Well…. WildChild is finally back in the water, all systems running great, she is in good shape, and ready to go….! So let’s go. We sailed up to beautiful Barbuda a few days ago and have been enjoying paradise. We have started to look forward.
We should start moving now right…? Seems like the next logical step.
The brilliant plan…. my brilliant strategy was… well…. Covid should be done in a year right…? Like surely they (those in power controlling the world) would not keep us all prisoner for more than a year right? Surely the entire planets best efforts and focus would have a vaccine by now right? Surely as long as we prove we do not have Covid via a PCR test… and sit thru quarantines the islands down here will let us in right…? Afterall… their economies, completely tourism dependent, are desperately trying to convince tourists to come to their resorts. Their websites say we are open for business.
WRONG…..!
I got a lot of things wrong it seems.
About 2 weeks ago WildChild started moving around again, started sailing, much to my crews relief. Short sails that were good training for Alex. He loved it and was so happy to finally get to go sailing as he has been dreaming of. The sailing seemed to really please Alex. He was happy and came to life when we started sailing. He has done great applying all that I have taught him. He is great crew.
But… Alex is young… full of youthful energy and rather impatient. He is here to go sailing and see the Caribbean… now please. He does not do well when we spend an entire day on the boat, he needs action socialization and excitement. He tolerates the quiet life well, but he is tolerating it. He craves excitement. Alex is like a race horse at the starting gate and he really wants to begin the big adventure. He has been patient for over a month it took to get WildChild here to the starting gate, ready to go sailing… now he wants to go sailing.
I agree let’s go sailing
A week ago I told Alex to begin researching the islands and figure out where he wants to go and where we can get in. I am bureaucratically retarded, I cannot stand legal weasel stuff and government legal decrees and complicated rules and bullshit. Honestly I have no tolerance for it and it is hard for me to deal with. I let Alex do the research for the last week. He is good with rules and regulations.
Something has changed inside Alex the last few days, I can see it. He is quiet and sticks mostly to himself but it shows, something has changed.
I think the reality of how horrible and restricting Covid is has dawned on him, and surprised me too. Both of us have been in shock. It seems, the little governments down here, who usually do very little in the way of governing, have now had ten months to get busy being official. Governments are slow to move but when they do, they become like mountains.
The news is not good.
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…BAD…
Alex has been researching all the different islands and learning of the rules for entry. He emails governments where possible for verification and I talk to other sailor friends where I can.
I have sort of composed this bleak map to show you the dilemma.
It seems… the world is not opening back up down here at all. Just the opposite.
So understand, what we have learned… is that the CARICOM travel bubble… which I was counting on… has completely collapsed. These governments are unable to work together effectively. Latest information was that the only country left in the CARICOM bubble is Barbados. A bubble of one island is not helpful.
Travel is more possible if you are willing to sit out a two week quarantine on your boat, and pay for (at very profitable rates) a Covid test before you come AND pay again for a second test upon arrival. There is a lot of profit to be had maximizing profits over this necessary test you understand so no country wants to lose out of their shot at your wallet. Show up with a recent negative PCR test.. great… now pay us for another one…! Reason is always the first casualty of governments huh.
Personally I don’t mind sitting out a two week quarantine. A yacht is a nice place to sit for a while. Alex however, has been clear with me, he couldn’t do it, and doesn’t want to do it. He is not keen on the wallet picking for multiple tests…. he says okay… but the sit on the boat for two weeks would just kill him. Alex wants to travel and gets bored after a few days in one place. The kid is antsy.
A few days ago we sailed up to anchor off an abandoned resort up near the only city here and went to go visit Coddrington. Interesting little town, feels very Bahamas’ish. Nice people and its shocking how much of the town is still damaged from the last Hurricane. Still 50% of the buildings in there are still destroyed. Nice people though.
Yesterday we sailed back down to Coco beach and the sail did not go so great. Bad winds and it was a bit stressful. We caught a barracuda while fishing and accidentally tac’ed twice while trying to get it in. Completely my bad, my screw up. Just when we hooked the fish, and Alex got so excited about it, the winds got unstable. I mean they were squirrely for about 20 minutes before hand as several storms passed overhead, but they continued to get worse while we were busy dealing with the fish.
