SAILING SHORTS: Short Films about Sailing is now on Patreon!

Support SAILING SHORTS on Patreon! Experimental short films chronicling east coast sailors and adventures!

First up meet Anna & George Jordan- a cape cod fishing family that salvaged and restored a 76-foot steel schooner.

Next is Eddie & Dean. Teen brothers who refit a boat with the help of their parents to “sail the world” in lieu of college.

If you enjoyed these videos please join the SAILING SHORTS patreon for only $5 a month @ www.patreon.com/ADHDSAILOR

“ALL IS WELL” a Short Film by Emily Greenberg

“ALL IS WELL” A FREE short film by Emily Greenberg
features ‘All is Well,’ a poem by Henry Scott Collins.

Follow the Death of a Yogi—a Jewish grandfathers attempts Sanskrit + the growing legacy he left behind continues to flourish at his “celebration of life” in the Catskill Mountains of New York.
Many thanks to all who made this possible.

In loving Memory of Rob Greenberg,
1933-2021.

SUPPORT THE ARTS!
THANK YOU FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTION!
PayPal: Emilyf.greenberg@gmail.com
Venmo: Emily-Greenberg-25

SUPPORT THE ARTS!
THANK YOU FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTION!
PayPal: Emilyf.greenberg@gmail.com
Venmo: Emily-Greenberg-25

Million Dollar View

‘Sail it ‘til it sinks.”  Said Tom the brewer with the beautiful wooden boat from 1937. I’m more like sail it to the islands and abandon or sell it for really cheap somewhere else. He shrugs his shoulders and takes a sip of his beer before he walks away. He thinks I need to touch up the paint on the hull, but to make sure it matches otherwise I’m going to have to re paint the whole thing. That I need to scrub my teak with a green scrub pad. And he’s going to bring over some rust off spray to get the stains off my deck. He thinks it’s more important I clean my teak then fix the leaks.

“If it’s leaking on your head just move over,” he said.

 I’m half rolling my eyes half listening intently. I plan to take his advice. On a boat, some day, but probably not this one. I was going to do a little cosmetic stuff anyway, I’m literally patching this thing together. This boat. I don’t know really what else to do at this point. I don’t want this to turn into a two year project with brand new awl grip paint on deck and topsides. Bright varnish. Perfectly pressed on tell tales. That’s not what this boat is.  At least, not right now.

I like Tom. I figured he thought I was a degenerate making myself look bad with my sloppy finish work. But it was quite the opposite. “I’ve got something for you,” he said one day and handed me two picture books; one on the stars and the other on marlinspike craftsmanship (subtle, Tom).

“Wow, I’m honored,” I said. “I always thought you were ashamed of me.”

“Ashamed of you?” He said laughing in disbelief. “I admire you!”

Sometimes everything is such a chore. I feel like a pirate amongst the royal fleet. But then, I’m sitting on the dog house fiberglassing some free scrap plywood I got from the shop, drilling holes with borrowed drill bits, sitting under a makeshift sun shade, with the perfect afternoon sea breeze and the boats just tugging lightly at the pilings. And I’ve got the same view as the million dollar yachts.

And I won’t let them take that away from me.

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Sailing a Remote Coast

What did I learn from sailing a fiberglass spin off of a Hershoff 28 down a remote coast with a psychologist?

Believe what people say; don’t read between the lines. Past behavior is an indicator of future behavior.

Always demonstrate captaincy, even when it’s not your boat.

Two weeks together on a small boat and you’re bound to have some arguments. If you’re still friends at the end of it, you’re mates for life. Sometimes things can fall apart between crew members when you need each other most. Swallow your pride when it comes to passage making and keeping the peace with crew. Tone is everything.

I don’t believe in dogs on boats from a philosophical standpoint, but pugs aren’t really dogs.

Helming; it’s all instinct.

Making decisions is easier at sea than on land. Anxiety on land is crippling, at sea it is necessary for survival.

Mosquito’s can turn ‘God’s Country,’ into “God’s Asshole.”

They don’t call it a shakedown sail for nothing.

Shit is going to break, whether it is a $3,000 boat or a $30,000 boat.

Anything that can go wrong, will.

