Acadia's Log: Spring Training in Florida

02/15/07, Stonington CT

Its is about 20 degrees out and blowing 30 knots, a good time to sit in my warm apartment in Stonington and write this update. I fly back to Florida tomorrow to join up with Acadia in Coconut Grove for five more weeks of training before she is loaded on a ship bound for Belgium. Much has happened since the fall… 250 pounds of weight has been removed from the boat, she sports a new rig and sails, and I towed her to Key West where she was initially launched and sailed for 2 weeks before the move to Coconut Grove (part of Miami).
 
From the middle of October until the 1st of the year, Acadia was again in a shed at Dodson Boat Yard here in Stonington. The Team Acadia crew managed to get 30 miscellaneous pounds out of the boat (lighter line bags from Katie at Custom Marine Canvas, fewer shackles, etc.) and 105 pounds out of the keel. The new mast and rigging weigh 35 pounds less with the help of Forte Carbon Fiber Products (the mast tube) and Applied Fibers (textile PBO rigging). One Hundred pounds was saved in battery weight by switching from lead acid AGM batteries to new state of the art Lithium Ion batteries, thanks to the help of Peter McCall and the folks at Genasun. Sure, people wonder about the wisdom of going with a lighter mast and rigging after the last mast broke, and I will admit it does seem a bit counterintuitive…though in Florida, I am pushing the boat hard. In one instance, in 20 knots of wind off Key West, the autopilot took the boat into an uncontrolled gibe with the spinnaker up. The mainsail went from fully out to slamming into the backstay and the boat rounded up and heeled to about 70 degrees with the chute flogging like crazy to leeward…I thought for sure the mast was going to come down then, though everything was okay.
 
Acadia, in her new configuration, was launched here in Stonington on New Year’s Eve…it was about 55 degrees and winds were around 10 knots, pretty amazing day! We sailed the boat here three days during the following week and then Ann Wilkie, Jennifer Languille,  David Eck and Lee Johnstone helped in a last minute scramble to pack the boat on a Saturday so I could make it to Alexandria,Va by Sunday afternoon, where I was scheduled to give at talk at Episcopal High School, my old alma matta.
 
When I have traveled up and down route 95 from Stonington to Florida with Acadia in tow, I can always get a sense when I have ventured fairly far inland, the Atlantic a distant drive from some convenience store/gas station that I might find myself at. When towing the boat, I seem to be pulling in to fuel up every 250 miles. “Is that a submarine you got there?” someone in the store would ask.  I ponder the question and reply “matter of fact, sometimes it is,” remembering those times when I would be flying down some wave, water rushing over the bow and thinking to myself, up periscope.
 
On one particular refueling stop, either in Southern Virginia or northern North Carolina, I was pondering my junk food options in the shop when one of the two lady attendants in the store belted out “is that your J-Boat out there.” I gazed up from the pre-package powered donut section and thought to myself, wow, this woman knows something about sailing, and more specifically, knows J-Boats? As I approached the counter, I replied “yes, that is my boat.” “I saw that last night on the Discovery Channel” she went on. My initial thought was how the hell was my boat on the Discovery Channel and I did not know about it. I then gazed out the store window, the large J-Boat logo on the side of Acadia readily visible from behind the cash register. “Yes sir, that boat is the sister ship to one of them ice-rescue boats up in Alaska” she stated with authority. “Well no, it is actually a..” I started to reply, though she interrupted, “na ha, I saw it on the Discovery Channel, it’s one of them special boats they use to rescue people who have fallen through the ice.” I found myself nodding in agreement as she made change for my $10… hmm, maybe I should find out who operated these ice rescue boats and offer my boat for sale when the Transat Race is over. 
 
As I exited the store and made my way to the Suburban and boat, I noticed a US mail truck parked, perhaps 30 feet away from the rig, the driver studying the boat intently… I walked up, thinking this should be interesting. “Is that one of them solo, Transatlantic sailboats?” he said. After my experience in the store, I was almost speechless. “How the hell did you figure that out?” I responded. “I used to sail when I was younger and I follow this stuff some, in magazines and on the internet. I see you have a canting keel and twin rudders. And are those slots for daggerboards? She looks extremely high tech and very fast.”  I climbed in the truck and smiled at the contrast.  By later that day he had been to the website and fired off an e-mail to me.
 