We were sailing close hauled tight to the unstable winds, port tac, sails tight to center. You sailors know this. So you gotta pay attention to mothers little mood swings and wind shifts, and adjust course or sails. We had a fish on which put the fishing line too near the prop for me to use the engine. What I normally do when I get a fish on, is slow the boat down. Just go 10 degrees tighter to the wind and let the sails lose lift and luff. Usually the boat drifts sideways… usually.
BUT…. the wind was just getting to +/- 15 degrees with a falling component on the Z axis. Winds under storms clouds sometimes falls down. Non-sailors always think of wind 2 dimensionally but sailors understand you have to pay attention to all three axis in space. At this moment I was getting a downdraft and associated instability in my winds but didn’t know it.
Alex does not know how we deal with a fish on WildChild, she is not setup very well for fishing so its hard to reel it in. It takes two people to get the rod around to the side deck thru the side screens I have on her.
So I put the boat into a slow upwind hover and began dealing with the fish when I feel WildChild suddenly start to lose her forward momentum and stall out. The winds crossed 30 degrees to the bow and suddenly we were in irons at the moment I am busy reeling in the fish.
I put the rod back into the holder and grab my wheel and steer hard to starboard to get the wind back onto the port side, but it was too late, we lost all forward speed and the genny backwinded..!
I start yelling at Alex dump it dump it dump the genny quick. I go to start the engine to use it to boost me back over and cross the wind again, but I realize I have a barracuda on a fishing line near my rudder and prop. I cannot use the motor to save me.
Alex was great and we used the sails to tac back again within a minute, perfectly executed we saved my screw up. I still did not understand what was happening with the wind though, why we tac’ed in the first place, so I returned to the same sail plan. I didn’t know mom was in a mood and the winds had begun falling downward.
We are working on the fish again when WildChild tac’s herself again not two minutes later. By this time Alex was on the side deck and reeling the fish in close so I decided to quickly bump the motor on and save the tac again. The barracuda decided to run for the prop at that moment too and Alex had trouble fighting him away from it.
I managed to get WildChild kicked over enough though that the genny dumped her back wind and filled her sail properly again. I killed the engine before the fish could get to the prop. With Alex on the deck still I got WildChild back under control, and stood there staring into the heavens and thinking, why again..? I studied my helm instruments and the clouds for signs, I wracked my brain to figure out what was going on. It dawned on me, falling winds under a storm cloud. Also, my bad completely, we were trying to sail really really tight to the wind, like TWA=35 and AWA=23 deg. We were already too tight for me to try and luff the sails. I should have just eased the sails in those conditions. Captains error please forgive me sailors.
This time though I understood and did the right thing and set a less tight to the wind course, apx~ 50deg TWA and then I luffed the genny, main sail still tight to center, I didn’t have time to adjust everything.
I got up on the side deck, yes camera in hand, to help Alex get the fish in and off the line and out as quickly as possible. Alex was excited for this moment but I have caught so many barracuda’s and you can’t risk eating them so they are a wasted catch. We just got to get the fish off the deck fast so we can return focus to the boat.
WildChild was not in good conditions and I needed us to return to tending to the yacht quickly.
Yep, I had to be firm with Alex.
The kid got so singular in his focus several times, tunnel vision, he couldn’t see the big picture. He was moving slow and not listening. I got sharp with him. He stopped what he was doing to defend himself and explaining himself. Wrong time, bad time. I spur him on… GO!
Here is the link for raw video of “THE INCIDENT” that hurt his feelings. See for yourself how I “yelled at him in a panic and was swearing and freaking out” according to Alex’s version of reality. I was horrible in the way I spoke to him and “I had to say something about your ‘wild’ aggressive behavior Lexi“… what you cannot see is he was afraid to pick up the fish, and the boat was not sailing “safely”. What you can see is how he stops everything to focus on me and lost focus on what he needed to be doing. You can hear me prompt him… “get the fish off the deck”.
