Lets Learn About Sailing with Another Story

When I say "sail boat" what do YOU think about? Most power boaters will think that they are ridiculous little pests on the water that are always getting in the way.  Well, for the vast majority of my life, I would have agreed with them, until now.  Last year I had the opportunity to work with a local charter boat company that had two sail boats (S/V Seawolf, a 40 foot custom wood catamaran and S/V Bucket List, a Corsair F37 trimaran) and a power boat that measured in at about 52 feet.  When I first started working there, I was honest with the captain of the sail boat in that I had NEVER stepped foot on a sailing vessel while sailing.  I had looked at them at the boat show and boarded a few at the dock, but never sailed on one.  I had known the captain for a few years and saw him every day during my time at the marina, we both had a tendency to joke with each other about my "hatred" toward sail boats and how I always thought that they got in the way.

I was hired by the captain of the power boat as we had a past relationship from my time at the marina, but we agreed that I would work on any of the boats.  For the first few weeks of working I spend almost all of my time on the power boat, it was exactly what I was used to and felt comfortable when I took the controls.  When the time came that I docked the boat and did some maneuvering in tight quarters, I felt like I was in control the whole time and used everything that I learned in my life before.  According to the captain, I was ready to take over the boat, which we both knew was a joke, but none the less, its good to know that someone recognized my skills not relative to my age.  In fact, he said that I controlled that boat better than some that do that for a living.

When it came time for me to work on S/V Seawolf, I have to say, I was nervous.  I had talked to the captain almost every day but I didn't know if he was aware of just how little he knew about sailing.  For the first few runs, he did all of the sails and I drove, since according to some sailors, that's all power boat captains are good at. The first he had me set the sails, I had to quickly research on my phone the things that he was saying, soon, I figured it all out.

Toward the end of my time with the company, we aquired another sailboat, S/V Bucket List.  Like I said earlier, Bucket List was a Corsair F37 trimaran. If you were to do some research and look at some videos on YouTube, you will see that it is a very high performance boat and takes a special type of person to sail on it.  After about a week of owning, I got word that I would be one of the primary crew members on the boat apart from the captain's wife.  It turns out, that after a few months, I was the only one apart from the captain and his wife that had the knowledge to crew on the boat.  The captain of S/V Bucket List had a very strong relationship regardless of the fact that we had rarely seen each other in my previous time at the marina.  It was requested by that captain that I was the only one who would help sail the boat.  With our strong relationship and trust in each other, we felt that we could take on any task at hand, more on captain and crew relationships later though.

There was a lot to learn and more importantly, it all happened very fast.  Though we never did it with passengers aboard, it was not uncommon for that boat to reach double the speed of the wind, which in most cases is unheard of in the world of sailing, not to mention dangerous in some cases.  The boat is constructed with the use of lots of carbon fiber, thus making the boat both very strong and very light.  New, the boat can be optioned up to about $300,000.

Now, I dont want to say that I have switched over to the "dark side", but its good to change things up sometimes, at least I know how should the opportunity ever arise.  Like I have always said, "there is no replacement for displacement", meaning that you will never beat the feeling that you get when you pin the throttles and go from 0 to 50 in 10 seconds, and for those who have spend time on the water, it is a much different feeling doing 50 on the water than 50 on the road.

Recently I was given some new sailing books and have enjoyed the little that I have read in them.  Don't get disappointed if you see some posts about sailing, I think that everyone should know the basics.

Finally, trust me, I will NEVER be involved enough to solely sail, I will always keep my roots in power boating.

Here is a snap shot of S/V Bucket List during some of her sea-trials before passengers started coming aboard.  This was taken from the pilot house of Harbor Lights, the power boat.