Team Northern Atlantic 2011

Even with all the controversy surrounding this year’s 33rd America’s Cup, it was still not difficult to become sidetracked by the sheer coolness of the multihull sailing vessels involved in the race – Alinghi and BMW ORACLE. These multihulls evoke shock and awe when considering their speed, size and beauty. Team Northern Atlantic are hoping to further the acceptance of the multihull concept in the sport of ocean rowing.

Our 30 foot multihull ocean rowing boat is being built on Shelter Island, New York by Captain Roy Finlay. Roy built and skippered ‘ORCA’, the first multihull ocean rowing boat ever rowed across any ocean. ORCA’s four-man crew left the Canary Islands and arrived in Barbados in 36 days. We believe that multihull ocean rowing boats in general, and the ORCA design in particular, hold great potential for setting new ocean rowing speed records.

The picture on the left (below) is our new boat starting to take shape: MDF frames on the strong-back almost ready for foam planking and fiberglass to form the hull. The picture on the right (below) is ORCA, rowed by a four-man crew from the Canaries to Barbados in 2007/2008 in just 36 days. Our boat will be a very similar design. She’s fast, but the boat is only part of the equation: Speed = Boat + Crew + Weather. I believe Team Northern Atlantic are well on our way to taking care of the first two operands in the equation!

I joined the Rockville Sail and Power Squadron (RSPS) in June. Mike is doing the same. We want to take advantage of their navigation and seamanship member classes as well as glean as much maritime information as possible from the experienced members of the club.

Last weekend, we went for a sail on the Chesapeake Bay with members of the RSPS. I took my SPOT device and recorded some lat/longs from our excursion. I created a SPOT Adventure out of our trip. Check it out.

http://www.spotadventures.com/trip/view/?trip_id=208134

For all you wooden boat master craftsmen out there, this post is not for you. Move along. For all the rest of ya, who’ve not got an eye for symmetry nor detail, check out these pictures of the ‘Row the Pond’ Training Dory.

We’re putting cedar floor boards in the gunning dory, which we plan to row across the Chesapeake Bay in July as part of our preparation to row across the Northern Atlantic next year (but in a different boat, which is being built by a professional boat builder as I write).

We’ve got all the cedar floor boards cut now, and have but the sanding and screwing left to do on them. After that, all that’s left to do is to touch-up the paint once more and then we can take her out and try to sink her! We need to see how she performs totally swamped with water before we try to row her across the Chesapeake Bay. That’s one thing I did not do last year that I wish I had, so it’s definitely one milestone on the ‘project schedule’ now.

I am very fond of cedar. I think cedar floor boards in a wooden boat are a classy touch – they look and smell great. My nostrils and lungs are full of cedar dust now, hopefully to soon be replaced by the light July sea breezes of the Chesapeake Bay!

Mike and I are going sailing this weekend. If interested, watch the tracking section on our website for a near-real-time map of our location. Not much wind is forecasted for this weekend, so we might not be sailing far, but we’ll see.

Launch FineMeSPOT Map

Launch sat2twitter Map

We’ve completed week 2 of the Concept2 World Rowing Challenge.  As of 11pm this evening, March 29, 2010, we have 2,227,875 meters behind us, or approximately 1,385 miles.  So we’re not quite to the half-way point yet and we’re still behind schedule.  The great news we received last week, however, was that the guys from the newly formed team, Ocean Adventure Racing Northwest, composed of Jordan Hanssen, Greg Spooner, Adam Creek and Richard Tarbill, graciously signed-up to our team and are now helping us slog our virtual way from New York City to the Isles of Scilly.  Jordan Hanssen and Greg Spooner were two members of the 2006 four-man crew who actually won an ocean rowing race over this same course becoming the first Americans ever to successfully row this stretch of ocean, land-to-land, West to East.  So it’s great to have them on our team!

If you notice on the Google Map image below, we’ve just cleared the coast of New Foundland and The Grand Banks area, and we are just about at the same longitude of the location in which the HMS Titanic sank.  You’ll also notice, many miles off of to our port, the Hibernia Oil Field.