After the incident, when I got WildChild back under control and sailing well again, fish gone. I corrected Alex and explained that when the Captain tells you something, you should do it and not argue it. In the moment is not the time to stop everything and focus on your feelings, focus on the task at hand please.
If you watched season 1 and read the book Sailing Crazy winds you will understand my sensitivity to crew preferring to argue in the moment rather than comply. The kid got excited and I think the adrenaline got him pumped up so it narrowed his focus, it happens to a lot of people, especially young men.
Alex is very strong willed, very dominant in his own right, and very sure his way is the right way. He began arguing with me and explaining how his reaction is not his fault, its my fault for not communicating more gently softly nicely and politely. IF I spoke more nicely to him and more softly, then he would not have reacted that way. Millenials were raised to believe nothing is their fault, there is always a way to cast blame elsewhere, personal responsibility is a long gone idea in our societies.
During sailing is not the time for these type of conflicts.
He does not understand. He understands only his feelings in the moment, he pushes his defensive argument with me further. He begins “fixing me” and teaching me how the way I perceived the same event was completely wrong and everything was my fault. He was blameless and perfect.
I yell at him again to “Swallow it… Alex STOP…!”
Millenials… they all seem to think the world revolves around them and their feelings. Mommy taught them they are indeed the most wonderful person in the universe, always right and always deserve to be treated with a mothers love and kindness all the time.
REALITY CHECK.
Mother nature doesn’t care.
You are not the center of the universe.
And nobody cares if your feelings get hurt.
SUCK IT BUTTERCUP AND TAKE IT LIKE A MAN…!
The rest of the sail was in silence.
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…MORE BAD…
Well… here is a big surprise for you.
Last night Alex hits the alcohol harder than normal. This morning he wakes up later and sits quietly and calmly in the cockpit as he usually does in the morning.
Eventually he says he needs to talk to me.
See it coming yet…?
He is calm and diplomatic and super polite and kind, very carefully measured with his words.
He tells me that it does not seem like we can go sailing anywhere. He is going home soon, he is leaving WildChild to go do other things..
There was lots of talking and blah blah after that. All good. We get along well, he is a great sailor and has been wonderful crew. He is a wonderful human being. We get along well. No hard feelings on either side. This is just not going to give him what he wanted, it is no longer useful to him. He wants to go sailing now and go to all the islands and he has recently learned this is not very possible right now.
I lose another crew to Covid. I invest a lot of effort into training these people.
What is interesting is that this morning Alex told me sailing is nothing like he thought it would be, nothing like he imagined it would be.
🙂 how can you not smile at that
SAILING IS NOTHING LIKE YOU IMAGE IT WILL BE
Covid lockdowns are worse not better. We both thought the world would ease up by now. We were both wrong.
My friends in Grenada inform me they have had a big outbreak of Covid there from resort guests which has spread to locals thru the resort employees. Like 50 new cases in the last week and growing fast. Grenada is going to lockdown hard very soon if not today. After Christmas and new years there is very likely to be more outbreaks in other islands.
Island hoping is going to get harder and not easier.
The prospects of WildChild getting to change islands is slim right now.
This weighed heavily on young Alex’s decision to return home soon.
I cannot help but wonder how much hurting his feelings by being sharp with him influenced his decision.
You have to be tough to live on the ocean. Not a place for the weak or delicate.
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Sooo…. I am looking for new crew again. I will post ads in all the appropriate places. This time however, I understand the reality is, there will not be much sailing. Mostly just living cheaply in paradise anchored off beautiful beaches, swimming with turtles, and living a good life.
Anybody wanna come for a lovely vacation in paradise?
We will sit on the deck and watch the sunsets over the bay. Overlook the resorts and other yachts and read books while relaxing and watching the local millionaires landing their helicopters in their villas. We can go for walks on the beach and go hiking and explore old forts. Its a quiet life here but still not a bad one.
Tough life…. wanna come play?
The way I figure things…. okay…. Covid is affecting the whole world. There is no escaping it anywhere on the planet. FINE.
But Antigua is not a bad place to sit it out.
Cheers sailors
Captain Lexi