The morning of June 23, 2016 dawned cool and blustery, with a 15 knot wind blowing from the north straight into Port Hudson Marina at Port Townsend. Big problem. Sixty six boats were about to leave port for the first leg of the Race to Alaska, and not one of them had a motor. Five thousand spectators swarmed the breakwater and shoreline and packed spectator boats to see the competitors off, while the crews nervously paced the docks waiting for a break in the wind. With the start fast approaching, the crews could wait no longer, and one by one pushed off against the wind. Most were eventually successful, but not all. The wind was too strong for many of the hobbled together rowing and peddling rigs, and they bounced off of the breakwater, moored boats and each other as they struggled out to the start. Carl Buchan didn’t risk his custom 40 foot monohull, Madrona, and had a motor boat tow him out. Technically the race hadn’t started yet, so that was legal albeit not in the spirit of the race.

Our entry, a 38' Growther Super Shockwave catamaran named Nice Pair featured four rowing stations. Two were sculling stations in the sugar-scoop transoms, and two were sweep stations on deck. We had never ever rowed the 4300 pound cat before, other than to show off a bit, with the motor running, and the skipper had grave doubts. But eventually we left dock after the starting gun had already sounded, turned into the wind, and with all four rowers straining as hard as possible, powered through the breakwater without incident. The race was on!

I originally had entered my Harmony 22, Gizmo in the race, along with Mark Welpman and Brandon Raftery, as a tribute to Jay Berglund. We named the group Team Ghost Rider since Jay’s spirit had been with me throughout the salvage and restoration of the boat. This is exactly the kind of race that Jay would get excited about. We entered the race and began preparations, but the reality of the event slowly began to sink in after we started course planning. With built-in delays in Port Townsend and Victoria and at least 10 days of sailing time, the boat was just too slow to complete the race in the two weeks of vacation time that we all had available. Maybe we should have thought of that before we spent the $1200 on application fees. So, the team fell apart leaving only me; I was willing to take leave without pay.

I picked up two new crew members. Richard Mackie and Ryan Smith, but the realities were still daunting. How do you get the boat home after the race? Maybe we should just do the first leg to Victoria? Not a very exciting option. We could do that anytime. In April, with the deadline to withdraw fast approaching, I chanced upon another team, Team Golden Oldies, who had a fast boat, but no crew. The solution was found! We would merge teams to form Team Golden Oldies / Ghost Rider. Gizmo would remain safely on her trailer, and we would take the big ocean-racing cat.

Competition in the Race to Alaska included a whole slew of trimarans, mostly Farriers, a few catamarans ,and an odd assortment of monohulls, a kayak, a stand-up paddleboard, and Hobie 16, a custom made peddle kayak, an open water rowing shell, all the way from France, and several other unique designs of dubious sea worthiness. The largest boat was Team Jungle Kitty on a 44' version of McSwoosh with twice as much sail area and six world championships aboard. Carl Buchan’s 40' sloop had an Olympic gold medal and several world championships aboard. Stiff competition.

Sixty six boats in total, though only forty four were slated to go all the way to Ketchikan. Several were purpose built just for this race, not necessarily well built, mind you. The most impressive purpose-built boat was Team Turning Point Design, who entered a custom 25' carbon fiber catamaran which was designed around its ultra-efficient peddle drive system. And then there was Team Tritium, who entered a massive 73' ocean racing trimaran. I was really looking forward to seeing how they would propel that monster manually. It never made it to the start though. Supposedly, they broke down on delivery to the race, and were forced to borrow an incredible foiling trimaran with a canting mast all ready to go on a trailer complete with peddle power already engineered. Hmmm ... Team Alula is an unmodified Farrier 27 that entered the race crewed by three guys that were all paraplegics! Anyway, not a motor on any of them.

The manual propulsions systems ranged from incredible feats of engineering to a dubious single oar sculling station on the stern of a Thunderbird. Eventually, most made it out of the harbor against the wind which I suppose was the first test. If you are going to fail, it might as well be at the starting line close to home. The first casualty, a purpose-built peddle kayak, Team Take it to the Volcano,broke down upon launching. Undaunted the skipper grabbed a wherry, drove up to Port McNeal and rowed south meeting the fleet enroute.

