Sail!

Two summers ago my husband and I bought a sailboat. It had been one of my husband's dreams to have one. I was surprised how inexpensive used sailboats were. I think it is was only $2500. As soon as we purchased it, my husband wanted to be on it as much as possible. I did too, but I just go with the flow anyways. We were ready to take this thing out into the ocean. There was only one problem. We didn't know how to sail. You have to learn how to sail. There is no way around that. It's kind of like an art and you have to learn the lingo too. Luckily, we made friends quickly on our dock. We met some pretty cool characters. These three guys, "Red Beard", John and Garret, were some of the most awesome people we have met to this this day. They really made everything fun about that dock and they sailed regularly. A few even lived on their boat. We would take turns hanging out on each other's boat with Rum in one hand and Coke in the other.

John offered to take us out on our boat and teach us the ropes of sailing. We invited a few friends out and set sail. This guy knew pretty much everything you need to know about sailing. Sailing requires doing multiple things at once. One person was in charge of the tiller, which is what you use to steer. Left goes right and right goes left. Even right and left are referred to as port and starboard. John designated jobs to each of us who were sitting near the sails. Depending on direction, wind and speed the sails would need to be let out or tightened. I still don't have all the lingo down. Our sailboat had two sails: the main sail and the jib sail. That day John taught us everything we needed to know and all he wanted in return was cigarettes.

Did I mention that my husband is brave? Well, after one lesson he was sure we were ready to set sail on our own! We planned our first trip to Catalina. I'm not going to lie but I was scared. Not only do I get sea sick/motion sickness, but it would take us hours to get there in a sailboat. It really depends on the wind. I was ready to face my fear. I didn't tell my husband how scared I was. I took some anti nausea pills and was ready to set sail. We had been sailing a few hours already but the winds were weak and we weren't making much progress. We poured another Rum and Coke and decided to motor sail for a bit. We had the music blasting and were dancing around the boat just the two of us. Our favorite song, Sail, came on and suddenly our sails were taken by the wind. We were so excited! We felt like we were flying on the water! It is a great feeling when you can count on the wind to take you places, just like Columbus did. We started going so fast we didn't need to motor sail anymore. The wind pushed us the rest of the way to Catalina. "Land Ho!" Catalina was in sight! We anchored to a mooring and headed for town to get some grub. We had been making mini salami sandwiches all day with our Rum and Cokes. Sailboats really bring out the pirate in you.

We hit up a pizza place and afterwards a bar that was shaped like a ship on the inside. That night the waves rocked us to sleep. It was a beautiful morning waking up on the ocean, but the fog worried us. We weren't sure we could see our way back. We set sail back to Dana Point Harbor with my eyes glued to the compass. We we arrived our friends all wondered where we had gone since they saw our boat gone. They couldn't believe we already took it out on our first adventure, especially with the foggy conditions. We jumped off the boat and I kissed the dock. It was an 11 hour venture. I was relieved that the trip was a success and I didn't get too sick if I just stayed in one place on the boat. Going to the bathroom was a different story. Trying to stay put on the toilet that's bouncing up and down is definitely a challenge. The bathroom was so tiny, my knees practically went up to my chest. I was glad to be back on land from our very first sailing adventure. That was just the beginning...