See you out there

single handed sailor girl, pearson ariel 26

I’m sitting in a swanky modern coffee shop with an iced tea that cost four dollars. There are dogs and wooden chairs and young mothers with babies in slings, men with beards and macbook pros. I smell like gas and sweat. I just rode in from a neighboring bay where I left my boat safely on her anchor with a seven to one scope in 20 knots. I surf down four foot waves on my mate’s dinghy, yipping and hollering as spray explodes across the bow and into the boat. I spot a Nor’Sea 27 in the harbor with its mast down. I knew it was Nor’sea the other day when I spotted it nearly a mile away and my suspicion was correct. They must be going south.

I struggle hauling three gallons of gas a few blocks from the fuel dock to the dinghy.

I find an eagle feather on the sidewalk in my first steps onto the city side walk.

I haven’t showered in a week.

I subsist off rice, beans, kale, tortillas, and tofu when I can afford it.

My days are governed by the wind and waves.

I take freelance assignments from the paper. I reject freelance assignments from the paper.

I’m broke. I’m ferrel. I’m free.

The past seven days have been a blur of repairs, purchases and installations, raft ups, long beats, long reaches, long scope. Lazy nights under candle and starlight.

Everything is always better out there. Amongst my people or alone, it’s better out there. 

When people come into the anchorage I stand on my bow and stare them down. Yesterday I fended three people off from my space. One bearing down on me under power, another anchoring 30 feet to starboard, another about to drop their anchor right on top of mine. They all obliged. Something about this being a lake, perhaps, but people don’t seem to know anything about seamanship.

I suppose I was there myself, once.

NOTE: My main sail is gutted. On its last legs. I find a new tear everyday. I’ve taken to patching it with 5200, as sewing has just created more strain on the disintegrating fabric. I need another primary main or at least a spare. I have a last ditch plan to turn an old main off a Columbia 26 into a spare. I’ll have to put in reef points and new hanks. I’m going to do it Tom Sawyer style. It’s the only way. 

If anyone knows of or has a mainsail that would fit my boat (dimensions below) PLEASE CONTACT ME and we can strike a deal. 

Luff : 27′
Foot : 11’11”
Leach: 29′ 4″
dinghydreams@gmail.com 

ALSO– watch my film and donate if you care to see it completed !!!

 

Marooned in Shelburne Bay

dinghy dreams, live aboard, lake champlain sailing

I don’t know if Shelburne Bay passed me by, or I passed by it. I arrived with the intention to find some work. Maybe a job at a restaurant,or at the shipyard I rowed into, but rarely on this trip does anything I expect to happen, well, happen.

Shelburne Bay is a great place with a cove for nearly every wind direction, a boatyard full of many classic and forgotten beauties, sailors from near and far full of much advice, and ghosts. Crawling into my little berth at night, Shelburne was the first time I closed my hatch boards to feel more protected by the spirit of my little boat from the spooky evening.

I did find some work there, only not in a traditional fashion. When the shipyard gardener was using the hose and I needed to fill my water jugs we got to talking. She’s a homesteader, master gardener, and keeps chickens and goats. My past days of goat rearing came in handy as we hit it off. I asked her if she needed any help and she set me up with two days of work digging in the dirt.

I reached out to another shipyard down south and while he doesn’t have any work for me right now, he offered to help me advise me with any projects I intended to do to get my boat ready for leaving the lake. There’s a possibility there for end of the season work, perhaps in exchange for yard storage in the winter. While in Shelburne I also made arrangements with the sailmaker a short sail north to work trade for a second set of reef points in my mainsail.

Perhaps the most profound thing to happen to me in Shelburne Bay, however, was the chance meeting with the canvas maker at the yard. He lives aboard a Shannon 26 with his wife, also a sailboat sewing guru, and they’ve cruised the world extensively with their children.

I’ve been vacillating between going south down the Hudson this year or waiting another. This time a month ago I gave myself four weeks to make a decision. As time went on I became more and more over whelmed with what the boat needs in order to actually be ready for salt water.

The words of so many couch sailors I’ve met echoed in my ears.

“Just go.”

Talking with the canvas maker he said, “why not wait a year? Don’t outfit in Florida. You’re one of a million. Everything is more expensive. Here people want to help you. You need to be ready.”

