Saturday -- Travels and the Wedding

At approximately 04:00 Saturday morning (after ~ 3 hours of sleep), Olav woke me up, informing me that it was time to go the airport for what would end up being a very long day. Olav's flight out was at 06:15, and mine was at 06:45. Poor John volunteered to drive us over the airport (only a few minutes away from the villa at which we stayed). I had needed to fly out so early so that I could get back to NYC for Ted and Alyssa's wedding at 19:00 EST. As scheduled, I would arrive at JFK at 13:20...

I arrived to get into the Alitalia line at approximately 04:30. I can understand why they're practically bankrupt and losing about 2 million euros per day. There was only one attendant checking people in, and the first couple took about 30 minutes to get their boarding passes. Three other attendants came at 05:00, fortunately. I received my pass, breezed through security (short lines, not surprisingly), and sat down near my gate along with a bunch of other 505 sailors going to their appropriate homes.

My flight to Rome was pretty much uneventful. I was fortunately able to find some shot glasses in the airport there for my coworkers and nicely paid for them using my last Euro cash. Rome Fumincino airport (as did Charles de Gualle in Paris) had a pretty ridiculous shopping experience. Every major fashion label had a decently sized store. I'm curious to know what kind of traveler drops 1000 euro a Ferragamo handbag in an airport. Needless to say, it was interesting to watch people just browse.

While the Rome flight was pretty tame, my flight back to JFK was painfully long. Alitalia clearly flies much older planes than AirFrance (I had been pleased with my flight to Paris). Much smaller overhead bins, less comfortable seats, and no in-seat entertainment system. The in-flight movie was Get Smart. Bleh. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to sleep to much, and the food was pretty pathetic. I didn't even nibble on the tuna salad sandwich.

The flight to JFK took longer than scheduled. We touched down at 13:51, and even sat parked on the runway for 20 minutes. I started to get worried, as I usually do when it looks like I'm running late. Fortunately though, there were no lines at customs, and I waited for only 5 minutes for our bags to come down the tubes in the claim area. In a hurry, I opted for a cab to NYC ($60, ouch) rather than the available mass transit options (bus, subway).

I arrived at the hotel around 15:00. I was doing pretty well on time, and things were looking good. The hotel staff at the front desk informed me that my little sister had in fact delivered my tuxudo that morning. She even had it pressed! What a good sister! I bolted up to my room, dropped off my bags, and went around the corner to the closest barber shop for a trim. I ended up back in the room at 16:30, running right on time. I got dressed and walked over to where the wedding was (the very nice Essex House). Unfortunately, my bowtie practice back in DC wasn't good enough, and Phil ended up helping me out. Anyways, I made it to the wedding without a hitch. In spite of all the potential logistical hangups, I arrived perfectly. Here's a photo of the four of us in the hotel lobby.

The wedding was great. Alyssa was very pretty, and Ted was very happy. The speeches were particularly cute. I had a wonderful time, and I looked dashing in the tuxedo.

Friday -- No wind, container loading, rain, and awards

Friday was supposed to be a big day for racing. All throughout the week, forecasts for Friday had looked solid in terms of breeze (10 knots or so) as a front was to move through Mondello. Racers had all been somewhat excited going to bed Thursday night.

Upon waking up Friday, I looked outside from our villa to the bay. It was complete glass. I cursed loudly and began to make my breakfast. We arrived as usual at the club and rigged up the boats. 11:00 came around (the normal launching time), and the AP (postponement / cappuccino) flag went up. For what seemed like the 20th time, everyone grabbed another cup of coffee. Of all the days though, this was looking particularly bad in terms of breeze. There just wasn't much of it, and nothing was creeping in as it had the previous few days. In fact, the Chicago boat (the Long's) actually started to de-rig immediately upon arriving to the club.

One benefit of this lack of breeze (and this is something that Pip Pearson noted to me) was the large amount of time the competitors spent talking to each other ashore. He commented that it was good for the class and helped generate new ideas. Here's a shot of people doing exactly that. Around 13:30, people started to de-rig their boats entirely. The RC fully canceled sailing for the day a short bit later due to lack of breeze.

This early cancellation did provide one small benefit: it allowed us to begin the container loading process that much earlier. Loading the container generally takes 2 hours, and it pretty much did. I noted that we finally closed the doors at 16:25; one of the German containers finished loading a bit faster, but I was still pleased. It had started to rain right around when racing was canceled, but it wasn't much breeze at all. Note that Friday's rain was the only precipitation we had seen other than the first day of arriving in Palermo. Again, Sicily is beautiful.

Having packed the container, we then returned to the yacht club for celebratory beer (container loading is a lot of work). Fortunately, we had good help getting the eight boats, dollies, and bikes in, so it wasn't too bad. I packed in a lot of gear that I won't be using back in the U.S. (wetsuit shorts, for example). The container should arrive sometime in November hopefully.