Nice Pair was late to the start by at least 10 minutes, but quickly made up time weaving through all the slower monohulls, flotsam. In 15 knots of wind on a close reach, we were matching the speed of the wind and closing on the slower trimarans. The first trouble showed up when we attempted to set the spinnaker, just past Point Wilson. The skipper pulled a little too hard on the end of the halyard, only to have the bitter end run freely up the mast and fall in a neat pile at his feet. So, up the mast he went to rerun the halyard. By the time the spinnaker was finally set, the wind was dying. Four hours of rowing later, we got a light breeze to take us into Victoria. I had set a course to the north east of the rhumb line to allow for current to take us back west. Unfortunately, the wind was on the other side of the course and Nice Pair finished 19th into Victoria. We were required to row the last 2 miles into Victoria Harbor by the Canadian Coast Guard, so we were completely exhausted by the time we rang the bell. The Victoria dock party lasted three days.

The real race to Alaska started at high noon on June 26th, and featured a Le Mans start. Our strategy was to get a fast start and an early lead because it is hard to pass under oar power in the narrow channel. We were hoping to lead the tris out of the harbor and hold them in check for a while. Unfortunately, Team Bunny Whaler got a faster start and cut right in front of us unseen. They ended up stuck between our two hulls when we launched ourselves out of dock. We sat and watched the tris go right past us as we waited for the Boston Whaler to get out from under us. Finally, the sails were up and the race was on! With a nice, albeit short lived, breeze, we quickly over hauled the slower Farriers, and sprinted out to third place, following Team Tritium and Team Turning Point Design. It was really nice to see the all-professional crew on Team Tritium blow their first tack and have to do a 360 instead. It was also nice to see Carl Buchan launch a perfect hourglass that couldn’t be cleared even after about 5 minutes of struggling with it.

I had set a course to go inland of the Trial Islands and the Chatham Islands to avoid the current, but the skipper followed the professionals on Team Tritium out into the main channel thinking they must know what they were doing. They did, of course. Little did we know that they had already withdrawn from the race and were just out sailing along with their sponsors , Sperry. Team Turning Point design made the same mistake, and found themselves with us trailing the fleet that had gone inland around Trial Island. Team Tritium had read the weather forecast which called for light winds for the next week, and decided that it wouldn’t be much fun so they withdrew. Wimps!

We spent the first day rowing and sailing in a light breeze through the islands south of Nanaimo, and finally traversing Active Pass into the Straits of Georgia just at dusk. That’s when the wind failed us. We drifted all night since we were now too tired to row, and at dawn we had traveled a whooping quarter mile. I finally went below at dawn for a couple of hours rest, and when I awoke, it was to the sound of water rushing past the hull. What a great sound! That day and the next we sailed when we could, rowed whenever the speed dropped below three knots. A single person rowing lightly could add a knot of boat speed if the boat was already going 1 or 2 knots.

The tide was against us in Discovery Pass, and the wind was light enough that we weren’t making much progress. So we found a resort near Campbell River and decided to stop for breakfast. However, we were met on the dock by a stately old gentleman who more or less informed us that this was a private resort and that they don’t serve ragamuffins. So we anchored offshore to await the current and eat home-made hot granola. One of the resort boats came by us a little too close heading to the dock that we had just vacated and wrapped our anchor line around their propeller. What a bunch of rich Bozos!

As the current waned and the breeze filled in, we raised anchor and headed for the infamous Seymore Narrows. We could see the white caps long before we got there. The 25 knot wind was blowing against the current, raising quite a bit of chop. But this is what Nice Pair was built for! Full main and working jib, Nice Pair tore through the narrows quickly passing Team Hot Mess, a Santa Cruz 27, and Team Ain’t Brain Surgery in a Farrier 31 as though they were sailing backwards. We continued powering through some of most gorgeous countryside on earth, past unnamed mountains that really, really needed to be climbed, on past fjords and waterfalls that beckoned us like sirens.

That evening, Nice Pair was in Johnstone Strait when the wind grew to gale force. Nice Pair could handle the wind with no problem, but the short steep waves were launching the boat and shock loading the rig to the point that the skipper made the decision to find shelter; not so loony after all, huh. Searching the chart, I found shelter in a beautiful little cove named Billygoat Bay. Safely anchored inside the cove, you could barely feel the breeze at all. Richard and Ryan went ashore and even set a bonfire on the beach just because it seemed to be the thing to do. Billygoat Bay is a must see for future voyages up the inside Passage.

Underway again once more, we soon found ourselves rowing more often that sailing. The days are really long in Canada in late June, but they are twice as long when you are rowing a 4300 pound boat! On we went, laboriously up Johnstone Strait and into Queen Charlotte Sound. It was here that we discovered that the gooseneck fitting had come apart. At first, it seemed like the end of our race. But we had resin and carbon cloth aboard, so perhaps we could jury rig something. As it turns out, we were able to figure out a permanent solution that we could do now without outside assistance. My suggestion was to sail on under jib while we made the repairs, but Port McNeil was right there. Hot showers and a pub beckoned, so we pulled over. That’s where we met Team Take it to the Volcano rowing south in his wherry and heard his tale of woe.

