee or tea might be nice. An hour and a half later we remembered breakfast and ate some cereal.

“Who’s our fourth crew member going to be?” I asked Ed. “Did you get one?”

“Bill,” he said, “the one who did the Half Pint of Rum race with us.”

“Oh, I know Bill. He’s a good sailor.”

“He’s in the Navy, you know, a jet fighter pilot. He’s so team-spirited, gung-ho, and formal, that when we asked him to race with us, he said, ‘I’d be honored to help win a trophy for the Malabar Star in the Ensenada Race.’”

We both chuckled. “I hope we don’t disappoint him,” I murmured.

Time passed gently for us in Newport Beach. It was old stomping grounds for all of us, especially Vern and Ed who had lived there. There were friends to see, who obliged by driving us wherever we wanted to go, and historical monuments to point out to each other—“I used to live there, just across the bridge from the beach.” “We brought Ed and Alicia home from the hospital to that apartment right there.” “Here’s my old grammar school.”

We picked up our race packet and freebee baseball hats, visors, and embroidered patches, and Vern bought an official tee shirt for each member of the crew.

On Thursday, the dock master decided that since nobody had touched bottom on our shallow side of the dock, maybe he could squeeze in one more row of boats. We three put out fenders then stood ready on the rail as a boat inched its way into position beside us. “Hand me your bow line,” Ed directed to the man on the bow.

“Bow line?”

“Give me your stern line,” Vern told the man on the stern.

“Stern line?”

I hunkered down in the middle and grabbed their stanchion*, trying single-handedly, to stop their boat’s motion and to prevent it from swinging in at the bow or stern and bumping us.  I held their boat hard against our fender and with alternating hands reached down to push on their toe rail to try, against enormous leverage, to keep their boat parallel to ours; they had neglected to deploy their own fenders. The boys had put me in the middle, to give me a job, to make me feel good, since they, as boat owners (and men) expected to do all the real work themselves.

Stanchions (stainless steel poles) – Life lines (white cables supported by the stanchions)

“You know, your mooring lines, what you use to tie up to a dock with,” Vern was explaining to the skipper.

“Oh, those!” said the skipper.

“Could you get a couple of fenders to put out?” I asked the man who had finally grasped the need and was squatting opposite me, holding on to our stanchion.

After much rummaging through lockers on the other boat, its five crew members had managed to secure their boat to ours, bow and stern, with fenders between.

“Now you’ll need spring lines,” Vern said.

“Spring lines?”

“Yes, to keep you from surging backwards and forwards.”

“Oh.”

“Do you have two long lines? I’ll show you.”

After much patient instruction—“No, it goes under your life line and forward of that stanchion. No, the other side of that shroud, it has to run in a straight line, see?”—their spring lines were secured to our boat and led fair to theirs. Vern had reached across and secured their stern spring to their boat.

“Now,” said Vern to a man holding the end of the forward spring and standing in his own cockpit, “just tie it around that cleat and we’ll be done.”

The man looked at Vern, looked at the cleat, and looked at the end of the line in his hand, shook his head and handed the line to another man, who repeated the performance, then handed the line to the skipper. The skipper looked at the line and at the cleat. Then his face lit up. “I know,” he exclaimed, “let’s get Bob up here. He’s the one who knows how to tie a knot.”

It was too much for us; we’d been polite and helpful, but that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. The three of us nearly crushed each other crowding through the hatch into the cabin to explode in laughter. “Did you hear…” we said in chorus. “Let’s get Bob up here,” Vern began, but couldn’t finish for laughing. 

“He’s the one who knows how to tie a knot,” Ed finished.

We were helplessly flopped on the settees, holding our stomachs and wiping tears of laughter from our eyes. Each time we caught our breath someone would pipe up—“Bow line?”—“Spring line?”—“Fender?” And it would set us all off again. It was many minutes before we were calm enough for Vern to say, “How will they ever get to Ensenada?”

Glossary:

Bow—the front of a boat

Draft—the depth below water of the boat

Fenders—hung on the sides of a boat to cushion contact with a dock or other boat

Jetty—the projection into the water that formed the edge of the harbor

Life Line—on a modern yacht, a cable that circles the deck just above knee height and serves as a last refuge to someone who might be falling overboard, replaces the rail in larger boats

Port—the left side of a boat when facing forward

Shroud—a cable that supports a mast from falling over sideways

Stanchion—an upright pole anchored to the deck to the top of which the life line is secured.

Starboard—the right side of a boat when facing forward

Stern—the back of a boat

Toe rail—the protrusion of the hull an inch or two above the deck all the way around