Day 19. The Big and Bold Don't Always Win

We consciously didn’t have lots of beers last night so we’d be fresh for this morning. And although we kept saying it last night I never thought it would stand. Well it did. And I felt fresh. We were going to Santa Barbara, which is a really nice coastal town about two hours North of LA. It was very quant with a really nice harbour. We looked around and went for Lunch, I indulged in my favourite cocktail- a mojito. And then a raspberry mojito. I tell you this vital piece of information as it is exactly that, vital. It impeded our judgement in the moments to follow.

I had always wanted to take a sailing boat out, and Tris thought this was a great idea. We noticed some children practicing their sailing and went into the boat hire shop. It was full of artwork and carpeted booths everywhere- I also felt this was a place where people bought boats. I already felt out of my depth. We tried the well spoken and enunciated British accent ‘We’d like to hire a boat please’. ‘Have you sailed before?’ Between skiing and playing Polo I do. ‘Well there is a basic written test you need to take’. We felt disheartened, but then the mojitos sunk in and we came out with ‘easy’. I could have flown a fighter jet with my current confidence. She handed us paper and pencils, and I suggested we move outside...buying time. The questions were hard. We had no experience. We had to draw where the sails would be due to wind direction and who had right of way when crossing paths. Name all three coloured buoys according to their shape. Some questions we wrote with such poor handwriting we hoped they couldn’t read it and would be too embarrassed to ask about it. We were too far in now, we’d written our exam paper and handed it back to the women with a level ten of confidence. ‘Right well you’re ready to go...the pointed buoy is red not green...’ in unison ‘oh, it’s the other way round in England’. She believed us, we were now given charge of a 20ft boat, with sails either side pointing high towards the heavens and heading towards the vast ocean. 

The guy un-hooked us and threw the ropes on board. Something obviously clicked with him as he started shouting out ‘starboard, now move port and loosen the jibe with your left hand. Rudder right and keep eyes on the rope’...what the bloody hell is this guy saying? Whatever language he was talking in he got Tris and I panicked and we became a blubbering wreck. As we tried to nod and follow his instructions and navigate around $500,000 boats I almost abandoned ship. Before we knew we’d done a complete circle and were now heading back towards to the dock we’d just left. Slightly over in fact and heading for the rocks. Tris jumped for the dock and pulled us in. Within 3 minutes we’d gone from arrogant and proficient sailors to weeping wailing girls. The guy asked what was wrong and like anyone in our situation we responded with ‘it’s been a while since we last sailed and thought Kayaks would be more fun’. It was mortifyingly embarrassing but the kayaks were fun. We went right out into the ocean and then back around the marina, only to have some seals start swimming around us. He didn’t fool me though, if things kicked off I could have hit him with my oar. But they were in fact friendly. 

We walked around the marina and enjoyed the picturesque town. A good day but very tiring. 

Lesson Learnt: Things take time to learn, who am I to say a few mojitos will give me powers to take on the impossible.