This week we planned to properly get out on the high seas, with harnesses and jacklines, and make a lap around the South Farallon, which lies 28 miles west of San Francisco. It is known for being steep-sided and inhospitable, smelling of guano, and being home to lots of great white sharks.

Earlier in the week we got up at 5AM and it was already blowing 25 knots, so we gave it a miss. Yesterday, however, the forecast was for winds in the low 20’s all day. My girlfriend Alison, my little brother Jim, and I set sail on the ebbing tide…which promptly crashed into the North Pacific swell with great violence, making all aboard queasy.

We raised sail, then minutes later triple-reefed in the freshening wind. We pounded seaward, passing a few container ships on their way into port. At about ten miles offshore we were engulfed in a fog bank, making us peg our eyes nervously to the radar, knowing that more big ships were lurking in the fog. With the spray and vomit flying, we called the fight, tacked, and shooshed back into San Francisco Bay to lick our wounds and take a nap anchored behind Angel Island.

Daysailing is so nice in that one can just walk away from such weather and be in a hot bath by nightfall. On a longer voyage we’d just have to make do, meaning be cold, wet, worried, and sleepless. I’m out of practice for such adventures, and I didn’t know that could happen to me. Last year I was charging through conditions like that for weeks on end without a complaint, while yesterday I was drained after just a few hours. Finally, San Francisco sailing is not to be taken lightly. It howls pretty hard inside the Bay sometimes, but outside can be a real trial, even on the good days.

My gigs are Wednesday, April 15th at 6:00PM in Tent C; Friday, April 17th at 3:15 in Tent A; and Sunday, April 19th at 11:45 in Tent E.

I’ll be doing a slide show and regaling the crowd with fascinating anecdotes and invaluable information.

Hope to see you there…

Everything I read these days seems to be either about great hope (Obama as messiah) or apocalyptic despair (the financial crisis). When I read about the former I think about my new life on shore and the good things it may bring once I move beyond underemployment. San Francisco seems a prosperous place, and my girlfriend just bought a house. Let’s call this the optimistic plan.

When I read about the latter I’m glad I’ve still got Condesa.

There’s been a lot of mention of sailboats as liferafts to escape the death spiral, and not just from the lunatic fringe. Or perhaps in light of the crisis the fringy are having their day. I’ve read mention in both The New Yorker and The Economist lately. An often cited work is Dmitry Orlov’s The New Age of Sail, if you’ve got an hour to spend. In The New Yorker he’s quoted,

“We don’t have a long wait before sail-based transport is the only option. In the future, I expect coastal property owners to get downright excited when they see any sailboat, whether it looks fashionable or not, paddle out their leaky canoes, and try to barter jewelry, silver cutlery or pretty seashells for the things they desperately need.”

Mr. Orlov lives on his sailboat. He is Russian and survived the collapse of the Soviet Union by bartering a trunk full of vodka when rubles were worthless, so he might know what he’s talking about.

Let’s call this the pessimistic plan, in which Condesa could be the most utilitarian way to ride out total collapse of petroleum, the monetary system, and the economy. I wonder how many ‘cruisers’ have set sail from Iceland lately?

The great thing is that in either scenario a sailboat is a highly coveted possession. If it’s optimism, nothing like a nice sail on the Bay with friends and colleagues after a hard week’s work once things pick up. If it’s pessimism, nothing like a sailboat to get away from the armies of desperate mutants who roam the earth fighting for the last remaining scraps of food, human flesh, and gasoline (see Cormac McCarthy, The Road) in a land slowly disappearing as the sea levels rise. Can’t sell a boat in this market anyway - not that I’d want to - so Condesa stays in the mix, for better or for worse.

People love wine and people love sailboats, so I think I’m onto something. Stay tuned!

On the writing front, I’ve got a six-page article on Colombia in this month’s issue of Yachting World. They allow limited access to the digital edition online. My article starts on page 94.

I’m always happy to help a newbie learn the ropes, but this guy with the new boat just won’t stop: How do I tie the fenders on? What does this thing do? Can you help me get my outboard started? How do I tie a bowline? What do I do when the wind gets strong? I guess we all have to start somewhere. Apparently Mr. Perkins has already decided that sailing isn’t for him, because the boat is for sale for 115 million Euros. Dilettante.

