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| Ayala Cove, at Angel Island |
I miss the salt air. I miss hauling all our duffel bags and crates of picnic supplies and extra clothes across the parking lot; down the gangway. I remember flip-flopping along rickety, briny smelling docks, knowing where the weak spots were and avoiding them, to our beloved sailboat. I say, "sailboat," though there were many to love through the years.
When we got the O'Day, which we sailed for one day only. The O'Day fell from grace before it could be christened when, on the open Ocean just outside the Santa Cruz harbor, we smacked off a wave that opened a large hidden crack in the hull, my father crawled in the open cabin, took a look, and stoically turned for the harbor.
Once the O'Day was returned, my father chose an Aurora, which was a sweet little boat of about 20 feet, and my father liked that he'd found a boat he could haul around behind our big International Travelall. He was able to keep it home, and tow it to and from the marinas where we would launch.
That end of the bay was shallower and more forgiving in terms of tides and currents, and it gave my father the opportunity to really get his skills refined, I know now. After only a few months or so, my father wanted to change things up. The new boat was an Erikson which my parents named "Mermouse" -- an affectionate reference to me, as my nickname was Mouse. It was wonderfully spacious compared to what we'd been sailing in. Sailboats have such a cozy, nesty feel to them that my little sister and I always were thrilled to discover each successive boat, and learn how we most enjoyed creating "forts" in the forward cabin and setting up our entertainment in the main cabin for the time that we weren't on deck either enjoying the sail, or helping handle the sheets and the tiller.
While we had it, we kept it at the Redwood City marina, and my parents joined the Sequoia Yacht Club. It was fun to be able to do things with other sailors, though there were few kids for us to play with or get to know. That didn't really slow my sister and me down; we were too adventurous. My sister and I thrilled in the excitement of getting to know the marina's grounds, piers, and docks as our own. When we sailed from there, there was a long stretch of estuary we had to travel along to get to the open waters of the south bay. I remember, on opening day of racing season we dolled the boat up as a giant mouse with a big styrofoam nose we spray painted pink, and long whiskers and ears set on the sides.
Later, my parents sold the Mermouse and bought a 22-foot Balboa on a trailer. They dreamed of venturing to other places, and so this allowed them to take a vacation in the San Juan Islands of Washington, and run up to the delta for the weekend now and then. But, eventually, my father longed for the challenge of the San Francisco Bay, and for a place where the boat could stay and be ready to sail when we arrived.
My father himself grew up sailing little boats, and being the engineer and inventor he was, he enjoyed playing in the wind; finding that sweet spot that actually created lift on the sails to pull the boat along, and knowing the tides and the currents and how to read the water. When we sailed, we truly sailed. The San Francisco Bay is not a place for the faint of heart, and my father knew everything there was to know about sailing on it. I feel, even today, a decade and a half since I last owned a sailboat, I still know that bay the way a sailor knows it; from the water, looking at the shore, and knowing the full force of that water.
The next of our boats through my childhood was a Santana 27, and this is the boat that really ties it all up in my memory. This is the boat where all of us; my Dad, my Mum, my sister, and I, all really became even better sailors. It was on this boat that we would venture from the Jack London Square berth we had on the Oakland estuary, up to the Delta, and spend a week at a time. Each trip took two legs up and two back, and we would overnight at the Benecia marina, or, occasionally, at the Martinez marina (which was a bit sketchy, back then). The time we overnighted at the Martinez marina, I remember my dad felt sure we'd be able to walk from the marina up a few blocks to a place where we could get dinner, and, back then at least, it was almost skid row and my father seemed incredibly non-plussed that we would be unlikely to find anything edible within our reasonable walking distance. Of course, back then, I didn't know words such as "sketchy" and "skid row." My friend Alice was with us on that trip, I remember. We had an incredible week paddling our kayak around the delta in the sun.
By the time I was about 20, I was comfortable looking at the San Francisco Bay from vantage points that few had seen. The topmost point on Angel Island was a place I felt so at home; not to mention the various ways one could hike there and return to the little Ayala Cove where visiting boats moored. The view from Angel Island was three hundred and sixty degrees looking almost one time at Sausalito, Tiburon, San Francisco, and Berlekely; not to mention Alcatraz Island and Yerba Buena and Treasure Islands. Those places are views that, even now, reside in my soul.
At some point, my father sold his first Santana, and bought a Cal 2-24. It was another trailerable boat, and had a swing keel for ease of transportation. Of course, it also made it easy to avoid running aground, as the skipper could raise the keel if suddenly in shallow water. The Cal lasted for a few years, and my father got itchy for another Santana. He found one that was nearly the twin of the first.