I arrived in Key West at the beginning of Key West Race Week. The weather was perfect and sailors and boats were everywhere. The place was a bit of a zoo, though I soon learned that is the norm for Key West. I spent 2 days wandering around trying to find some place to dock Acadia when I got her in the water, though race boats took up every inch of space. I moved the boat to the Truman Annex, a beautiful old government facility located on the water in downtown Key West. Many of the racing boats were launched and hauled here and lots also used the long bulkhead for dockage during the week. I parked the trailer near the bulkhead and proceeded to spend the next week on land, fixing electronics, waterproofing the keel box, fairing the keel and rigging the mast. Everyday, all day, there was a steady stream of sailors who wandered up to inquire or talk about the boat. Many had read my article in Sailing World and were familiar with the campaign, others looked at the twin rudders and the canting keel and knew it was something unusual, some odd small version of an Open 60. Some  would look at the graphics on the Suburban and see the “2007 Mini Transat,”  they then might stand there thoughtfully as I worked away, waiting for an opportunity to talk about it…which I was always happy to do. “How many people on the crew?” was a common question. “Just me” I would reply.” “No shit.” Often times I would be working inside Acadia and would hear people discussing the boat as they walked by… “imagine sailing that little boat across the Atlantic?” I would hear. I would glance around and study the cramped interior space and for an instant remember some cold, violent ride on a moonless, windy night; the extreme heat and lack of moving air below snapped me back to the present, lads got a point I would think.
 
I finally managed to get the boat in the water the last day of Race Week and was able to secure a dockspace on the boardwalk in Key West Bight (the harbor) in front of the Schooner Wharf Restaurant. The bar was a busy place, music day and night and the boardwalk had a steady flow of people. When on the boat, I spent a good deal of time answering questions from people from all walks of life…some sailors, many not. For six of the days at Schooner Wharf, it was also the base for Campbell and Company Productions to do additional shooting for the documentary. Nancy Ogden is the producer and her husband Doug Curtiss handles logistics and some camera work, though head of photography is Dan Lyons. Dan is a documentary film cameraman specialist and has traveled the world working with people like Alan Alda. He currently has a show on the The Learning Channel and another coming out on Showtime. They plan on filming the Mini Fastnet Race in France in June and then being at the start of the Transat, at the stopover in Madeira and at the finish in Brazil. When done, Nancy’s goal is to have a one hour documentary on the project – they started filming here in Stonington in October. Doug, Dan and I had a great time during the week and needless to say, the big cameras, headphones and microphones generated a lot of curiosity. Our stay with Joe and Jean Audette was also highly rewarding and very amusing (Joe does a great imitation of the average 70 year old guy in Florida being driven around by his wife…Joe is 75). I spent the week before sleeping in my Suburban.  On one occasion two guys broke into the thing while I was laying there… a beautiful house with a comfortable bed was a welcome change.
 
After Doug and Dan left, I spent a couple of days prepping the boat for the 150 mile sail from Key West to the Coconut Grove Sailing Club. I installed an I-boat Track beacon on the boat so people could start to watch my progress at sea, similar to last year when I did the 1000 mile solo qualifying sail. I left on a Monday afternoon in a Northerly, which actually was not a bad wind direction to start with since much of the initial journey from the Keys to Miami involves sailing to the east, and this time of year, the wind often blows from the east. I spent about 8 hours, close hauled on port tack, sailing up inside the reefs that lie about 4 to 5 miles offshore on the Atlantic side of the Keys. The water was flat and the sailing was pleasant, though as the sun disappeared, temperatures dropped into the 40s as the coldest night of the year descended over Southern Florida. The wind shifted Northeast…with no chart plotter and no motor, it was too risky to stay inside the reefs at night (there were shoal areas all along the route), so I ducked out into the Atlantic at Marathon Key. Instantly, the ride became violent. I was not in the Gulf Stream (which flows north and can be rough in a northerly wind), but it seemed as though I was. Three to four foot vertical waves bashed the boat for 11 hours straight. It was like slamming into brick walls. Sometimes we would crash through them, other times fall off the top  and land squarely in the trough, like doing a belly-flop. Occasionally, I would try to rest below, curled up on a sailbag…with each crash and shudder of the boat I would wonder if the hull was going to split in half, the keel was going to fall off or the mast was going to come down. My Jetboil burner was out of fuel so no hot food or drinks. I squeezed down some crackers and Gatorade and wondered if I should have delayed my trip…not turning back now I thought. If I cracked off too much for a better wave angle on port tack, I would quickly enter the Gulf Stream, which would make my current ride seem pleasant. When I tacked to starboard, the wave angle was better, though within an hour I was back on top of the reefs…I was tired and the thought of falling asleep while on Starboard tack scared the hell out of me, it would be all over, so I sat glued to the helm for the run back to the reefs, then back below for desperate attempts at sleep on the violent port tack back out again…sleep never came.
 
At sunrise, I was 40 miles from Miami and the wind shifted east, perfect for my last part of the trip that had me mostly headed in a northerly direction. The wind then proceeded to shift 40 degress every two minutes. North for two minutes, then East, then Northeast, Northwest, back and forth…sometimes blowing 15, then zero, up to five knots, then two knots. The throbbing in my head became more intense. I attempted to make the autopilot steer on apparent wind mode, but whenever a wind shift came through at more than 15 degrees, an alarm would start beeping and not stop until I pushed a button. It was impossible to catch some sleep now. It took me 10 hours to cover the last 40 miles.
 
