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 The Day, Today Last week we ran a picture (The Day) and asked you to tell us who it was. The correct answer was Webb Chiles and his Ericson 37, an accomplished singlehander who made his fame a few decades ago. We asked Webb to give look back on his sailing, and give us his impression on the state of single-handing today. Enjoy. It has been interesting for me to read some of the comments about the photo of EGREGIOUS, and particularly to learn what became of her after I sold her. I am writing this aboard another One-tonner on my mooring in New Zealand's Bay of Islands. I don't love IOR boats, but have owned several because they sail well enough and have been what I could afford. What is now difficult to believe is that these were once near cutting edge racing boats. In the early 1970ties the World One-Ton Cup had all the big names. EGREGIOUS was indeed an Ericson 37, designed by Bruce King, whose boats won many races back then. She was launched in 1973 and had been out-designed even before she went in the water by Doug Peterson's GANBARE. In her I was the tenth or eleventh person to sail alone around Cape Horn, as well as the first American; and, while I am not certain of this, she may have been the first boat with a modern spade rudder/fin keel to round the Horn. After my circumnavigation I was often asked if I thought she was too light for such a voyage. Her designated displacement was 16,000 pounds, of which half was lead. Without an engine or an electrical system or many other things people consider essential, she actually displaced less. My time was then the world record for a solo circumnavigation in a monohull, a now-laughable 202 sailing days and some hours. I think GUINNESS listed it at 203 days. But I broke Chichester's record set in a considerably bigger boat by more than 3 weeks, and I did it with my own money. As I note on my website: www.inthepresentsea.com, I have lost everything I owed in the world twice, including all photographs, and the one of EGREGIOUS was copied from the dust cover of STORM PASSAGE, and is the only one I have of the boat. It shows me sailing with one of the women in my life off San Diego before the voyage. Not incidentally, I did not go to sea because of her. Women have driven me to distraction and despair, but never to sea. The voyage had been dreamed of for twenty years, since I was a boy growing up in painfully landlocked Saint Louis, Missouri; and specifically planned for five. I even set my departure date and time a year in advance, left forever the office in which I worked at 5:00 p.m. on a Friday, and pushed off from the dock at Harbor Island Marina at 11:00 a.m the next morning, on time to the minute. San Diego's weather permits you to do that. There are many differences between solo sailing on the cutting edge now and then, perhaps chiefly among them money. Back then a man of modest means could go off and set a record; now obviously he or she can't. The base price of an Ericson 37 in 1973 was $27,500. I think I earned all of $14,000 a year, and when I sailed had about $45,000 of my own money in the boat. There wasn't any sponsorship available, and I wouldn't have asked for it anyway. I navigated with a sextant. There wasn't any alternative. There also weren't any quartz watches. I got time, as many of us did, via a Zenith radio receiver that used 9 D cell batteries. For those of you who have come of age in the era of GPS, a position will be wrong by one nautical mile at the Equator for every 3 seconds your time is wrong. Navigation hadn't really changed much since Captain Cook. For what it is worth, I still have a sextant aboard, but haven't used it in more than a decade. I also have a chart plotter, two laptops with chart plotting software and three Garmin eTrex for input. Jib furling gear was new in the early 70ties, and back then I did not trust it. EGREGIOUS was cutter rigged, with the staysail cut as a storm jib. In the Southern Ocean I often lashed the jib to the deck and sailed under staysail and deeply reefed main. North Sails were passing Hood back then as the premier sailmakers, but mine were made by Hood. They were not up to the task, but I don't blame Hood. Back then no one had ever set out from California alone for the Horn, and no one knew what the Southern Ocean required. Fortunately self-steering vanes did exist, and I had an Aires, which did a good job until it was ripped apart by 100+ knot conditions south of Australia in my fourth month at sea. I continued on using sheet to tiller self-steering. Jumping forward to the present: sails are better, line is better, navigation is better, and the boats themselves are bigger, incredibly faster and incredibly more expensive. The speeds and times being achieved now were unimaginable 30 years ago. I was most stuck by this during the Millennium Race. I was living aboard in Boston at the time, and when the boats passed through Cook's Strait, they were talking about being at the Horn in a week. I made my own second rounding of Cape Horn on a passage from New Zealand, but when I left port, the Horn was six or seven weeks away and not on my immediate mental horizon. Of the money, I'm glad I lived in a time when I could afford to compete; but I like to believe that whatever the time I would have found a challenge. After all, I found an even greater edge to live on in my next voyage by sailing an 18' open boat, which didn't cost much. One element of today's scene that I don't care for is the hype, but that goes with sponsorship money. An example is the PR men spouting off about "great waves rolling all the way around the globe." As anyone who has been to the Southern Ocean knows, it isn't true. Moitessier wrote about it, as have I, and I expect others. Waves rise and fall down there with passing lows as they do everywhere else. I was in Force 12 and 30' breaking waves off the Horn on December 12, 1975, and two days later becalmed on a glassy sea, watching an albatross swim circles around the boat. There are some achievements that don't really need to be exaggerated. The simple truth can be enough. One element missing from present-day solo sailing/racing is solitude. It isn't really a solo activity, it's a team event with one person driving, and that person is essentially outer directed. Communication is almost constant with weather routers, shore support, media. Francis Chichester complained about having to make radio broadcasts during his circumnavigation, but then he had a sponsor who understandably wanted reports and publicity. I don't criticize this, but it destroys one of the essential qualities of solo sailing. I did indeed set off in EGREGIOUS without a radio, and, except for a handheld VHF with a 5 to 10 mile range to communicate with officials as I enter port, I still sail without one. When I go to sea I don't want to talk to any one who isn't on board. I really do want it to be just me, the boat and the sea. I have based my present 37' sloop, THE HAWKE OF TUONELA, in New Zealand for a few years, ever since completing my fourth circumnavigation at Sydney, Australia in 2003, and, while I continue to love New Zealand, I miss the solitude of the sea and am starting to think of going around again. Two of my circumnavigations have been west around the Horn; two east through Panama; so this will be the tie breaker. I'm not sure which direction I'll go, but I am reasonably certain I'll go via the cape instead of the canal. I officially become a senior citizen in a few days, and long range plans are always subject to revision. I'm surprised so many of you recognized the photo. I invite you to visit www.inthepresentsea where you might find some words and images of interest. And I wish you all good sailing. 11/06/06 |
