Letters
Swiftsure 2003

I just got my steering mechanism back from the Gudenuph machine shop. The steering broke during the 2003 International Classic Swiftsure Race. The crew of Acquitted was particularly anxious to do well in this race as last year it took us nearly eight hours to get over the start line only then scored a DNF after spending more than six hours within 2 miles of the turning mark.

The race started this year the same way this year as last. For our class there was an hour delay because of lack of wind. When we did start we had to anchor twice before the wind started to fill in. Then we had lots of wind, mostly strong. There was a reported sustained wind of 28 knots for awhile in the Straits of Juan de Fuca.

That is the kind of weather that the Acquitted really likes. We did very well considering the steering problems. When the afternoon wind began to fill in we were headed to the US side of the Strait. We got lifted all afternoon so we made it all the way to Crescent Bay on a single tack. The Acquitted got to the half way and turn-around point at 2121. At the turning mark, the winds had gone light and it was just getting dark. By 0100 the next morning the wind had built again to 15/18 knots. At 0300 we had the spinnaker up and were moving at 7+ knots.

We had to make a decision of whether to go through Race Passage, a narrow passage that is the shortest course. Usually the decision is made on the current. If you don’t go through the passage you have to make a wide arc around 37 large rocks and islands. Just as the decision was made we lost steering ... and things got exciting.

Access to the emergency steering is in the aft cabin. The excited skipper, me of course, is yelling at the two crew members asleep in the aft cabin to wake up and move their *&@* sleeping gear so I could get at the emergency rudder connection. Well, there just isn’t enough room back there. This is one emergency drill I had not done before. So after several minutes I realized they had to get out of the aft cabin first. And of course the boat is going all over the place; sails flapping and snapping in the wind and worst yet the Rocks were getting closer. The blinking light on of the rocks just kept getting brighter and brighter. There was no way I could get through the narrow passage with no steering.

The emergency tiller is a 35 year old piece of oak that was original equipment. Well, you may have guessed it. As soon as I put it on the rudder and gave the first push, we all heard the CRACK and everyone’s breathing stopped. Well, mine did for sure.

While the aft cabin/tiller excitement was going on the two crew on deck were trying to take some sail down but they were having all kinds of troubles in the dark. Remember the boat was not exactly under control. I suppose I should also tell you that half of the crew had been seasick because of the rough seas so they were slow in reacting.

It had been a cool night so I had on some heavy clothes and my foul weather gear. Everyone on deck had life jackets, harnesses and had been tethered to the boat. Everyone was safe but I was soaking wet from the sweat! Needless to say the decision which had been made was changed and we went around the outside of the Race Rocks. I was very glad to see the Race Rocks blinking buoy fall astern.

We crossed the finish line at 0838. Limping in under almost no sail reduced our performance to a second in class. Like I said, the Acquitted loves that heavy weather! And what a ride we all had!!!

We went back to Victoria BC for breakfast, caught some zzzzs and later a great movie. For dinner we ate the food we had been too busy or queasy to eat during the race.

Jim Lengenfelder, Acquitted

Jim Lengenfelder and Emily Ray are co-skippers of Acquitted. The boat was crewed by Carl Applebaum, Lori Crews, Sam Lehmann and Barry Zickuhr.
The South Sound Sailing Society had eight boats in the races this year. SSSS also provided the crew for Hooligan.

I was excited. Now I’m exhausted.

I drove down Hood Canal Friday night, excited that the winds were howling down the canal. This bode well for Saturday’s Swiftsure International Yacht Race, from Victoria, BC: out the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the Swiftsure Bank and back. As I crossed the various rivers, the Skokomish, Hamma Hamma, Duckabush, Dosewallips and Quiliute, I started seeing the Washington State Flower in bloom. The Wild Rhododendron is pale pink and flowers all along the area between the Quiliute and Port Townsend. The last time I drove through here with the Rhodys blooming was 7 years and a lifetime ago.

I made much better time that I thought I would for the Friday night of Memorial Day Weekend. I figured the holiday traffic would slow things down, but it was not true. I actually got into Port Angeles a full hour and a half before the ferry was to leave. This was not a problem, as I was tired and looked forward the relaxation of just sitting for a while.

I met two kids on the ride: Alex and Skyler. They were 17 and 19, both crew on one of the big boats, a 70 footer, that does the full run out to Swiftsure Bank, about 20 miles past Cape Flattery out into the Pacific Ocean for a total of 140 nautical miles. These guys were bouncing off the walls, and kept barraging me with questions about my boat. It made the crossing a bit easier, but because we were coming in late, 2315, we missed most of the pre-race party.

