Tall Tale Trite Tutorial

There are many ways to tell a story and I tend towards whimsy rather than purely fact. If I am telling stories around sailing I tend to avoid drenching them in nautical terms, to my mind it becomes hard to read and not particularly engaging. I'll illustrate this with a retelling of the same tale in different styles.

"The wind had moved from our gunnel and was now pushing on the nose. We went from a fast reach to a hard beat from the lee shore, with our outboard out of commission progress was slow towards our final mooring at Granton. We were glad to see Inchcolm abaft our rudder, particularly as a deep haar was approaching from the East!"

This is a quite common style of posting and I am sure it is jolly informative to sailors. However to non-sailors it appears no different to a random collection of words, some of which sound "piratey". I've read many logs like this and I can decipher them easily, but to me it does not capture the moment or the passion of the sail.

So, I'll start by laying down the bones of the story, but this time in language that does not sound like a Pirates of the Caribbean script.

"Despite our best laid plans, the wind had shifted round and was now pushing us back towards the island. The engine was not working and we resorted to tacking from side to side in an attempt to make some progress from the shore. It was a long journey and hard work but we eventually made it to Granton harbour, happy to see Inchcolm behind us in the distance. We were happier again when we realised that we had managed to avoid the thick sea fog that was rolling in from the East"

OK, a little better, factually correct but written in something resembling English this time. However, I haven't added in the human element and humour yet. To me this is what makes the story something that you actually want to read. So now to the final draft:

It was a sunny day with a nice breeze so Murray and I decided to take the boat for a little trip round Incholm and over to Granton, where we could pick up some gas for the boat's cooker. For some bizarre reason the only place we could find those gas bottles was in a camping shop near the harbour. Driving into Edinburgh is a bore and we were not ones to miss a chance to sail when presented with it!

We took off in great style towards the historic island and enjoyed a couple of beers by way of reward to ourselves. The day was glorious and we decided to thread through the semi submerged islands that surrounded Inchcolm, confident that the wind was our friend today. We made it through the rocks and turned the corner round the edge of the island, pointing ourselves towards Granton. Sometimes the wind is our friend and sometimes the friendly blast turns into Satan's lactose intolerance. Whatever the cause the wind had changed causing us to decide that being blown back onto the rocks was not a good idea so we opted for the lazy sailor's solution and started the engine.

I say started, we tried to start it but it simply refused. Normally I would do a full diagnostic and fix the issue but time was against us as we would be blown onto the rocks in a matter of minutes. So, we sailed, hardened the rigging and worked our way against the wind, gaining a few meters each time as the wind did its best to spoil our day. Once we were in the rhythm of the endless tacks we started enjoying it, the beers appeared again and we decided to go the whole way, earning the right to buy gas at a discounted price.

"Ahh well, at least we didn't turn that into a problem!", I observed as we approached the harbour walls.
"Take a look over your shoulder mate!", Murray replied, nodding his head towards the dark, cold wall of fog that was chasing us down.
"Pub?"
"Aye, that's a good idea!"

I know my preference, I like to spin a tale out and add some human interest. I also try to avoid telling stories of extreme hardship and woe, all that does is reduce the chances of lovely ladies joining us on the boat and surely that is the whole point of owning one? ;)

@knot