The closing awards dinner and ceremony took place Friday night over at the villa portion of the yacht club. Each country took a group photograph of its competitors (I'll try to post the U.S. one). Team Canada was represented by just one boat, sadly. Lots of German and Aussies. A few comments on the rest of the dinner:

• No free beer at dinner. Big mistake, though I believe it helped force the postawards debauchery to move elsewhere.
• Reading of names. As with Europeans, all competitors were read off, beginning with the last place boat. Team Interstate 95 finished in 117th out of 122 boats. Certainly not the greatest finish, but we did have a DNF and DNS. I likened the reading to college graduation. Instead of saying, "Hey, I knew that guy from English class," you said, "Hey, we passed them at that mark." It took a long time, but I still think it's a good idea. Others had mixed opinions. Reading off the top 25 would probably suffice.
• Awards: All competitors received a ceramic dish. A nice touch. Mine can be used to hold spoons used for soup. It was good to see the awarding to Ian Pinnell and crew Carl Gibbons. For the 8th time, Howard Hamlin (with crew Andy Zinn) finished in 2nd. That's a pretty ridiculous statistic.
  
• Dinner: A made rush as possible. I hope future regatta organizers figure out a way to orderly serve 300+ people. The 4-station Italian operations did not work well. We actually blew out of there to go into town (Mondello) to have a "proper" seafood dinner, as we had grown tired of the usual crowding and such. We ended up drinking wine with East Coasters and Andreas' friends (Fulvio, etc.) until about midnight, had some gelato, and returned to the yacht club, only to find it pretty much deserted. Many sailors were taking early flights out of Palermo the next morning, so we assumed that many rolled home early.

Final comment: after receiving our prize, I was pulled aside by an Aussie family member who had been reading this blog. She had the link forwarded to her by another Aussie back home. She commented that it was "excellent." Good to see that I'm having such an international influence.

Thursday night

Thursday night was the International 505 Class's annual membership meeting. These meetings are always held at the World Championships so as to get as many members together as possible. Some topics that were discussed:

• Class president Pip Pearson led off the meeting with a proposal that the boat should be made simplier. He didn't outline any specifics, but this was more or less a challenge to the class. I believe his basis is that the boat is too complicated for newbies and also too expensive. It's unclear what'll become of this proposal, but it has already started some discussions among sailors. Friday in the dinghy park, some ideas were being thrown around that focused on attaching a fixed spinnaker pole to the bow so as to have an asymmetric kite (i.e., no poles, etc.).
  
• An update for the 2009 regatta at San Francisco was made. It'll be windy.
• The 2011 site was selected, with Hamilton Island, Australia beating out Thailand. Both venues would be awesome, but Australia I think is more family friendly.
• An Aussie is overhauling the International class website. I'm pleased.

Following dinner, we went over to Mondello proper for some food. I had a grilled squid. Good times, but a bit touristy.

Last day

And still no breeze at 0900...

Thursday afternoon

Thursday presented yet another day of light air. The RC postponed us ashore at 10:45, and then sent us out at 11:45. John decided to go for a haircut (not sure where this occurred, or why it couldn't wait until Monday, or why he even attempted a haircut and a beard trimming without being able to speak a word of English). I frantically called his mobile and he scurried back. We ended up making it to the course with about 20 minutes to spare. We're actually sailing about a mile from the club, which is technically too close to shore according to the class rules, but this is Italy, and complaints generally go unheard.

Anyways, we arrived out there only for the AP to go back up. We bobbed around for about 1.75 hours before the RC sent us back in. Once there, I joined an adhoc game of cricket on the beach being played by a few Aussies. As it turns out, taking a baseball stance and swinging like it was baseball worked out pretty well. I tried bowling (pitching with a straight elbow) and that worked alright, though I certainly felt some strain on my shoulder. I hope to heal in time for next year's company softball season. We were ashore for about 40 minutes before the RC finally cancelled sailing for the rest of the day.

John and I dropped the sails and finished washing everything off. I changed, hopped on my back, and rode into Mondello proper. I found a nice little ceramic shop to purchase some shot glasses for coworkers and gifts for the lovely roommates. Hopefully they'll like them.

We're back now at the club, waiting for the pasta appetizer (in 10 minutes, I hope). Following that is the Annual General Meeting of the 505 class. The last one I attended was back in Santa Cruz in 2004. Hopefully it'll be interesting. It's unlikely there'll be any major debates / discussions (like on carbon masts), but we'll see.

Dinner tonight is either going to be at the pier restaurant ("The Charleston", which sounds like some kind of old man's club where you go drink Scotch with your bond trading friends from West Egg) or the restaurant where I had the tasty grilled squids. I'll let you know how it goes.

Thursday, sigh...

The first day back from the layday at Worlds started well for Team Interstate 95. We had a really good start, getting launched out off the starting boat, pointing high and sailing fast. The breeze had come in from west of north touching about 10 knots – a great breeze compared with what we had seen so far. The breeze had shown up quite a bit later than normal – the RC kept us ashore for 2 hours with a lack of breeze postponement. The fleet now refers to the AP flag as the “cappuccino flag,” as everyone goes back to the yacht club for a cappuccino when it goes up.

