Blog 031 – Big Dreams On A Little Boat – Part III

NOTE: We have wifi for a short time so I’m able to add a few pictures to Parts I, II, and III.

Gallegos in all his glory 🙂

The memories of the glow from the Coleman gas lantern hanging on the end of the boom are as clear today as they were 20+ years ago. We were sitting on the water but still watching and listening to the sights and sounds of the harbor from our little boat. The lights at Casino Point’s iconic theater lit up the bay and even the Rigley Mansion was all lit up on the hillside. The night life was in full swing and we had a front row seat. It was an amazing, peaceful, relaxing evening. The next morning we pull-started the little Johnson outboard and while it was warming up we secured the dingy’s painter to the stern, dropped the mooring lines and headed for home. We all waved at the Dock Master in the tall green and yellow dock house where they watch the marina. Now on the deep blue sea it was hard to say good-bye to Catalina Island. Avalon was a quaint little tourist town, golf carts and all. We enjoyed exploring along the side streets and town park. But we pointed the bow to the southeast and its hills and shoreline faded off into the distance. We sailed towards the California coastline slicing through deep blue water. I watched the little teak trimmed sailing dingy ride up and down on each wave about eight feet behind us. We were all topside enjoying a wonderful morning at sea under full white sails. Tiller in hand, we each took about an hour at a time steering a compass heading just like sailors have been doing for thousands of years.

Captain Gary

First Mate Chelo

Every half hour I took a navigation round, plotted it on the chart and calculated our progress towards our destination. This consisted of plotting the fix on the chart then checking our sounding against the new fix on the chart using the hand dead reconning (DR) position, computing our set and drift, and adjusting our course to steer. Loran Charlie was the only navigation system we had onboard besides my old sextant. Taking latitude and longitude was not too difficult and it was pretty reliable and fairly accurate within a mile, most times. (Just imagine way back in the stone ages of navigation before GPS and back before the six feet of accuracy that we take for granted today.) So on schedule, I went below to plot our position but as I was plotting I started to get an upset stomach and a bit dizzy. I thought to myself, its calm out today, why would I feel like this in calm weather? Uh oh, my breakfast was coming back up but I held it in long enough to make the few steps up the ladder and get clear of my wife sitting on the port side. I leaned over the rail and was violently sick. Now seasick for me is an extremely rare occurrence. I can remember once in Alaska when the submarine was stuck on the surface because of some hydraulic issues, and once in the Indian Ocean during a huge storm that tossed us beam to beam for hours on end. But this did not make sense. Gary was the first to notice the smell. It was gasoline fumes that had settled in the bilge. Gary smokes and I’m glad he didn’t light one up just before we noticed this problem. Remember those faded pink, plastic gas cans we took with us? One of those was stored in the lazarette locker. We lifted the deck plate and found it had ruptured and all of the five gallons of fuel was sloshing around in the bilge. Thankfully, Rocket Ship did not have an electric bilge pump or we may have gone up like one. We were faced with one very dangerous situation. If one spark would have ignited we would not be here to tell the story.

We assessed the situation. Using the radio to call for help might create a spark. We determined this to be too dangerous so we used rags and buckets to clean up this disaster. As much as possible, we put the liquid in empty water jugs and the rest went overboard, one cup at a time. I can remember using a red solo cup to bail the gas from the bilge and it melting in my hands. We didn’t want to put fuel into the sea but our lives were in very real danger. It took all of us to clean it up, taking breaks topside for fresh air. By the time we were done every one of us were sick from the fumes but we got it all out and washed the bilge with soap and sea water. We opened all the hatches for ventilation until it was safe.

The rest of the day as we recovered from the headaches it was pretty quiet, no rock and roll blasting this afternoon. We did watch a group of bottle-nosed dolphins as they traveled along beside us and everything went back to wonderful. The coast of California was in sight and the sun was starting to set. The wind died down and it was time to turn back into Mission Bay where we had departed a few days earlier.
We went to start the old Johnson outboard and the rope broke….So Gallegos and I pulled off the cover and tied a knot in the rope. We wrapped it around the pulley at the top of the motor head. And gave it a tug. It didn’t start. We took turns pulling. It would rumble, sputter, belch smoke, but refused to start. So I went through the possibilities and eliminated them one by one. Check the fuel vent, pull – Nothing! Check the plug. Yuck. Dark. Black. Goo. Fouled plug. Do we have a spare? Yep, but it is a rusty piece of crap so I cleaned up the fouled plug with a pocket knife and a lighter. I scraped the goo off and then cleaned it to something that resembles a spark plug. This was likely from old fuel that has turned to lacquer from lack of use.

In the meantime the sun went all the way down and we don’t even have a breath of wind. If we had just a whisper of wind, I know Gary could have sailed us right into a slip and tied us up all by himself. But we were now drifting dangerously towards the rocks and cliffs off the coastline and we can see the kelp beds getting closer. With no wind and the direction of the seas inshore, we need the engine to navigate the channel. No cell phones either, those things became barely affordable a few years later. Remember the brick phones? I whispered a prayer as I put the spark plug back in, wrapped and pulled the cord, one last time.

And the old Johnson outboard roared to life! And so did our spirits. After a few high fives and a thank-you to God we headed away from the cliffs and towards the breakwater. We made it safely back into Mission Bay.

For some, the challenges of this voyage would have deterred them from ever setting foot on another sailboat. But for us, this voyage at sea, on this little boat, had altered the course of our lives to come. This was the beginning of the dream that lead to where we are today.

Thank you Chelo and Gary 🙂