Three Ways to Capsize a Boat - Chris Stewart [22]
And the fact that there is so much lore and literature about boats is because sailing goes back to the dawn of history; it goes deep into the genes of our island races, and if one is not a lover of poetry and literature, then there are few better ways to become one than to spend time sailing in small boats.
We raced on, hour after hour across the wine-dark sea … not really like wine at all, but a deep, deep blue that gave the impression of unimaginable depth. The lovely treeless island of Hydra appeared on our bow, pale and stark and rising sheer in gray and red cliffs from the waters. We stuffed ourselves with bread and olives and figs and watched the ferries and fishing boats busying themselves around the mouth of the tiny harbor.
Finally we cut between the end of Hydra and the bare uninhabited rock of Trikiri, and there, barely five miles off, lay Spetses. The wind dropped a little and there was only the lightest of swells on the sea as we pulled away again into the open water.
TIM AND I WERE getting cocky; we had been sailing fast and easy all day long and now our bourne was in sight. We wanted a little more of a challenge.
“Right,” I said. “Let’s do a man-overboard drill. Test ourselves a little.”
“What would that involve?” asked Tim.
“Well, it’s a thing you do when you learn to sail, one of the most important of all, really. You throw a buoy overboard and then do the appropriate maneuver to pick it up, as if it were a real person.”
“Sounds like fun. What shall we throw overboard? I know: the bucket.”
“Over my dead body; the bucket is the most important thing on the boat. I know, you jump overboard and I’ll do the stuff and pick you up.”
“OK,” said Tim. “I could do with a swim.” And before I could utter another word, he was gone, a neat dive deep down beneath the surface. A few seconds later he was up and spluttering. “Jesus, man, it’s just beautiful. Come on in.”
“I don’t think that would be a very good idea. Just hang on in there and I’LL SEE IF I CAN REMEMBER HOW TO DO THIS.” I had to shout the last few words because we were already quite a way apart.
Now, what you are supposed to do is the following: you harden your sheets and work upwind of your man, tack, then go downwind of your man, then harden up, and just as you come up to windward of your man you let fly your sheets and come, all being well, to a stop with your man just beneath your lee bow.
I muttered the formula uneasily to myself as I pushed the tiller over, and, keeping an eye on the head bobbing about among the distant waves, cleated in the sheets as we came close to the wind. I ducked as the boom flew across, and, sheeting in the headsails on the other side, I lost sight momentarily of my man.
“Now where’s that man? … TI-I-I-M,” I cried.
“OVER HERE,” he yelled. I saw him splashing.
“OK, here we come.”
The last bit was to head a little downwind of him, then come back up on the wind … at least I was heading toward him now. Things were looking up. Finally there he was, dead on the bow—metaphorically speaking. I turned upwind some more so that he slipped along the lee side, and then I let the sheets fly.
“There,” I said. “How about that, then? Piece of cake.”
There wasn’t very much wind now, so the operation was not too difficult, but even so it was amazing how quickly we had moved apart. Tim hauled himself with impressive agility back into the boat.
“Right,” I said. “Your go now. Let’s see how you make out.”
“Oh, I’m not so sure,” he demurred. “I don’t think I’m ready for this yet …”
“Nonsense, man. You’ll have no trouble at all.”
And I explained to him clearly and succinctly the moves of the drill.
“So now imagine you’re sailing along