Anyways, after getting off to a great start, we found ourselves probably in top 30 about 2/3 up the first beat. Then, John and I returned to our human forms and slowed dropped down through the rest of the race. We’re still losing boats upwind and catch the occasional boat or two downwind. For example, we caught 3 boats at the jibe mark by rolling them to windward (i.e., getting me up on the wire and powering over them). We seem to be pretty good at catching boats stuck in inopportune situations such as being outside at the leeward mark (during the 90 yard beat to the finish) or at the jibe mark. We finished the race back down in the 100s, our usual position. We haven’t been able to put together a great race.

Well, after a 2 hour delay in the morning and light breeze, there was no time left in the day for the second scheduled race. We had 3 races remaining over the past two days, and the breeze does not look to be cooperating. The Mediterranean Sea currently looks glassy, as usual. Tonight is the Annual General Meeting of the Int’t 505 class. I’m not sure what’s on the schedule. I may ask some questions about the international website, which is pretty poor.

Ian Pinnell and crew Gibbons (?) continue to dominate. Yesterday’s race looks to be their drop (still only a 9). Howie Hamlin and Mike Zinn are still in contention, about 20 points behind. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we’ll see much more in terms of breeze.

Italy continues to be Italy. We dined last night at the yacht club with other US East Coast sailors. It was tasty, though certainly not as exciting as some of the other dining venues. Friday is my last full day here. We have one race and then need to start packing the container. We’ll have 8 boats going in, which makes it a pretty tight fit.

Octopus photo

People have been interested in seeing what the octopus looked like at dinner a few nights ago. Here it is. Jesse commented that "at least it was garnished with a lemon."

Yesterday was the layday. We spent the morning walking into Mondello to send postcards and getting some sun at the beach. The afternoon was spent at a private walking tour by the brother of a Fulvio. He's an architect and had worked on some of the restoration projects that Palermo has been undertaking. He knew a lot of the cultural and architectual significances of the individual buildings and piazzas throughout the city.

Sadly, it looks like it won't be able to see the cathedral at Monreale, which is supposed to be really nice. I'm also having issues finding shot glasses for coworkers. Ug.

Through Day 2 of Worlds

Today is Day 3 of the World Championship. Both Day 1 and 2 were particularly rough for almost all racers.

[I apologize for the XX’s and YY’s, parts of this are a draft for Sailing Anarchy’s front page.]

Light breezes continued to persist in Palermo, site of the 2008 International 5O5 World Championship. Fresh off their layday following the European Championships, sailors awoke to find conditions not dissimilar from what they had seen the previous week: a shifty easterly with winds not more than eight knots. Sensing the fleet’s disenchantment with the conditions, the fleet postponed ashore for an hour, allowing racers to grab a second cappuccino at the yacht club bar before heading out for the delayed start. The race lasted approximately 1.5 hours with it being taken by Pinnell and Gibson of GBR. Gorge and Schomaker (GER) finished second and Holger Jess & Scheder-Bieschin took third.

It was a particularly rough initial race for Team Interstate 95. We had a bit of communication problem in the prestart sequence and ended up on the wrong side of the gate launch, resulting in a DNS. We trudged downwind to watch the race from below the leeward mark. Needless to say, it was a long two hour race to be watching, not only because of the light wind, but also due to the poor result (a DNS, last place + 2 points).

Following the first race, the RC tried in vain to start another race, but after a recall and an abandonment, sailing was finished for the day at 16:30; the fleet threw up their kites and headed back ashore.

Saturday night we were taken out by Claudia, Andrea’s college friend. She took us to an area whose name translated to “Horse’s Shoes,” which was pretty much a very down-to-earth beach area completely devoid of the usual tourist venues. It was about 15 minutes from the club, about halfway back to the villa where we are staying. There we went to a really cool pseudo-outdoor (more or less an enclosed porch) restaurant that was the Sicilian equivalent of a crab house. Large paper tablecloths adorned the tables with the menu printed on them, and beers where an attractively priced 2 euro apiece (we actually drank white wine). The five of us started with a round of various crustaceans / shellfish, including clams, mussels, oysters, octopus, and sea urchins. The clams and mussels (as previously) were the highlights. Sea urchins were apparently the specialty of the place, and upon finding this out, I immediately wanted to try them. However, I must say, the sea urchin experience is a bit lacking. Granted, it was cool to watch the guy at the front counter opening them up, but each urchin only yields about 5 teaspoons of this pinkish, caviar-like meat – salty, poignantly tasting, but still good. Having never seen them served before, I had also ordered the pasta with sea urchin sauce, which ended up being pretty underwhelming. In the future, I’ll avoid the sea urchins and save my euros for the octopus. I recommend you do the same.

Following dinner, Claudia took us to a bar (again, not like a bar in the U.S.) for gelato. A few things really stuck out in my mind out of the entire experience. First, the dude serving the gelato was so well dressed that I know think of the frozen delight-serving profession as a masculine one. The Sicilian gentleman was dressed in a buttondown shirt with a (bit too wide) tie and a small navy blue hat similar to what a navy serviceman might wear aboard a battleship. With his sleeves rolled up, I was somewhat in awe as he scooped my pesche (peach) gelato onto my cone. Good stuff.