Twenty four hours later, we were rowing again. A little sailing every now and then, but long laborious hours of rowing all through Queen Charlotte Sound and through the islands at the mouth. It was here that I saw a Minke whale, which are rare to see. And a few hours later we saw a small pod of Humpback whales off in the distance. Dusk found us finally past the islands and entering open water, where we expected Nice Pair to excel. By this time, Team Ghost Rider, who did almost all of the rowing, was exhausted. Thankfully a strong southerly breeze filled in, bringing Nice Pair to life. We tore off up Fitz Hugh Sound under reefed main and working jib at 14-16 knots, gobbling up the miles in major mouthfuls.

By dawn we had reached Bella Bella, the second required check point. This is where we had a video interview with a videographer from the NW Maritime Center. It is posted on their web site.

Once back out in deep water, we found the southerly breeze again and tore off north to Alaska. We were averaging 14-15 knots all that day, which to us was great. But I had told our ground crew, Fran Reisner, that we would be entering Ketchikan late Sunday if not Monday, so she booked a flight for Saturday afternoon. GPS was now telling us we would complete the race by Saturday morning. We blew through Hecate Strait that night, never slowing below 14 knots, and often surfing at 20+ knots. The fastest that we clocked was 21.8 knots. And this was with reefed main alone! The wind didn’t feel that great since we were going down wind at 18 knots, but several of the other boats were scared enough that they were periodically calling in their positions to the Coast Guard just in case. I heard others claim that the wind was over 35 knots.

All was well until we got close to Rose Point on the west side of Hecate Strait. I hadn’t allowed for the surf over the shallow waters when I plotted our course. The waves grew steeper and started breaking as we crossed the shoal, leading to some incredible surfs and our highest top speed of the day. But it also almost led to disaster as we stuffed our bows into a particularly large wave and came close to pitch-poling her. One moment we were tearing along at 20 knots, and the next we were stopped dead. I was launched from the tiller all the way across the boat grappling for anything to check my slide before I went over. The skipper had dumped the main sheet as we plunged down the wave, which really doesn’t help when you are going down wind. But it did accomplish pulling a section of main track right off the mast and forcing us to douse the main. We had already blown out the screacher, so we were down to only a working jib and a spinnaker.

We traversed Dixon Sound and entered the United States again in the middle of the night under jib alone surfing along at a leisurely 14-16 knots. The GPS was still telling us that we would be in port by 1000, good news to a very tired crew. But not so for poor Fran who was frantically trying to change flights to get there in time. We sighted Alaska for the first time at dawn, and about that time the wind began to wane. GPS was now predicting noon for an arrival time. By 1000 we were rowing. At first, just one of us, then two, and eventually three as the wind failed us completely and the current turned against us. We probably should have just anchored, but we were so close to the finish. On we rowed, barely making any headway. The fourth rowing station had come apart in Queen Charlotte Sound, which wasn’t really a problem since the three of us in Team Ghost Rider were doing all the rowing anyway. Two hours turned into three, then four and finally we turned the corner and could see the finish line. But it would take two more long hours of rowing to reach it against the current. At least the lack of wind gave Fran a chance to catch up and she was able to get to the finish line when we were still a mile away.

Team Golden Oldies / Ghost Rider officially finished 10th and completed the course in 6 days and 6 hours. Had we not had to stop for repairs we would have beaten Team Elsie Paddock’s winning time from 2015. All those ahead of us did so. The winner was Team Mad Dog Racing who sailed a Marstrom 32 catamaran non-stop to an incredible winning time of 3 days and 20 hours. Two monohulls were second and third, Team Jungle Kitty and Madrona, followed by another catamaran, Team Turning Point Design, and finally a slew of trimarans.

After we finished, the wind never did quite recover leaving the rest of the fleet stranded. It would be five more days before the next boat finished. Twenty six boats completed the race, plus Team Alula who required outside assistance and was therefore disqualified. I averaged about 2-3 hours of sleep each day, and finished the race with blisters on every finger and all over my palms. And I’m still planning my next attempt, maybe in 2018 after I retire.

John Thompson, Gizmo

Photos by Richard Mackie, Ryan Smith, and Fran Reisner
More Race to Alaska photos