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Prima Facie [Latin] : prī-mə- fā-shə
Literally: Prima meaning “First” and Facie meaning “Face”
Figuratively: At first glance.
In the weeks leading up to my January 6th flight from Miami to Grenada I was a bit apprehensive of what I’d find when Hazel and I were reunited. Sure, I was paying Clarke’s Court Boatyard good money to store HJ on the hard and keep an eye on her. But “keeping an eye” on something or someone, is very different than—quite literally—being in their skin 24×7. Within the skin means all five senses are immersed in the experience, which is how I like to cruise and sail: Hmmm, our fresh water tastes a little “off,” I’ll have to hit the tanks with bleach at the next port; Hmmm, I’m smelling mildew in the forward starboard berth, it could be seawater leaking in from the anchor-chain hawse pipe yet again; On an inky midnight foredeck sail change I feel my bowline-knot to make sure it’s tied correctly before trusting my life to it.
Between July 2024, when Rhett and Sunny disembarked in the Eastern Aegean Sea (the Mediterranean Sea between Greece and Turkey), and I arrived in Grenada in January 2025, the only nights I had slept off Hazel where when Rhett visited us in the Canary Islands—I was in her skin, she and I were one.
As we accelerated down the runway I felt the mass of the plane supported more by its wings than its wheels. That got me thinking about where I was going, what I was doing, and transitions, change and impermanence. And—as so many things do—that lead me to thinking about Colleen and the last several years of her life. Maybe I had just been “keeping an eye” on her? If I had injected myself into every part of her life—even against her will—would things have been different? Where does responsibility begin and end? Where does chance and bad luck begin and end? Where does love begin and end? Maybe the singer/songwriter Iris DeMent was right and I should just let the mystery be.
As the mainland slipped under the plane’s wings, A shot of hope and joy was added to my poignant cocktail. I realized that it wasn’t just any place in Florida that would be my last look, but the coordinates of Rhett’s and my…and Hazel’s…first date. It was Memorial Day 2020 and we were deep in pandemic. I had just arrived home after sailing 1,000 miles or so nonstop from the Virgin Islands. This was after a months-long lockdown in the BVI (…I know, I know cue the violins here for Dan’s pity party). If you haven’t read about that epoch and are curious, go to our home page and click on Voyaging Blog then scroll down to 2020 Winter/Spring Voyage. Start at the bottom and as the posts are in reverse chronological order.)
On that sail home I had hatched a plan to take advantage of the upcoming pandemic-summer solitude by refitting Hazel and preparing her for more adventurous and comfortable cruising. However, this would involve decommissioning HJ for several months (she’d be un-sailable, like a car in the shop). The rub was that while I had been communicating with Rhett, we’d never even been on a terra firma date before. With a thousand miles of separation, our writings and discussions were intriguing and our intentions were increasingly serious. However, while it’s one thing to be in love and it’s another thing to love the sea, being in love on the sea is an entirely different kettle of fish. For better or worse, the two of you are trapped on a tiny island with constant reminders of the impermanence of this world.
As a prudent sailor who has a tendency to obsess on the logic of love, I decided that a shakedown sail, sometimes called a sea trial, was in order to get a sense of how Rhett and Hazel might get along. It wouldn’t be everything but it would be a prima facie of Rhett’s and my compatibility at sea. So, over Memorial Day 2020, I invited Rhett for a long-weekend sail from Pompano Beach to Biscayne Bay and—if the ship didn’t sink—back. HJ was still commissioned and ready to go and the plan was a 30 mile day sail down to our destination, anchor up for a couple nights with the glow of downtown Miami to the north and the beginnings of the Florida Keys to the south, then sail back home. Easy-peasy: no night sailing, never out of sight of land, etc.
However, I had planned and the Gods had laughed. Perhaps Poseidon knew that Rhett and I had real potential and therefore a bit more of a test was in order. I’ve since learned that Poseidon is a trickster which is probably why and he lured us in by giving us a perfect daysail southward: morning departure, clear skies and 12-15 knots on the port beam, and midafternoon we were dropping the hook in the shelter of Key Biscayne (the exact location that I was now flying over). Once anchored, I checked the weather and felt the butterflies in my stomach—the outlook dramatically degraded. For the entire rest of the weekend the winds howled amidst sheets of rain. While had I thought it was good practice to leave the VHF radio on during the most intense parts of the storm, I noticed that my crew’s eyes got bigger and bigger every time some other boater hailed the US Coast Guard that they were dragging anchor and needed assistance. At that point, I turned the VHF off, we had to focus on ourselves and our self-reliance. Besides, if my crew’s eyes had gotten any bigger they would have popped out of her head…and then I’d have a medical situation to deal with.
The day after Memorial Day dawned clear (we ended up staying an extra night waiting for the weather to calm down). All indications were that Poseidon had indeed tested us, deemed us worthy, and was going to grant us another idyllic sail home.
He trickster did…for 25 of the 30 miles. Then just outside Hillsboro Inlet, he called in his brother Zeus to throw a quiver full of lightning bolts at us in what was one of the most intense electrical storms I’ve ever been in. Rhett (again, wide-eyed) asked, “Isn’t lightning attracted to high metallic objects?” As captain, I had to admit that my crew had a good point.
