The plan was to get to the boat by 8am and do a spring cleaning for a few hours, then leave with the ebb tide to a still undetermined destination. Unfortunately, the night before my buddy called and asked me to join he and his broker for a little night out. It was one of those moments when your Spidey sense tells you there's danger close but I didn't listen. I dragged myself back home at about 1am.
I managed to get to the boat by 8:30am feeling a little worse for wear. The deck of Ge'Mara has been covered in green funk from the winter rains and this morning we were supposed to scrub it all off. I let David know that wasn't going to happen and instead I went to the grocery store to purchase some provisions.
Later that morning we shot out with the ebb under First Narrows and things looked decidedly brighter. I had stopped at McDonald's for a Sausage n' Egg McMuffin, hash browns and coffee and was feeling much better. For his part, David was feeling bullish and actually suggested we sail all the way to Smuggler Cove. I questioned whether we could get there given the brisk northwest wind we'd be beating against so we decided to play it by ear.
We debated motoring all the way to Point Grey to get past the ships in the harbour but the temptation to catch the wind was too great so we raised the sails and tacked back and forth in English bay. This took longer than we expected and with the boisterous conditions, my sins of the previous night were coming back to haunt me. We decided to just head to Hallkett Bay on Gambier Island. We have always passed over Hallkett Bay in favour of the more sheltered Long Bay next to it but we wanted to check it out.
As we passed Point Atkinson we noticed a bright red kayak in the water with no one in it. We then realized that its owner had fallen out in rough seas. We slowed down and the man signalled that he could use assistance. Nearby was the rocky shore of Lighthouse Park. The seas were up that day and if he allowed himself to be swept onto the mussel and barnacle covered rocks he was likely to get pretty beat up. My plan was to simply drop the sails, motor over and offer to take him on board and tow his kayak to calm waters. However David had other plans. He lunged at the opportunity to raise the Coast Guard on the VHF radio.
Now, there is a protocol for VHF radio communications that we learned when we got our radio licenses. The Coast Guard in particular likes to adhere to this protocol. David, in his excited state at being a First Responder, grabbed the mic and unleashed a stream-of-consciousness narrative about who we are, something about a guy being in the water, it being cold and a variety of other things that may or may not have been relevant, ending abruptly with "Ge'Mara Out!" whereupon he put the mic back in its holder and looked out to sea. Having done his civic duty he then consented to dousing the sails so we could motor over and offer assistance ourselves. As we drew closer to the floating man the Coast Guard was responding to David's call, asking questions and generally trying to make sense of his incoherent transmission. David got back on the radio and filled in the blanks for the Coasties while we covered the last of the distance to our man in distress. By this time the guy had managed to climb back into his kayak, perhaps realizing his chances were better on his own. We asked if he needed further assistance and he indicated he thought he would be ok but would appreciate an escort to calm water. At that point a Coast Guard patrol in a rib boat showed up and took over the escort.
With the excitement over, we raised the sails again and rounded Point Atkinson heading towards Gambier, only to lose the wind in the lee of Bowen Island - per usual. We motored the rest of the way to Hallkett Bay and had the anchor set by 3pm. It was an earlier arrival than usual and after getting settled and taking in our surroundings I dove into my bunk for a much needed nap. Later we dined well as usual but didn't eat or drink to our usual excess - a good thing for both of us.
The next day dawned fair but breezy. There was a brisk outflow wind coming out of our bay and David commented that we could probably sail right out of our anchorage. We had never done this before and agreed to try it. Still full from dinner we decided to delay breakfast and perhaps enjoy it in Seymour Bay on Bowen Island, on our way home. We went up top and I raised the mainsail while David prepared the anchor. When he main was ready he hauled up the anchor. At first she sat nose into the wind or as sailors say, "in irons." Tweaking the traveler, her bow swung to port, at which point I pulled out the headsail and we arced around towards a small sailboat with a couple of young guys sipping coffee bleary eyed in the cockpit. At first they looked alarmed at us coming straight at them in an anchorage under full sail but as we continued our arc around to port we swung the bow past them and pointed out to the mouth of the bay. We silently slipped out of our anchorage with the young guys in the boat hooting their approval at our rather slick exit. David and I looked at each other and agreed that for all of our follies on Ge'Mara, that was a win.
Based on how the wind was behaving we decided to head home via Collingwood Channel which is between Bowen and Keats Islands. Soon we were tacking back and forth in the channel at a placid 3 - 4kts on calm seas. Given our smooth ride David suggested this would be a good time for breakfast. I agreed and before long we had the autopilot set and were dining on scrambled eggs, breakfast sausage, fresh oranges and piping hot coffee while the autopilot kept us sailing in the right direction.
