When Cruising With the Kiwis, Leave the Brie on the Dock

Sailing, to San Diego, is a bit the way fishing is to the Great Barrier Reef or wine-tasting is to the Loire Valley or skiing is to Aspen.

These are all things not everyone can afford to do, or places not everyone can afford to go.

But here I have been, living in San Diego for more than 10 years, and only twice had I been aboard a sailing vessel . . . at least until this week.

Admittedly, this was my fault. I investigated the costs of purchasing, berthing and maintaining a yacht and came away with what I determined to be a very efficient and economical conclusion.

I would sail on my friends’ yachts.

The weakness, as it has turned out, is that none of my friends own yachts. They have computers and video games and VCRs and maybe a hot tub or two . . . but no yachts.

Lo and behold, my telephone rang, and I was invited to go sailing one day this week.

“Marvelous,” I said. “What should I bring? Wine? Cheese? Maybe a loaf of French bread with some nice cuts of lunch meat?”

Nothing, I was told.

Even more marvelous, I thought. It must be a catered cruise.

And so I showed up at the New Zealand compound at the foot of Eighth Street slickly dressed in my whites and prepared to loll on the decks of Michael Fay’s 123-foot America’s Cup challenger, New Zealand.

When I clambered aboard just off Point Loma, it was just as I had expected. Guys were lying all over the boat, sleeping or sunning or both. Only three people were awake, and they were talking quietly so as to not disturb the tranquility.

This was going to be my idea of a leisurely afternoon.

First impressions were not lasting. I looked around and did not see any deck chairs or lounges or ping pong tables or shuffleboard courts. I didn’t see anything that seemed to be part of a pleasant recreational sail.

In fact, there were no chairs or seats of any kind. There were indentations in a couple of places and holes in a few others, but no signs of steps to the game room or snack bar or bowling alley.

I did notice that the yacht was sleeping about 15 people above deck, but all of them were face down or face up on the bare deck. I presumed the staterooms must have been full. I learned later that there was nothing below deck that did not have something to do with making the boat faster, rather than more comfortable.

So there I was, sitting awkwardly on a deck strewn with ropes and winches and dozing men.

And then everyone came to life. The yacht had been under tow, and now it was time to raise the sails. I supposed that this would be the time someone would haul out the musical instruments and hors d’oeuvres.

No such luck.

Peter Lester pulled out a notebook and double-checked a schedule of things to do, none of which sounded like anything involved in a recreational sail.

David Barnes took the helm.

Richard Morris popped out of a hatch with a computer reading.

Rod Davis pulled out an empty notebook and started writing heaven knows what.

Sailors were scurrying from place to place, calling numbers and orders. There were 26 people on the yacht, and all but one had assigned tasks. I felt a little bit like the 12th man on a football field when the quarterback is already barking the snap count. There had to be a place to get out of the way and not be noticed.

Through a bit of trial and getting tripped over, I concluded that I could scramble back and forth under the swinging boom to the rear of either the port or starboard wing and stay clear of trouble.

My sail in the sun was a rather sophisticated day of work for the others on board.

“This is a testing day,” said Lester, who alternates with Barnes as the helmsman. “We structure what we want to do from start to finish, and that begins with physical training at quarter past six.”

If I correctly understood what was being said, and this does not come with a guarantee, the principal chore was to measure how many boat lengths were lost with each tack or jib under a variety of conditions.

“It takes a long time to collect all the data we need,” Lester said, “and today we’re doing a little seven-knot part of the whole picture.”

You see, no such data exists for this magnificent Kiwi yacht, which hopes to be challenging some version of a Stars & Stripes in an America’s Cup regatta come September.

“It’s still yacht racing,” said Davis, an American who serves as the Kiwis’ sailing coach, “but this is a whole new ballgame. We can’t just take a picture of a deck layout and say, ‘This is the way we’ll do it.’ No one’s been on this turf before.”

Activity ranged from relative calm sailing in a straight line to near frenzy when tacking or jibing, particularly when a sail change was involved.

And the pace seemed to quicken near the end of the day, when I assumed everything would wind down. They went to racing conditions rather than testing conditions.

“The testing gets tedious,” Lester said. “We try to end the day with a bit of action.”

Off in the distance, toward shore, the Stars & Stripes catamarans were going through exercises of their own. No one aboard New Zealand paid much attention.

Indeed, there was enough to do on board.

Davis ended the day with an admonition that alluded to the fact that this 123-foot spaceship is not thinking of slinking back to New Zealand if the New York Supreme Court rules the catamaran a legal defender.

“We have to start thinking of boat speed on our tacks,” he told the gathered sailors. “We have to learn to race the boat, not just sail it. If we have to race a catamaran in this regatta, we’re going to have to find ways to beat it.”

The Kiwis are serious. I knew that when I accepted the invitation to go for a sail. I should have known to pack a lunch.