Looking Back: My First Boat

From sailing the “KOOL floating bathtub” on Lake Thunderbird with Dad as a teenager until my next boat, I had many years pass and many things to keep me occupied.   Cars, girls, college, career, and kids – all the normal stuff.  But in my thirties I realized I missed heading out to the lake for a few hours of fun on the water and decided it would be a good idea to buy a boat of my own.  It was nearly twenty years from my first sailing days, but I bought my first boat.  The infallible Flying Scot.

The Flying Scot sailing Lake Thunderbird - with my Dad, Mom, son Jordan, and myself onboard

Those were busy days.  A family and a company with lots of travel left little time for sailing.  But occasionally, I could make my escape to the lake.  It never failed to happen, whatever worries, or concerns, or stress I might have been feeling at the time, sailing allowed me to focus on the water, the wind, and of course relaxing and having fun – everything to do with work and the stress of life faded and was singularly put in its place.

I can’t say enough good things about the Flying Scot.  With a jib, a main, and a spinnaker it’s not just the perfect boat to learn the art of sailing, but one could easily sail it one’s whole life and find complete satisfaction.   Things happen faster on a small boat, mistakes tend to be amplified, and thus you either have a ton of fun, or you learn a ton…. Either way, both are good.

Heading to the lake with a cooler full of sandwiches, cokes, and of course a few beers was always a great way to spend a weekend afternoon.  My kids were little and we all had plenty of fun sailing, swimming, and fishing.  Whether I was sailing solo by flying just the main or with crew flying the spinnaker, the Flying Scot worked its magic on me.

Many years later, I still own it.  I just can’t bring myself to sell it.  Each year, the once or twice I make it out to good ol’ Lake Thunderbird, we have a great time.  After several years of sailing the Flying Scot, I found myself on a business trip to California, oddly enough, it was a business trip which would change my sailing perspective forever.

I was working very hard in San Diego integrating our software with another companies.  It was work, work, work… to the tune of eighty hours a week.  After a few weeks at this pace, the president of the California company stopped by to introduce himself.   “Michael, I’d like to entertain you for an evening.  What are your hobbies?” he asked.  I remember thinking that was sort of a strange question to ask, but I listed my hobbies and of course sailing was in the mix.  He perked up immediately and responded “Have you ever been sailing on the ocean?  I’d be happy to take you”.  Now I perked up.  Actually, the only place I had ever been sailing was on Lake Thunderbird so I couldn’t say “Awesome”, “Count me in”, and “Hell Yea!” fast enough.  He wrote down his address and instructed me to meet him at his house at 6:00 pm.

I didn’t know what to expect, but I did know I was going to be out of there at 5 o’clock sharp, just enough time to get back to the hotel, change into my bathing suit and t-shirt, and zoom over to the address he gave me.  I found the neighborhood, I found a parking spot, and I walked up the drive and rang the bell.  When he answered, I have to say he looked at me a little funny, and it took him quite a while to speak, but finally he said “... Oh great, you made it.  I hope you don’t mind but I invited some of the VPs from work”.  He walked me thru his house until we came to a huge glass wall looking out over the San Diego bay.  We went downstairs and passed thru a door and then we were on a dock with a finger pier leading to his 48’ Catalina yacht.  It didn’t take me long to figure out why he looked at me funny, here I was in a bathing suit and there he was, with all his VPs, still in their neckties and slacks – ready to shove off.

I spoke first.  “In Oklahoma, our sailboats are about a third that size, and when we go sailing we nearly always get wet.  That’s why we wear bathing suites”.  Fortunately, they thought it was a funny thing to say.  Apparently in California, or at least in this crowd, you wear your necktie, you sail over to your yacht club, and you fine dine. “No problem”, I was told, the yacht club will have slacks and a jacket you can borrow.  Once the ice was broken, we all laughed for the 45 minute sail to the yacht club. True to form, the maître d’ found me a pair of slacks to put over my bathing suit, and a jacket to cover my t-shirt.

That’s a true story.

That was my first time to be aboard a large sailboat, and it left a large impression.  It had bathrooms (actually called “heads”).  It had a kitchen (actually called “a galley”). And it even had bedrooms (actually called “staterooms”).  All this was news to me.  It was amazing.  Really, quite amazing.

My first question was, “How does one learn to do this?”  The answer was relatively straightforward.  “Take the week long class, pass the tests, then start bare boat chartering (a fancy name for renting a boat).”   Another true story - that business trip wasn’t over before I had booked my next vacation:  Live Aboard Sailing School.