Synge on the trailer, headed to San Francisco. Even getting to THIS point was a story in itself!

The 2005 sailing season didn’t end well for Synge. In October, we were involved in a collision with another boat during a race. The boats glanced off each other, so the impact wasn’t huge and the damage to the hull was minor. Damage to the gear on deck was pretty bad, however, and involved some new stanchions and new side stays (the wires that help hold the mast up). The accident was ruled the other boat’s fault, and repairs were made quickly. Injuries were mostly minor, with a couple cuts, bruises, and one torn up shoulder. We had some trouble with the motor, which wouldn’t idle and kept dying, and we were towed to the boatyard by the boat that hit us.

In December we were back on the water for the Winter Vashon race, again the motor wouldn’t idle and again we were involved in a crash. This wreck occurred at the starting line, as we jockeyed for position at the gun. We made a last-minute maneuver to get on Starboard tack (favored because it has right-of-way over Port tack boats), and again a boat failed to see us coming down the line towards them. This impact was spectacular in comparison to the first, as the other boat’s bow (the really hard, pointy end of their bow) crushed its way right through the relatively soft side of our hull. The damage was very bad, and we nearly took on water through the hole which went from the deck, all the way down the side and within 2 inches of the water.

This shows the hole punched in Synge's side by the other boat

After a lengthy insurance battle, this too was ruled 100% the other boat’s fault and repairs began. A few improvements were started as well, including a new instrument case just above the companionway, and the removal of the head and holding tank. The head was replaced by a porta-pottie which cut about 30 pounds off our weight. And since the bottom didn’t need a complete repainting, we had the sides of the hull painted instead, and Synge went from white to blue.

This shows the repair in progress. All the damaged material has been removed and they are starting to fix it. The boards across the hole will act like forms for the new hull material

The hole is filled, the black material is carbon fiber cloth. Just needs the fiberglass put on and painted.

Due to the time needed for repairs, Synge was a late entrant in to the 2006 sailing season. Unfortunately 2006 started up where 2005 left off. Our very first race after repairing the boat was Smith Island, a long 80ish mile trip from Seattle to…you guessed it…Smith Island and back. The trek north to the island was rough - all upwind, bumpy and wet. Our new instrument panel hadn’t been waterproofed, and several of the instruments got wet and stopped working.

Sailing in the Smith Island race, the first race after repairs were done

We were eager to get around the island, stop getting wet, and start going downwind which Synge is very good at. As we rounded the island, we prepared to raise the spinnaker. We were in about 15-20 feet of water and were doing about 7 ½ knots (about 10 mph), when WHAM the boat jerked to a stop. Everyone on the boat however kept moving at 10 mph and fell / slid / stumbled around the deck. We figured we had run aground, but we were still floating. As we started moving again, in a slightly different direction than a moment before, out from under the boat appeared a very large rock. It was a pillar of rock, actually, whose top was about 2 feet below the water’s surface - that was what we hit.

This is an underwater shot of the bulb (large piece of lead at the end of the keel that acts as a counterweight). You can see the front of the bulb where it hit the rock.

Luckily injuries to the crew were minor. Damage to the boat was hard to determine, since it was all underneath the boat. We were taking on water through some cracks by the keel, but slowly, about 5 gallons per hour, so we pumped it out and finished the race. The boat was pulled from the water (again) and the damage was assessed. Since there were no other boats to blame, we decided it was the rock’s fault. The rock was not insured, so this repair was on the Captain’s dime.

This shot is looking up at the bottom of the boat, and shows the crack we opened up in the hull when we hit the rock. The vertical piece is the keel, which sticks down 7 feet from the bottom of the boat

Since the repairs were not covered by insurance, we did much of the work ourselves. Mike, the Captain and owner of the boat got out the grinder and started cutting out the damaged areas around the keel.. The keel was removed by the boatyard. So, there we were, halfway through April, about 10 weeks until the Pacific Cup started, and the boat was a shocking mess. It was sitting on jack stands with no keel, and a big hole in the bottom where the keel used to be. No mast, no boom, no rigging. Grinder dust was everywhere. The boat looked naked, hollow and broken, and after 3 accidents, morale was at an all-time low.