Also amusing was the payment system of the bar. I had encountered it way back when I originally visited Italy back in 2004, but I hadn’t seen it since my Russia trip in 2006, so the operation evoked memories of Soviet-style market operations. In this bar (which had a normal (coffee) bar, a gelaterria, and a wine store all under one roof), you go to the area from which you desire goods and services, order what you want, receive a printed receipt with your desired items, head to the register and pay, and then return to the original area to receive desired goods and services. Upon delivery, the server will put a small tear in the receipt so that it cannot be used again. In this bar, it was clear why this system was employed – so that one register could be used for the entire place. In Russia, I had been informed that the reason for this system was so that it would ensure that customers wouldn’t be given goods for which they wouldn’t be able to pay later on.

In other news, the Red Sox lost! Joy!

Sunday marked Day 2 of the 2008 International 5O5 World Championship. Sailors drudged away from the dock at 11:00 (having anticipated another early postponement) to get out to the racecourse to find a light 4-6 knots of breeze from the northeast. The first race of the day was started in this breeze and ended up taking a lot longer than expected. Midway through the second windward beat, the breeze dropped off to just above calm. Race winners Howie Hamlin and Mike Zinn (USA) narrowly beat the time limit of two hours by seventeen minutes. Normally accustomed to the strong winds of southern California, Hamlin and Zinn had built a crushing lead of more than six minutes over the nearest competitor. In fact, per the rules, the race committee scored more than seventy boats as DNF for failing to finish within one hour of the race winners. Second place was taken by XX and YY, with third going to ZZ and AA.
Team Interstate 95 was sadly among those scored DNF, making the race particularly frustrating since we had picked up five or six boats on the final downwind run.

Following Race 2, the wind clocked left about 100 degrees and built to a solid 8-10 knots from the north. The frowns on crews’ faces turned a bit, and many put back on the trapeze harnesses they had removed during the previous race. The race committee, fearful of another dying breeze, setup a particularly short course, with a beat only about a mile. The chop built back up a bit, and combined with the small course, lanes were hard to find. XXX took first, YYY took second, and ZZZ took third.

Team Interstate 95 fared alright, finishing somewhere in the back 10. We were particularly frustrated as we were fouled very hard by a Finnish boat at the leeward mark of the triangle. We were giving inside water a German boat (both of us on port) and the Finnish boat came barreling through, hitting the German boat and foolishly calling starboard. We ended up coming to a near stop, the outside of a three boat pileup. Needless to say, this threw off our game, and we ended up giving up a lot of boats we had just passed on the next upwind leg.

Following 3 races, the top five are as follows
1. X
2. Y
3. Z
4. Aa
5. Ab

Today is Day 3. 2 more races are scheduled. Breeze continues to be light and flaky. The Californians are growing restless; I fear a riot brewing.

Quote / thought of the day: [From an unnamed German business tycoon] “Sicily is very nice, we [Germany] should have bought it years ago.”

End of the Pre-Worlds / Europeans & Cephalopods

Yesterday was the layday between the Pre-Worlds and the Worlds, so in the spirit of being lazy, I didn’t put anything together. As such, this post will be a bit longer than usual. I’ll begin with the sailing and then will circle back to non-sailing matters.

The International 5O5 European Championship (Pre-Worlds) was completed Thursday with the Tampa-based team of Ethan Bixby and Erik Boothe winning two of the six races to take the title. The regatta was sailed at Club Canottieri Roggero di Lauria in Mondello, Sicily in light breezes from four to ten knots generally from the north / northeast. Jens Findel and Johannes Tennel of Germany finished second and were the top European.s Howie Hamlin and Mike Zinn of the US took third.

Team Interstate 95 finished the regatta with a similar result as the other five races with a score in the upper 60s. Overall, we finished in 51st. At the awards ceremony, the presenters read out every participant (all 70+), which ended up taking quite a bit of time. 51st is certainly not the greatest of finishes, but hopefully we’ll do better when / if more breeze rolls in. Ethan switched boats with us (John hopped in 8715) for a few minutes after the race yesterday and pointed out a few things (tighter jib, moving the cars back two spaces) that should help with the upwind speed and pointing, which so far have been our weakest areas here. Additionally, during the layday today, John and I installed a ram up system, as we’ve switched from a Glaser to a North mainsail. The latter relies on ramming up as opposed to increasing the shroud tension in order to prebend the mast in lighter breeze. Additionally, we took the centerboard out and fixed a few ruts that had become worn in it. Neither bit of boatwork should make a huge speed differences (if anything the first should be more influential), but we did find ourselves with not much to do today. Andrea’s friend, Fulvio, has already suggested that he give us a private tour of Palermo along with his architect friend (who knows the historical and cultural significance of the churches / buildings, etc.) on the next layday (Tuesday).