At nearly 300 feet Maltese Falcon isn’t even the largest sailing yacht in the world, just among them, but some say it is the fastest of the big boys. We can charter it for a paltry 350,000 Euros per week, with crew of eighteen, including gourmet chef, but not including food and wine. Somebody must have beat us to it, because she’s already gone…

Morelia’s Cathedral:

It’s always a guaranteed good time, but two weeks before the festival someone pitched a couple of hand grenades into the town square during the Independence Day celebrations. Ten people were killed and a hundred wounded. They say it was a message from one of the drug cartels to Felipe Caldron’s government.

Because of the attacks, most of the foreigners backed out of the festival, but we decided to stick with our plans. A good time was had by all, but the tragedy weighed heavily on everyone’s minds and there were many dedications and speeches honoring the victims.

The sea of votive candles at the massacre site:

To add to the dark side, we flew in and out of Tijuana. In the few days before we flew out, thirty-seven people were murdered in TJ, many of them handcuffed and beheaded. During the week we were in Morelia there were another seven found murdered in TJ, but bodies in various states of wholeness seem to be turning up every day.

As to the dangers in TJ, I figure that if you don’t happen to be a member of a drug cartel (I’m not) you’re not in too much danger. In Morelia they thought they’d caught the guys who were responsible for the grenades, and security was cranked way up. Obviously we made it back to California without incident.

I was wondering around during the last few hours before my flight out of Morelia, looking for a knick-knack to buy. As I walked down a back street there was a knot of people on the sidewalk ahead of me. I saw a girl in a Girl Scout uniform hug another girl, then I noticed there were eight or ten Girl Scouts and their Scout leader, a man in his fifties, all in uniform. When I reached them a cute blond Girl Scout came up to me and said, ‘Abrazo gratis!’…free hug. I hesitated for a second, perhaps my American hesitation about touching strange young girls, then hugged her, or rather, let her hug me. She really put some effort into it, then gave me a big smile.

I walked past the knot and watched this spontaneous outpouring of goodwill. Cute little Girl Scouts kept announcing ‘abrozo gratis,’ and were hugging old ladies, old men, kids, vendors…anyone who walked by. I watched one girl go up and hug a surly-looking cop and the guy pretty much melted. A few people broke into to tears after their hugs and looked visibly better and relieved. I certainly felt better about life in general, and considered walking around the block for a second go-around.

I kind of already knew the answer, but I asked one of the Girl Scouts (when she had a short break from hugging strangers) why they were giving free hugs: ‘With all the murders and violence, we asked ourselves at our meeting what we could do to help. We decided we could give free hugs. Everyone feels better after a hug.’

I heard what I can only describe as a very loud crackling behind me, there was a commotion, and I looked back to see that someone had fired a couple of gunshots into the two back windows of the trolley. Nobody had been hit, but once the word spread up the aisle it was pandemonium. The poor Dane sitting in the middle of the back seat was lucky not to be hit, but got broken glass all over his neck, and down his jacket and shirt. For the next minute most of the attention was on him, with people dusting his neck with handkerchiefs and helping him shake out his clothes. A few of the Danes stepped forward to take digital photos of the bullet holes, and I learned very quickly that the word for gunshot in Danish is very similar to our own.

It was so crowded and the trolley had moved so far that it was little use to try to get to the driver and get her to stop. Whoever did it was long gone. Looking at the holes, I’m not at all sure that the bullets even made it through the glass. It would have been thick tempered glass, and I’m guessing it was just a .22 caliber bullet, just powerful enough to crater the glass and send glass flying inside, but not enough to penetrate the glass or worse, wound one of us.

About this time many of them looked to me as the only local (I can now call myself a local since I’ve lived in San Francisco for the requisite ninety days) and I realized I had been staring at the bullet holes for over a minute with a look of complete horror on my face.

It isn’t often in life that you get set up this well. I smiled and said, “Welcome to America!” Big laugh and I was everyone’s best friend.

In the mean time San Francisco has world class sailing, and slowly but surely I’m exploring every nook and cranny of the Bay. One caveat though: It’s a windy place, or at least it’s usually very windy in ‘The Slot,’ where Condesa is moored, so it’s pretty much right into the firing line from the moment I leave the dock. The main has been double-reefed all summer long.