So it was decided. I made three lists of what the boat needs. Before winter, before south, and ongoing. While I felt a great relief to be able to enjoy the rest of the summer sailing on the lake without the pressure to leave by a certain date with a certain amount of money, a new type of anxiety set it. I’d have to find somewhere to store the boat, and worst of all, I’d have to move back to land for what could be seven months.

But I didn’t have time to worry about the impending dark months ahead, my little boat sitting lonely on jack stands—I had a weather window and a sailmaker to meet.

Sailors are a lonely bunch

bristol 24, lonely sailor, single handed sailor, live aboard

It’s nearly two in the morning and I’m rowing my dinghy around the marina back to my boat. I round the corner of B dock and the sheer line of my little vessel is illuminated from the soft lantern light coming through the port. The sound of laughter is coming through the hatch.

launch, bristol 24, live aboard, sailor girl

This is my little house, I think to myself. She’s floats.

bristol 24, full keel, sailboat restoration

My two friends and a dog are inside. They’re cooking chicken and laughing about the French guy on the boat a few slips down that ran out in his speedo to help us dock the boat after we went for a sunset sail. He invited us over for drinks and put out a spread of every cocktail imaginable and high end cheese. With ice clinking in my glass  I’m reminded of why I love this lifestyle. The people.

launch, bristol 24, live aboard, sailor girl

When the yard manager and his crew knocked on the hull at 9 AM on Friday morning and said, “You ready, Captain?” all the work from the last four weeks, all the uncertainties, and lonely nights in the boatyard, the hours of frustration and fears, the storms that bellowed through, the long days filled with little food floated away with the gentle four knot breeze.

DSC_5971

And as my nearly two ton boat was lifted into the air, my motley crew surrounding me, I stared in wonder at this piece of fiberglass, metal and wood that has already taken me on a great adventure.

solo sailor girl, live aboard, bristol 24

To all the people who have lent me a hand, a buck, or a word of advice–I couldn’t have done it without you.

live aboard sailor girl, solo sailor, single handed

“Happiness only real when shared.”  -Alexander Supertramp

crew, sailing, sailboat, bristol 24 , dinghy dreams, live aboard

Adventure vs. Ordeal

From the countryside of Quebec, to a frozen boatyard, to the lounge of a 200 year old Adirondack cabin, to my grandparent’s house, to the grimiest city in the world, and back home again–the journey to see the boat was a long one.20160216-DSC_4803It started early in the morning in sub zero temperatures as I caught the bus to New York City, to catch another bus, and then another bus. From there I did as best I could for my self-survey, but it was cold. Bitterly, bitterly cold. The wind howled through the rigging and snow drifts piled around as the wind off the water blew frozen bits in a steady direction. Before I left the boat, I sat in the port side settee, leaned against the nicely varnished ceiling boards and closed my eyes. I tried to picture warmer weather. I tried to picture myself, with all of my stuff, and my all of crazy notions, living in harmony within this little vessel. Thirty seconds later I sprung up. I had seen the light. Bristol 24 interiorThat evening I enjoyed a traditional Quebecois meal of meat pie. A few glasses of tea, and a quick performance on the squeeze box and  it was time for bed, as the next day I was meeting the surveyor in the wee hours of the morning. Luckily, the temperature was going to near 45 degrees that day. It’s damn cold in the north country this time of year. 20160215-DSC_4786
When we arrived in the boatyard the next morning, the wind had quieted and the temperature spiked. Within minutes though, the current owner (who had graciously put me up for the night and offered me a ride to the bus stop to catch home later that evening) slipped on some ice which resulted in an intense injury. He had to call it and retreated to the Canadian border.

The surveyor and I went through every inch of the boat for the next four hours. My toes were about ready to fall off, but I felt like a got an education that was worth the frost bite. When the current owner had to bail, the surveyor said he would drop me at the bus stop. The thing was, I would be stranded there until midnight! I didn’t want to fish too hard for an invite to spend the remainder of the day at his house, so I didn’t. “I’ll find a coffee shop,” I said. “Or a bar.”20160216-DSC_4807Turns out, he was heading south where he also has a home and business, so I was able to catch a ride with him to my grandparents house in the rolling mountain range a few hundred miles down the line. A quick stop at his 200 year old house that used to belong to the secretary of the great New York poet Pearl Buck, and we were on the road.

