life at sea is better
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Today was fantastic for sailing! At first it seemed like there wasn’t going to be any wind at all. I (as the youngest person on board) had to resort to doing the “wind dance” and even went so far as to whistle. It didn’t seem to be taking any effect, but once we were clear of Point Loma the breeze picked up, and we were ripping along at ten knots! Obviously, it was all thanks to me. The video shows how loose the leeward shrouds were in that wind.
I spent the morning doing various little repair tasks on the Californian—fixing lashings and spot-serving. Most of it was taken up looking for the right size seine twine and some parcelling, which were remarkably difficult to find.
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IT’S MY BEAUTIFUL BEAUTIFUL BOAT!
So excited to get back to sailing again.
(Source: navalarchitecture)
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More fun and games at the Museum. Today I worked on worming, parcelling, and serving stirrups for one of Californian’s footropes.
The stirrup is too short to make a serving mallet useful, so I tightened the service with my bare hands. In doing so, I ripped off a good chunk of skin between my thumb and index finger (this is why we use a marlinspike hitch, kids). Of course, my hand is covered in tar from the seine twine except for that one spot of raw skin. Very sanitary. I hastily washed it and slapped on a bandage to continue working. Came home and tried to clean it properly. The tar doesn’t come off without taking more skin with it, so I soaped it up as best I could and poured some hydrogen peroxide on, which hurt like hell.
Ah, the joys of working on tall ships.
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Fun stuff!
Been working on Californian since Wednesday. She’s down for January for her annual month of maintenance. This week was spent striking yards, and on Sunday we’ll house the fore topmast. All of her sails have been struck, topmast backstays are off, and topmast shrouds are hanging limp from the crosstrees. It’s a bit of a sad sight, but she’ll be put back together by the end of the month. I’ve spent these days of down-rigging splicing and seizing new gaff vangs and fore boom lifts. Also got roped into taking down Christmas garland on the Berkeley… But for the most part I’ve been getting a lot of splicing practice (and teaching) in, which is good fun. My hands are black from working with seine twine, and I imagine they’ll remain this way for the entirety of the month…
Get the day off tomorrow and then it’s back to work on Sunday!
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Today was an amazing day for sailing! There was weather in San Diego (WHAT? WEATHER?) which made for a great day out on the water. Californian was ripping along in about twenty knots of wind. We set a reefed tops’l, something I’ve never done on Californian before, and got to furl in the rain!
The most exciting moment of the day was when we were running downwind back into the bay. We had been sailing wing-on-wing and were in the process of jibing the main when the sheet got away and the whole sail swung over to port about as far as it could go. The pressure that put on the peak halyard snapped the belaying pin it was made off to! Luckily, we carry spares aboard, so we hauled the peak back up and made it fast to a new pin.
Hope the weather sticks around for tomorrow’s sail!
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I had a fantastic weekend sailing Californian! After two months without my beautiful tops’l schooner to carry me to sea, it was wondrous being back aboard, despite the light wind. Saturday we were rather short on crew and thus were unable to set squares. There was a regatta in the bay, so avoiding other boats was our primary concern. We only did one tack outside of the harbour before heading back in. Sunday was far more exciting.
I spent the morning helping to put Christmas lights up on Surprise, which consisted of a few more SNAFUs than usual. Star usually gets a Christmas tree hoisted to her main masthead, but this year Surprise got one as well. We usually hoist the lights up with the royal halyard, but had to use that for the tree in addition to the lights. So we got the tree up to the t’gallant yard where I was stationed sorting out the bundles of lights. I tied the apex of the three strands of lights that would run to the foremast, to the port t’gallant yardarm, and to the starboard yardarm to the pigstick that the tree was tied on to. The tree was then hoisted up, but as the strands of lights followed, they got caught between a couple of blocks and a stay. A bulb popped off of one of the strands and flew away, bouncing off of the maintop and into the bay.
We have a rule here that if anything hits the deck from aloft, whoever dropped it owes the entire crew a round of beer. Well, that wasn’t anyone’s fault, and it didn’t hit the deck. But it’s still terribly frightening to see something fall from aloft.
