2017

HALYARDS

So it’s Dec, ’17, my 6 mth visa in Panama expired and I sailed back up to Golfito, Costa Rica , couldn’t think of another destination, A. I’d originally returned to Panama to go to the San Blas on the Caribbean side, but having talked to a lot of cruisers about the islands becoming crowded, the Kuna Indians becoming aggressive toward yachties, etc and having been in and out numerous times from ’97 to ’07, I thought maybe I’ll just coast on my memories of what I still think of as paradise. B: To hang out with my friend Rick, the shipwright (see woodworking, actually I think Rick needs a sequel. He’s one of those very rare good people, that if you meet 6 of in the course of a lifetime, consider yourself blessed) So while Rick isn’t a saint he’s certainly not a sinner, he’s different.

My 1st night in Golfito cost me a 6 yr old, 2 hp Yamaha outboard that had really been running well, mostly because I’d been stealing parts off an identical new Yamaha. The thieves took the old motor, the new one didn’t have a prop, carb or gas tank. I was awoken by the sound of the thieves tearing the wood kicker pad off the u bolts that held it to the rail, it was locked to the pad, as was the motor missing the parts. They were under $500 new in Langkawi, Malaysia, when I needed a carb and the dealer didn’t have one I just bought a new motor. Bad crack problem in Golfito, thieves are aggressive and relatively fearless.

I didn’t have an itinerary for the 3 mths Costa Rica would allow me to anchor out, but the failure of one of the interior chambers on my hard, nesting dinghy, right where the davits attach, gave me one. I had to fix the dinghy. Fortunately I’ve been packing around a little 8’6” Achilles inflatable, since ’99, that mostly gets loaned out to friends that’ve lost a dinghy. So now I’ve got a reason to hang out with Rick, like I needed one. Fixing the dinghy was no big problem and in the meantime Rick introduces me to his good friend Sandra, a 46 yr old Tica with 3 grown children. In Rick’s words Sandra is elegant, I’m not bad with words and I can’t improve on that.. Rick is renovating a house with a small crew working under him, including Sandra, even covered in paint in drywall dust she’s a nice looking lady. Eventually I asked Rick why he didn’t just hook up with Sandra, I mean it’s obvious they like each other, a lot. “Oh man, Ive been trying to geet into her pants for years, she won’t have none of it, besides I’m just an old whoredog and she’d never accept that” he said cheerfully. “You could change” said I, “Sure, but I won’t, I like the way I am” he said with a grin. Ok there’s no come back from that.. So a couple of weeks later, we’re having a drink in Latitude 8, where I met him many months prior and this little puta (look it up) comes up to him and asks if he wants to buy sex, “Forget it, I’ve got no money, but my friend George will buy you a beer, he’s picking up the tab, ‘cause I’m broke” “How about your friend, does he want to buy sex?” she asks while rubbing up against him. Now I’ve got to interject, I’ve never met this girl, but I know who she is, she’s stolen 2 of Rick’s phones after they’ve finished in bed, separate incidents. When Rick accused her of stealing the 2nd phone, she replied indignantly “No, I only stole one” Cool, I’m safe I don’t have a phone. So Rick replies “Well, he’s standing beside you, why not just ask him, he speaks OK Spanish” “Tienes una amiga aqui” she purrs, “have you a female friend here” I’m thinking Sandra would be such an improvement I reply yes,” “Entonces, no quieres sexo con me?” so you don’t want sex with me? I reply in the negative, Rick is pissing himself laughing, the bartender Nanni is preparing to throw her out. About 2 wks later Rick and I are yet again drinking in Latitude 8and in wanders the little puta, this time Rick is fairly drunk and being the old horndog that he is agrees to trade her something for sex. They wind up back at his place and he offers her a router, we can’t get it to work, clearly this ain’t her 1st rodeo, she plugs it in and it doesn’t work. Can’t blame a boy for trying. So he offers her a ½” Millwaukee hammer drill he just bought because $70 was such a good deal. Another interjection, the price of sex is normally $20 - $40. Just before consummating the transaction Rick begged “please don’t steal my phone I need it to get paid tomorrow.” Guess what he couldn’t find in the morning. So in an effort to find his phone he went to see Nanni, the bartender at Latitude 8, she’s an enterprising lady who deals in stolen phones along with other unmentionables, besides they’re good friends. Rick explains what happened and Nanni said “Rick, I told you last night not to go with that girl, she;s no good, Ok that’s it she’s banned for life in this bar.” No phone, but let’s face it, someone gave the little puta cash for that phone, otherwise why steal it?