Slowly, and after many hours of effort, progress was made. Mike finished the fiberglass repairs to the inside bottom of the boat. The boatyard finished the exterior repairs, got the keel fixed and attached and re-stepped the mast. Synge was back in the water and at her home berth with about 4 weeks to go. Darren, one of the crew, and I attached stanchion bases, lifelines, and created an emergency rudder (a requirement for doing Pac Cup). Darren cleaned the gas tank and I put in new gas lines from the tank to the engine. Mike finished the instrument case, bought new Speed and Depth displays and a new GPS and got them all installed and working. Mike rewired the entire boat (with the exception of the wires in the mast). A new electrical panel was installed along with a new battery switch. Mike built a new chart table with a radio rack and storage drawer. The bunks, comprised of 2 aluminum pipes with canvas strung between them, were repaired and cleaned. An antenna for the short wave radio was installed. 2 new spinnakers arrived, with one more on the way. The hull was waxed. The boat was getting close to being ready. The last steps were removing the lifelines and the winches that were on the top of the cabin, all of which would have made the boat too high to trailer (we would have hit overpasses)

Personally, I still had much to do. I had a list of things to take, suggested by the Captain and crew (Darren and Braden) based on their first Pac Cup in 2004, but there was much I didn’t have already. Here’s a list of what gear I had and what I had to buy for the trip:

Other than gear, I also needed some medicine. I went to my doctor to discuss asthma and seasickness drugs. My asthma has been under control for years, but I was concerned about trying to sleep on a wet, potentially moldy, enclosed boat in both hot and cold conditions. The doctor armed me with 4 levels of asthma drugs: my normal preventative, a stronger preventative, an attack-ending inhaler, and some prednisone in case the attack-ending inhaler didn’t work. I also had 2 epi-pens in case of allergic reactions, and seasickness patches. With my gear and my drugs, I was getting close to ready.

Another part of preparation that Sally and I were able to help out with was food. Sally found out that REI was offering 20% off their freeze dried food, so we took orders from each of the crew members, and we purchased 96 freeze-dried meals (Mountain House brand) from REI - about $450 worth! Mike bought 96 instant oatmeal packets, and Darren bought chewy granola bars.

One week before our start, Synge was pulled from the water and put on the trailer. The trailer is not pretty. When the boat is on the trailer, most of the weight of the boat sits on the keel, which sits on a steel beam just over the axles. The boat also sits on two “bunks”, which are wood 2x12’s cut to fit the shape of the boat, one in the front, one in the back. The wooden beams are bolted to steel uprights. The uprights are braced by 2 L-angle steel pieces. Much of the steel is unpainted. Darren took a day and welded on 4 more braces to keep the bunks upright. With Synge on the trailer and the mast taken off, we took the mast apart and stored the cables and wires inside the boat. The boat was tied down to the trailer, and all the sails, food and gear were stored inside. The mast was fed up under the boat and over Mike’s Durango which was our towing vehicle. Whenever we took a sharp turn we had to keep careful watch on the mast, as it would stick way off to the side of the Durango when we’d turn. Yes, it was as scary to drive as it was to look at!

The Saturday before the race, July 1st, Mike and I left Seattle at 5 am to drive to San Francisco. It’s always nerve-wracking to pull a trailer, and worse when your trailer is 14 feet tall and your towing vehicle is barely up to the task! The worst part of the drive was hitting the rough spots in the road. Sometimes when we’d go over a rough bridge or a bump in the road, the mast would come down and hit the top of the Durango! The drive went okay, though, and 18 hours later we were entering San Francisco. Driving the ungainly rig through San Fran traffic, even at 11 pm, was slow going. No one wanted to follow us, and everyone wanted to cut in front of us.

Sally had a flight from Seattle to San Fran and got in at 10:30 am. My sister Linda flew in from Kansas City, and she got in around 11. They got a rental car, drove around the city (it was Linda’s first visit) and saw the sights. They went to Muir Woods and Sausalito, then met Mike and I at Svendsen’s boatyard about midnight where a security guard let us in so we could park. We stayed at the Marina Village hotel nearby.

Synge at the boatyard in Oakland - notice there are no lifelines, no cabintop winches, no mast, no boom, no motor.

Sunday morning we began putting the boat back together. Darren, Braden and I worked on assembling the mast, while Mike started untying the boat and filling in some dings on the keel and hull.

Synge at Svendsens boatyard in Oakland - lifelines are started, the bow pulpit is not yet in place.

Darren and Braden put the lifelines and winches on, while Mike and I did some sanding on the bottom where some overspray from another boat (back at the boatyard in Seattle) had gotten. It was getting hot, around 85, and once we sanded the rough spots, it was apparent that the whole bottom could use some burnishing, which is basically rubbing with very fine steel wool to shine the paint and make it slick and fast. That killed much of the day, and was dirty, sweaty work. Linda and Sally had a nice day sightseeing, and I met them for dinner.

Mike, Joe and Darren sanding the bottom. It was tricky sanding while standing on the trailer.

Monday we got the boat put in the water, the mast stepped, the side stays on, the boom attached, and motored to Marina Village. The day went pretty well, and the boat started looking like a boat again. It was a lot of hard work, but seeing the boat assembled gave us all a good feeling. We organized our food for the trip - there were 4 large plastic containers, one for each 3 days’ worth of food. Each crewmember put a lunch, a dinner and a breakfast (2 pouches of oatmeal) into a Ziploc, labeled it with their name and the day they intended to eat it. Everyone’s first 3 days went in one box, days 4-6 in the next etc. This let us keep food handy, but store the later days’ food way in the back of the boat.

