How's that for a title? On a wet Wednesday in Weymouth, after my recent visit to Alderney, I am moved to recall a couple of incidences of my own nautical hubris which occurred in that neck of the woods; I make no apology for the brief explanatory prelude to my narrative!
'Hubris' is an interesting word, one to which an entire theatre genre – that of tragedy – is devoted; for Athenians of the fifth century BCE it was a crime, specifically that of ignoring the rights of another free man, abusing him as one might a slave, in any number of ways. ‘Assault’ might be the simplest translation.
With the despotic Persians at the doorstep for most of the century, Greeks knew the importance of their own distinctive political culture; anyone exhibiting hubris, and
therefore behaving like a Persian, required the urgent attention of the polis, or collective. For, if the behaviour continued, the result for everyone might easily be 'katastrophe', the downfall of the collective.
Humans need to be careful. Sophocles in his 'Antigone', that most telling examination of hubris, uses sailing as a metaphor for the perilous human condition:
Strange. Life is strange -
what could be stranger, though,
than man’s intelligence? What can’t he do,
where can he not go,
moving over the night sea with winged sails
when the south wind blows against winter?
Bob Dylan articulates the problem in the modern world:
Advertising signs they con
You into thinking you’re the one
That can do what’s never been done
That can win what’s never been won
Meantime life outside goes on
All around you.
'Ananke' is what has been forgotten in this bubble state - not a deity, but with more power than most. Ananke is often translated as necessity, a natural rebalancing of things – think gravity, or tides. Mere mortals do well to remember ananke, especially sailors, whose hubris, in this world of electronics and powerful motors, is almost normal. But the rules always apply..
Which brings me to the Raz Blanchard, or Alderney Race, and the power of equinoctial tides. On the first occasion, I was motor-sailing up from St Helier in near-calm conditions, trying to beat a front which was not far behind – a normal part of cruising in September! It was a long shot, but I hoped to get round La Hague and anchor for the duration of the ebb in the anse St Martin, which many club members will remember from the YCC barbecues held there every year. A beer on the terrace of my friend Nico’s hotel overlooking the anchorage struck me as a very civilised way to pass the..
...then, opposite the semaphore tower, the GPS speed went from 5 to 3 to 0 knots in about as long as it takes to write this. Gunning the engine with the fury of a tragic protagonist, I thought I could get through this last bit, as a wave broke over the deck ( the forehatch was slightly open in the sunny conditions!), and the boat became increasingly difficult to keep bows on to the sea. The distance to the entrance to St Martin’s bay increased as I began to go backwards, and my beer with Nico rapidly evaporated.
Plan B, which I’d never really believed would be necessary, was to anchor in the baie des Ecalgrains, between Goury and the Nez de Jobourg; thither I hastened with the tide under me, and spent the afternoon watching the tide sluice past from the lighthouse, hoping a sea-breeze wouldn’t get up and make the bay a lee shore! The novelty of the vantage point wore off as a slight swell made the boom creak against the mainsheet pulled as tight as I could get it, and I read, dozed fitfully and waited…
At about six pm, the tide was visibly slackening, though by now the sea was reflecting an oily grey which did not bode well. I had not made it very far along the coast with the beginning of the flood before the rain started; as I got into Cherbourg and moored up, the heavens opened, which I took to be part of ananke’s lesson for the afternoon…
The other occasion had a happier outcome. I had joined the YCC Fish and Ships outing to Alderney, and was reaching along off the coast in a light southerly breeze, when I noticed everyone else was much further offshore. Catering was the priority, though, and by the time my bouchée à la reine was cooked so, figuratively, was I: the bearing to Braye was the same as the heading, which I then remembered was how not to do this…
The same furious hubristic gunning of the engine, trying to escape the inevitable, just south of Quenard light, and the eventual yielding to ananke - this time not alone, as others found themselves in the trap. This felt crowded; I wanted to be alone and there was just enough wind to beat down with the tide to the south of the island, where, in company with a small French yacht, I started trying to creep up the Swinge, hugging the rocks on the island side with a very close eye on the tablet with Navionics on it.
This in itself might seem to have been perpetuating my hubris, but curiously, it worked. We could see the ebb flowing like a river down the centre of the channel, but managed to keep out of it, and sailed gently north-eastwards up the Swinge. There is a bit where you have to come out round a rock, but by then the tide was slackening, and the wind had died, so a bit of motoring was in order, but just before that I approached the other boat, whose lone occupant suddenly called out ‘It’s you – from Weymouth!’
Thus began my friendship with Bernard, and, through him, the whole of the crew with whom I normally sail at Cherbourg. We moored up to a buoy at Braye, and toasted our adventure before going ashore to join the rest of the club, who, unlike us, had arrived in record time and appeared to have spent the whole afternoon in the yacht club bar! This time I felt my acceptance of ananke had been rewarded, a feeling which has only deepened during the ten years of sailing in France which have been the result.
Steve Fraser
Aliya