In consideration of the markers of interest just pointed out, and the fact that we’ve just cleared the New Foundland coast and are now at a spot where the warm waters of the Gulf Stream race eastward while the cold waters of the Labrador Sea flow southward, I imagine this to be a particularly scary stretch of ocean.

We are, virtually, at 48 degrees West, 46 degrees North.  This, oddly enough, is almost the exact location where Harbo and Samuelson reported coming into near contact with their first iceberg.  When I read about this is David Shaw’s book, ‘Daring the Sea’, this literally made the hair on my arms stand up.  About 330 more miles East is where Harbo and Samuelson experienced their big capsize where they lost most of their provisions and water, so we have that to look forward to this week!!

Here’s a video of Team OAR Northwest’s West to East fours race in 2006:

Mike and I attended an ISAF Safety at Sea Seminar at the US Naval Academy this weekend (March 27-28, 2010). It was a great event and we both learned a great deal about seamanship and boating safety. The speakers were exceptional, and the information provided was, for the most part, lucid and pertinent. One of my favorite presentations was made by Captain Matt Klunder, USNA Commandant, who admonished the importance of the sea throughout American history, and exhorted us to help expand appreciation for the sport of sailing and nautical sport in general.  As Americans, the sea is in our blood.

I also particularly enjoyed the talk presented by Gary Jobson as he provided a number of colorful, and somewhat scary, anecdotes from his heavy weather sailing experiences, particularly the 1979 FastNet race and his experiences on board Ted Turner’s vessel, Tenacious.

The in-the-pool demonstrations were enlightening in that we learned how difficult it is to get into a life raft with foul weather gear on. Moreover, life rafts are not comfortable – even in a calm swimming pool.

The Navy Midshipman did live man-over-board demonstrations in their 44 foot yachts and we got to see a live demo of a rescue at sea operation with a real Coast Guard helicopter!  The real-life demonstrations truly helped to interject a sense of reality to rescue at sea and the difficulty thereof.  Stuff happens!

Especially pertinent to our own objectives were the discussions on weather, heavy weather sailing and the Gulf Stream – the warm water current running South-to-North up the Eastern Seaboard. The information on warm and cold water eddies off of the Gulf Stream were tasty morsels of information. We want more!

More importantly, however, I think this weekend helped us to better understand just how much more we need to learn!

Education + Preparation = Success

Happily, Mike and I passed our ISAF Certification Tests so we are both eligible for international offshore sailing events now!

My partner Mike brought this great article to my attention today. It’s about a man named Herb Hilgenberg who provides highly accurate forecasts to mariners over single sideband (SSB) radio.

http://www.americanwaymag.com/herb-hilgenberg-jason-white-caribbean-puerto-rico

I like this quote by Bernard Moitessier:

“You do not ask a tame seagull why it needs to disappear from time to time toward the open sea. It goes, that’s all.”

I’m intrigued by the life of Moitessier.  He seems to have been a man who was truly about the journey.

Happily, I have just learned that Moitessier wrote a book called ‘The Long Way’ about his journey as a participant in the Round the World Race in Singlehanded Yachts.

A friend bought me a 3 month subscription to NetFlix for Christmas.  So far, I’ve watched ‘Deep Water’ and ‘Morning Light’.  ’Deep Water’ is a movie about Donald Crowhurst’s attempt to win a London Times-sponsored sailing race around the world.  Crowhurst risked everything to enter the race, including his house and business, and got himself between a rock and a hard place with investors; he ended-up cheating in an attempt to save face and ultimately lost his life.  ’Morning Light’, on the other hand, is a much lighter movie from Walt Disney about Roy Disney’s Transpac sailing team of twenty-something’s who put forth a valiant effort to win the Transpac Yacht Race in 2007.  I was most impressed with Jeremy Wilmot, who was voted by his peers to take the helm as the skipper of the ‘Morning Light’, but the other crew members were unexpectedly talented as well.  Crew members hailed from schools the likes of The Naval Academy, Stanford, Harvard, and the Merchant Marine Academy.

Both movies are good open ocean sailing flicks.