Overall, it would take him 90 miles out of his way total to drop me off there. Not only did that not matter to him, but he knocked $150 off the survey price, and we smoked cigarettes in his flash Range Rover the entire time, talking about boats. I felt like a sponge, thirsty to soak up every last bit of information I could from him during our impromptu road trip. He has thousands of sea miles, many of which were offshore.

So many people don’t take care of their boats, or take care of them wrong. In some ways, talking to the surveyor gave my confidence a boost, as I asked the right questions. It was like we both came from the same school—except he was a near zen master, and me just wee student.

Somewhere in between the highway and the back mountain roads he said to me, “Emily, I think it’s great what you are doing, and I’m really excited for you.”

“Thank you. Wow,” I said. “I’m excited to have you as a part of it.”

I’ll keep him in my proverbial rolodex for years to come.

I was at my grandparent’s house in time for dinner, where my poppy gave me lessons in the art of negotiation, and my grandma advised me to wear a life jacket.scrabbleTucked into bed with my aunties playing a rousing game of scrabble, the past 36 hours almost seemed like a dream. It had all happened so fast. The boat, the miles of road, the mountains…

Living “well” below the poverty line

When I told the editor of the newspaper I used to work for that I’d never made more than $12,000 per year at the age of 25 he looked me in the eyes and said, “that’s impossible.” Meaning it’s impossible not only to live, but to live well, under those circumstances. People, like my boss (and others), might wonder how it’s possible to live on such a low income without either living in your parent’s basement forever or receiving government assistance. While it may be the case right now that I’m living with my parents to save up to buy my very own tiny floating home (thanks mom & dad!), I’ve never needed government assistance and I’ve been in a perpetual state of (slow) motion for nearly five years.

The reason I make so little is not because of low wages, rather because I chose to work for a while and then not work! My time not working is spent traveling, exploring, sailing…
Sailor girl

So, curious what kind of accommodation less than 12 grand per year can buy a girl???

Dorm style living, in New Zealand.Duncannon, NZ In 2012 I traveled overseas by myself for the first time for a seasonal job at a winery in the wine region Marlborough. That year was lousy for grapes, in fact we coined a catch phrase “Vintage 2012: Bad for grapes good for mates.” This may look like your typical college party but I assure you, it wasn’t. Everyone in this photo ranges in age from 20 to 40 and everyone is from a different country. Portugal, Argentina, Spain, the US, you name it. I’ve never been to to Italy, but I lived with Italians who taught me how to make excellent pasta sauce from a can of whole peeled tomatoes, which of course we ate at 10 p.m.

One third of a van. IMG_0276I was working for Greenpeace as a street team campaigner and was staying at a hostel in a room where beds were constantly emptied and refilled with travelers and seasonal workers. After a couple of months Greenpeace sent me to campaign all over the North Island using that van above as a home base. In theory, awesome. Sharing the van with a very tall, very stinky Irishman and Canadian? Only awesome for a couple of weeks.

A little cottage with a banana tree.IMG_0301
And an incredible view.
IMG_2524
(For any sailors reading this blog, that’s the Bay of Islands where Lin and Larry Pardey live). This sweet little abode was half mine for eight hours per week of housekeeping at the bed and breakfast next door. My then boyfriend/flatmate also worked for eight hours gardening at the B&B to cover his half of the rent. We got sick of the TV so we turned the couch to face outside. The view was always better than what was on.

A room in the cleanest house that ever existed.IMG_3204
Honestly probably my favorite place to live if only for what it represented at the time, a refuge from the storm. I went back to the NZ wine region last minute in 2013 for a job and wound up living in a house that was advertised as having access to the river, and only $75 per week. Well, the river was nice but the owner raised the price to $90 per week because he had bought each of us containers for our food and cleared out extra cabinet space. There were nearly seven people living there and one roommate spoke very loudly (nearly screaming) every night around 2 a.m. to his family in Sri Lanka. The homeowner also refused to turn on the heat and was not very kind to his mail order bride from the Philippines (who by the way was very sweet and made me a plate of mussels and potatoes once). I begged my workmate to ask his landlord if I could stay in the extra room in his house. It was $125 a week and I’m pretty sure the landlord checked every night to make sure I didn’t leave any clothes on the floor (it was a stipulation to living there), but I didn’t care. It was a clean, well lit place.

