A Night at Sea |A story by Scott Sadil|


“Te night Pacific is little at all like the day’s.” — Ivan Doig, Te Sea Runners


T


he story is that John Muir, small craſt curator at the San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park, tootled around


Bahía Magdalena for a week or so in a pretty little carvel-planked daysailer—and when it came time to head for home, he leſt the boat in storage in Puerto Adolfo López Mateos, on the shores of the bay, because he couldn’t imagine finding a better place for small boat sailing anywhere else in the world. You’re telling me. Over 100 days in and around Mag Bay in


Madrina, my faithful Iain Oughtred Sooty Tern, and I still feel like the luckiest small-boat sailor west of the Greenwich Merid- ian. Te iconic sail, one I’ve done (and written about) before, remains the counterclockwise circumnavigation of Isla Magda- lena: nearly 150 miles both in the bay and out on the Pacific; through bocas big and small; with and—if you’re not careful— against tides that will humble even the freshest aſternoon breeze. Mangrove esteros. Secluded anchorages. Majestic headlands.


Empty beaches. Wild waters all my own with rarely another boat in sight, rarer still another sail to mar the horizon, the illusion that I’m soloing along untamed shores in my small but graciously seaworthy craſt. It’s a fine sail, challenging without the element of recklessness, even foolishness, that colors so many small-boat tales. Better still, there’s the satisfying affirmation that comes from the eventual understanding that a voyage through these complex waters demands a small but nimble craft—that the journey isn’t some sort of made-up stunt but, instead, a passage into and through the littoral realm for which a traditional open boat was originally designed, where larger boats can’t go. But for me, this trip, there’s one problem—a ghost that’s


haunted me since the first time I circumnavigated Isla Magda- lena. Te longest leg of the voyage—a passage out through the surf-lined Soledad boca, thirty miles south to Cabo Lázaro, and then another extended reach around Punta Hughes and into the safety of Bahía Santa María—is just too much water to expect to navigate in a single day. Or in the daylight hours between dawn and dark. It’s not just the miles. Te tricky dance through the surf-lined boca and out into the open Pacific involves a spell of protracted waltzing, the need to negotiate the intricate nuances of choreography between wind and tide. And this year, because I’ve chosen to visit Mag Bay in winter, an opportunity to sail with whales, my daylight hours are fewer still. Which means I’m finally going to have to face a trial I’ve put


off facing since I began my brief but energetic boating and sailing education just five short years ago. It means I need to rein in and tame my fears, aboard Madrina


, of a night at sea. For many readers, the prospect of spending a night out on the


Pacific, in a small open boat, will seem no more daunting than jumping into a swimming pool off the three-meter board. Big deal. Yet on my behalf I’ll point out that in an otherwise adven- turous life, I can count on one hand the number of nights I’ve


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spent offshore aboard any boat, much less a little sailboat. As a longtime surfer, the approach of darkness has always meant the time you get your one last wave and head for shore. Of course, a rational examination of most fears should im-


mediately dispel them. Ten again, what does reason have to do with it when your bowels clench, your stomach turns, and your heart begins secreting a bile-like potion that suddenly infects every thought flushing through your feverish mind? And we all know that there are real and present dangers at sea—although the first serious question I finally begin asking myself, when I decide I need to get over my fear of a night in the Pacific aboard Madrina , is how the danger at night is any different from the inherent dangers during the day? For many of us, our oldest fears involve an idea that some-


thing is going to come out of the dark and get us. Like . . . the bogeyman? Once I conclude I’m probably safe, even at night, from an attack by a boat-eating great white shark, an angry sperm whale, or even a giant squid, it’s easy to shiſt to more pressing concerns. The first, for me, is corollary to the bogeyman phobia:


What if, all of a sudden, the weather goes haywire, wind and waves appear out of nowhere, and I find myself in the middle of a vicious squall or chubasco? Good question. But the answer probably isn’t going to be any different from one I propose in daylight: I’ll ride things out the best I can. Te rightful fear might be, instead, that at night, a severe weather change could have a better chance of sneaking up on me, catching me by surprise. Really? Maybe if I were offshore in some already marginal weather. But if I’m familiar with what’s typical, and typical is relatively benign, and I have plenty of good weather forecasts and information to consult before I set sail, have I ever seen coastal winds and waves that I’m familiar with go from normal to deadly in the blink of an eye? I remind myself I’m considering a night at sea, not a pas-


sage to Islas Revillagigedo. Tings can change, I know, in the course of a night. But I’ve spent more than fiſty years up and down the west coast of Baja California, at all times of year, in all types of weather, and only once have I seen a dangerous weather event jump out of nowhere and strike from out of the blue—and even that time, the wind swung round to the south and stayed there an entire sunny aſternoon, which should have been all the information I needed to foresee what was to come. Still, don’t get me wrong: I’ve witnessed plenty of dirty


coastal Baja weather that could take me down—if I were nuts enough to try to be out in it in Madrina while it was rough- ing up the neighborhood. But, again, I ask myself, is my fear specific to a danger unique to night? Or is it simply a healthy anxiety appropriate for anyone venturing out onto the Pacific in a small open boat?


rogs start pounding Madrina ’s strakes shortly aſter night- fall. At least they look like frogs. Loud splashing and the heavy thump of flesh on wood jolt me out of a stupor as I driſt,


F SMALL CRAFT ADVISOR


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