Tuesday we took the boat out for a test sail. I was not fully prepared, as I thought we were going to work on the boat some, stop at the hotel and then take the boat out, so I didn’t have my foulies or PFD with me. We sailed past Alcatraz, and went close to the Golden Gate, but stopped short of it since the conditions were pretty rough. 6 foot seas and winds in the high 20’s. We put up an old spinnaker, and started heading downwind so I could get some driving practice. This did not go very well. I was over steering, and with the high winds and all the traffic in the bay, it was not a good learning environment. It would be easy to wipe out in those winds, and we didn’t want to take a chance. I just started to get a feel for it when we had to quit.

Joe preparing to run a new halyard through the mast.

We headed back to the dock and took everything out of the boat. We put everything out on the dock so we could pack the boat for the trip. We had twelve 5 gallon fresh water jugs, which we filled with water and some Clorox to sanitize them. Then we rinsed and filled them. All of the sails, except for the 2 we would start the race with, were put into big clear plastic bags that Sally got us so they would stay dry. Darren and Mike were in the boat, packing things away. Braden was on deck handing things to them. I was on the dock, handing things to Braden. Only the spinnakers went up front to keep the bow light.

View of the cabin, looking forward. This was actually taken during the race, so things are little out of place. You can see the sink, and the light blue is the edge of a water jug. The stove, the mast, the nearly empty v-berth with just a couple spinnakers and our spare pole in it, the porta potty and first aid kit. The blue/gray blob on the floor is my foulies, laid over the life raft for drying. Oh, and you can see a pair of my wet socks.

90% of the gear went under the cockpit, including our 500 lbs of water. The bow was riding high, just the way we wanted it so it would ride up on the waves and not go through them. In the middle of the cabin was our essential gear. We each had a duffel bag with our clothes and personal items, and there was a cargo net on each side of the boat for loose / wet stuff. On the cabin floor, right in the middle of the boat was our 47 lb life raft and the “oh sh*t bag”, with flares, emergency rations, water maker, GPS etc. Finally the boat was loaded. It was amazing that it all fit and we still had room for us to sleep!

View of the cabin, looking towards starboard (right) side. You can see part of the life raft, the navigation station, the shortwave radio, VHF radio, satellite phone, electrical panel, laptop and part of the "park bench" settee (there is one on each side) and just the tip of the overhead netting we used to hold gear.

Tuesday night we had a team dinner, to which the crew wore their matching Synge shirts. Dinner was just okay food-wise, but we were at a restaurant that overlooked a waterway and the view was nice. Everyone was tired from all the boat prep and traveling, and knew that Wednesday was race day, so there was very little drinking and it was an early night. Back at our hotel I packed my sail bag and set out the gear I was going to wear. I was going with 3 layers – long underwear, fleece layer and foulies, my new socks and boots, baseball cap, PFD, tether and gloves. My warm weather clothes went in a space bag. My daily drugs went in a small Ziploc, and my “uh-oh” drugs in another along with my spare sunglasses and extra lip balm. My log book and pen also went in a Ziploc, where I also put my wedding ring, so it wouldn't get caught on a line or anything during the trip and tear off my finger.

The starboard side settee, the storage net, and Captain Mike, unfortunately seasick and in his bunk.

Now that the packing was done, it was time to try to wind down. This was the roughest night for me before the race. Being out in the rough seas and high winds, trying to learn how to drive under tough learning conditions, sensing the enormity of the trip, seeing the boat all packed up - it got my mind going a little. I wasn’t panicking, but I could feel the potential for getting myself worked-up building inside. Up until that night, we were so busy and tired that it was easy not to think about the trip. Not so tonight. In the months leading up to the trip, there were a few nights (20 maybe?) where I’d lay awake and think about what all could happen going across the ocean. Those thoughts were good, as they helped formulate backup plans and lists of things to take, but they did have a tendency to make me worry and lose sleep.

I think I worried about the right amount, and after making all the preparations I could, I just let it go. I felt I was about as prepared as I could be, and whatever happened during the race, we’d just have to deal with it. Seriously, the absolute worst things that could happen were a) getting hit in the head with the boom and getting a concussion (there’s just not much you can do about brain swelling outside of a hospital), b) running into something (a whale, a container, a large chunk of sea junk), c) falling off the boat. Of those, a) can be avoided by being conscious of the boom at all times while you are on deck. c) can be avoided by staying clipped onto the boat and moving around carefully. There just isn't much you can do about b), especially at night, so you just live with the risk, which is pretty small. So on Tuesday night I made a very conscious effort to not think about the trip at all, and to not think about the next day being race day. I just said some prayers and somehow got to sleep.

