Saving Face

Taking a stroll in Newport Harbor on a July day, I couldn’t help but notice a large number of drop-dead gorgeous retirees strolling the docks: blond septuagenarian babes dressed in the local boaters’ uniform of white shorts, pastel polo shirts and Topsiders, their long legs tan and muscular beneath the crinkled tissue paper texture of skin, wearing their wrinkled, noble visages with insouciant grace.

I turned to my companion and said, admiringly, “This is definitely where I want to live when I’m in my 70s. See how youthful and fit they all are! Living on a boat is so healthy!” To which he replied, “These women aren’t in their 70s. They’re only a couple of years older than you.”

Now, it may be coincidence that my first wrinkles appeared when I turned 37--within six months of moving aboard my 30-foot sailboat--but probably not. When I’m aboard, I even get a tan indoors. The glare of light rays refracting off of water and white fiberglass is so pervasive and wily that below deck every porthole becomes a potent UV laser beam. You’d have to lock yourself in a fish-hold to completely avoid sun exposure.

I take vitamins C and E and beta carotene, which are rumored to help prevent sun damage, and I pat a few drops of Cellex-C Serum onto my face every night, partly because the vitamins it contains are supposed to help skin resist sun damage, and partly because the word “serum” is so captivating. But it became clear that my usual moisturizer with sunscreen wasn’t going to cut it at sea, or even at dock.

So I called my landlubber friend Amy, a redhead whose stunning, snow-white pallor has never been broached, though I know from many pleasant luncheons at the Farmers Market that she does go outdoors in daylight. “I use the Elmer’s Glue of sunscreens,” Amy said blithely. “Hawaiian Tropic Baby Faces 50 SPF. I look like a person who got dropped in a glue vat, but it does the job better than all the rest.”

Baby Faces sounded effective, but unpleasant, so I called my mom, who shares my genes and has always looked young for her age. Mom swears by Clinique’s City Block because its deceptively lightweight formula disguises the fact that it works well enough to keep you pale and pasty.

At the cosmetics counter, I discovered Lancome’s Soleil Ultra Protection Eye Creme, with an SPF of 40 and a list of four active ingredients. (How many sunscreens tell you to “avoid eye area” and yet that’s the skin you most want to protect?) This one comes in a tiny tube, but I’ve been known to smear it all over my face; it has a lovely matte texture.

And since I hate hearing, “My, what nice leather gloves you’re wearing!” when I don’t even own a pair, I also picked up a tube of Robanda’s Anti-Aging Hand Cream, which is the only product I know of that has an SPF of 20 and contains a natural whitening agent to combat freckles and liver spots. Robanda makes a similar product for the face, along with matching night cream, which is a wonder-drug if you’re afflicted with unwanted freckles.

What I learned in my quest for the ultimate in sun protection is that there is no bad sun block. Whatever the florid labeling hype on the fancier products, the main ingredients in all of the products are the same, and they’re all safe and effective. Higher SPF products protect you better, longer, with somewhat diminishing returns above a factor of about 30, though very fair people or those in punishing environments will like the extra protection of an SPF of 40 or higher.

Yes, a vat of no-brand goo from the drugstore will prevent cancer just as well as Estee Lauder’s Oil Free Sun Spray--and a 1983 Ford Probe will get you to work at the same time every day as a 2000 Lexus. But texture and scent can mean the difference between a day spent feeling like a glistening, anointed Tahitian idol or a stinky strip of human flypaper.

I can’t afford a Lexus, but I can afford Estee Lauder, which makes my favorite line of elegant, nongreasy sun products, including an After-Sun Rehydrator for those occasional days when you accidentally-on-purpose forget to wear your sunscreen and sneak a tan. This is not necessarily the stuff I’d pack in my sea bag for a single-handed circumnavigation, but it’s what I use when I’m feeling civilized.

When gearing up for heavy-duty sun exposure, barrier sun blocks that deflect the sun’s rays are the best at providing complete, lasting UVB protection. They also tend to be less irritating than chemical ingredients that work by absorbing UV rays. Professional Solutions makes the cleanest all-natural products anywhere, including one consisting of pure titanium dioxide in a water base. The company does sell to the public, even if its marketing, consisting of the Web site professionalsolutions.com, is aimed at plastic surgeons and their patients. (A post-lift sunburn is about as pleasant as the final face-melt scene from “Raiders of the Lost Ark”).

A sympathetic facialist from a salon that services many local sailors recommended M.D. Formulations’ Total Protector, which comes in sober packaging embossed with the Skin Cancer Foundation’s recommendation stamp. The feel is thick and more medicinal than sensual, but there are times when a stern, paternalistic layer of protection is awfully reassuring--like when you’re halfway to Catalina and you realize that your eyebrows look like the rim of a margarita glass because they’re so caked with salt borne in on the ocean breeze.

One day I was heading for the launch ramp to crew in an all-day regatta and discovered I’d forgotten to pack a barrier coating, so I dashed into the local drugstore and discovered a product called Ocean Potion Face, which comes in a little pot and looks like something a surfer dude would buy. Ocean Potion contains micronized zinc oxide, which means it goes on sheer but has an SPF of 45. It smells lemony and doesn’t leave a residue, and I’ve been able to smear it on my eyelids without ending up clawing at my sockets and weeping like Oedipus at Colonus once the sweat begins to drip down from my eyebrows. Best of all, I wore the stuff all day in the ocean spray and came back with nothing but the glow of virtuous exertion upon my cheeks.

There is, of course, more bad news from the medical community. Recent studies suggest that rates of melanoma have been going up despite--and perhaps because of--the now widespread use of sunscreen. As it turns out, most of the sunscreens we commonly use block UVB rays that cause sunburn and most skin carcinomas, but not the UVA rays that can lead to the much trickier melanoma as well as deep aging of the skin. Sunburn actually protects us from extended UVA exposure by driving us under cover. Now, because we’re all wearing sun block, we stay out in the sun longer and the UVA rays go to town. Go figure.

Products have begun to appear containing a recently FDA-approved ingredient called avobenzone, which blocks UVA rays. Sea & Ski’s Premium line contains it, as do Ocean Potion’s body products, and one I consider to be the superlative all-around, swimming, sailing, mountain-climbing, staked-to-the-anthill-in-the-desert-sun prophylaxis: Ti-Screen Sports Gel.

This stuff goes on cool (it contains alcohol), then evaporates, leaving a comfortable film of broad-spectrum protection. Since it’s a gel, you can even work it into the part in your hair (or, yes, your bald spot) without disastrous cosmetic effects, and it lasts a good six hours in or out of the water. And even though it’s about as sexy as a can of Raid, Ti-Screen gel is so thin that you can always put something else on top of it, like a good bronzing lotion.

Bronzers work by oxidizing the top layer of dead skin, much like the effect of leaving a sliced peach on the kitchen counter. Rub on Lancome’s Flash Bronzer or Estee Lauder’s Bronze Booster and, voila--an hour later you’ve turned brown. The effect is realistic: Unless you tell, no one will realize that your impersonation of a Polynesian nymphet is really a chemically enhanced impression of a rotten apple. And, who knows, they might not even know that you’re over 70.