Our second Santana was the boat that my father would own until his last days of boat ownership. Through my early 20's, and into my 30's, the Santana continued to be a place my sister and I, and occasionally my step-mother, Ruth, and my Father would have our visits, often including a picnic at the top of Angel Island, but sometimes we would simply sail around Angel Island and head back in and have Manhattans and crackers on the boat as we cruised down the Oakland Estuary back to whichever marina the boat was currently berthed.
After I graduated from Davis, in my mid-30's, and went to work as an engineer, my Dad happened to call me one evening to chat. We meandered our way through everybody's news, and then he finally dropped the news that he was getting rid of the boat. I clearly remember feeling that a piece of my life's memories was suddenly on the chopping block.
"Why?" was of course the first response I had. My father went on to explain that the more time went by, the more he noticed that his hands, in particular, hurt for some time after a sail. He recognized that it was simply the progression of age, and that things would probably not get noticeably better. My father has always been very progressive in the way he has sought homeopathic assistance to help his health and well-being. This I knew, and have known all my life. He had clearly thought through the choice.
Before I knew it, I was making a proposal,"Can I have the boat?" I asked. I can hear his cute chuckle even now, (partly because he still offers that "belongs-only-to-my-father" chuckle that he does), and he asked me if I was serious. I was. Even that fast, my mind was racing because I felt that I could handle the cost, but also wanted to have a "partner in crime" for such an adventurous plan. I was single at the time, but had a wonderful sidekick of a friend who I saw almost every weekend.
Within a week, my friend Eilean, and her son Tim who was a gigantic 12-year-old, and I, were meeting my Dad for our first session of 'Sailing 101' which they needed because they'd never sailed, and which I needed because I hadn't had the responsibility of being a captain ever before, and hadn't sailed more than about six times a year with my father for quite a few years.
By this time, my father had been keeping the boat in the Delta--Antioch, specifically--for a number of years, so it was somewhat closer for us to drive from where were were (Sacramento-ish). One of the most glorious summers I have ever enjoyed was that one which ended up being spent carpooling back and forth with Eilean, Tim, and I; rarely ever on the Interstate but instead along the sweet little levee roads, and meeting my Dad for a sail and usually a lovely evening snack on the boat to recap what we'd done that day. By summer's end, we were all sailors, each in our own right. I was designated Captain, and this was Eilean's comfort level anyway, so it was a perfect arrangement.
We enjoyed a number of years with the boat, and I owned it for about six years or so, eventually replacing the partners I had in Eilean and her son, when she felt it had become too much for her budget. But, never were their replacements in the same league, and I missed my old partners. I moved "Experiphilia" as the boat was known, to Sausalito, in the Clipper Marina, for a couple of years at the end, but eventually, horses took center stage in my life again, as sailing had done earlier, and our sweet sailing legacy came to an end.
My father, although he thought he was done sailing, could not be kept from the waves and the briny air quite so easily as he believed. Shortly after pushing his sailing protege's from the nest, he called me to tell me he'd bought a boat.
"A Boat!" I exclaimed.
"Well, a dinghy, really," my father answered, clearing up precisely nothing. "It's an inflatable. A Zodiac."
I was actually a bit shocked. My father had always had a bit of disdain for "power boats" and this had no sail, I knew. He'd even contributed to a bit of my own snobbery in that regard. I couldn't picture any of what he was telling me.
It turned out that he was able to trailer the Zodiac with his Toyota van, and launch it by himself, and, amazingly, he'd convinced Ruth to go along for most of his excursions, which were almost always in the Delta. They'd go for a picnic on an uninhabited island--there were hundreds--and then my dad would get his chance to wave jump crossing a body of water that I had personally hated since my childhood. It was a place known as Frank's Tract, and it was a choppy, icky, windblown, tract that was an island that had sunken many decades ago in a flood that broke its levees. When I was little, it was always a tense crossing due to many submerged obstacles and sudden changes in the bottom depth. It was only more disdainful to me once I became the Captain and had to cross it almost every time we sailed.
Nonetheless, my Dad had gotten very, very, good at zipping over the waves kicked up by the howling winds on Frank's Tract, and he enjoyed jumping the little Zodiac over the waves, which were often as high as six or more feet--big for the Delta!
After my initial incredulity, I felt thrilled to know my Dad had found something he could enjoy, even love, and keep himself on the water longer. I had never stopped feeling sad that he was setting down one of his lifelong joys. I wish I had a photo of my father with his little Zodiac, but I never actually got to go with him, although I did once see him in it, bouncing along over the waves.
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| The view looking southwest from Mt. Livermore, Angel Island's peak. |
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