Talkin' Shit About A Pretty Sunset

I'm not a loopy person, I don't believe in the supernatural, and I have a healthy annoyance of hippies, but I appreciate a half-insane guy named Reid Stowe who set out over 500 days ago to sail non-stop at sea for 1,000 days. Sometimes reading his blog makes me feel a bit more free.

His voyage has generated a ridiculous amount of criticism at a popular sailor forum called Sailing Anarchy; the post on his voyage has received over 190,000 mostly negative comments and 600,000 views. I stopped following the thread long ago, and I won't try and dissect the various reasons people are against Reid and his weird voyage, but I wonder if the root of the criticism is simply the fundamental difference between racing sailors and cruising sailors.

I've sailed for 10 years and I'm passionate about it but I don't race. Sure, I love the Volvo Ocean Race, but mostly for the cool videos. The first time I directly experienced the mentality of the racing sailor was when I applied to be a sailing instructor in Annapolis. Me and three other applicants went out with this hardcore racer sailor for a day of observation and training on the water. I was excited because I'd get to sail on a J-80 --- supposedly the Corvette of sailboats --- but while on the water, I felt something that I'd never felt while on a sailboat: the desire to just get back to the dock. Usually, going home is the least fun part of the trip for me. What was going on?

Racing a sailboat often draws the same jockish mentality that I hated in high school. On the water that day, trying to sail a boat in a racing style reduced my enjoyment and I made mistakes that I would've never made on my own boat. See, I'm a set-it-and-forget-it sailor; as long as the wife isn't complaining, the beer isn't spilling and the dog isn't about to fall overboard, I'm happy. I could give a flying fuck about whether the outhaul on the mainsail is the right tension or we could be going 0.03 knots faster. If I wanted to play competitive sports, I'd join a soccer team instead of owning a 36-year-old barnacle-covered sloop.

This is likely why many racing sailors find Reid Stowe so repellent. Reid is a dreamer --- a real dreamer, the type that's rare these days. He talks to rainbows and fish. He tries to sail paths on the ocean in the shape of turtles and whales. He practices yoga on a gimbaled platform on the stern. He lives on mung beans and flying fish. He's a freak who's over 50 and got a 23-year-old pregnant. He was arrested for trying to smuggle massive loads of marijuana into the US in the 1980s. He made this hippy-dippy tripped-out video. For god sakes, his website has a banner of him looking like this:



The square world has a natural hatred for all that shit!

I can't wait until Reid finishes his trip. When he gets back to New York after 1,000 days at sea, I'm gonna make a road trip up to welcome him back. And I'll be laughing at all the people who said he couldn't do it --- just like the d-bags who said Obama could never win. Reid and I probably have nothing in common other than our love of sailing and the sea but I'd like to shake his hand. I don't care if he owes alimony (he does) or the 100 transgressions he's made in the eyes of racing sailors. This is a man who looks out at the water as I do, and sees not a race track or just another component of the rat race, but something deeper, more spiritual.

No, I didn't just say the word "spiritual," did I? Oh shit, am I becoming a god damn hippie?? STOP ME.