Below is an email Sally sent out to family and friends on Tuesday, the day before the start.

Wednesday July 5th – race day! We got up and had a bagel and some coffee at the hotel free breakfast. We got to the boat around 8 am. We didn’t have to leave the dock until around 11 to get to St. Francis Yacht Club where the race would start. We had a few things yet to do – one of which was run reefing lines through the boom. That meant we had to fish 2 lines through the boom where we couldn’t reach. We got that done, re-caulked some fittings on the bow that were missed earlier, and figured we were about ready. Sally and Linda ran out to get the last-minute items, Gold Bond powder and 3 cheap hand towels. Both of those items turned out to be essential and I was so glad I had them. We said our pre-goodbyes (at least I did, to Sally and Linda) and we headed for St. Francis. Sally and Linda by car, us by boat.

Pulling into St. Francis Yacht Club. The mainsail is attached and the bow is riding high.

The motoring was slow, the waves were high, and after a bumpy ride, we got to St. Francis. The bad news was it was already noon, the waves had really slowed us down, and we had to hurry to get our goodbyes said and get out to the start line. We docked and got off the boat and I hugged Sally and Linda. Most of us had to hit the restroom, so we got that done and then another round of hugs and kisses. We were all pretty frustrated that we didn't have more time, and that our send off wasn't a bit grander. There were other boats there that had pretty big sendoffs but with all the last minute preparations it just didn't work that way for us. More hugs and kisses, and some well wishes, and we piled back on the boat.

Synge motoring out to the starting area with Alcatraz in the background.

The first job back on board was to put a jib (front sail) on. We hadn't picked one yet since we weren't sure of what the wind was going to be. We chose our #2, which is a little smaller than our #1. We motored out of the marina and headed into the wind to raise the sails. This is where a few things started going wrong. The winds were pretty high, mid-20's (in knots) and gusts as high as 32. Waves were pretty big too, 5-7 feet, which made for a bumpy ride. We started putting the mainsail up, got it up about 1/3 of the way, and of course it jumped out of its track and we had to bring it back down and get it back in the track. That killed some time we didn't have, but we got the sail back up and headed off the wind to start sailing.

The mainsail goes up for the first time..and stops.

The wind wasn't letting up, still in the high 20's. That is more wind than Synge likes, and we knew we'd have to reef the main (bring part of down and tie it off). This is where the second problem happened. Remember the reefing lines we had to run through the boom? Well on the first attempt to reef, one end of one of those lines wasn't tied correctly and was knotted up, and rather than take the time to sort it out, Mike cut it, and it ran through the boom and out, so it was lost. We managed to get the remaining line onto the main and get the main down to the first reefing point, but we didn't have a line for the other end of the sail (near the mast). We ended up using the Cunningham (a device normally used to pull some slack from the bottom of the sail) to act as the front reefing point. Now all of that was working fine but it took a lot of time. The motor was still in the water, the jib still wasn't up, and we were running short on time!

The main is up and reefed, and Recidivist, who would come in 2nd, is nearby. Notice that they are a bigger boat and didn't need to reef.

The next thing we had to do was get the motor on board so it wasn't dragging in the water slowing us down. We turned way off the wind to keep the boat flat so Mike could haul the motor in more easily. As I let the main out, the line slipped out of my hands and started racing through blocks (pulleys). By the time I dove on it and stopped it, it had pulled through 2 of the 8 blocks. I hauled the mainsail back in, and there was no time to re-feed the line, so we decided to just sail as it was. It was not a big deal, but it would make trimming the main a little harder since I had less leverage. That emergency over, we got the jib up and started sailing. By this time, we were way far away from the start, and were dodging shipping traffic.

About this time, Sally and Linda realized the same thing I realized. We hadn't eaten lunch, and we didn't have anything handy! I ate 2 granola bars and had some Gatorade. We headed back towards the starting area and got there just a few minutes before the start. We just had time to get on each tack for a short time and make a few tuning / trimming adjustments to the main and jib before we had to start fighting for position at the start. As the one minute warning sounded we knew we were in trouble - we weren't very close to the other boats and they were all going to start ahead of us!

The starting gun sounded, and the other 7 boats in our fleet went across the line and started the race. All we could do was watch and wait, and hope no one was laughing at us too loudly. These great shots of the start are all due to Sally and Linda's hard work finding the best places to shoot from, getting there in time, and doing without lunch!

Half of our fleet as they cross the starting line and head for Hawaii! Where's Synge?

Here Comes Synge! Nothing like starting out in LAST PLACE! Turns out the fleet needed much more of a lead to beat us!

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for...Synge sailing under the Golden Gate Bridge!

Chapter 1 – Getting to the Start Line