So I went sailing

Had a chance on Saturday to go for a sail at the local yacht club. I had figured on something pretty low key, like going sailing. Boy was I wrong. I was going to crew for this guy Paul who was getting ready for the Lightning national championships the next weekend. His regular crew was out of the country so he invited me along. The plan was to get out on the water for a bit of practice, since we'd never sailed together before and then participate in the regular 14:45 saturday race.

Well, we didn't get out on the water early because there was plenty to do fixing up the boat. Paul had bought it recently as a project and it still is. I helped where I could but there was plenty to do. One key thing was rearranging the blocks (pulleys) to make raising the centerboard easier. IIRC the board is 180 lbs of stainless steel that is raised and lowered through a narrow trunk involving a lot of friction. While Paul was up under the bow fiddling with that I was doing a few things and mostly baking in the sun. Bad plan, didn't drink or eat enough or stay in the shade enough.

I also spent time trying to learn the various lines (ropes) on that boat (a Lightning) since I wasn't familiar with it. "There are lots of strings" as Paul said. Here's the rundown as I can remember, starting at the mast and moving down the port (left) side of the cockpit.

* jib halyard
* jib cunningham
* jib luff tension
* jib sheet
* barber haul
* tweeker
* spinnaker sheet
* traveller adjustment

On the centerboard trunk
* spinnaker halyard
* centerboard raise/lower
* mainsheet

The starboard side was similar except the first three things near the mast were for the mainsail.

On the mast was the vang and Cunningham.

Simple huh? To summarize, when the race started, I was doing quite a bit of fumbling around while Paul was trying to win. (Did I say he is a recently retired General from the British army?) We actually got on pretty well considering. One complication I didn't mention was that there are some sailing terms different between American and British english. Took me a while to understand that when he was yelling at me to pull in the uphaul, he meant the topping lift. (etc)

After the race, we did several more practice spinnaker sets and jibes and came in. At that point I was really knackered (a British term I do know). Again I hadn't drunk enough water and was really dehydrated. Paul sat me down with a beer in the clubhouse while he saw to getting the boat put away. After chugging down the beer, I (discreetly) went to the bathroom and threw it up.

The next day, I could hardly move, I had used/abused parts of my body that weren't used to it. Particularly my forearms ( from gripping the lines) and the front of my thighs from hiking. Also several new bruises on my shins. With all those lines, that boat seemed to be trying to trip me at every turn.

The sailing here is in the harbor where the big ships are coming in and out. And a large dredge constantly going back and forth down the channel. The water is really polluted and when the tide was going out an amazing amount of plastic trash (bottles and bags etc) washed out of the lagoon into the harbor. In Santa Barbara the sailors clean the kelp off their rudders, here they clean off the plastic bags.

I might go back sometime.