Spooky Stories: The Pram and the Pelican
A story from a reader called "B."
It'd only been two months since I picked up the 13-foot flat-bottomed pram, minted around the time of my birth. I’d only been sailing a handful of years, only production model keelboats. Daysailing sloops mostly. It took a month to realize what I now had, how cool and buoyant the wood. The upsides of an atavistic lug-rig and crazy flares on an open design. Summer was by now drained away, but I didn’t want to let go—wanted a cruise into the Straits, mixing it with a beach landing and stay-over timed to the tides.
Little white horses cantering along the broken surface.
Did my research. Tide heights, slack times, current speed, wind forecast, pressure overview… all good to go. So I head out at the appointed hour, and the outgoing passage unfurled like a charm. The beach stop was delightful too, a deep unhook from the mindset of land living. Heading back, I noticed immediately the chop. Little white horses cantering along the broken surface. And surprisingly noisy too. Thing was, the wind, which did switch directions as predicted, was whipping around the point, and what blow there was came against the current and made the sea state into slop.
This is the test, I remember saying. Of me and the boat that didn’t yet have a name. It also didn’t have reef points when I picked it up. Something I felt needed doing and did, and how glad I was at that moment to have them and to have practiced how to shorten up.
Fast forward. In making my way, conditions just keep deteriorating. Gusts were pugnacious. The boat was bobbing but upright, a regular Mayweather Jr. The lesser sail area was keeping us chugging along. Helm was comfortable.
We made our way home without incident beyond knotted knuckles and adrenaline overload. It felt so good to be in trim during such turmoil. All my practice and prep had paid off, and when I was back at the slip, a heron was perched on the break wall to greet me. Or was it a Pelican? I can’t be sure. I think it was a Pelican. And as I watched him lift off and fly out to sea the spooky part of it all hit me. Today it came together. This time, it all worked out.
Lesson Learned: Confident, not too confident.
Feel free to share your own spooky stories on the water. Send to josh@smallcraftadvisor.com —Eds
Reminds me of sailing my SF Bay Pelican down in Florida in the company of my cousin in his Scamp across shallow Carabelle Bay... we both got “Ruffed up”....reefed a bit late!!
Its good you had the discipline to be prepared! I don't share that quality .