Victoria, if you have not been, is a slice of England plunked down in the Pacific Northwest. The trip into Victoria Harbor is beautiful. At night it is breathtaking. The Parliament building has lights running like Christmas lights, outlining the whole building, and of course The Empress, where Mom & Dad went for their 40th anniversary present, is at the center of everything like an indulgent dowager overlooking children at play. The public wharves in front of the Empress were filled with yachts, all rafted together with the sailors partying and having a good old time.

Jim had told me that they were not going to be in front of the Empress because of the noise, and instead were going to be off the side in another public marina. I had it in my head from the one time I looked at the map, which I forgot in the car in Port Angeles, that it was to the right of the Ferry dock. So, I get off the ferry and look around for someone to meet me. Nobody was there, so I schlepped my gear and started walking. After about 20 minutes I get to the small public marina I spotted on the way in. There were a few race boats tied up there, but no Acquitted. It WAS very quiet, but I did hear the final applause from the big tent party up by the Empress at Midnight.

Well, this is a pretty picture. I’m tired, cold and grumpy, and I can’t find my boat. So I head back towards the party and the information tent. I get there, and fortunately someone is still there closing down. They tell me that the Acquitted is PAST the party at ANOTHER public marina about a block up. Turns out I read the map wrong and should have gone LEFT instead of RIGHT.

I finally get to the boat at about 2330 or so. Pooped. Unfortunately, I am berthed inside, sharing the drop-down table with Sam, the 17-year old son of Carl, neither of whom I have met yet. Sam is skinny, but about my height. We are comically positioned in our sleeping bags, face to foot, trying to sleep. Of course, the bar across the parking lot and up at street level that has the live band is making sleeping almost impossible. The band is pretty good ... for a band that plays only covers of Cheap Trick and the Cars. I’m in some kind of fugue state hearing “My Sharona” being chanted by the crowd back to the band, my head tilted at an angle with my feet hanging off the end of the bunk trying not to crowd Sam, who’s told me he has a “thing” with his personal space.

I woke up at 0700. We’re rafted up, which means we’re tied in a big row to a bunch of other boats, and people have to walk across boats to get to theirs. We’re third from the pier in a row of about 12 boats. No matter how stealthy you try to walk across someone else’s boat, you still sound like a heard of cattle from underneath. And frankly, most of the sailors are not trying to be very stealthy. I figure I must have gotten 4 hours of sleep total, none of it any good.

I stumble around downtown Victoria trying to find a latte stand. Apparently I’ve left the Pacific Northwest and can only find bad coffee put out for the sailors; nary a Starbucks to be found. I head back to the boat to make my own coffee, which I have fortunately brought along; Jim, the captain seems to think that Folgers Instant is good enough. After making coffee, which Jim and everyone are happy to drink, I get breakfast cooked by Emily, the captain’s wife: 1 sausage, 1/2 banana, 1 slice of orange and a slice of bread. Mmmm, fuel for the trip!

The raft starts to break up, and we pull up to the pier to finish breakfast. We’re not in the first start and have no problem pulling out later. It’s only when we get out a bit that I realize what I’ve gotten into. This is not your local Puget Sound race. There are over 200 boats out here, all jockeying for position. The Race Committee starting boat is a RCN frigate. With a cannon. That goes BOOOOM to start the races. Not at all like the piddly little shotgun we use back home.

We’re in the 4th start, with the Swiftsure Lightship Classic, Cape Flattery Multihulls and Cape Flattery Unlimited ahead of ours. The first 3 starts go without a hitch, but also without much wind. The Cape Flattery Unlimited, 103 Nautical Miles, boats are bigger than ours but are not going very fast. In fact, some of them are sailing backwards, because of the tide. We motor into the box, which is the starting area that’s something like 100 by 500 yards and prepare to cut engines. We can have the motor on until the pre-race horn for our race 5 minutes before our start. At the same time, the Unlimited boats are getting a little grumpy that these lesser boats are motoring around stealing what little wind they DO have as we jockey for a good position.

Then our start gets postponed. This was a bit irritating. Yes, there was not much wind, but it will only make our race longer in the end. After puttering around, we finally get our race notification. And guess what, many of the Unlimited boats are STILL THERE, although they are now starting to move because the wind is picking up. Or so we thought. As the start sequence completes, the wind dies. So what do we do? Rather than lose ground by drifting backwards with the tide, we drop anchor. In 210’ of water. With 380’ of anchor rope; rope that will need to get pulled in, mostly by hand. A lot by me. Sigh.

At last year’s race, it took them 8 hours to get across the starting line, and they didn’t make the rounding mark by the 24 hour time limit, and so didn’t finish. This earned the race the name Driftsure. It looked like it was going to be more of the same, but Captain Smilin’ Jim, ever the optimist, bets $10 that we’ll be on the way in 25 minutes. I took the bet, and lost. The breeze came up at 1121 and we weighed anchor. And believe me, 380’ of wet rope with an anchor at the end weighs a lot!

