It’s Monday, 8:00 p.m., sorry, 2000 hours, heading into Swantown. It’s windy and black as hell. Depth is 5 feet, that’s 60 inches, and we are looking for that bloody red light. Green light way off to the left. How could we have missed that light? Where did it go? Then, by magic, yep, I’m still a believer, a thin sliver of red appears about 30 feet on our left. That’s right, on our left. Explanation, enlightenment if you will, it was the cormorants heating their tushes round the light and completely obscuring it. One moved. The little dears. Sharp left turn and we’re back into 13 feet and then home.
This little adventure started when we were anointed and received an invitation the Seattle Yacht Club Grand Prix. Now, Swirl isn’t your everyday run-of-the-mill racing sailboat. For one thing, she weighs 24,000 pounds. In addition, she’s made of wood, and she’s almost 50 years old. So, it was a pleasant surprise last spring when our last-minute crew of friends and family actually placed first in our class in the Gig Harbor Yacht Club’s Islands Race. What we didn’t know was that winning that race gave her an automatic invitation to the Grand Prix. We decided to accept. We figured it was the grand old girl’s one and only chance to play with the big boys.
The Grand Prix is a three day event: Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Whoopee!! Three days of racing. Life is good. Reality is a bitch, apologies to the tender. We arrived at the Corinthian Yacht Club dock early Friday. We had a reserved spot and got assistance tying up. Nice bunch of guys. They kept looking at us. We thought they were assessing the competition. Not a bit of it. They were hungry for fresh meat and we were a 12-ton tasty morsel. Gotta go and register. So pulling our hats down as low as they would go and checking our shoes, we passed through these marine gladiators muttering, “Hi, nice day.” “Heh! Heh! Slurp!” Was all we heard in reply.
Friday noon: A brisk breeze. Boats are leaving for the start. We are all ready to go and so far no crew has shown up. Then, “Oh joy, here they come!” “Is this the boat I’m supposed to be on?” she asks. “Yeah, sure, welcome aboard. ”We’d never seen her before, but what the hell, any port in a storm. She turned out to be Jackie McKay, friend of Jo’s nephew, Vince Beyette, who soon arrived followed by another friend, Tim Clearly, all very knowledgeable folks. And so we conquering heroes set off. From then on there are only brief moments of clarity. The spreaders two feet above the waves. Doing the breast stroke in the cockpit. Falling into the cockpit. Water coming in through the portholes, and they were dogged down tight. We didn’t win. We didn’t finish. We survived. And just to top off a really bad day (That’s a lie. It was a wonderful day; being in a blender is so much fun! ), the other crews had eaten all the pizza by the time we got back to the dock.
Saturday: Calm. Jackie’s dad, Jerry, and his fiancée, Shona, join the crew. The race has seven starts, and by the time the last group set out, the first group was just heading back. That race was canceled and the course changed to compensate for a wind shift and adverse current. The second race was canceled as well for lack of wind. The guys on the committee boat did one heck of a job, though. It ain’t easy handling 800 pound gorillas bent on bending your boat while scraping your starboard paint work and keeping track of who’s crossing the line or who’s sinking. We didn’t win of course, nobody did, but you can’t lose either when the races are canceled.
Sunday: Nice steady wind. About 70 boats all milling around at the starting gate. Testosterone sky high. Growls, grunts and howls. “Starboard” seemed to be the magic word. Bumps and scrapes galore. Overheard, “I say ol’ chap, steady on.” In reply he received a well manicured digit. Sheesh, the race ain’t even started yet. In the first race we crossed the line first and stayed ahead for awhile, aimed for the wrong buoy and barely finished. We were doing much better in the second race. We got a good start, passed some boats, but somehow they ended up ahead. I think we got distracted by the delicious smell of chicken on the BBQ on the boat ahead of us. The last race we put everything we had into winning. But alas, it was not to be. But we didn’t come in last, either.
That night we got a lift to the Seattle Yacht Club. Very spiffy: blinding white linen. polished digging irons, good food, free beer. A very enjoyable evening. We would like to take this opportunity to thank them for the courtesy and camaraderie they showed to their fellow sailors.
Monday: weather lousy. Wild, wet, and on our nose. We decided to wait a bit and let it settle down. At 1100 hours we set out. Not too bad. In Colvos Passage we counted 13 fishing boats with nets out. At Devil’s Head the engine slowed way down. The tide wanted to put us on land, but we got the engine back up to 1000 RPMs. This was enough to keep us clear. Fighting the current made it slow going. Much later we were saying, “Where the hell is that red light?” After we got tied up, opened a beer and had a big sandwich, we decided that even though we didn’t win, it was a great experience. So what if we didn’t win any races; each time we lost by less. And, it turns out we were not last in our class. Two other boats finished behind us.
Jo Sohneronne and Scotty Fitzsimmons
Photos by Tim Cleary