Today is the first day of the World Championships, with about 120 boats registered and ready to go. Last night was a huge buffet dinner and a (fortunately) brief skipper's meeting, complete with wine, as usual. One aspect of 505 regatttas that I've generally enjoyed is the eating component. 505 crews are hungry specimens, and I think the prime example of this is Drew Buttner, crew of 8830 (Creamsicle). Sadly, the dinner / skipper's meeting had been delayed about 1.5 hours last night, and Drew sat patiently waiting. Finally, one of the waiters was kind enough and had noticed Drew's hunger and informed him (before anyone else) that dinner was ready. Needless to say, I've never seen a 215 lb gentleman move that quickly towards a buffet.

Okay, coffee is finished. Time to walk over to the boat, get dressed, and go yachting.

As I alluded to earlier, Thursday featured only one race, as the RC decided to not start another race in the weak 3-6 knots of breeze. We ended up back ashore relatively early (16:00 or so), and following the award ceremony, we headed back into Palermo proper to meet up with Fulvio (Andreas’ friend). Fulvio showed us his wonderful ground floor apartment that includes a garden and own private garage. According to him, it at one point housed the entire kitchen staff of 3 Chinese restaurants in the Palermo area that were run by one family. The garage was actually a chicken coop at one point. Fulvio commented that it took a long time to renovate and clean up the place upon moving in. Anyways, Fulvio set us up with a table at a nearby restaurant whose owner (Giovanni) he knew. It was not in anyway tourist-friendly (not that we complained – that’s desirable to us). The menu was written on a whiteboard with all Italian, and we pieced together what we knew of Italian to figure out what to order. Having been pleased with the grilled squid twice before, I chose the “polpito” that Andreas indicated to me was squid. Well, it wasn’t squid; it turned out to be octopus. To be fair, I frankly don’t have any particular bias against any members of the Cephalopod class, especially when it comes to eating them. However, I characterize the presentation of this meal as being “aggressive.” The grilled squids I had eaten before had all been placed on their sides “rather gently.” The octopus was presented upright, as if it had been plucked from the floor of the Mediterranean that morning and delivered directly to my plate. The eyes had been removed, but the head was still completely intact. I gingerly ate the tentacles and left the rest as it was delivered. Fortunately, that was filling enough for me (the fish pasta as the first course was also quite tasty). I’ll be sure to post a picture of this dinner. Oddly, Andrea’s octopus was roughly twice the size of mine (Andreas is about 8 inches and 40 pounds heavier than me).

More thoughts on Italy:

• Driving: I highly recommend you don’t ever drive in Italy unless you're an avid go-kart racer. Rome and Naples are particularly bad; Palermo is comparatively tolerable. Not only are the cars flooring it constantly, but Vespas / motorbikes are consistently weaving in and out of other cars. I had one sailor tell me that he was driving downhill on a two-lane highway around a mountain and Italians were passing him by cutting into the opposite lane and blindly speeding by him. Anyways, I can’t help but to wonder where these Italians are going that’s so urgent. Most Italians I’ve seen are generally standing around or sitting talking and smoking. What can be so damn urgent about that?
• Security: A somewhat more depressing thought around Palermo and Mondello is the relatively high level of security around the apartments and villas. Almost all the villas have high steel fences with views of the property obscured by either bushes or the fence itself, and almost all windows to the outside have very thick wooden blinds and more thick steel gratings over them. As beautiful as they are, residential buildings are somewhat fortress-like. To top it all off, most properties have very large dogs (not like English sheepdog large, more like dogs you don’t mess with, like German Shepherds). Anyways, this was explained to me in that up until a few years ago, Sicilian police generally couldn’t be counted on (i.e., you’d call to tell them about bad guys robbing your house, and they wouldn’t necessarily come). Thus, it was up to private citizens to protect their own houses as much as they could.
• Dogs: Everyone has a dog here it seems, and there are plenty of stray dogs wondering around. If you’ve ever wanted a big dog as a pet, come here and take one home with you. Small dogs just don't exist. Boxers, labradors, golden retrievers, and those big dogs with really droopy faces are everywhere.

Day 3 of Racing

Day 3 was even a bit lighter than Day 2. Winds continued to be from the east around 5-6 knots. Current remained a factor, particularly in the latter portion of the day. Team Interstate 95 didn't sail particularly well. We started the first race of the day pretty well, maybe at one point in the top 15. However, our upwind speed and pointing was poor, and we finished somewhere in the bottom 10 again. The second race went a bit better, as we caught a few boats towards the end of the race, but with pretty much the same result.

Boothe and Bixby continue to represent the US and are doing well, with another bullet and a third. Howie Hamlin won the second race of the day. Buttner and Ramsey continue with top ten finishes. I haven't talked to them since yesterday morning, but Buttner's probably too tense to formulate words. Maybe I'll bring up the damn success of the BoSox to calm him down.

Worlds measurement begins today, and more teams have showed up. Doug McKeige and his helm Tom Golsch have arrived, and Olav Schulter (Andreas' cousin) arrives today. They should all be out for at least one race today.

2 races today followed by a layday tomorrow. John and I will be spending part of it working on the centerboard.