As the 3 1/2 hour flight droned on, my mind turned from the past to the future, the near future. I hadn’t seen Hazel for a full year, by far the longest we’ve been separated since we joined forces in 2017. While the good people at the yard would have let me know about any obvious problems they noticed as they walked by her, for me it would be the prima facie of the first couple days—clambering onboard and really poking around—that was going to tell the tale.
A complicating factor was that she’d sat through the sultry Caribbean summer. Her last couple off-seasons had been Mediterranean winters with cold (but not freezing) temperatures. Liquids, polymers, and fabrics age a lot faster in heat and summer’s high sun. Of course she’s not air conditioned…how would all our clothes, bedding, and other fabrics do sealed in the oven of her saloon? In addition, I had nightmarish visions of water- and critter-intrusion.
After landing and clearing immigration and customs, I met my driver Terry holding a sign that said…
Daniel Coate
Hazel James
When I greeted him (he had driven me to the airport last January), and said, “Let’s go!” He replied quizzically, “Aren’t we waiting for another person? You’re with someone named Hazel?” I told him she was already on-island.
It was surprisingly hard to find Hazel in the yard. When we questioned a boatyard staff as to her location, he’d think, scratch his rasta hat, and then with a look of realization say, “Ahhhh, yah! Green bō-t (with a long ‘o’).” and point to the next row of yachts. As Terry crept along in the tiny right-hand drive mini-van up I searched for her distinctive turquoise hull. After driving past her twice, we found her tucked in behind neighbors.
After finding a ladder and climbing up and aboard, I surveyed the deck and was happy with what I saw. Yes, some of the plastic tarp that I had wrapped components in had been shredded in the wind and UV radiation of the tropical summer, and she was dusty and dirty, but nothing seemed amiss.
The next step was to open the companionway hatch and inspect the saloon. Although there was chaos below deck, it was the chaos I had left and was expecting. Before leaving her, I had stowed everything I could below decks and out of the sun and weather. After my first glance, I listened intently for for the scurrying of rodent feet or the scuttling of cockroach legs—nothing but the whistling of a benign wind in the rigging above. I took a deep breath through my nose…not bad. Sure, a bit musty—like the childhood memory of my great-aunt’s house we’d visit at Christmas and Easter—but not bad. I didn’t sense appreciable mold or mildew, or some food I forgot to get off-board before closing her up.
I felt the apprehension I had carried with me the last several weeks ease.
The challenge now was to get her ready to launch. I had boarded her late-day Tuesday and I had a launch time for her to be “splashed” at 10:00 on Friday. That gave me two days to do three main things: 1) recommission her diesel engine “Ox,” 2) take care of below-the-waterline maintenance like re-packing her feathering propeller with grease and lubricating seacocks, and 3) teak sealing and other inspections that are done a lot easier out of the water. She didn’t need to be ready to sail by Friday, just taken care of below the waterline and able to motor a couple hundred yards from launch point to the marina’s dock.
In addition to allowing cruisers to live aboard their boats while on the hard, Clarke’s Court Bay Boatyard and Marina offers some modest and reasonably priced short-term apartments. I could have afforded to stay in an apartment those first several nights, and I would have done so if Rhett were with us, but it was just Hazel and me and I missed her and didn’t want to be apart. So the evening of my first night was spent cleaning off the port settee (couch) so I could sleep on it. Besides, it would remind me of autumn 2024 in Almerimar, Spain where HJ and I were on the hard for nearly a month prepping for the east-to-west transatlantic sail.
Sleeping on a narrow settee on the hard was a funny juxtaposition as the only time I normally sleep on a settee is when we are at sea and Hazel is rocking and pitching…sometimes violently. Also, at sea I always sleep on the leeward (downwind and “downhill”) settee so that gravity pins me in between the settee’s bottom and back cushions.
As I fell asleep on Hazel on my first night aboard in nearly a year, it was unsettling as there was absolutely no movement of her hull but I was sleeping in my offshore berth. As I drifted off, I wondered why we say, “Dead in the water.” Navigating my way into dream sleep, it seemed that we should instead say, “Dead on the hard.”
After a couple days of dirty work, launch day arrived. Sweaty and grimy at the end of each day I enjoyed the hot showers of the marina’s facilities and its restaurant—aptly named The Cruiser’s Galley.
The launch was scheduled for 10:00 a.m. and promptly at 9:30 a gang of 5 or 6 friendly yard staff rolled up and went to work…
Once the staff got her to the launch point, they transferred her to a “travel lift” crane (click if you want to learn more) for the final splash.
And that’s my perspective of Hazel’s and my reunification. I wonder about her prima facie of the whole affair?
Today, Rhett, Sunny, and Rhett’s best friend Maria are on the same flight from Miami that I was on 10 days ago. We hope to get out for a daysail, and will also enjoy several days of resort-style pampering. After Maria returns home to Florida, Rhett, Sunny, Hazel, and I will continue the voyage of life by setting forth on our season’s voyage.
Fair winds and following seas. Hazel James out.
Thanks for the update on your next sailing adventure. You are my hero for following your heart and doing what you love. Hope to see you soon on the hard. Godspeed.
Thanks Nadine. Best to you all.
Another good read.
Quite thought provoking.
Enjoy the moment.