Ok, we’re getting to the halyard part, I promise, I just got hung up on Rick ‘cause he’s just …. Rick. Sandra and I went out a couple of times and Rick must’ve said something nice about me to Sandra, for which I’m eternally grateful, and eventually I asked if she’d like to sail to Mexico, La Paz to be exact. It’s 2,500+ mi to weather and current and I explained that Thalia, being an old CCA design heels ferociously, but points well and for an overloaded little cruising boat and made good speed. Sandra doesn’t have A: a lot of sailing experience and B: a lot of English so we rely on my Spanish and I try to teach her English. But she was definitely up for the adventure. We leave Golfito a couple of days before the government will seize my boat and head offshore, the 1st thing that happens the SS steering chain in the binnacle breaks and we’re relying on the below cockpit autopilot to steer. When I put that autopilot together I sacrificed the emergency tiller for the autopilot tiller arm. Poor decision I’m now reflecting if the autopilot goes... After a couple of days we run into a huge cold front, by this time Sandra is over the vomiting stage of seasickness, that front runs us through Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala and across the Teuwanapec(?) in S Mexico. The front which had been giving us beam reaches in 30 – 35 kts of wind and spectacular speeds, was now moderating, but man it had legs. That’s when the headsail halyard broke, right where it came out of the sheave box and went to the furling swivel. I didn’t exactly say “Oh, that’s just wonderful” but they’d never print what I actually said.. I knew that halyard lead was bad from the instant I put that $60 used Schaeffer furler on, great furler by the way, but I’d gotten by for years by putting a piece of hose over the halyard in the sheave box. Now that halyard should’ve dropped down the mast, just from it’s own weight, but we were only ½ way through the trip and sailing upwind with small sails on a removable inner forestay? You just know that’ll be dog slow. I had to go up. Thalia doesn’t have a tall stick, she’s an old low aspect rig, but up 55’ in a seaway is pretty much an invitation to getting the shit kicked out of you, plus we were a good 150 offshore, plus the cold front had just petered out, but the seas were still up.. Miracle of miracles the halyard is stuck in the sheave box, I’d brought a couple of pairs of needlenose pliers, vicegrips etc and I managed to pull that halyard out, but then of course I needed to tie it onto the furler swivel which has dropped about 10’. You know it was relatively easy to hang onto the mast wih your legs while working with your hands at the masthead, not the case with a furler foil, you can wrap your legs around the foil, but all that does is direct your nuts straight onto the foil as you swing. Lovely, and I’d plans for those later. Got it tied on, but in my haste to get down crossed the main halyard, which I was up on, through the spreader triangle, 3 hrs of poking throwing, cursing, etc didn’t resolve it so I sent Sandra up in a bosuns chair, That woman looks great when viewed from below even in a bosun’s chair. I can climb a mast but the main halyard was fouled from our efforts to free it and the lead on the other halyards was bad, so Sandra couldn’t tail the bosun’s chair under my ass like she could with the main. So now we have matching bruises, but I don’t think her crotch took quite the pounding, she didn’t have to go above the spreaders.

The 1st thing upon reaching la Paz I did was look for steering chain, unbelievably it was easy to locate, the 2nd was have 2 monster SS nuts stacked and welded on top of the autopilot tiller arm, a huge deep socket, long extension and a long 1/2” breaker bar make a hell of an emergency tiller. Well, despite sailing for 9 yrs without an emergency tiller Id had 26 days to mentally kick my ass and resolved to find a solution.

“If I’m lyin’...”