Where have you been?

So there is a problem right now with Blogger and I am unable to upload photographs tonight. Hopefully things will be sorted out tomorrow or Sunday so I can post the last of the sailing pictures. In absence of photographs I would like to introduce a new feature that will occasionally appear on the OC_Photography - Ruben's Rants. These will be posts were I basically put in my two cents. I had thought of other, more clever, names like "Views from the Edge" or maybe "How it looks from here" and these might work better if I was just going to post opinions, observations, or whatver. But I basically just want to bitch so "Ruben's Rants" works best.

And I have to apologize for being guilty of a bit of plagiarism. But, Brooker, if you publish any "Brooker's Rants" in the Cambridge Department of Chemistry news, then i will gladly change the name here on my blog.

Now, without further ado, the very first Ruben's Rants:

"Do I look French?"

After having dated my girlfriend for about three months she confessed that she initially thought I was French. If I was actually French there would have been no problem. But I am American, not French, and lets be honest, no one really likes the French. Brits call them Frenchies, Poles call them frog eaters (zabojad), and Americas call them yellow bellied surrender monkeys. Naturally I was a bit annoyed with the mistake but she said it was because the British guy who worked at the sandwich shop said I looked French. Dick. Anyway, I bring this up because yesterday I was riding the elevator with some Polish girl who tried to talk to me. I told her I didn't speak Polish and thought that was the end of it. But, once in the lobby, she ask if I was French. WTF*? Why do people think I am French? I asked my girlfriend if I looked French and she said my hair was sort of French. My hair? What, is it greasy and smelly? Maybe it is time for a wash but really, French? Now don't get me wrong. I have known many great (and clean) French people. Hell, Nicolas Sarkozy is doing a great job as President (stupid unions). Just don't call me French, thats all.

Notes:
* WTF = What the fuck

One of the most interesting things about this race was that I got a close up look at the heart of the Port of Long Beach. According to the Port website it is one of the busiest in the world and is the main trade link between America and Asia. There were several cargo ships anchored just outside the harbor at the time because of a strike so we were able to get a closer look at them as well. In the photo above you can see a sail boat (in the right hand corner) heading towards the finish line around one of these ships.

During the Queen Mary Regatta the racing was actually quite close. As an open water event I assumed we would be near our competition for about twenty minutes and then wouldn't see another boat until we reached the finish line. We were only alone, however, for a short period of the race. At the beginning several of the boats in our group (ours included) crisscrossed at quite close quarters. Everyone was trying to find the best wind so there was quite a bit of jockeying for position. As you can see from this photo the boats were indeed quite close.


As the race played out everyone found their lines and the boats separated. We were never really alone as there were boats pretty evenly spaces along the course. The fasters boats from behind eventually caught up to us as we caught up with the slower boats in front of us. Here is a photo of one of the faster boats pulling off into the distance.

For better or worse this is probably my favorite photograph. Several from the UK and Thailand are very nice but this one of the ocean really speaks to me. I guess it reminds me of my childhood and memories of the beach and surfing. Anything water basically. BTW this is the deck of My Crystal as we were sailing down to Shoreline Yatch Club.

The Queen Mary Regatta is an event hosted by the Redondo Beach and Shoreline Yatch Clubs. The race is from just off Redondo Beach to the bow of the Queen Mary which is moored in Long Beach harbor. In all the race covers about 23 nautical miles. There are several classes of ships, some of which are actual race boats that use this race to prepare for the longer Newport to Ensenada race.

If I remember correctly this was my first time in "real" open ocean on a sail boat. The Beer Can races were all relatively close to shore - if things went pear shaped I could always just swim in. In this race, however, we were much further out to sea and the nearest coastline was not always that welcoming. An example is shore just below Point Vicente Lighthouse shown above.


Fortunately we were always in visible contact with the shore which was at least a bit comforting. We didn't actually need GPS guidance but it helped. Pluse it was cool to chart our progress and try to maximize our speed.


I could not imagine sailing in the days of sextants where you just wanderd about guessing where you were. Thanks to technology we only needed the binoculars to watch our competition and try and see where the best wind might be. Here is (finally) a photo of our captain steering us home and his girlfriend watching for better wind.

Before we move on to the Queen Mary race photos I thought I would share pictures of our captain and crew. As I said we were all working for Northrop Grumman (NGST) at the time (although I no longer work there now).



First up is our captain and the owner of the boat although I don't have a better photo of him ready yet. He is the guy in the background, behind our first mate. He had owned My Crystal for a few years when we raced a few years back and was quite active in the RB Yatch Club. In fact, after the race season, I believe he became one of the club presidents or vice-presidents or something.



Next we have the lovely woman of our crew. She worked in the same department at NGST as our captain.



Here is our first mate, a sailboat owner himself. His boat is a bit different though, he owns a 35 foot (~11m) catamaran. We went to Catalina Island with him and while the sailing was great the trip was a bit of a disaster.



Finally, one of the whole gang. Again our captain is behind the mast but hey, you can see his hands. The quote in the title of this post is from one of my favorite Robin Williams movies, Club Paradise. In an interview he said it was his worst movie but I think its really funny. Anyway...

These photos bring us to the end of Beer Can racing. I hope you enjoyed the pictures. Next I will post some of my photos from one of the longer races that we did, the Queen Mary Regatta.

I received a few questions about spinnakers so here is the definition from www.dictionary.com:

"a large, usually triangular sail carried by a yacht as a headsail when running before the wind or when the wind is abaft the beam"

Its the large sail towards the front of the boat, here white with blue and red, that is only occasionally used. It takes quite some skill to hoist and retrieve and we actually practiced a few times before we used ours in a race.

Although it might be hard to believe the slow paced, methodical sail boat race can actually be quite action packed. The starts involve several boats trying to reach the same point in time and space at exactly the right moment. Throw in the need to be on the windward side on a heading towards what you think might be the fast side of the course and the action gets even more intense. During the race you might find yourself all alone with only the wind as your company but don't let your guard down. Everyone else might be on the opposit side of the course but when it comes time to round a buoy you can bet it will be close and action packed again. Towards the end, at least in my experience, there is very few times when it is "down to the wire". But even so, if you are not careful about your positioning relative to the wind you might see all your efforts go for not as someone on a better heading blows past you.

The pictures shown here are all from the Redondo Beach Yatch Club races. All of the races ended near dusk so racers are rewarded weekly with stunning sunsets as they return to port.