As I approached within 5 miles of Key Biscayne I thought I heard someone say a muffled “Acadia” on the VHF below…I  had turned the volume down at some point that night during one of my attempts at sleeping. I reached down and dialed up the volume, figuring that perhaps Nick at the Coconut Grove Sailing Club was wondering when I would arrive. Twenty minutes later a booming voice came across the radio, “This is Coast Guard Miami Sector trying to reach the sailing vessel Acadia with a Clay Burkhalter on board.” Huh. I jumped below and grabbed the mike. “Yes this is Acadia.” “Acadia, you are reported overdue, is everything okay on board.” I informed them that everything was fine, except for the fluky winds. They informed me that the I-boat Tracking beacon had stopped working last night at midnight and showed my last position off Islamorada Key. David Eck realized this when he woke up on Tuesday and called Horizon Marine, who provided the beacon. They informed him that the units never breakdown…the only way it would stop transmitting is if it was at the bottom of the ocean. Faced with these facts, David eventually called the Coast Guard in Key West and informed them of the information he had been presented with. The Coast Guard spoke with the folks at Horizon Marine, interviewed people down at Schooner Wharf and initiated a PAN PAN radio search from Key West to Miami for all vessels and marinas to keep a look out for the sailing vessel Acadia. They stayed in touch with David, calling him three or four times during the day…at 3:30pm, the Coast Guard informed him that at 4pm they were going to start search and rescue operations with aircraft. At 3:45 I heard Miami Sector’s call on the radio. Fortunately they did not go through the expense of sending up aircraft.  David said they were extremely professional and polite and I appreciate their concern as well as the concern of  my brother-in-law Brian, my sisters Wendy and Susan, Andy Williams, John Duerden and Tony Dilima and the folks at Forte. For a handful of hours on that Tuesday, there was a small group of people who wondered as the hours passed with no word, if I had been run over by a cargo ship and had no opportunity to set off my EPIRB (emergency locator beacon).
 
As I slowly drifted in the channel just south of Key Biscayane, I was able to reach Nick Mansbach of the Coconut Grove Sailing Club.  He blasted out in a whaler and towed me the last four miles into the anchorage. The folks at the Club have been fantastic. They have welcomed me as one of their own, provided me with a mooring and Nick and Captain Terri Henderson have given me their Irwin 42 to stay on. On Tuesday, I will be giving a presentation at the Club.
 
I will fly over to France at the beginning of April, then do the rather nerve wracking land tow from Belgium to the Atlantic Coast of France, then get ready for the 1st race on April 25th, a 500 mile solo race starting in La Rochelle. I will be competing in six races before the Transat Race, which starts on September 16th. The Transat Race organizers have expanded the number of entries in the Transat to 84, there are 55 boats on the waiting list. The link provided goes to a PDF file that shows all of the starters and those on the waiting list.  You will find Acadia under the DCQ section which is where the wildcards are listed.
 
As always, thanks to everyone for helping me to get this far…it would not have been possible without it. Hard to believe that nine months from now, it will almost be over.
 
As I mentioned above, Acadia was at Dodson Boatyard for the fall, and as always thanks to Bob Snyder and the great crew at the yard…they have helped a ton over the past two years. Thanks also to those that helped me on the boat: Bruce Biddle, Ann Wilkie, Bennett Brissett, Jennifer Langille, John Johnstone, Rod Johnstone, Lee Johnstone, Margo Johnstone, Dee Vaughn, Tim Griggs, Alden Alexander, Rene Boelig and David Eck. Jennifer Langille, through her business Sailtrim, also handles my training and nutrition. Thanks to Peter and Ann Harvey for the Suburban which I now use in Florida; Tony Delima and the Folks at Forte were a great help on the mast and fun to hang out with; Stonington Harbor Yacht Club always helps by providing a venue for my talks and donating all of the door take; Duncan and Ruth Sweet at MidAtlantic Yacht Service in Horta, Azores for taking care of me and my boat; my old friend Charlie Nulsen, his family and the Washington Property Company for their help; Paul and Sarah Janseens for donating the beautiful Quimper plates; the folks at UKHalsey Mystic for my great sails; Joe and Jean Audette for their hospitality and company in Key West. Thanks to Paul and Evalena Worthington at the Schooner Wharf Bar in Key West…for the dockage and the best bar in Key West to hang out. And many thanks to Nick Mansbach and the Coconut Grove Sailing Club, Miami, Florida. Thanks also to the folks at Samson for all my beautiful lines, OGM for my great LED Tricolor light and the folks at Atlantic for two EGO Waterproof IPOD cases with speakers.
 
Thanks also to Thomas Mitchell for the great web work; Wendy and David Eck for their continued business, logistics and general support; my sister Susan for jumping in and helping with e-mailing, web updates and sponsorship development; Frank Gibney for pursuing sponsorship opportunities; and my Mom for taking on the plate distribution and mailing.
 
Lastly, thanks much to Mike Leahy for his great support so far…many people across the country now know about this project, and Mike, through his PR efforts, is responsible for much of that. Mike is on the mend and I truly look forward to having him back.

-- Clay