Even then, we wouldn’t officially cross the starting line until 1135 or so because the breeze was just so light. But we could see that the big boats were into some serious wind and heeled over way out in the Strait. Jim decided that the wind was coming our way and decided to play the eddy in the bay with the tides and try to scoot out into the wind that way rather than trying to head straight out into the wind as many of the boats were doing. That turned out to be a bad call and after 1/2 hour of struggling for a few hundred yards of gain, we dropped anchor again.

But now, things started to change. After a bit of time at anchor, the breeze started to come up. Now it is still sunny, and I have my short sleeves on, but I can see the wind coming in. Unfortunately, because I have anchor duty, I don’t have a chance to put on any foul weather gear. This would prove to be a major error on my part.

Sam ran the anchor rope in the wrong spot, or I pulled it in wrong, and somehow it got around the forestay. Rather than try to run 380’ of anchor line around the forestay to fix the problem, we decided to disconnect the anchor and reconnect it behind the forestay. I get the duty, and am trying to get the dang screw shackle disconnected with pliers as the wind builds. Pretty soon I’ve got one foot on the stanchion at the side of the boat practically standing up because we’re heeled over so far. And the spray is flying off the bow and soaking me. It’s ok though; I have more clothes and can change as soon as I get back in.

Weather like this is fun for sailing, but is also a little difficult. You have to keep one hand on the boat and one on whatever you’re doing. The snap shackle and anchor and pliers make it difficult to keep together in one hand while I’m holding onto the lifeline, but somehow I manage. Anchor stowed, but not pretty. Putting it down again will be a chore for whoever does it.

Finally I head back to the cabin to strip out of my wet clothes and get some dry ones on. This is mandatory in the wind, because hypothermia is not something I want to experience. I climb down into the cabin and realize something else. Seasickness is also something I don’t want to experience. Unfortunately, I am left with the option of freezing to death, or getting sick. I foolishly choose to change clothes. The port windows in the cabin have an interesting view: water. Lots of it, just a few inches away from the window moving back and forth and back and forth and ... ugh.

I finally get changed and back on deck, but the damage is done. I’m in the oogy zone. I do my best to hold together, but as we get out into the Straights proper, I stumble to the low rail and heave-ho! Up comes the nice corn & potato soup that Emily made for lunch. Oh well.

We’re now into some interesting water. Swell is not too big, maybe 3 to 4 feet, but the winds are building and the current is going to make the chop bigger before too long. Soon we’re in 6-8 foot swells and 25 knot winds. The mainsail is reefed, the small jib is up and we’re cooking along. We saw one boat with a broken mast heading back in; not a pretty sight.

The pretty sight was the HMCS Oriole, the Grand Lady of Swiftsure. She’s 102 feel long, 75 years old and just plain beautiful to watch. She was behind us!? But she sailed on by, slicing through waves that were throwing our little boat, less than 1/3 her size, all over the place. Unfortunately, because I was pretty out of it, I didn’t get any pictures. That’s too bad because she was fabulous.

Emily also succumbed to seasickness, and later I had to change again and it kind of became a joke in my mind. Barry goes below, comes up and blows galore. Fortunately, the waves started to settle down a bit and I began to feel better. Not that I was ready for the smoked tofu that Emily was going to make for dinner, but frankly, she wasn’t in a position to MAKE it anyway.

By this time we were on the US side of the Strait, and we had to tack a few times to make it into Clallum Bay and around the mark boat. We didn’t know it at the time, but we were the first boat in our division to round the mark. All the other boats we saw coming back were in the division above us!

Ahh, the ride back. It’s now about 2105 with still enough light to see by. We get around the corner, out of Clallam Bay and pop the chute. The big spinnaker is finicky in the light wind and doesn’t want to stay full. It doesn’t seem like we’re moving at all, but our sped through the water is 4.4 knots! For this boat, that’s great in light wind. The hull is rated to 8 knots. Jim’s had it to 9.8, but he said it was pretty scary.

After a while, I take over on the spinnaker sheet, which means I’m standing up at the side of the boat, shackled to the lifeline and wrapped around the 3 shrouds at the side of the boat. I’m holding the sheet in my hand using a cleat for leverage. I did this for about 2 1/2 hours, and I didn’t notice, but the wind really built in that time. By the end, we were making a solid 7 knots. It was dark by now, with the lights of other boats and the shore off in the distance around us. There were these phosphorescent critters in the water now and again, and when the stars started to come out it was beautiful. Lori was on the helm, and it was really peaceful. We had our steaming light on to illuminate the spinnaker so we could see to adjust it; technically we weren’t supposed to do this, but it is just a minor deal. I bet we were gorgeous glowing on the water.

