We are sailing past the shores of Sicily and Greece, crossing the Ionian Sea. We have a steady strong wind, making 6–9 knots, waves 2–3 meters high, with heeling and water everywhere. The waves that sharply lift the ship, then crash with a twist and roll away into the distance, create a picturesque backdrop for our voyage — especially beautiful under the bright full moon. This is an ancient human sea; thousands of years ago, it was already navigated by Phoenician, Greek, and Roman ships. It was here that part of Odysseus’s journey took place.
I can’t stop imagining that we are not on an 18th-century frigate (a rather advanced seafaring vessel), but on an ancient trireme with a single square sail. How those waves must have tossed them around…
Good sailing is the complete dialectical opposite of comfortable conditions.
If you have good sail performance, there will be heeling. I’m not particularly bothered by the fact that things go flying or that you get thrown out of your bunk. With heel comes water.
We don’t say “it’s leaking” or “it’s flooding” — such impersonal phrases diminish the experience.
We say, “water comes”, acknowledging the inalienable right of water to appear whenever it pleases. It simply comes.
If everything is dry and stable, it means there’s no wind, no sails — just dreary motoring.
It is very, very satisfying to sail with a 15-degree heel at 9 knots.
It’s pure joy.
Well, sort of. It’s pure joy if you’re a young volunteer at the helm, given a simple task — keep the speed up.
But if you’re the one who knows that on this side lies a wind shadow and on the other, a heel that will collapse the sails — and that you must avoid both, and also make sure the young helmsmen avoid them too — then the joy becomes… a little less unlimited.
As Ecclesiastes said: “With much wisdom comes much sorrow.”
Alexander Orlov,
watch officer of the frigate Shtandart
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