(Author’s Note: This column first appeared in the September 2016 edition of Freshwater News.  Whether you’re one of those who have or those who will, this accounting of your author’s journey into the delightful world of offshore puking will, hopefully, not give you any ideas of your own.  Good luck, and keep it down…

We’ve all heard the old adage about sailors and seasickness: “There are those who have, and those who will.”  Or something along those lines.  As one of the latter, I’d never truly had a full appreciation of the agonies some of my fellow sailors have endured.  Oh, I’ve toyed with the dreaded mal de mer on a few occasions.  The 2007 Oregon Offshore tested me from a gastrointestinal point of view, but it never got the best of me.  I’ve had the usual “funny feeling” for the first few hours on many an offshore run, only to find my equilibrium fairly quickly.  No, I’d just never experienced either stage of seasickness, and you know what I’m talking about:

Stage 1 – You’re afraid you’re going to die.
Stage 2 – You’re afraid you won’t.

I’ve sympathized, I’ve encouraged, I’ve supplied crackers and ginger ale.  But I’d never found myself in their somewhat uncomfortable shoes.  Right up until I accepted an invitation to help deliver a boat from Hawai’i to Portland.

Enter Riva, Scott and Jody Campbell’s J/46, and one of the most beautiful boats I’ve ever seen.  As many people know, Riva this year entered and competed in the 2016 Pacific Cup Race, which turned out to be a little over 2,000 nautical miles of every kind of sea state challenge, not to mention health and welfare challenge that the Pacific Ocean could dish up.  Between various tropical storms / cyclones stirring things up, coupled with an apparently REALLY lovely storm down in the Roaring Forties affecting the fleet, the “Fun Race to Hawai’i” was at times about as much fun as a sixteen hour Justin Bieber concert.  Nevertheless, the boys on board Riva managed to get in safely to Kaneohe Bay, and presumably the Kaneohe Yacht Club bar for a round of Mai Tai’s.  Or five.

And then it was my turn.  Scott had recruited a pretty good crew for the return trip: he and Dave Moran, plus Jerry Barnes, Scott’s nephew Matt Taylor and I.  Jerry, Matt and I arrived in Honolulu on Saturday, July 30, and after making sure the bar at the KYC was indeed as good as advertised (albeit in measured doses, since we were headed for open water the next day) we left Kaneohe Bay on the morning of July 31, under a beautiful good luck rainbow.

Seas within the protected bay we pretty mild, to say the least.  Then we got outside, and things got…interesting.  I’ve dealt with waves coming from multiple directions over the years, but waves the size we were seeing coming from multiple directions leant new meaning to the phrase “motion of the ocean.”  Fine, whatever.  After all, I hadn’t signed up for a pleasure cruise.  I’d signed up for a full-fledged ocean crossing.  I had no idea it came with a…bonus prize.

Anyway, we started making our way in the general direction of the Mainland.  It was rough, there’s no other way to describe it.  And steering by hand, since the auto helm simply refused to cooperate (and I’ll get to that momentarily), was definitely a challenge at times.  But I didn’t care.  We were in the gorgeous blue waters of the Pacific, the sun was shining, and I was sailing instead of occupying my office cubicle.

I was feeling my usual bout of funny stuff that, I was certain, would dissipate in an hour or two.  I joined the rest of the crew for lunch in the cockpit, and then settled in and waited for everything to equalize.

Except it didn’t.  Equalize, that is.  No, instead everything immediately south of my throat kept threatening to make a return engagement.  Taking the wheel didn’t help.  Sipping water didn’t help.  Invoking the Rule of DWL’s (and we all remember what those are, right?) didn’t help.

And then I reached that point, that point where critical mass wasn’t just down the street, it was right next door, and it was coming to my house to borrow a cup of sugar.  I looked at no one in particular, announced that I was about to feed the fish, and then, with as much grace, style and panache as I could muster, I headed to the rail and deposited the entire contents of lunch right into those deep blue Pacific waters.  And in spectacular fashion ended my 44-year-old streak as a sailor who hadn’t pitched lunch over the side.  That wasn’t the end of my indignities, by the way.  I pretty much repeated the aforementioned scene for another 16 to 18 hours.  So awesome.

And then just like that, I was perfect.  Food looked inviting again, a daily helping of beer seemed like a good idea, and I wasn’t forced to view lunch and dinner twice in one sitting.

Meanwhile, Riva was suffering her own problems.  As I stated earlier, our auto helm, affectionately named “Bob” (and I’ll leave the meaning of that name selection in Scott Campbell’s capable hands) wasn’t doing what auto helms are supposed to do, meaning that we were driving the boat by hand 24/7.  Challenging at times, but not insurmountable.  Unfortunately, somewhere around the 24-hour mark, we also lost our propane system, meaning hot food was no longer on the menu, not to mention provisions that required heating in order to consume (which made me feel mildly guilty for yanking so much of the stuff overboard on that first day).  Anyway, now the equation looked something like this:

(Hand steering in heavy seas = burning more calories) + (no propane = reduced provisions) = rationing cold food for 10 more days

We never actually got to the point of solving the reduced food supply in the same exact way that the boys aboard the whale ship Essex did back in 1820, although there was talk of cold spam sandwiches, which in my book is reasonably close.  So with all of this in mind, and Oahu 320 miles behind us, we decided that the best course of action was to return to the island and get a few things taken care of.  This of course meant sailing back through the 320 miles of lovely sea conditions we’d just come through, but no problem.

Instead of Kaneohe, we headed around to Honolulu and the Waikiki Yacht Club, which received a full crew approval rating for their warm showers, hot food, and cold beverages, to say nothing of their outstanding hospitality.  Unfortunately, the added days going out and coming back meant that I was going to run out of personal time off days back in my cubicle, so I was forced to say goodbye to Riva and a great crew, and return home via an Alaska Airlines 737 instead of a dark blue J/46.  Nevertheless, those 4+ days in the Pacific have me hooked, so hopefully one of these days, we’ll get to try it again.

And besides, what better way is there to break a 44-year-old winning streak…