3-22-16

Surfing...

I went.  Joe emailed me, suggesting he would be going surfing.  I think the exact words in his email were " quit crashing boats and go surfing".  For the record no boats were crashed, I've got no idea where he is getting that from.  The sailboat that I was training on Sunday, maybe.   I came in a little hot to the dock and Mike had to jump out and slow the boat down before hitting the B-boat (the rental power boat).  The next two times I didn't even come close, they were perfect, however Mike insists I come back and do it again with more wind, and someone else as crew so I could direct them properly and not rely on Mike to do the things I should be telling someone to do.  The rental 22 foot Catalina Sailboat has no engine.  So part of the sign off is being able to sail it to the dock in the harbor, sailing it to the mooring in the harbor and doing a "man overboard" drill.  Its a bit of challenge to bring a boat under sail to a dock without damaging stuff.  Its all about timing and when to "dump" the wind from the sails, then there is all the crap going on in the harbor too, I guess.  B boats moving around, private sailboats doing weird stuff, the 3:30 ferry departing, and the wind does funny stuff.

Back to the original point.  I went surfing.  Joe never showed up.  I went out there alone fully expecting him and Christen to be right there.  They didn't show, but two strange guys showed up whom I'd never seen before.  They told me they were from the NOAA ship.  In the harbor for the past few days sat a 250? foot, white coast guard looking ship with the NOAA insignia.  I gave them the "whats up" on how to line themselves up for a wave, but it was mostly small tonight, and they didn't have big boards.  They didn't seem to really care though, it seemed they were happy to be off the ship and dong something.  Two guys mid to late forties, with wives and kids at home it seemed.  I mostly eaves dropped on their conversation, while trying to catch the few waves that were there.  These were guys who spent most of their time at sea.  I say that because late in the evening, one of them paddled after a wave, and as he did all these purple fish swam around him.  I was farther out, but they headed right at me too.  It was kind of strange.  Then a bunch of flying fish started flying by all of us, like maybe 50 of them, then one of the fish I call "needlefish" (they are long and skinny), about 2 foot long and as thick as a cucumber goes flying by using his tail to propel him wildly on top of the water for about 40 ft.  The two NOAA guys were getting a little sketched out by all the bait fish running by, so I had to tell them what they call the "break" we were surfing.  Oh yea, the "shark pit".  The one guys looks dead at me all wide eyed and says "are you fucking serious?!".  They both headed in.  I was smiling.  I still have all my limbs.