A handmade clay cabin surrounded by rainforest and permaculture gardens.
IMG_3872IMG_3812In Australia I stayed for free for a month helping my now dear friend maintain her gardens. I went to Australia in hope of staying longer (and because my second visa had expired in NZ), but found myself yearning to experience the coasts of my own country.

A room in wine country.IMG_4385I didn’t get to meet the land lady for a while because she was busy hiking the John Muir Trail (she didn’t like me very much anyway). I remember sitting outside underneath an electric sky of stars and could hear coyotes. Less than a mile away was a dense forest wilderness, vineyards and more sky than I’d ever seen. I felt like I’d finally arrived in California, the promised land.

A really crappy yet fully functional and (basically) reliable car.photo-2
I pretty much lived out of my car for a while as I road tripped both with friends and solo from California to Canada and everything in between, multiple times. When my friend and I crossed the border into Canada the immigration officer was very confused by the amount of stuff I had in my vehicle and I think he thought we might try and stay there forever…

A tiny cabin/shed on a mystical goat farm.IMG_5039
Some of the best six months of my life were spent shoveling goat poop, milking their udders, and canoodling with the guard dogs. This farm was entirely run by (mostly) young, open minded and inclusive people. We were in the foothills of Mount Rainier and on clear days you could see the mountain in all its glory. But even the stature of the mountain did not compare to the bounty that was this farm and the community that kept it thriving.

A prefab log cabin on a little evergreen island. IMG_5148
This cabin was sweet, but I’ll admit I was very lonely at the time and mostly only took pictures of the food on the shelves (I was OBSESSED with trying to have a “clean diet”). The cabin was part of the employee housing at a snooty marina where I worked tying up boats.

A berth on a 22 foot sailboat.IMG_5378
But anyone reading this blog already knows that story…

Baptism of fire

Everyone’s first time is different. Some are with a small, short dinghy. Others with a long, strong yacht. But me? My first time sailing was a 1200 nautical mile journey from Vavau’a, Tonga to Opua, New Zealand, out of sight from land for 10 sanguine days, on a posh 43 foot catamaran. No one told me not to put toilet paper in the head so how was I supposed to know (having never stepped foot on a sail boat before), that within hours of casting off from our mooring ball I’d be covering the toilet with saran wrap, hoping the excrements would stay put for the next 1200 miles? (Secret: we’d been at port living aboard on anchor for a little over two weeks waiting for a weather window to make our crossing. I’d been putting toilet paper in the head all along, so, knowing what I know now about marine toilets, I’m surprised it didn’t clog sooner).IMG_2325

It was a matter of being in the right place at the right time. Who I knew, not what I knew. The boys delivered the yachts to and fro twice each year and had room for me. So I paid my way from NZ to the islands and lived like a sailor for close to a month. I didn’t know cruising existed, and it wasn’t for many years later that I knew I could live on a boat, hell even own a boat of my own. Blissfully ignorant I had no idea the implications of sailing this somewhat treacherous area of the Tasman Sea at this time of year. I listened to but never felt concerned about the reports that came through the coconut telegraph on the VHF each morning. I trusted our captain, and we were at port a good while waiting for a clear window in between cyclones.

While in Tonga I walked a pig on a leash, rode in the back of a hay truck to a strange lagoon where the beach dropped suddenly off into the deep ocean, slept in a traditional Tongan hut with the branches of palm trees for bedding (when I told my Tongan friend I was freaked out by all the spiders in there he snapped his fingers and two little Tongan boys went and shook out all the leaves), ate a piglet roasted on a spit and root vegetables cooked in banana leaves, got the shits from drinking too much coconut water, got the shits from drinking too much kava, got the shits from eating too much papaya, got constipated from taking too much imodium.

While at sea…time blurred, or stopped all together. I felt truly free and alive for the first time. I cooked and made sure we didn’t run into any shipping containers. I kneaded and baked bread. I wrote sea shanty’s. I never got seasick. I picked up pumas from the water that had come from an underwater volcano eruption–it had tiny crabs living on it and I thought to myself, this baptism of fire is how it all began…