Dinner last night, as usual, continued to be an adventure. We ended up driving back towards the house and after about 30 minutes of driving around the small towns out there (this is 25 minutes outside of Palermo proper), we ended up at another quaint family-oriented place. There was a 10 year old's birthday party ongoing with about 20 kids (boys at one end, girls at the other) and one poor mother trying to supervise this mess. Needless to say, there was lots of pizza and Coca-cola. I'm also wondering when exactly Italian children sleep. We left at 22:00 and the party was still rolling on. They had just brought out cake.

We also drove by a bar (note that Italian bars are quite a bit different from the US version) labeled "Bar Renda." We may return soon for a photo and to look for longlost relatives.

Day 2 of Racing

Day 2 of racing at the Europeans was slightly better than the first in terms of breeze. I was at least trapping upwind for most of the day and occasionally on the very tight reaches downwind. There was enough breeze (i.e., no postponement) to complete 2 races in 6-10 knots of breeze. John and I had a pretty poor start for the first race. We were getting pinched off and was unable to power past someone to leeward. As it turns out, that boat was pretty slow. We should have bailed quite a bit earlier, and this poor start hurt us for much of the race, as we weren't able to get a good lane. We finished roughly 61st out of 65 boats. A bit ugly.

Race 3 was a bit better. The breeze turned around a bit more to come from the northeast. We had a much better start and were able to spring free. We scored a 41st again. Ethan Bixby and Eric Boothe won the race (good stuff for the East Coast) while Drew Buttner and Ramsey Key were again in the top ten. Both boths are doing well in the lighter breeze.

The course has quite a bit of chop. It's hard to tell if it's due to the bay, the 60+ boats, or the 15+ support boats zipping around. Anyways, it's making upwind tough (hard to hold a lane if you need to keep bearing off to keep speed) and downwind a bit dicey in the light breeze. There's also a hugh current line as well, with noticeable current differences across 15 boatlengths. John and I haven't quite figured it all out yet.

Today looks to be another light one. Competitors are starting to wonder how Palermo ended up with the selection. I think it's easy: all the girlfriends / wives who were at Warnemunde in 2006 and were freezing were like, "Hey, let's go to Italy!" and then the decision was made. Nice to know who really makes the decisions in the 5O5 class.

No cumulative results through race 3 have been posted. I'll hop back on later tonight.

Pompeii, Ferry, Containers, and Arrival in Mondello!

Let me begin by apologizing for the lack of postings. I lasted posted Thursday afternoon, and it now being Tuesday, much has transpired. Between now and then, I had problems getting an internet connection, and my laptop battery completely died out. Like fish, I like news served fresh. Anyways, I now write to you from the yacht club in Mondello, Italy.

What I’ve been up to:

Friday: Having arrived safely in Naples, I slept until about 0700 and left along with my Uncle Frank. He headed to his job as a surgeon at a hospital. I hopped the Metronapoli into Piazza Garibali, where I then took the 45-minute train (called the Circumvesiano or something like that) southwards to Pompeii. I then strolled around Pompeii until about 1300, at which point I headed home (back to Naples) to my uncle’s apartment. Once there, we had the typical Italian lunch (pasta, some ham sandwich, a giant piece of melon, and plenty of vino). My uncle was quite proud to show me his webcam that he uses to talk to my Uncle back in New Jersey. Being an old person, my uncle can’t really type well, let alone type in English, so I ended up typing his broken English into his laptop. Kind of an odd situation. As is par for the course, we all took naps. I woke up around 1645 for another quick bite to eat and to say goodbye to my wonderful aunt, who had done all the cooking during my stay there. My uncle and I then got into his little Mercedes for adventure in Naples’ traffic (i.e., a 4 mile drive to the ferry port that took about an hour). After struggling to figure out exactly from which dock the SNAV boat to Palermo departed, I wished him well and boarded the boat.

The overnight boat to Palermo was alright. As a competitor at the regatta, I had received a 30% discount on my trip (35 euro). I had purchased a spot on a “reclining chair,” (vs. a cabin, etc.) which was very underwhelming. These tilting seats actually drop backwards about 3” from their near vertical position, leaving those wishing to gain a night of sleep squirming for an uncomfortable position. The boat left promptly at 2000, and through some contortion of my own and resting one foot on the windowsill and one foot on my bags, I managed about 5 hours of shuteye. I unfortunately was not alone in the room of reclining chairs and was forced to cope with the snoring of one of the other fiver persons in this odd room.

Saturday: The boat arrived in the port of Palermo at roughly 0700. There I received my first welcoming experience of Sicily. That is, a 25 euro cab ride lasting 15 minutes and covering about 8 miles. I decided not to get too pissed off, as I was tired and had been delivered to the yacht club of the regatta.