On another note, I completed the 200k meter Concept2 Holiday Challenge just in time for Christmas.  I also hit my first 1 million meters logged in the C2 Logbook.  I’m now working on fast twitch workouts, wind sprints and such, in preparation for Erg Sprints at the end of January.  I don’t think Crash-B’s are going to happen for me this year, though.  Bummer!

Here’s a video, recently posted by Shaun Quincey (rowing from Australia to New Zealand in November of 2009 – next month), providing a really interesting background to Shaun’s solo rowing project.  Of particular interest is Colin Quincey’s boat: she appears to be a flat-bottom dory with a fixed seat, mostly covered with decking.  I found this to be a really interesting video!  Thanks for sharing, Shaun, and best of luck with your row!

Tonight, I sanded last night’s fiberglass I put on the hull and applied a second coat of epoxy resin.  Looking to the rest of the week, I don’t think it’s possible for me to do a nice job of primering and painting the hull, along with everything else I need to do to prepare for this Saturday’s regatta; therefore, I plan to put one more coat of epoxy resin on her hull tomorrow night, paint the thwarts and varnish the oars, put on the oarlocks and give it a go.  If she floats on Saturday, I should be well positioned for the long weekend row on 9/19.

On The Water (OTW) Safety.  I’ve been thinking about this since day one of hatching my little plan to row across the Chesapeake Bay and back.  I obviously want to do this row safely, soundly and even triumphantly.  There are many hazards to contend with on such a long row: huge container ships, cruise ships, fast moving motor boats, rapidly changing weather conditions, high seas, strong wind, fallible equipment, poor planning, LochNess Monster-like sea creatures (I’ve heard stories…!) etc.  I’ve been seeking advice on safely rowing the Bay since this past April when I started taking a Boating Safety Course offered through the Power Squadron.  I’ve also discussed the issue with a number of open water rowers.  Here’s a list of safety equipment I’m collecting and planning to take with me on my voyage:

• SPOT Satellite Tracker
• HH VHF Radio
• Signalling Mirror
• Flares
• Dye
• Whistle
• Bearing Compass
• GPS
• NOAA Chart
• PFDs
• Rapid Ditch Floatation Bag
• Bilge Pump (manual)
• Bucket
• Anchor and line
• Float Plan

This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it covers the major safety equipment items, I think. Having the proper safety gear is one thing; knowing how to use it, and being to do so in a tight spot, however, is another.  For example, I have never used a VHF radio before, but have read about how to use it, the protocol for doing so, etc.  There is a bit of a learning gap between reading about doing something and actually doing it.  The flares are another good example.  I only have four flares and have no intention on shooting one off just for the motor memory experience.  Reading the instructions will have to do for now.

I’ve never rowed with any of this equipment ever before, so all of this stuff seems like overkill!  However, on my way back from the beach last weekend, I paid special attention to the distance from one side of the Bay to the other, when crossing the Bay Bridge.  The distance is about 3+ miles.  You can see across to the other side, on a clear day, but only just.  The distance I will be crossing is roughly 8x’s that (25 nautical miles).  There will be times when no shore will be in site, and it will seem like I really am out at sea.  Alot can go wrong out there, so I think in terms of safety preparation, there is no such thing as ‘overkill’.  Here are some good motivational statements to prepare by:

• ‘Semper Paratus’ (‘Always Prepared’).
• ‘Prepare for the worse, hope for the best!’
• ‘Hope is not a strategy!’
• ‘Semper Fi!‘ (‘Always Faithful’)  – just an overall fine piece of Latin phraseology to help one motivate.

