Trick or Treat

October 31, Halloween, the day you're supposed to don a costume and make the rounds. So Ross and I (in the company of a friend named Alistair) put on our sailing costumes (in my case at least, that would be whatever happened to be handy when I got out of bed, plus a Sunfish cap), hopped on a boat, and went tricking out into the Pacific.

What treats we got!

First, the day was beautiful for sailing — temperature in the 70s, wind 12–15 knots, and never a cloud in the sky. Regrets to all of you for whom winter has set in.

When we cleared Point Loma and had headed five or so miles out into the Pacific, Ross looked back toward Point Loma and saw a big thing. It was too far away to make out in detail, but it was two or three times as tall as sailboats in its vicinity. Ross hazarded a guess — could it be the boat BMW Oracle is developing for the upcoming America's Cup?

Indeed it was. If you're not following recent America's Cup doings, this boat is a trimaran that is 90 feet long and 90 feet wide, with a mast 185 feet tall. (Check it out at bmworacleracing.com) To give an idea of how fast it goes, we'd spent an hour and a quarter sailing our five miles out to sea. Without trying very hard (no headsail, for instance), the Oracle boat covered the same distance in 10 or 15 minutes. It sails with a small fleet of support boats, not to mention gawkers (like us) who try to get a close look.

For whatever reason, it would sail a bit, then stop and make adjustments to things. It appears to have a canting mast — when the boat heels, the sailors tilt its mast to windward so that it remains vertical and has a better aspect to the wind — and we thought they might be making repairs or adjustments to that mechanism. Its stopping gave us the opportunity to catch it; we would get quite close, only to watch it sail away again.

Finally, it sailed off downwind of us, and although it still wasn't trying very hard, it was moving at a speed well in excess of anything we could do. So we went our own way, off to windward. Then, miles away, it turned around to sail close-hauled. Now apparently really trying, it approached us so nearly that we thought we observed it to slow a little at one point to be sure it wasn't going to run us down. Then it zoomed by, not only its windward outrigger but also its main hull out of the water, balanced entirely on its leeward outrigger. It passed us, and minutes later it was on the horizon.

I work for Oracle; I wonder if I could get Larry Ellison to take me out for a sail?

By now, we were the only boat in our patch of the ocean, ten miles or so out to sea. Suddenly, Alistair exclaimed that he saw a spout. Then, looking about in reaction to Alistair's exclamation, I briefly saw a dorsal fin and a grey-black body. We turned downwind to follow, and soon found ourselves in a pod of whales — fin whales, we believe. There were at least twenty — maybe thirty. We saw spouts off in the distance, then spouts nearer to us, and then whales surfacing to breathe so close to us that we began to consider how to keep clear of them. Fin whales grow to be sixty or seventy feet — much larger than the grey whales we usually see in San Diego — and it's very hard to describe how impressive an animal that size is (particularly when your boat is about half that size). We were grinning like idiots with excitement.

Then, suddenly, they were gone. It was only then that each of us acknowledged recalling a story — just last week a boat was racing off the coast of Mexico and sank after having been rammed repeatedly by a whale. Good thing our whales were friendly....

All in all a better way to spend the day then asking for candy!