This is John, skipper of Avocet, hailing from Redondo Beach, CA.
I wish I could fill you in on some personal details but I did not get a chance to interrogate him in my usual manner. He suddenly had to leave with his wife to tend to his elderly mother and all that is left of his presence in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle is his elegant, trim sailboat and this blog entry.
And of course an amazing moment a week ago when he sailed his 41 foot sloop into dock. No engine, no reverse gear, no brake – his his marvelous boat-handling ability. More about this later.
I first met John when he dropped by SolMate shortly after we had arrived here at Marina Riviera Nayarit. He wanted to confirm that our cutter was in fact a Valiant 40 and so often as these conversations start about boats, there’s a typical boyish dog-sniffing that goes on about whose is bigger, better, etc.
Not with John. He just smiled when I answered his question and let him know I am completely new at this cruising thing and have a lot to learn.
“So do I, ” he said with the barest hint of a smile. “I’ve been doing this for 21 years and there’s a lot more to learn.”
It was a kind response, but the sincerity of it did not really strike me until a few days later, when I saw him on his foredeck raising his mainsail.
Now for Wendy and I on SolMate, raising our main is a two-person job, one of whom has the mechanical advantage of a winch with a handle that imparts tremendous pull on the halyard.
But there was John, without a shirt on, pulling up his sail with powerful, hand over hand sweep. It was like watching an Olympic event like the hammer throw – all muscle, graceful, impressive – but raising a sail at the dock?
A few minutes later, John and his wife (sorry! I have forgotten her name) had slickly sailed away from the dock without the benefit of the engine. It was the first time I had seen such a thing since my early introduction to sailing in San Diego, in 1960, when I went out on a new neighbor’s PC – a 30′ sloop that did not HAVE an engine. You had to know how to get home safely by sailing into the dock, a maneuver that never failed to impress me.
So a few hours after he left the dock, I was wondering whether he would sail back in – much more difficult than sailing away. Remember sailboats do not have a brake – except the engine’s reverse gear, and an anchor. Neither is a particularly elegant way to return to dockside (although I have seen many remarkably skillful pilots at their helms).
John brought Avocet to rest in the slip as quietly and fusslessly as a motorcycle cop whipping out his ticket book.
And I remembered his incredibly modest statement that he still had “a lot more to learn.”
John has offered to take me out and I am still looking forward to that treat.