Well, the weather, as it were, changed all too quickly.  I took a hard look at the rigging required for a sliding seat rowing position to be feasible and concluded, hopefully once and for all, that the cost to benefit ratio is too high.  Like any good Project Manager, there comes a point where getting ‘er done must be strictly weighed against the cost of doing so, and it’s a really tough balancing act, I am learning.  Here’s what I was looking at:

• Roughly $420 for D-Sleeves, oar locks and outriggers from Shaw and Tenney.  Whitehall Rowing sells the same for about $475.  I could almost buy a drop-in Piantedosi rowing unit for that much.
• At 58″ beam, I was having a hard time coming up with a great design for installing the foot stretchers.  As of last night, I thought I had an OK design, which entailed building a box out of white oak that would be screwed and glued into the 4th frame with support 2×4′s radiating out from the 5th frame, but it did not seem like it would be sturdy enough.  I did not relish putting screws through the bottom of the hull into the box either.  In addition, after having just removed the motor well, I did not like the idea of having another big 10″ high wood box in the middle of the boat.
• If I want to row in the Blackburn Challenge next year, a Dory with a sliding seat would most likely put me in the open category, which is just asking for a good ‘ole fashioned butt whooping.
• Moreover, there’s the echo of constant reminders from the sea salts I’ve consulted who have counseled me on sticking with fixed seat rowing positions for rough open water, including the man I bought my gunning dory from, Don.  Don has rowed open water in both fixed seat and sliding seat boats.  He noted that sliding seat rowing in rough open water can take a toll on your lower back as the boat is constantly being hit and redirected by wind and waves.  I considered that and thought I could build in a mechanism for locking the sliding seat as necessary, but then I think about…
• …the sailing option.  If I put in fixed seats now and get my Chesapeake Bay row under my belt next month, then I can spend the rest of the winter building-in a centerboard box, rudder, spars, etc, so I can get some sailing in next Spring.

So, I spent this evening putting some final touches on the frame repairs I am making due to wood rot, and got started making my breast hooks and marking up my last sheet of okoume for the end decks.  By the way, I think I know why they are called breast hooks – once you make them and sand them really well, you just can’t stop rubbing them.  Is that too risque to say?  Rubbing my new breast hooks is helping to take my mind off the rowing position conundrum for the moment.  Besides, earlier today I ordered horn oarlocks and oar leathers from Shaw and Tenney – hardware most suitable for fixed seat rowing.  It’s a done deal now, unless a hurricane of an idea hits me tomorrow.

I’ve ‘evolved’ my Dory renovation plans from sliding seat, to ‘hey, I think I also wanna sail her!’, to ‘man, building a centerboard box blows!’, to ‘I think fixed-seat rowing might be the easiest (in terms of skill level to build-out)’.  Tonight, however, I’m back to working out how to build-in a sliding seat rowing position.  I might still snap and go back to fixed-seat, but as I stand at the moment, I’ve got most of the sliding seat problems worked out in my head and the measurements sketched out in the boat.  The counsel I’ve received from most somewhat anonymous folks online, who appear to be much saltier sea salts than me, have said fixed seat rowing with a centerboard is the way to go.  They may be, and probably are, entirely correct.  Nevertheless, I just cannot imagine rowing any boat without my feet strapped into a good ‘ole pair or Vespoli foot stretchers, and the (mostly) smooth feel of rollers gliding under by butt.  Moreover, I just cannot imagine rowing for five or more hours straight without being able to put your leg muscles – the largest muscle groups in your body – into each stroke.  So, I feel a bit guilty for not heeding the counsel of those much wiser and learned than me, but I’m choosing to march to my own drummer on this one.  At least for the moment…My mind is wont to change faster than the weather on the Chesapeake Bay.

Got two coats of Primekote Primer on the Dory’s insides this afternoon. She’s much nicer to look at now. I still have a considerable amount of epoxy and wood work to do on her insides, but things are slowly moving forward.

I can’t explain how double-minded I am about my sail vs. row decision. I’m not sure why I can’t make up my mind?!? I think one reason is because building in a sailplan will cost me about another $500 to $1000, when I add in the cost of mast, spars, sails, etc. Plus, I’m anxious to get my Chesapeake Bay row in this year, and I don’t really want to be renovating a boat the whole year without getting any on-the-water action. I wouldn’t mind getting the experience building in a centerboard though. Interesting mental challenge.