I immediately dropped off my bags inside the club, and realizing I was the only American who had arrived, set off on a mission to find the shipping container. As I’ve mentioned earlier, we’re able to get our boats to these regattas by packing them in a shipping container and sending the off via barge to almost anywhere in the world. While Jesse Falsone (the guy who had handled the arrangements) had assured us all that the container had arrived, I wouldn’t be satisfied until I saw it. Anyways, about 3 blocks away from the club (in what the street signs identified as a piazza, though certainly nothing like the piazzas in Rome or Florence, more like a cul-de-sac), was in fact our container. I was relieved (with Jesse’s name on it). I broke it open to find the contents intact (though my rear bike tired developed a flat, sadly).
John, myself, and a few other U.S. East Coast sailors spent the rest of the afternoon unloading the container and getting it measured. At major regattas, all boats go through a few checks to ensure that they are in compliance with key class rules (minimum weight, sail shapes, mast lengths, etc.). This generally takes some time and is a bit of a hassle. That morning (right when I had arrived), a storm front rolled through, dumping quite a bit of rain on the area, and kicking the breeze well up into the 20+ knot range. Come nightfall, it was gusting well into the 30s. Launching would have been a bit dicey (with the waves crashing directly onto the north-facing beach), but it would have been great sailing.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Andreas Schluter. Andreas is Olav’s cousin and provided the four of us with housing a college friend’s summer villa in Sicily. It’s about a 20 minute car ride from the yacht club but is very nice – a true shore villa on the Mediterranean, complete with a view of waves breaking on the shore and a family of stray cats that require constant feeding. These Palermo inhabitants really have a rough life. Most (~ 1 million) live in Palermo proper but keep a summer home about 10 minutes away in Mondello (where the regatta is). This house is great. It has marble steps as well as backyard sink and grill – perfect for cleaning your freshly caught fish before throwing them on the grill. Saturday night the 3 of us (Olav arrives Thursday) found a cheap Sicilian pizzeria (3 euro pies) that had an entire room of very long tables – idea for very large families. We (not surprisingly) were seated at a much smaller table. My pizza had an assortment of toppings, including mozzarella, prosciutto, and mushrooms.

Sunday: John, Andreas, and I awoke and headed down to the club to get stuff done. The rest of the Americans (East Coast and West Coast) startled to trickle in, so it was nice to begin to see some familiar faces, as well as meet some of the other competitors. The Aussies are particularly funny, and I even met a couple of nice guys from Poland. They won the Polish national championship and thought it would be worth the 1500 km drive (700 miles?) down to Italy to try their hands at Worlds.

John and I managed to get the boat out around 1400. Yesterday’s storm had left some breeze around (8-10 knots), so it was good practice. Additionally, it had left quite a bit of storm swell around as well, with wave heights between 6 and 8 feet. I hadn’t been in waves that big since Santa Cruz back in 2004. It felt good to get back into 8939 (which we hadn’t sailed in since the Gorge back in July) and figure out any kinks (like the fact that our guys and sheets are both 7/64” red Spectra).

The water here is crystal blue, and one can easily see down about 15 feet. This has led me to actually fear falling into the water, as the Palermo bay is inhabited by the nastiest looking jellyfish I’ve ever seen. About the size of basketball, they blob around between 1 and 6 feet below the surface of the water, waiting for the feet of young 505 sailors to come their way. Needless to say, I’m going to try capsizing. John and I even tried to run a few over with our centerboard to see what happens. Nothing does.

Dinner was a welcome BBQ at the yacht club hosted by the regatta. I dined on pasta, a few types of fish, and some risotto. The wine was excellent.

Monday: Monday was the first day of the European Championships. They serve as the Pre-Worlds as well. John and I woke up early and left the villa around 0800. Our first stop was the nearby supermarket. This was a true supermarket, not the usual bodega-type operation I had become accustomed to in Naples or Rome. Unfortunately, it wasn’t open until 0900 so John and I continued along to the club. (Andreas had a work commitment in Palermo, so we went our separate ways for the day.)

We arrived around 0830 to find the club busy with sailor prepping for the day. The breeze had significantly dropped off from the previous day, and we left the dock around 1100 for the 1155 start in about 4-6 knots of breeze. The postponement flag went up.

After about 2.5 hours, the race committee started the first and only race of the day in about 6 knots of breeze. I had the lovely time of being cramped up sitting on the centerboard cap upwind. The breeze was from the north with a persistent right shift going on throughout the race. Downwind was a mix between trying to run dead downwind in the puffs and going high trying to keep the kite full. A strong current exists out in the bay going from left to right; it’s definitely a knot or two and has an effect on the racing. The first race was a bit of a mess from a competitive point of view in that most of the sailors didn’t really know anything about the current. The RC did a rather poor job of moving marks (i.e., they didn’t) since the wind shifted so much throughout the race. Additionally, at one point they even pulled the wrong windward mark (i.e., pulled the WW mark rather than the offset). Hopefully things will be straightened out a bit more for today’s racing. At least the RC is being intelligent about not running races in no wind conditions. Both the West Coasters and Aussies have commented on the light conditions. Even the East Coasters have commented that Annapolis has the same amount of breeze (and it’s much cheaper there!).

Anyways, after a good first beat (went up the middle, played the shifts and puffs well), we rounded the first mark in ~ 15th. Our downwind speed on the first run left much to be desired, and we finished the race in 41st out of about 55 boats. Another 30 are registered. The Creamsickle / General Lee finished in 8th, and the Killer B’s finished in 12th. Jeff Miller of the West Coasts finished in 3rd. The German Boys (Jans & J???) won the race.
It’s 0930 now and time to go rig.

