From
First Mate
Bob Nelson
Underway from the Maritime Museum of San Diego at 0555.
Cleared Pt. Loma at 0650 and set a course to Santa Barbara that would pass Catalina to Port and leave Anacapa Island to Starboard.
The conditions at 1200 were as follows:
SEAS – 1-2 FT
WINDS - less than 10 KTS out of the NW
TEMP - 65° F
DISTANCE TRAVELED BY 1200 – 35 NM
5 a.m. was a pearly dark mist, like the inside of black abalone shell. By the time I got up, the crew members who had not slept aboard were arriving, various crew were coming and going with little Styrofoam cups. Bos'n George was there to wish us well, take our group photo (with 4 different cameras) and cast off our mooring lines. We raised the main, fore and staysail and motored into the fog. Behind us, the sun came up like a gold coin over a silver city. I was reminded of the second verse to "America the Beautiful", the one about alabaster cities gleaming, undimmed by human tears. As the monster cruise ship "Monarch of the Seas" came in, we came out and left San Diego behind. By the time we return it will be a different city, the Museum will have its new barge in place and the Festival of Sail will be ready to begin. This seems so far into the future that it's more like watching a movie than thinking of my own upcoming life.
Mr Nelson gave out the watch and station bill and covered the safety drills. We had breakfast (biscuits and gravy, a great favorite of the male crew members) and the watch-on-duty were kept busy spotting blue whales (two pair) and so many pods of dolphins that we lost count. The weather continued warm, overcast, with almost no swell. The ship motored steadily all day, a silver ship under a silver sky on a sea of crinkled silver foil. Lunch was jambalaya, so good it drove most off-duty crew to their bunks for naps I'm sitting in the main compartment now with sleeping bodies around me on a few bunks, Mr Nelson studying charts on one table, Scott B reading across from me, Kenny in the kitchen starting dinner. Nettings full of cantaloupes and honeydew melons sway gently overhead, as sleepy as ancient sailors in their hammocks. Kenny is making dinner, something called "Guinness stew".
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