While I’ve been at the general task of getting my shore-based life back together and figuring out what to do with my life, I’ve still been flogging magazine articles (see the September SAIL for an article on Peru) and doing some boat repair work both on Condesa and on other boats…I’m just so good at it.

Begin Commercial–Your boat may not be circumnavigating, but I’ll treat it as if it were. Electrical, plumbing, mechanical, diesel repair, painting and varnishing, rigging and rope work. Attention to detail. No job too small. Bay Area only, unless you want to fly me someplace beautiful. Inquire within.–End Commercial

Condesa has made countless sorties directly across the bay to Angel Island and Tiburon, where the legendary Sam’s has public dock space right in front of the most expensive bar on the Bay. Let’s hope the coast guard doesn’t start enforcing the drunk boating laws.

She’s made two other more significant voyages into the heart of wine country, one up the Napa River to Napa, another up the Petaluma River to Petaluma. In Petaluma, unfortunately, our voyage ended at the D Street bridge, which is closed for repairs until November. On the Napa River, the voyage almost ended unfortunately when the Mare Island Drawbridge nearly closed on Condesa, which would have necessitated many repairs, which would have run long past November…

I was solo sailing up the narrow Mare Island Strait, riding a two-knot current. I sailed close enough to the bridge to write down the bridge keeper’s phone number, tacked against the current, and then a friend called on my mobile phone. While I was talking to him I heard ‘ding ding ding’ and the bridge started to open. I assumed the bridge keeper saw me waiting and opened the bridge for me. I said a quick goodbye to my friend, rolled the genoa all the way out, jibed, and resumed riding that two-knot current at a good clip right toward the gap in the bridge–I didn’t want to keep all those cars waiting too long. As I neared the bridge a power boat came through the other way and ‘ding ding ding’ the bridge began to close. I made the crash tack of all crash tacks, rolled up that genoa, got the engine started and floored it. Condesa was about thirty feet from the bridge and finally started creeping upstream just as the bridge got to about the height where it would have taken Condesa’s mast off at the spreaders. Or maybe it would have come down on TOP of Condesa’s mast, and God knows what that would have done.

When I called the bridge keeper he was obviously flustered, and I don’t think I needed to remind him that it was important to look BOTH WAYS before closing the bridge.

After that I ghosted up the Napa River, wing and wing, as topless maidens leaned over the banks to feed me pinot grapes and top my goblet with the vineyard’s finest. It is a little known fact that there is deep water up to within four blocks of the eateries and tasting rooms in downtown Napa. There I met up with Condesa record-holding crewmember and container ship accident veteran Ian Blake, his girlfriend Lauren, and her friend Carrie, who were all up there to run the Sonoma Half Marathon. I did not run the Sonoma Half Marathon. We all sailed back to San Francisco together a few days later, and this time gave the bridge keeper plenty of notice.

The jubilant and blistered half-marathoners:

The voyage up the Petaluma River was a bit shorter, the water a bit deeper (the Napa had some dicey spots), and the Petaluma was maybe a bit more scenic. This time it was with my mom and my Aunt Carole from Phoenix, who were mutinous and unruly:

Mom with Carole behind the wheel:

This weekend it’s up into the Delta, a galaxy of cruising that we’ll only be able to scratch on a long weekend.

Some typical Central California riverfront scenery:

So on shore-based life, everything is going swimmingly except for that pesky job/income/what to do with my life thing. I have no desire to sail around the world again any time soon, and all the things I’ve been missing out on all these years are pretty nice: community, companionship, volleyball every Wednesday, and a nice Thursday tradition too.

I carry a device in my pocket that can call anywhere in the world, show me maps of the world and where I am on it, take pictures and videos, send and receive emails, tell me tides and currents, and surf the web. I knew all these technologies existed independently, but to have them all in a device the size of a pack of cigarettes was a bit of a shock. The first time a friend showed me such a device I demanded he return to his planet with his magic box. How long have I been away, a hundred years?

To close, here is a picture of some cute little ducklings:

She plays me out to be quite the daredevil…and a small correction, that’s an 800-foot container ship, not an 80-foot container ship.