Career and Careen

Endeavour Careened by Kevin Charles Hart

It is pleasing when someone uses a word precisely and correctly. It happened like this. My friend Paul was recounting one of his nautical yarns. Paul has happy memories of sailing around Vancouver Island and across the Salish Sea. He enjoys a coffee at the Oak Bay Marina, overlooking the boats that bring back these memories. That is where we were when he told me this story. 

He was moored for the evening in a bay on San Juan Island, settling in for his tumbler of scotch, when his tranquility was disturbed by another boat heading for the shore. Towing a dinghy, it cruised in gently,  dropped anchor, and stopped short as the anchor held, but before the the motor was cut, the dinghy drifted on towards the boat. I cannot convey the sound as the rope wound around the propeller, but Paul did a pretty good job with a series of whirrs of varying pitch followed by a clunk.

Much consternation and dismay! Ever the gentleman sailor, Paul offered to help the inexperienced boatmen, who were at their wits’ end. The next morning he towed them to shore. And in Paul’s words:

“Using a winch and a line fastened high up the mast,” he said, “we careened the boat on the sand, exposing one side of the hull and some of the propeller, so we could get at the rope and remove it.”

Now these were hapless, but not reckless, Americans. Their boat had not careered towards the shore, swerving from side to side as they wrestled with the wheel. No, they had approached the shore slowly, not realizing the danger as the dinghy rope slackened. This was an edifying tale of inexperience and a helping hand, and Paul’s skill in careening the boat was equalled only by his correct use of the nautical word.

Nor were they the first sailors to careen their boat. Before the age of steam and steel, it was not uncommon for vessels to be careened to scrape away the barnacles or repair the hull. Captain Cook careened the Endeavour after striking a coral reef in North Queensland.