Paul
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I love the water and adventure, and I love to sail. I grew up on Monterey Bay, and thanks to Mom's love for the beach, I spent summers in the '60s playing in the surf, sand and tide pools. It doesn't get much better than that. The sights, sounds and smells of the sea from those idyllic days are somewhere imprinted on my brain, because every time I jump in a boat they come back to me. I started sailing as a teen. El Toros and later Hobie 16s, capsizing frequently from the cold sea breeze. Years later, and after moving to Colorado, I picked up wind surfing, which during the microbursts of summer was quite a thrill. I still sailed a Hobie 16 and my daughter and I enjoy showing off by flying a hull together on the trapezes. It was after a day of battling 30- to 40-knot summer storm winds in 1999, and actually tacking the beach cat in that stuff and NOT capsizing, that I think I literally got charged with a pure joy of handling a boat (as well as the electricity from the air). Sailing would no longer be a pastime. I took up racing keel boats with friends on gorgeous Colorado lakes, and I took a series of keel boat courses on my home waters of Monterey Bay. In 2002 I bought a Santa Cruz 27 and sailed that little boat probably a hundred days a year initially. It's that experience, I think, that kindled my enthusiasm for solo sailing. Who in their right mind was going to accompany me on the water as the first sign of winter arrived with snow flurries? I moved back to California in '05, sailed several seasons in the OYRA shorthanded division, and fell in love with sailing on the ocean, sometimes in 30 knots of breeze with the kite up. I mean really, is that sane? I'm on a drier, saner boat, now a beautiful 1990 Olson 34 that I
got in August 2008. I'm fortunate to have found boats that are full
of spirit and vigor but are safe on the open sea. The sea itself,
and the boat's response to it, is a great teacher. I love tweaking
the lines, shaping the sails, carving over the textured water, feeling
the feedback from the boat and the sea. This adventure to Hanalei
Bay (and back again) is another aspect of learning, and a chance for
uninterrupted days sailing.
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