Kauai to Oahu: First ocean overnight, Part 1

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Written by Kaci Cronkhite  Winter 1992  All rights reserved.

Nawiliwili Harbor,   Kaua’i, Hawai’i
Alaska was at its darkest, coldest decrescendo.  Perfect time to head to Hawaii.  I wanted to think about sailing and set a course  for my next ten years with a warm clear mind.

As fate had forseen, the friends who introduced me to sailing in Port Townsend had been struck and successfully weathered Hurricane Iniki on Kauai.   From Oahu, I called to check in with them and they invited me to come visit and help, as long as I could camp. Backpack loaded with food and tent, I hopped a flight to Lihue and walked to the marina. Palm trees were stripped, houses roofless, power poles and other debris still littered the island. Most people still didn't have water or electricity. Aboard their voyage ready boat they were stocked for two months.  When I arrived they were mired in Plan B, something to keep the fire stoked on much bigger plans. Plan B was a tangent indeed. A tack to the north of their previous course, an interisland interlude day sail from Kaua’i to Oahu.  They invited me along as crew.  I knew little more than I had in Washington, but they didn’t seem to care. I was little trouble to feed, had a stomach of steel and was handy with tools in emergencies.  It was a short trip and one they could do with their eyes closed.

The chilly morning of my first ocean sail began at 0400.  I throbbed with enthusiasm and could hardly sleep,

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Honolulu to Seattle: First Ocean Passage

Honolulu to Seattle: My first long voyage, 1993

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Written by Kaci Cronkhite  March 2012  All rights reserved.

"So you serious about doing an ocean passage," asked my buddy Bruce as he walked up to C Dock in Ala Wai where the boat I was varnishing was moored.

"You bet," I said. "But I know how to cook, Bruce. Sort of. You wouldn't want me for a cook. Would you teach me how to navigate, use the weather fax, sail in the ocean?"

"Sure," he said with the impish grin I'd come to love in this Kamaina guy who'd been one of my first friends in Hawaii. "I need crew that will work!"

A few weeks later, we were headed out of the channel and west into the cooling sun in a 40 foot Gulf Star whose almost unpronouncable name meant sweetheart. In an hour the sun would set and we'd still be in the lee of Oahu. This part of the journey I'd sailed a couple of times already. Twice at night the year before and a half dozen times as crew for the man who owned one of the boats in my care. I knew this part was a pretty easy cruise in the lee of the island. No big waves. No big wind. As we passed close to Ko Olina, wisely tucked in the last of our shelter, the two guys who'd signed on as crew drunk their last beers for awhile (or so I thought) making grand claims about the surf, the women or the fish they'd caught along these shores. 

"Hang on boys (I'll call them #1 and #2)," I whispered. The channel in the islands could be rough and we were just entering the zone. That beer was likely going to reappear if the channel was anything like my other trips. Bruce just smiled at them and listened.

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OffCenterHarbor.com sets sail: Kaci one of 20 bloggers

When you get an invitation to be part of a brand new venture on the opposite side of the country, like Maine, you pause. When that invitation is from Benjamin Mendolwitz and includes Maynard Bray, plus three other guys with excellent and complimentary areas of expertise synergizing in Brooklin, Maine  (Steve Stone, Bill Maher and Eric Blake) you leap, not pausing for a second.  Because in that second, you might think, "Who, me?" and totally miss the chance to work with some of this nation's most prolific and beautiful creators of wooden boat books, calendars and now, video!  

This new venture is not just to focus attention to the latest greatest new genre (video) and does NOT sell ads. Instead, it's a call to sanity, a throw back or a throw forward, depending on where you stand, to authentic people presenting authentic "know-how" to boaters world-wide and online.  Sure, they use video, but they also love books, magazines and writing. And yes, there's a subscription fee ($29/year for unlimited access to tons of info!) but the mission is simple: inspiring the use of well-designed boats to connect with friends, family and the natural world. 

In addition to gorgeous, informative video about specific boats, boatbuilders and activities for families, there are topics on gear, maritime art, and blog topics written by 20 "expert" Guides.  I am honored to be included. As their token Okie (by birth) and one of the few who didn't grow up on the water and in boats, my perspective supports their mission by proving you don't have to be blueblood, or a New Englander, or fed sawdust since birth (no really, shipwrights are raised on it, LOL) to love, love, love wooden boats and get to write and talk about it. 

The focus of their website is about accessibility, about self-reliance, about beauty and the powerfully positive experience it is to be in a well-designed boat on the waters of the world.  Take a look!

Lost @ Long Beach: article for Wood Hull Yacht Club

Seeking Owners & Info about Danish Spidsgatter FIRECREST 1960-1974  (aka Pax since 1976)
by Kaci Cronkhite for Wood Hull Yacht Club newsletter, Los Angeles, California January/February 2012

How the heck this all started
I sailed around the world on a plastic double-ender, finishing that six year westabout circumnavigation in Port Townsend, Washington, August 2001. A month later, I hopped a ferry from Friday Harbor to attend the Wooden Boat Festival and the morning of my return trip, planes hit the World Trade Center towers.  The culture shock of returning to America from a world voyage was compounded that morning exponentially.  Staring at the television coverage, hugging strangers, talking to family daily for the first time in nearly a decade, life changed. Love of the ocean married my former love of wilderness and together, that ultimately led me to wooden boats.

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Capes of Hope (originally published @ 48 North)

Capes are the poetic points of continents—landmarks of legends. The focus of fears and goals to reach. Capes are the summits of our sailing souls.  Kaci Cronkhite

 by Kaci Cronkhite (Published 2003, 48 North Magazine)

 When I doubled The Cape, Africa's southern most point, with Nancy Erley and her Port Townsend built Orca 38, Tethys, I could breathe like I was on my way down from 18,000 feet. Every fiber in my body was happy. I could taste relief and it was sweet. At 1120 (local time) on April 10, 2000, we watched the GPS course count down to zero miles to go, then project a northbound heading for our first time since crossing the equator in the Maldives, halfway behind us in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Nancy's hair stopped turning gray. Tethys kicked up her 19-ton heels. We laughed louder than the wind for the first time in months and slapped hands and pounded the cockpit teak. Our gale force headwind moved abeam and Cape Seals leapt through our wake chasing us toward Cape Town, 125 miles north.

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