Practical Boat Owner - June 2018

Sam Llewellyn writes nautical thrillers and

edits The Marine Quarterly. He is currently

patching up a 30ft ketch

Flotsam and jetsam

Sam Llewellyn

Philosophy of a

sailing manual

When is a sea area not a sea area?

The French have an altogether different view

of what makes home waters special

O

ne of my favourite sailing

manuals was published in

1979 by the Centre

Nautique des Glénans, an

organisation based in the

heaving Atlantic some 10 miles to the

south of Concarneau.

The Glénans was started by tough eggs

who shared the common French notion

that 12 people is about the right number

to cram into a 24ft boat. Its manual deals

with sailing in oceanic conditions. It also

outlines some ideas odd to the British eye,

for instance that a way of scrubbing the

bottom of your boat is to haul people to

the top of the mast until the whole works

lies down on its beam ends, then hop

onto the keel and do your worst.

My favourite bit, though, is right at the

end, and relies heavily on those fi ne Gallic

traits that brought us philosophers like

Descartes, Voltaire, and the chef who

invented mayonnaise when strapped for

ingredients at the siege of Mahon. It is

entitled What is a Sea Area?. To the British

mariner, the answer is simple: a patch of

salt water like that one over there.

To the Glénans, defi nitions are more

subtle. There is the special feel of your

home waters, their swells and rips and

funnels, unlike the feel

of my home waters.

Then there is the nature

of larger waters and the

boats that sail on them.

The Atlantic is a deep,

rolling thing, swarming

with seabirds, sailed by deep-draughted

ocean greyhounds. The Med is a thing of

ease and pleasure, almost fi shless, to be

sure, but warmer, and featuring boats that

can deal with waves the shape of

packing-cases lightly fi lmed with suntan

oil. The North Sea is grim and greyish and

cloudy. It speaks to the Gallic mind of

Vikings and the necessity to pull a swift

180° and get back to where the wine is

drinkable and the inhabitants of the

coastal towns do not eat their young, or

anyway cook them with more fl air.

For some, this is all a bit too French. But it

does not hurt to study your home patch. If

you go out on the blackest of nights with a

fi sherman, he will have a pretty good idea

where he is going to fi nd his pots without

switching on the GPS. And most yachties

have a favourite short cut through which

they buzz under full sail while angels,

fearing to tread, take the long way round.

Some appreciations of a sea area can

come down to general principles. There is

the ancient chestnut of the great sailor

Blondie Hasler, whose technique for

heading down-Channel in a westerly was

to tack at the CH1 buoy off Cherbourg.

According to legend he would determine

the whereabouts of this mark by sticking

his head out of the hatch and sniffi ng the

breeze. When the nostrils sent their signal,

he would say, ‘Cheap scent and garlic,’ or

words to that effect. ‘Tack now.’

There are the more mystic identifi cations

of sea areas found in the south seas. Here

the Polynesian navigators work their

magic by star tracks, the feel of wave

patterns and the underwater fl ashes of

light known as te lapa which emanate

from islands and reefs. In the 19th Century

a renowned Polynesian navigator was

taken to sea by German missionaries who

wanted to prove him a primitive impostor.

They kept him below in their schooner

until they were somewhere near the North

Island of New Zealand, when they brought

him on deck and told him to navigate

them to his home. They offered him a

chart with the current position on it, so he

would at least know where he was

starting. The navigator waved it away.

During the weeks he had been below

decks, he had felt the action of the waves

on the ship, and he knew exactly where

he was and which course to steer. And

home they went.

I am in a sea area

myself just now. A

sheet of blue-grey

water stretches away

to a coastline from

which mountains rise,

some capped with snow. It could be

Alaska, or possibly New Zealand, or

maybe even Norway. But each sea area

has its own characteristic. And over there

are two long, low shapes that leave no

room for doubt. The shape in front is a

tug, and the shape astern of it is one of

Her Majesty’s nuclear submarines, under

tow. So our sea area must be the Inner

Sound off the west coast of Scotland.

Quelle joie!

Each sea area has its own characteristics

The Med is a thing of

ease and pleasure ...

the North Sea is grim

and greyish and cloudy

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