![[Photo: the Radio Flyer at Anacortes Marina]](rflyer.jpg)
In which the crew arrives at Anacortes... The crew has to attend a class and pass a test... A bit about the boat itself...
Seattle 1998 Aug 02 Sunday
Getting up that early [We planned to leave at 5:30am, in case you forgot], especially to drive 90 miles to Anacortes, is always a problem, but we had preloaded the cars the night before, and Scarlet was very familiar with the route. I could have tried to sleep in the car, but decided to talk the drive away with Scarlet instead. I was happy with this crew. Everyone had boating experience (and indeed, Scarlet had more experience than I did, though she was without certification), Larry had sailed with me countless times, and my recent practice had me if not polished, at least confident that I could get out of most situations in one piece. Lea was closer to a wildcard, but so far her enthusiasm was a delight to behold.
Our band piled into cars and started the long drive up to Anacortes, the port where our boat awaited. We were going to be sailing in the San Juan Islands, and Anacortes was probably the nearest mainland port to the islands. Piaw and Scarlet were in one car, leaving me in a car with Lea. I wasn't too crazy about this. Didn't this woman like to talk about anything I could stand? I needn't have worried. We listened to the news on the radio, chatted about current events. I never know anything about current events, and took advantage of this chance to get caught up. We talked about books. I'd been reading Byron's Don Juan, which was much funnier than I'd expected. She was reading Trollope. I blinked. She talked about being an activist in Atlanta. I did a double-take. At the start of this car ride, I'd been ready to dismiss Lea as just another boring med student. By the end of this car ride, I'd figured out that I'd been an idiot at the start of the car ride. This, this med student had more personality, more history than I did. My preconceptions were shattered. On the plus side, my hopes for the voyage were looking up.
Anacortes
Photo: the Radio Flyer (not our boat, but pretty)
We drove through fields, forests, and fog. It all seemed too still for the beginning of an epic voyage. The radio announced a big fire in a cedar lot near Anacortes. "Our coming was heralded with flames," I muttered. I didn't know what it meant, but it sounded good.
We pulled into the marina plenty early, killed some time at a local 24-hour donut place, and got back to the Marina in time for our briefing. We filed into a classroom. The Anacortes Yacht Charter company insisted on giving a briefing to its skippers before letting them wander off with rented boats. I'd never seen such a thing. At the head of a classroom were two sad sights. The first of these was a collection of photos of boats which had run aground in the area. The second of these was our instructor, whose weary frown bespoke a history of answering calls from hapless boaters in the midst of irresponsible behavior towards A.Y.C. property.
The skipper's briefing started ominously, with a series of pictures about beached boats, looking all the sorrier for being out of the water. Then a litany of dangerous places, and places to watch out for. If they'd given this talk before we paid up I might have gotten scared off. Well, I reasoned to myself, sailing is supposed to be the safest sport, bar none.
We learned many useful things. Our boats would be equipped with standard boat VHF radios. The sort of radio where you hold down a button and say, "Friday Harbor Harbormaster, Friday Harbor Harbormaster, Friday Harbor Harbormaster, this is The Healer The Healer. We would like to request a slip for the night. Over." And the harbormaster would then need to get back to you, tell you to switch to another channel to continue the conversation. Complicated. We learned that, in the San Juan Islands, celphone coverage is better than radio coverage. We learned that in Canadian waters, if you're picking your way through certain tricky areas, sometimes your best strategy is to find a boat flying a Canadian flag and follow it. We learned about some deceptive harbor entrances, and some areas to be careful in. I paid attention with half an ear, took notes, doodled. Behind me, a small child spilled a package of Sugar Smacks. It was reminiscent of high school.
Then it was checkout time. We walked down to the boat, called The Healer (a Beneteau305), after using the rest rooms, and were greeted by Butch Cassidy (no kidding, that was his real name!), who gave us an overview of the ship's systems, capacity, quirks, and locations of various items.
I copied this information from the informational binder on the boat:
A HISTORY OF THE HEALER
In 198l this Beneteau 305 (1988 hull) was one of only 8 boats in the world to race in the Liberty Cup competition in New York Harbor. During this match cup rce she was crewed by 8 different teams skippered by: Gary Jobson (USA), Eddie Owen (Great Britain), Marc Pajot (France), Peter Gilmur (Australia), Terry Nielsen (Canada), Chris Dickson (New Zealand), Yasuyuki Hakomari (Japan), and Pelle Petersen (Sweden). She was boat number 2 and is featured in the 1988 Liberty Cup promotional poster as she heels across the harbor. When her spinnaker is let out, a red and white Statue of Liberty fills the sky.