I quickly messed-up the White Oak I bought at Mystic, CT and carted home.  I was hoping to make bedlogs for my centerboard box out of this wood.  Crestfallen, I had just about totally given up on the idea of installing a centerboard box in my dory.  Then, I discovered a cragislist ad for white oak lumber in a lumber yard out in Catharpin, Virginia.  Russell, the proprietor of the lumber yard, had a wide variety of wood to choose from, including White Oak, Cedar and Mahogany.  I bought some White Oak and Cedar from him and the centerboard box was back on my radar screen.  I’ve already cut the okoume plywood sides for the centerboard box, so I am committed to the task. The Cedar, by the way, is going to be used for the floor boards of the boat. I think Cedar is an awesome wood to have in a small wooden boat like this – it looks and smells great.

Here are some pictures of recent progress:

I’ve been reading Thorne’s Chamberlain Dory Skiff Renovation page over and over again, and each time I do, I glean another important tid-bit of information.  It’s a really interesting read for any wooden boat renovaters out there, especially if you’re working on a Chamberlain-style Dory.

When I got home from vacation this afternoon, I discovered, to my delight, that I had received a copy of John Gardner’s ‘The Dory Book’.  I ordered a used copy from Amazon.  In this book, Mr. Gardner discusses in detail how to build Dories in general and the gunning dory, specifically.  I wish there were more gunning dory pictures in this book, but some is better than none.  Also nice is the historical background on these fascinating boats.

As an aside, it looks like I am going to devote considerable energy to following Mr Gardner’s plans as carefully as possible, to include the installation of a center board box.  Some advice I received: “Any sea-going rowboat should have some way to get a grip on the water. For most beachable hull forms, that means a centerboard.”  I was just going to put a sliding seat in my boat and be done with it so I could be off and rowing as quickly as possible.  Now, however, I think I am going to stick with Mr. Gardner’s plans and make a fixed seat row boat out of her, with the ability to sail if so desired.  I plan to build a centerboard box with centerboard, install fixed-seat thwarts, make other arrangements to facilitate mast for sailing, then make necessary repairs and paint in order to get my Chesapeake row in this year – hopefully by September.  Then maybe next year, I’ll make the mast and things for sailing her.  See how it goes.

I was at the Wooden Boat Show in Mystic, CT last weekend.  I wanted to see as many wooden boat builds as I could to hopefully give me a clearer mental image of how I wanted to fix-up my dory.  I saw many great wooden boat examples, but I was very distracted by the beauty of Mystic Seaport – the water, all of the boats in motion, the old buildings and stone, not to mention plenty of sunshine.  I bought some white oak with which to fashion frame replacements for the bits I cut out due to rot.  I also found some cool 12 foot whale boat oars which I snapped-up.  I figure I can cut them down to 9 or 8 feet and they should be perfectly fine after a good sanding and lots of varnish.  I got all this for $14!!  I was ecstatic.  Of course when you factor in the cost of the trip, it was not all that cheap, but it felt like a real bargain in any event.

Here are some pictures I took at the Wooden Boat Show:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/33047380@N00/sets/72157620608196663/

My son and I drove to Annapolis, MD, this afternoon to pick up two sheets of 6mm 4′x8′ okoume plywood from Chesapeake Light Craft.  This type of wood should resist rot and stand-up to salt water better than the plywood from Home Depot.  I figured if I was going to put the time, money and effort into restoring this boat, that I might as well do it as well as I am able.

While at CLC Boats, I got to see some of the boat models in the shop, in person, and boy are they beautiful!  The Skerry and the Noreaster Dory are my favorites.  I got some good boat renovation tips from a guy that works there, so that helped make the trip – that and I got to spend some quality time with my son.

I learned what I found to be an interesting bit of trivia tonight.  The British ‘man-of-war’ war ship required around 100 acres of timber to make – that’s over 3000 oak trees; trees which took 80-100 years to grow to maturity.  That is pretty amazing.  Not surprisingly, the British had to import the bulk of this timber lest they deplete the timber reserves on their own tiny island.

I found a link to a July 4th, 1840, edition of ‘The Saturday Magazine’ containing an article on British ‘man-o-war’ vessels:  http://tinyurl.com/d8b9b7.  This description of the Sr. George fighting vessel helps one to understand why Great Britain dominated the high seas for so long.