Near the end of my watch, 2200 to 0200, we jibed the boat. Jibing is turning the boat to catch the wind on the other side, by letting the wind go behind the boat. This is a little more dangerous than tacking, turning with the wind at the front of the boat, because the boom jumps across very quickly. Jibing with the spinnaker is a chore. You have a pole at the mast that sticks out to the side or front and is attached to the spinnaker sheet on one corner of the sail. When you jibe, you have to disconnect the pole at the mast, connect that end to the sheet on the other corner of the sail, disconnect the pole from the old sheet and hook that end to the mast.

We jibed once to get out around Race Rocks, a point of land that has a lighthouse and as the name implies, can be raced through. But not at night. Not without knowing what you’re doing. We heard one boat on the radio got hung up at Race Rocks. They were able to get free, but decided to motor in to port case there was unseen damage to the boat. At least they weren’t taking on any water they knew of. Best to just avoid these, we decided, and go around.

The first jibe was ok. After that, the wind continued to build a bit, and once we rounded the corner it was time to jibe again and get back on a great spinnaker run downhill into Victoria. Unfortunately, this was not easy. Both Jim and I were on the spinnaker pole and it was jumping like a bunny on steroids. The swell would rock the boat a bit, flop the sail back and forth and pull the pole just about out of our hands. I almost went overboard twice, and at one point was sure I’d broken my finger. It went numb so fast I decided to just keep going and get this done. After about 10 minutes of this, Sam was roused to help us and we were able to get it connected. This was at the end of my watch and beginning of Sam’s, so I crashed out below.

I was just dropping off and I kept noticing that the spinnaker was no longer staying full. It was like a huge thhWHAP when it snapped full of wind and the whole boat would shudder over to the side. I didn’t realize it, but the wind was a bit too much for running that big of a sail at that point. We could have broached, which is when the spinnaker pulls the whole boat over to the side and can end up capsizing the boat. It can happen VERY fast.

All of a sudden, there was this loud POP and the boat starts to flop around a lot more. Jim was at the helm and I hear him say “I’ve lost steering.” This is NOT something you want to hear at 0300 with the Race Rocks just off to your port. I am able to somehow come back awake, throw my shoes and life vest on and headed out on deck with only my jeans and thermal shirt on. It’s you’re basic nightmare. Jim is ... um ... concerned, VERY concerned. Nay, excited, even AGITATED. The spinnaker is hauling the boat around and we are not in a happy place. I bolt forward, snap my tether on to the stay and Sam and I take a quick assessment. The spinnaker is shooting straight up in the air like a kite and is causing all kinds of problems. We have to get it down FAST.

And we did. I was surprised that it went down as quickly as it did. I was able to unsnap the boom preventer in a matter of seconds, a niggling job that normally stymies me when I try to do it fast. I was able to one-hand uncleat the halyard and maintain a bit of control as the spinnaker wrapped itself around the shrouds and was pulled down into the cockpit.

Of course, now the hard part begins. With the steering mostly gone, we had to hook up the emergency steering. This is a shaft that connects directly to a pin on the rudder below decks in the aft cabin which is normally sail storage space. You have to steer from below while someone else relays direction. The wood shaft was cracked, but Jim was able to stabilize it with some pipe clamps and get it working.

At this point, it’s 0300 and I’ve had 5 hours of sleep in the previous 46 hours. I’m exhausted, and all I can do is just crawl below and crash. As I’m starting to drop off, Carl tells me that I should get all my gear on and sleep in it in case there are any problems. Can you sleep with a constant adrenaline rush of fear? Apparently the answer is yes because I zonked out ASAP. They woke me just as we were coming up on the finish. We were running our small jib rather than the spinnaker, and were still doing about 5 knots. This was not overpowering the broken steering, so Jim was able to steer mostly with the wheel, relying on the emergency tiller only occasionally.

We made it across at 0535 this morning. 70 nautical miles in a corrected finish time of 14 hours, 20 minutes. We dropped sails, turned on the engine and stopped at the race committee dock for a post-race inspection, safety gear, that sort of thing. At one point he asked if we had emergency steering. We all broke out laughing, with only a touch of exhausted hysteria.

Final results? We finished 6th in our class and 2nd in our division. If we had not broken down, and the jibing been better in the middle of the night, I am guessing we would have been 1st in division and 2nd or 3rd in class.

Afterwards, we took hot showers at the pay showers in the marina (they only take Loony dollar coins) and had a nice cholesterol laden breakfast at a local restaurant. I caught the 1030 ferry and was home by 1500. The Rhodys are still blooming, and I am going to sleep.

Barry Zickuhr