Quickly, other brief comments on Italy:

• Camo is somehow in fashion. I’ve seen it on a bikini as well as some girl wearing a camo sweater. I don’t think there is anywhere to hunt around Naples or Palermo, nor is there “Southern Pride.” I find this odd.
• Fiat makes a vehicle called the Panda. VW actually makes two models smaller than the Golf (the Polo & something else).
• Euros are annoying. The coins are worth too much. It’s too easy to sit down and lose 10 bucks in a sofa. Fortunately it looks like the greenback is making a comeback ($1.35 per Euro now vs. $1.60 a month or two ago).
  

Arrived!

I ve arrived in Naples now without too much incident. I didnt end up in first class on the flight to Paris, but I ll survive. No sleep on the Paris redeye unfortunately.

Ended up at my Uncle Franks apartment at 1400 Italy time. I took what I hoped to be a 2 hour nap and woke up 6 hours later. Not going to be able to sleep tonight. Oh well.

Tomorrow looks to be either visiting the museo or potentially going to Pompeii. I ll try to take some photos and post.

Checked in and no seat!?

Well, I've checked in and am currently residing outside gate 41 in B terminal at IAD. They informed me at check-in that I don't have a seat. However, this means that there is now a non-zero chance I'll end up in business or first class (or potentially even riding shotgun with the pilot). I'll let you know how it all turns out. I don't want to get too excited about it, but this trip could start out really well!

Packed!

I'm packed, the tux is en route to NYC, and I'm counting down the hours until I get out of work!

Addtional FAQ

A wise reader has submitted another FAQ:

• Do you expect to be impacted by the Naples trash crisis? I sure hope not. Wikipedia is reporting that Berlusconi has declared the emergency "closed."
  

What this is

All,

I thought it would be worthwhile to put together a blog to document my travels this October. Here's a quick timeline of my adventure:

• 10/01/08: Depart from Washington, DC via Alitalia @ 16:45.
• 10/02/08: Arrive in Paris. Depart for Naples @ 09:35. Arrive in Naples @ 11:50. Spend time with relatives while there. Hopefully visit the National Archeological Museum and the infamous Secret Room. Here in Naples I have relatives whose apartment I'll be staying at. Their apartment occupies the top 2 floors of an apartment building in Naples. Lemon and orange trees grow outside on the roofdeck terrace. On one side you can see the Isle of Capri; on the other side you can see Mt. Vesuvious & Pompeii. I'll be sure to send photos.
  
• 10/03/08: Overnight ferry (SNAV) from Naples to Palermo. This should be pretty exciting. I paid extra for a seat. Hopefully it'll be worth it. I've never taken an overnight ferry but have done an overnight train from St. Petersburg to Moscow (very Soviet style).
  
• 10/04/08: Arrival in Palermo. Likely setting up the boat and hopefully getting out on the water for a practice sail.
  
• 10/04/08: 5O5 World Championship (Includes European Championship): This is the main purpose of the trip -- competing in the world championship for a class of sailboats known as the 5O5. More information about the regatta and results can be found on the regatta website (http://www.505worlds2008.com/).
  
• 10/18/08: Fly back to JFK for the wedding of Ted Wittenstein & Alyssa Greenwald (two college friends). It's being held at the Essex House on Central Park South (http://www.jumeirahessexhouse.com/) and is likely going to be the nicest wedding I ever attend (except maybe for my own, of course).
  
• 10/19/08: Wedding brunch at the Yale Club of New York City & train back to DC
• 10/20/08: Stumble into work
  

Some FAQs about the trip:

• What's a 5O5? A 5O5 is a high-performance sailing dinghy that's sailed by two people. It has a trapeze for the crew and is generally considered one of the most technical and fastest two-handed dinghies. See the US website (http://www.usa505.org) for more information.
  
• Who are you sailing with? I'm sailing with John Wyles, a friend of mine from Rye, NY. He owns the boats and drives it. I crew (trim the jib and spinnaker). I'll get a photo up when I get the chance.
• How do you get your boat to Italy? It's easy. You put it into a shipping container and send it on a big ship, just like everything else in the world.
  
• Who'll be sailing in the regatta? There'll be approximately 12 teams from the USA, and teams will be coming from places such as the UK, Australia, Canada, Germany, and Poland.
  
• Who are Ted and Alyssa? Ted and Alyssa are a wonderful couple I met at Yale. I first met Alyssa (and will be sitting on her side of the aisle), though I lived with Ted in a house in VA for a couple of years following college.
  
• Are you concerned about Alitalia? Yes! The worst case I think is if they go under during the trip.
• How do hope to leave Palermo at 06:45 Saturday morning and get to NYC for a 18:00 wedding? Luck, time zone differences, and lots of logistical planning.
• Is it true you bought a tuxedo? Yup. I was inclined to get a white dinner jacket to complete the James Bond look, but passed.
• Are you taking photos? Yes, an incredible number will be taken.
• Can you bring me back XYZ from Italy? I likely can. Let me know what it is.

Well, I'm off on Wednesday. I will hopefully try to get something off when I arrive in Naples.