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Sailing AUKLET

~ Small sailboat cruising and related thoughts

Sailing AUKLET

Monthly Archives: May 2013

Change

29 Wednesday May 2013

Posted by shemaya in Why Go Sailing

≈ 8 Comments

Deep down, I don’t really believe in the possibility of change. This can get you into trouble, given the everyday evidence by which we are all surrounded, that change is the one aspect of life that one can really count on. Regardless, knowing that does not come naturally to me.

Sailing is fantastic, because it’s all about change, and adapting, and changing again. For someone who doesn’t believe in change – whose mind simply does not wrap around the concept – sailing is a marvelous, ultimately neutral affirmation of the possibility of change, moment to moment, week to week, and endlessly on, if one so chooses.

Some explanation is in order: how does one become a person who simply does not “get” change?

It takes big stuff. Or Stuff – the same sort of thing that would inspire going off in a small boat on a big ocean. And the Stuff is indeed big. I am a survivor, of severe childhood trauma/abuse. There are those who would say that this did not happen, and I am not here to argue the point, one way or the other. We all remember, and don’t remember, and survive, in the best way that we can come up with at the time. Regardless of who says what, this experience informs my entire being, from day-to-day life, to the long cycles of decades. It has become a teacher, though it’s a rough road.

My friend Dave, of triloboats.com, wrote a great article about some sailing that he and Anke and I did together (“The Able Bodied Sea-Person — Expanding the Notion” in the magazine Messing about in Boats, January 2013). While we were talking about this article, before he wrote it, he said something that stayed with me. I was saying that I don’t think that physical abilities, or limitations thereof, should be central to the story of me going sailing. To which he gently replied “that is the story.” This in the context that we are both pretty bored by “sailing travelogues.” (If you’re in this blog for sailing travelogues, it would be best to go back to the smugmug photos linked in the entry “previous trips”…)

Anyway, that was last October, and I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why I don’t think that the physical limitations are the story, and what I do think actually is the story. Which is this: I go sailing because I am a survivor of horrific abuse, and sailing makes sense to me. The challenges, the difficulties, the moments of joy, the meeting one’s physical limits, and sitting in that place of strain, by choice. The power of the sea (this has been said so many times that it’s utterly trite – but it’s still true) – the way that the tides and the currents come and go, predictably, and the wind comes and goes, much more on its own personal schedule, with the waves following. Ease, and difficulty, and risk, the need for constant vigilance, the blessed solitude. The loneliness. The fear. It’s all there, and it is my privilege to have the opportunity to spend time with it. This is why I go sailing. I sit with my fear, in the presence of a force that is vastly, overwhelmingly greater than myself, and completely, utterly not malevolent. Whoever said “the cruel sea” didn’t know cruelty – one can come to terrible grief on the sea, but it won’t be because anybody was mean. That’s the point.

I’m likely to come back to the various connections – I like sailing, and boat building, and boat tinkering, enormously because they so appeal to my techie, engineering nature. But that deep draw, that keeps me coming back over and over through fairly substantial obstacles, is bigger than the techie fun, and bigger than the lovely sparkle on the water. I keep coming back because it’s real, and because it sustains me, and because it provides a container, and a structure, for the biggest of big questions.

Previous trips

26 Sunday May 2013

Posted by shemaya in Trips

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Peep Hen

Last year, 2012, was a big year for AUKLET. The boat and I were out for just a few days short of seven months, from the Connecticut River to Maine and back. There are two groups of photos from this trip: a short one, including brief captions, and a long one, with more extended captions, that really covers the whole excursion. All of those photos can be seen by following this link: http://smu.gs/YMk58O

The header photo on this blog is from that trip, taken by Suzanne Jean in Belfast Harbor, Maine.

Before AUKLET, I was sailing in SERENITY, a 14 foot Reuben Trane designed Peep Hen, which is a highly entertaining fiberglass microcruiser. Information about Peep Hens can be found at the Yahoo group titled Hensnest, among other places.

Photos from trips in SERENITY can be found here: http://smountainlaurel.smugmug.com/Sailing/Serenity-14-ft-Peep-Hen

Each of the SERENITY trips involved tremendous amounts of help from adventurous and generous crew, who took turns accompanying me on outings that went as long as three weeks. I am forever grateful!

All of these trips, on both AUKLET and SERENITY, take place thanks to enormous amounts of help from many, many people. Both as crew, and as “shore support,” bringing supplies, meeting up in all manner of faraway locations, arriving with food, and tools, and lovely good cheer. The entire concept of Shemaya in boats has been an extraordinary team effort, and I deeply thank everyone who has been part of this sometimes far-fetched undertaking.

Voice

25 Saturday May 2013

Posted by shemaya in Uncategorized

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I have started this blog knowing full well that I, who write by speech recognition, have laryngitis. Precious bits of voice come and go, are measured, metered throughout the day, for so many necessities. Social connection, help, and stupid phone calls related to Internet order confusion.

I think about
what I really want to say.

This blog, begun now, in preparation for sailing. Because I had more to say last year than made sense for photo album captions. And because it seemed it would be easier to figure out at home, with endless computer electricity, and near-seamless Internet connection. I was right about that, and I’m glad that I did.

AUKLET launch 2013 has now been planned and postponed for enough dates that I’m not even telling people the new one. Maybe it’ll happen, and I’ll write from the water!

Meanwhile, driveway projects continue – and I write.

It’s a beginning!

15 Wednesday May 2013

Posted by shemaya in the boat

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AUKLET, glasshouse Chebacco, Matt Layden, Paradox, Phil Bolger

About the boat:
AUKLET is a glasshouse Chebacco, built in Rhode Island by New England Shipyard, from plans by Phil Bolger and Friends, and launched in 2012.  The design is included in Phil Bolger’s book Boats with an Open Mind, and the construction is plywood covered with dynel and epoxy.  LOA: 20’6″ Beam: 7’6″ Draft: 18″  The mainsail on AUKLET is not the original design, which was a 149 sq ft. gaff rig main.  This was replaced with a 99 sq ft. roller reefing lug, designed by Matt Layden for his Paradox microcruiser. The 27 sq ft. mizzen is the original Bolger design. Closer to the original overall sail area would be nice, but the short mast and easy reefing are a significant plus for my purposes.  Auxiliary power comes from a Torqeedo 1003 electric outboard, used sparingly, and recharged via the house batteries and a solar panel.  A yuloh (curved Chinese sculling oar) is under construction for 2013.

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