So, I climbed as high as the shrouds would go to inspect the damage. The bulb took with it the entire connection that runs to the rest of the lights. Plus, the whole strand of lights that would run to the foremast was severed. The skipper decided to forego that forward strand, and Paul came aloft with a wire-stripper and electrical tape and worked some wiring magic on the strand where the bulb had come off.
By that time it was around 1100, time to muster on Californian for sailing. But Chris, the skipper for the day, sent word aloft that we hadn’t sold any tickets and to keep working on the lights. Once that problem with the main t’gallant lights had been sorted, everything else went smoothly. We ran the strands down to the yardarms of the yards below to create a Christmas tree shape out of the mast and yards. Finishing up around 1230, Chris decided we should go sailing anyway, without passengers.
Any crew that wanted to go sailing got to go, and we ended up with around a dozen crew, more than enough to set everything. We got underway at 1330, set sail, and tacked up the bay. We got a lot of tacking practice in, always good after such a long break from sailing, and by 1630 we were back at the dock, furling heads’ls.
I snapped this pretty cool picture while putting the squares in their gear:
Afterwards we headed across the street to our usual watering hole, had a beer, then myself and a couple other shipmates stayed at the Museum for the parade of lights.
Now that it was dark, we could see our handiwork on the Surprise. And. Of course. The one strand that didn’t receive any damage, the starboard t’gallant, wasn’t lit up. Everything else was. What? I don’t even.
Attempting to get over that annoyance, we watched from the aft end of the barge as boat after boat in flashing lights came by. Some went all out, all available real estate covered with lights. A few others were a bit pathetic, but at least they tried. There were quite a few USS Midway impersonators, and loads of “USS Santa Clauses.” It was a great way to end the day.
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Tickets are now on SALE for the Californian Companion Sail with the HMS Surprise.
http://www.sdmaritime.org/shop/events/entertainment.htmlYou know I’m not on Tumblr enough when someone advertises my boats before I do.
BUT YES, DO IT! IT’S AMAZING!
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Had an absolutely wonderful time at the Museum yesterday! Spent morning maintenance working on getting Surprise’s mains’l bent on. It had been taken off so the yard could be painted. It was a bit of a “hurry up and wait” kind of a job, what with finding the sail, getting it up out of the barge and carried over to Surprise, then trying to raise it on the royal halyard with around half a dozen people. After several failed attempts of utilising the capstan (only after we had hauled the monstrosity up by hand, literally inch by inch) we finally got it hoisted all the way once we found more hands to clap onto the halyard. Once it was up there, though, we had to go aloft and bend it on the yard, another hurry up and wait process as everyone tried to figure out where the centre was and how to get the head stretched out and getting robands tied on the jackstay.
And while it didn’t seem like too much progress was made while I was there, I did finally find the Elusive Rainbow Whipping! Years ago, I had come across a rainbow whipping, but since then have never been able to find it. It got to the point where I thought I must have dreamt it, but there it was! On one of the gaskets for the mainsail. Less vibrant than I had remembered, but rainbow nonetheless.
There was still a lot of work left to be done bending on the sail, reattaching all of its gear, and finally re-furling it, but I left after tying three robands to go sailing on Californian.
Another fantastic day out on the bay, and this time we finally had some wind! While the direction was more favourable on Friday and Saturday, allowing us to sail out and all the way back in the bay, the speed picked up on Sunday, and we got going just shy of eight knots, though we couldn’t carry the squares all the way up the channel. I was first mate again, and I’m getting more and more confidant each time I do it (hopefully that means I’m improving). Three tacks out at sea, then back in the bay for our salute to the Star. The day was finished off with a drink and a laugh with shipmates at the pub across the street.
And now to prepare for the oncoming madness of school, our Festival of Sail, and Dana Point’s Tall Ships Festival.
Hello, there! My name's Katherine. I work at the Maritime Museum of San Diego, where I get to sail some lovely ships.
Here I post about my adventures aboard 