In 1988 she was purchased by her first and only owner, JL Pelfrey. Her name was selected for several reasons. First, she is considered to be a source of relaxation and renewal; second, a piece of artwork in the owner's collection features a magnificent watercolor depicting an Indian medicine man as he transforms into an eagle and is titled "The Healer." Finally, the owner liked the play on words with the sailing term "heeling", [sic]
For 8 years The Healer sailed the San Francisco Bay. She was tested by high winds and pounding surf and passed with flying colors. She sailed under the Golden Gate bridge and out beyond, and thrilled visitors with brisk sails along the San Francisco waterfront. She truly lived up to her name. In 1997 she was brought to Washington. She now awaits new adventures as the waters of the San Juan Islands beckon.
Now you can add your name to this illustrious history!
Butch Cassidy, an older sailor, had cropped hair, leathery skin, nasty cough, tabacco scent. The first aspect of the boat's workings that Butch acquainted us with were certain international ramifications of the boat's plumbing system. When you use the toilet on a boat, the results aren't just dumped into the water. Instead, they go to a holding tank. In USA waters, you're only allowed to dump the contents of your holding tank into the water if you're more than three miles from shore; you might not ever get a chance, and might have to vacuum out your holding tank in port using a "pump-out". In Canada, you can dump your holding tank willy-nilly, though it's rude to do so while tied up in a marina. Butch showed us how to flip valves to allow or disallow dumping while we privately pondered the ecological and societal issues.
I'd never had a charter company employee show me a boat's systems, and I learned many things. Butch at one point called Scarlet "Tiffany," and then apologized, saying that he'd mistaken Scarlet for his niece. "Tiffany." Heh. Scarlet grumbled that he'd better apologize for that. I immediately decided to tease her relentlessly on this point. Then I remembered that we were going to be on a teeny-tiny boat together for the next week, and decided against it.
Butch talked to us a bit about the VHF radio. He said that he'd been a radioman in the Navy. He said that while, "Meidez Meidez Meidez, this is the Healer" is the official way to ask for help, "Oh shit! Help!" is really just as effective as long as the people listening to you are calm enough to ask you for clarification.
The Healer had a couple of other features I liked:
Photo: the Healer (our rental boat)
![[Photo: the Healer]](fhealer.jpg)
What we had to do then was to take the boat out, take it around the block so-to-speak, and bring it back safely to the slip before he would turn the boat over to us. This was the moment of truth, since we were all up since 5:00am, and he mentioned darkly that he had failed someone the week before. What the heck, two weeks before, I had checked out a similar vessel, and docked and undocked her repeatedly until Sam, Larry, and Sam's girlfriend was quite sick of it. So I gathered the crew, gave them directions about getting on and off the boat, how to stop the boat, and how jumping off the boat in a docking situation was sternly discouraged. We disengaged the power cord, stowed it, I started the engine put the boat in reverse, and off we went. I wasn't in a hurry and took things slowly, as is my wont on a new boat. She handled really well, without noticeable prop walk, unusual in a sailboat. Most sailboats swing in a particular direction in reverse, since the torque of the propeller usually meant that the boat only wanted to turn one way. This boat had a prop walk, but it was very mild, and once I put the boat in neutral, I could actually control which way the boat would go in reverse. Impressive.
We must have impressed Butch, since he let us have the boat without much thought, and then we simply loaded the boat.
We wandered back to the cars to pick up our supplies. "Hey, do you go to Williams?" Who'd said that? It was a young man uniformed in a sort of polo shirt and shorts, pushing a wheelbarrow used to carry baggage. It was a "dock boy," a yachter's stevedore, working for tips. He'd noticed that Scarlet was wearing a "Williams" sweatshirt. Apparently "Williams" is the name of some (no doubt Eastern) university. Scarlet answered in the affirmative. "Williams is the one school that rejected me," the dock boy said, "but that's okay; I got into Dartmouth." They talked a bit, then he wandered off. Piaw was teasing Scarlet over the attention she'd been paid. Scarlet grumbled something disparaging about the school the dock boy had ended up at: "I could have told him that's why he's doomed to a poor dockboy existence." I gulped. Lea pointed out, "But that would have been mean." Scarlet gave a tight smile. I was suddenly glad I hadn't called her Tiffany.
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