Halfway through breakfast David was looking nervously at the shoreline of Keats Island. We were going to need to tack soon. This gave me an idea. I have inherited from my father a desire to make everything look as effortless as possible. I suggested to David that we could execute the entire tack without getting up from our seats at the table. He stared incredulously at me, at our plates of eggs and our still steaming cups of coffee. I assured him it was possible. The autopilot was within arm's reach and would take care of the tack at the helm. I could handle the mainsail from my current seated position and David was right beside the port side winch to handle the jib. David reluctantly agreed and I pushed the necessary buttons on the auto-pilot. The boat began smoothly coming about. I was dealing with the traveler and David was pulling on the jib sheet but he lost his nerve and stood up in order to better see what he was doing and have proper leverage to pull the sheet. I was disappointed that he ruined our "fully seated eating breakfast tack" but still pleased that not a drop of food or coffee was disturbed and we went about finishing our meal, our speed now increased to 6.5kts. Now for anyone reading this and shaking your head, of course I realize this was a stupid maneuver. We could have lost our breakfast to the sea, been scalded by hot coffee or worse. But some things just have to be tried.
When we left Collingwood Channel and turned East towards home in the Straight of Georgia the wind and seas really picked up. We turned downwind and enjoyed a brisk run past Cape Roger Curtis. It was fun sailing and we were making such good time that we elected not to stop in Seymour Bay but to maintain our run downwind towards home and surprise the girls by arriving home early.
At Point Atkinson we found that maintaining a downwind orientation was a little tough due to quartering seas which were up to over a metre by this point. We decided to tack across the entrance to English Bay toward Point Grey, putting us on a beam reach. Now we were flying. We sped along at 7.5 kts, taking boisterous seas on the beam, having a blast. In the distance was an incoming bulk cargo ship. We know from experience that these ships move quickly and we were about to cut across the shipping lane that enters the Port of Vancouver. David was eager to get on the VHF to chat with him about his intended course but I managed to talk him out of it. (I learned a long time ago that David was a traveling salesman in the age of CB radios and used to love chatting with truckers as he drove from city to city. To this day he will take any excuse to get on the VHF radio - warranted or not).
It was a thrilling sail home - the kind that makes up for hours of motoring on windless days - we had a blast. When at last it was time to douse the sails and motor under the Lions Gate Bridge, we started the process as usual by starting the engine. But when we pushed the ignition nothing happened. Even though our radios, lights, etc, were still working, there wasn't enough juice in the batteries to turn the engine over.
Our boat, like most, has several batteries. Two are designated for general use and a third is reserved for starting the engine. There is a switch that we use to ensure that we are only drawing from the house batteries while at anchor or under sail, thereby ensuring that the starting battery is always fresh. Now to be honest, we had cheated a bit on this trip. The autopilot was complaining about low batteries at one point so we switched the selector to "Both" in order to continue eating breakfast. We later turned it back but it seems we had over-estimated our power reserves. In hindsight we realized something else: Our slick sail out of the anchorage that morning had meant that we had not started the engine in the morning as we normally do. Thus our batteries had not received a morning boost charge from the engine. As we sailed closer to the bridge another realization hit us. We had been meaning to check the water levels in our old-school batteries for some time. Unfortunately they are stored deep in the lazaret and are very hard to reach unless you climb right in - a near impossibility for two guys who are 6' plus and slightly overweight. It was entirely possible our batteries performance was severely impaired due to low water levels.
We considered sailing under the bridge and trying to get as close as possible to the marina before flagging down some help. I even radioed Vancouver Traffic and signalled this intention before realizing this was a foolish idea. No matter how brisk the wind in English Bay, it generally dies once under the bridge. If we were to attempt sailing under and then lost the wind we could find ourselves dead in the water and directly in the path of a massive freighter. At the last minute we peeled off and sailed away from the lee shore to safer waters where we could figure out what to do. After several failed attempts to start the engine we gave up and reluctantly I called our old friends C-Tow to come and give us a tow to the marina. In a final insult, the guy on the other end of the line informed me that I had forgotten to renew our membership. I closed my eyes and swore silently to myself. David had reminded me multiple times to take care of this earlier in the year but I had procrastinated and ultimately forgot. Months later I thought I had done it. I feebly asked the C-Tow guy for mercy, given we were existing members and he promised to look into it. Then I remembered that as newbies we had used their towing services once in each of the two previous years and had therefore cost them money. There is an image in my mind to describe the treatment we would be receiving from them but this being a family oriented blog, I can't talk about it here.
We were told the tow pilot wouldn't arrive for about 45 minutes to an hour so we had no choice but to sail back and forth between Ambleside and Kitsilano in English Bay until he arrived. The wind had picked up even more and it was amazing sailing at 7.5 to 8kts the entire time. Normally we would have been thrilled but now we were just scanning the bay waiting for the grim reaper to come and tow us home.
An hour later we had limped home under tow and were tied up in our slip safe and sound. We plugged into shore power and within 15 minutes the boat started flawlessly, even unplugged. All you can do is shrug it off.
They say that the best days in a boat owners life are the day you buy your boat - and the day you sell it. We're not ready to admit to that just yet but on this trip we definitely saw both sides of sailboat ownership. The ecstasy - and the agony.
